Buying a boat out of state.

[chigger]

Hi Jim I follow your link from THT and was wondering if you could help me out with a little information. We are looking at a boat that is for sale in FLA. I believe the owner is listing it himself. We live in MA and are thinking of flying down to look at the boat at the beginning of April. The problem is we would only be able to drive down to pick the boat to trailer it back at the end of April. I was wondering how this tansaction should transpire? If we make them and offer after sea trail etc, and they accept do I leave a 10% down payment with them, getting a receipt from the owner?I would use a personal check that would have plenty of time to clear before we picked up the boat.Then make the trip down to pick up the boat at the end of April. I guess it would be a good idea to sea trail the boat again before handing over the money for final payment with a bank check.The boat is a 2004 model only has 20 hour on it and I'm thinking it might be worth the drive to go and get it.
Any help with ideas would greatly easy my mind with leaving a lump of money in FLA for a deposit.
Thanks Barry and Karen

 

[ByOwnerBroker]

I think you should call the owner. agree to a price before you invest time and money to go see it, then make sure the boat is available for sea trial when you go see it. If you plan to have a survey you might even have your surveyor on-call in case you like the boat and want to have it surveyed. This way you can wrap that part of the process up in one visit. You could bring your deposit with you. If you want to keep the boat off the market while you make arrangements to visit, but you don't want to put your deposit in the buyers hands you should use a well written Purchase Agreement and escrow the money with a third party such as an attorney or better yet www.escrow.com.

When you go down to take delivery of the boat you can exchange money and title with the seller. If there is a lien on the boat get proof of the lien and write a check dirtectly to the lien holder and the rest to the seller so you know the lien will get paid off. You might even put the check to them in an envelope in front of the seller and send it off so you know for sure that it is paid off. That payoff should be accompanied by a request for lien release that has your address as the place the lien release should be mailed to.

A lot of this depends on your conversations with the seller. If he/she sounds trustworthy then things should go smoothly, if they sound like a wheeler/dealer then you should absolutely cross every t and dot every i, including an escrow service.

All of this is detailed in our Guide To Selling in the "Seller Tools" section of our website along with all the docs you needs for a legal closing. You can access it by purchasing our Closing Kit for $39. I could type here forever about how to protect yourself but that is what our Guide is for. Hope this helped.

 

[chigger]

Buying a boat out of state

Thanks Jim!
We feel much better after reading your reply.I'll be ordering the closing kit soon.
Barry & Karen