Boat Journal

Chronicling a love affair with sailing

Month: January 2008

Engine Inspection

Well I talked to the guy who inspected the engine today. He said that he had looked at it a few years ago and it wasn’t in very good shape, which is why he’d recommended looking at the boat first.

He said that alot of *good* work had been done on it since then, and now he would recommend it. There were a few minor things: needs new batteries (which I knew), the alternator and starter should be serviced (as in they’ll run, but a ‘tuneup(?)’ would give me much more life out of them).

So next step is the boat survey: someone who’ll at the entire thing from stem to stern. That happens a week from Friday.

Boat Watch

For those who haven’t been keeping up, I’ve put an offer on a Cal 29′ sailboat. There was a counter-offer from the owners, which I’ve tentatively accepted, contingent upon an inspection (just like a house) of the boat and, separately, of the engine.

I’ve contacted both inspectors, who apparently know each other. They’ve talked among themselves, and have contacted the broker who is handling the sale for the owners (who now live in Hawaii – rough, huh?). I heard back from the boat inspector. He’d suggested I be there when he looked it over, so I asked him to do it on a weekend (saving ‘work time’ on the boat for when I can use my ‘mobile office’). But when he talked to the
broker about doing the inspection the last weekend of the month, giving the engine guy time to look first, the broker said it shouldn’t be on the weekend, because we couldn’t get the boat hauled out on a weekend, and it had to be this weekend, if it was, because the sale was to be completed before the end of the month.

Interesting thing. First offer asked that the current owners pay the slip fees for 2 months, allowing me time to find somewhere to put the boat. They said they were paid up until the end of this month, and that’s all they wanted to pay. I asked whether they’d pay February, if the sale wasn’t completed before then, and the broker said, ‘Of course.’. So my devious mind thinks that the broker is just trying to save the owners the $200 for the slip fees for February. But what do I know. 😕

The contract, btw, says that I’ll make a final decision by Feb 4th. So the inspections *don’t* have to be done by this weekend.

So, that’s how it sits. I haven’t heard back from the engine guy yet. If I don’t hear from him by this evening, I’ll give him a call.

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