Sea Trial; It went well, then it didn't. AITAH?

I'm glad we have a lot of people here smarter than me on yacht purchase. Would have caught everything before plunking down any money at all. The broker should have done a lot of things, the seller should have done other lot of things. I should have done everything different. This is the THIRD attempted boat purchase, and so far all three have gone Tango Uniform.

We agree on one thing. His job is to move fiberglass. If anyone saw this boat - it's just pristine. I could eat off the engine room floor. The cherry wood shines like new. There's not a scratch, or speck, or nudge, or crack, or crease anywhere. It's a time capsule boat. The survey guy says it's the cleanest boat he's ever seen that wasn't brand new.

Of course, above the waterline. No one has been under this boat, and it clearly hasn't been hauled in years. Who knows what we'll find living on the bottom.

I'm not sure I know what 'water soaked hull' means. Has not been weighed, and doubt it's 10k over.The surveyor found zero delam everywhere above the waterline, and in all spaces inside the lower hull. He's got that little plastic hammer 'tap, tap, tap' every where.
the boat is actually sitting a little high in the water. It's maybe an inch or so above the bottom paint, and both of the exh pipes are sitting right on the bottom of the pipe. I can see exh water flowing out easily, so it's not riding low at all. It's also the same on both sides, so it's not tipping either.

The forum doesn't like my image type, so - no pic of the engine floor so clean I could eat off it. Sorry. Believe me or don't.

If I have to reject this boat, I think I'm going to give up. A yacht is supposed to be fun to buy, and fun to use. So far, my 38 Sea Ray has been a complete hassle, and buying the bigger boat has turned into drudgery. I don't need the aggravation in my retirement. I'll go buy a nice Aerostar 600P. No trouble getting one of those to perform.

The exh stacks are barely above the water line. If this boat were soaked, the stacks would be submerged. I've been on other 53 and 56 hulls, and this boat is riding as high, or higher than all the others. Surveyor says no balsa on the Voyager hulls anywhere. I don't know if there's anything inside the stringers, or other spaces, but there's no water soaked anywhere.

I'm a diver. I also have underwater lights and a camera. At this point, it's on the broker. I just had a back and forth email with the broker. I'm paying for the quick haul, and his service dept is going to pick up the bill for the cleaning. Usually a quick haul is up to 20 min. I would bet they are going to spend hours on the lift. I advised him it would be a good idea to have a guy with a coarse buffer there to get the props sorted out. Back centuries ago I used to polish the props on my B-III every spring, and had very good luck with perf on a 27' cuddy with a bone stock 7.4 Merc putting out around 310HP. He's on notice if it doesn't get up and go, I'm done and want my check back.

Hoping for Wed, but waiting to hear on their lift access.

Sigh,,, just another day of crap trying to buy a boat. (hehe, I just mis-typed and used 'goat'; maybe should have left it like that)

Our rented captain was all set for Thursday. Got a call just now from the broker, the captain's son was killed in a MC collision yesterday, so he's out, and we're not moving the boat without him. Also, the fuel filters are in, but they can't replace without a special tool. I was about to tell the broker he qualifies as a 'special tool', but I held my peace. Sad about the captain family, I'm sure they're having a tough time of it.

We're delayed until next week, maybe tue, maybe not.

Amended contract for acceptance was today July 4 by 5PM. The boat is not ready for the haul out, or sea trial(2nd one). Broker has missed the deadline in about 30 minutes. Also, no new extension. I think the deal is now dead. Maybe a good thing, I don't know if it will perform or not. Such a screwed up process.