survey time, hanging it out there.
You've found your dream boat, negotiated an offer, put up your good faith money, and cleared your way passed financing. All of which you could back out of relatively unscathed. But, now it's time to commit. Not just money but time, effort and anxiety. The marine survey.
Regardless if the bank requires one, only a fool wouldn't get one, and the wise question everything on one. A "survey" is the marinized version of the home or car inspection. Most would argue and I agree that it's much more in depth than either. Unlike inspections, surveys aren't homogenized into a 180 point used car certification checklist or a fill in the blank home inspection form. In general, survey reports do use a standardized format but they contain typed out explanatory descriptions over check boxes and fill in the blanks. Here's an example of a Silverton 410 Sport Bridge survey from a Canadian surveyor. This (Thank God) is not Coraline's survey. It's one that I found researching for know issues of her model before the survey. Which, I actually did find a couple that I requested the surveyor pay attention too. I'll talk about those later on.
Setting up the survey can be a bit of a challenge, but knowing what's your responsibility can help. You should take it upon yourself to locate a surveyor. Your broker can and will recommend one, but there are inherent problems with going with their recommendation. This is the case with any third party inspector, regardless of personal integrity. The inspector will tend to have more allegiance toward the broker than you. To the surveyor, you're a one trick pony. As the surveyor will most likely never work with you again. The broker on the other hand can provide recommendations to the inspector ad infinitum. Allowing the surveyor to feed his family. So, it's in the best interest of the surveyor to foster that relationship by playing down low and mid grade problems they locate. This can help grease the wheels of a tough sale and push it through. Which the broker knows and appreciates. I'm not pointing the dirty end of the stick at anyone. It's just the way business (capitalism) works. It's not the fault of the players, it's the system they play in. However, later down the road the buyer might end up getting to feel Adam Smith's invisible hand going up their backside when these problems show themselves. So, get your own surveyor and get one that's as far away from both brokers as possible. This might mean paying travel expenses but this will be worth it.
Surveying pleasure boats is a job that requires hands on experience. There's no substitute for field time. Finding a surveyor to protect your interest is going to be tricky. Start your search online. Go to the ABYC find a surveyor page. Search a three state area around where the boat is located. You'll probably get a decent sized list. Now, start searching for reviews and recommendations of the surveyor business names. This should help cull the herd a bit. Bad reviews are out. Good reviews to the top of the list. Nice websites with survey examples are a plus. No reviews, website or mention is a best guess. But, don't throw those guys out yet. If they have a long history of being a surveyor and being on the Earth there's a good chance that they still work by word of mouth and don't pay mind to their online presence. Contact starting at the top of the list should be made by phone. This is important. Emails won't convey age and wisdom that a voice can. After the pleasantries and telling them that you're looking for a surveyor and (important) without disclosing what type of boat it is. You want to ask if they prefer or specialize in sail or power boats. It's usually one or the other. If they're coy about it, ask what types of boats they've owned. This should give you an idea of what they're into and ideally it should correlate to the boat you're looking to have surveyed. Next, ask about fees and availability. They'll want to know who, what and where. Let them know. Write it down and call the next surveyor. Gather info until you feel confident in a choice. Prices will vary, expect $25-45 (2016 pricing) per foot of boat. Do I have to say, DON'T choose based on fees alone? Your gut will tell you who you want to work with. Honestly though, there's not going to be 100% certainty in this. You need to go with who you're comfortable with. It will play well in the trust department down the road. Again, this is why you need to talk to them by phone or even meet them in person.
Once you've made your choice. Pass the information onto your broker. Your broker should be able to recommend a boatyard close by that can haul the boat out of the water and coordinate this with the surveyor. The surveyor will email you a contract to sign and payment instructions. Plan to pay the boatyard for the haul out the day that it happens. The boatyard usually will just call you to get a credit card number.
Pre-Survey prep. It's best to sit down for a few hours and research the boat online before the survey. Like I mentioned above, you're on the hunt for known issues of this model boat. Start with Google. Search terms that include the boat make and model with words like recall, survey, problem, delamination, sinking, issues, failure, articles, etc. This will not only help find known issues but you'll learn new things about your perspective purchase as you go. Next, you'll want to call the manufacture with the hull number (this can be obtained from your broker). Ask if there are recalls for this hull number. If so, try to get a copy of the repair bulletin to pass onto the surveyor to see if the correction has been completed. Follow up with a hull number and title search. There are several websites that, for a charge, will run the boat's hull number and search for damage repairs. This is similar to CarFax for automobiles. These services are not the end all, be all though. They only have access to repairs that were reported. Boatyards and other marine services rarely report to these databases. It's insurance companies that make up the bulk of the reports. But, this is good. Because, if an insurance claim was ever filed you can bet it was a large issue. At least large enough to risk their boat insurance rates to going up at the time. And that's what you're after "large" issues, not little things. Outline the things that you find in a print out and include the hull number research report to pass onto the surveyor the day of the survey. Researching these notations further should be completed by the surveyor. Your goal is just to bird dog them for him.
What I discovered about Coraline when doing my Pre-Survey prep: In the early years of manufacturing the 410 Sport Bridge, Silverton made a miscalculation of the hull displacement and location of the waterline. Located on both sides of the transom under the swim platform were two plastic drainage thru-hulls. On a gas engine equipped model these thru hulls were above the waterline. On a diesel engine equipped model the thru hulls sat below the waterline due to the miscalculation of the extra weight. Since the drainage thru hulls and attached hose were not suitable for below the waterline use, it was possible that they could fail and sink the boat. There is even a story of a couple that stopped at a waterside restaurant for dinner and came back out to a submerged boat. My surveyor verified that the repairs had never been completed on Coraline. Which was a negotiation sticking point after the survey.
The day of the survey. It's okay to be there but not for the whole thing. When getting services like this done, chances are that your presence is going to be a distraction. Since you can become the focus during the survey instead of the boat. You are the customer and the tendency will be to make sure you're happy. Its best to let the surveyor work without this burden. Present will most likely be one or both brokers, the surveyor and sometimes the owner. Staying away from this can keep you objective. More than likely all of them will be really cool and if you stay you can get a little soft when it's time to negotiate any needed repairs. I recommend meeting everyone at the boat the morning of the survey. Bring some bagels and coffee for everyone, hand off your list to the surveyor, thank him for coming out and boogie on home. The goal here is to make sure no one is distracted from the work at hand.
As the survey goes on, you'll usually get updates from your broker or the surveyor. You don't have to remember everything they say because you'll be getting a paper report later on. However, if they call telling you that they've located something that is cause for concern (usually it will be laced with technical jargon you won't grasp at the moment). All you need to know is that; If they end what they're saying by asking if you'd like them to continue on. It's time to pull the plug. It's the surveyor's gentle way of saying that the boat is not worth purchasing, cut your losses, and find another boat. This happen to us on a SeaRay aft cabin that we were planning to purchase. It sucks and is very deflating. You might feel like you're getting screwed but trust me it's for the best and you're not the only one that's losing money that day. Your surveyor just saved you thousands of dollars but cost the owner more.
Typically 2-3 days after the survey is completed, the surveyor will email you the report in PDF form. You need to forward this only to your loan officer so that the bank can review it. Keep the survey close to your chest at this point. Don't share it with anyone else until the bank says everything is okay. Now is when you want to use this tool that you just paid so much for.
- If there's anything that is on the survey that makes you want to back out. Tell your broker that one issue and that you'd like to get out out of the contract (which should be contingent upon a good survey). Ask them to see if the owner will purchase the rest of the survey from you. Sometimes they will to see what's going on with their boat and to make it more marketable. This way you may be able to recapture some of the money you just spent.
- If you're ready to move forward with your purchase. Sit down with the survey and make a bullet list of the needed repairs. You'll want to get repair costs on each one. ie if one of the bilge pumps doesn't work, go on Amazon or West Marine and locate the price of a new one. Or say, a thru hull needs to be re-seated, call a boatyard an ask for a quick quote/best guess. If the survey has mechanical or electrical items on it that require diagnosis to assess the cost of repair, instead calculate these as worst case and needing replacement. Ultimately, the idea is for you to figure a dollar amount that you can go back to the seller and see if they'll fix the issues or take the money to fix it off the price of the boat.
For me, I preferred if the seller took the money off the price, so that I could fix it myself. I don't like the idea of the owner attempting to do the repair, making it worse or cheaping out on materials. At least if a third party service does the repairs you'll get some type of warranty it's done right. The goal in this is to have all the issues repaired or money set aside to make the repairs. That way you end up with a whole boat. Don't bend on the negotiation, I can promise you that not everything was accounted for. You'll want every penny to make sure you can get your boat right.
Hopefully now you have an idea of what to expect during the survey, maybe learned a trick or two, and feel a little more prepared.
Cheers,
Mike
Life's a port
