A New Path

Today we decided to reject the vessel. It was a tough call, but ultimately we knew that paying top dollar for a boat that we thought was in great shape wasn’t a good idea. We don’t think Jim had any idea how bad of shape his boat was in, after owning it for only 6 months. There were going to be so many additional expenses and repairs that we’d have to do which means less time enjoying ourselves on the boat this summer. Part of me wanted to wait and see what came out of the engine repairs, but I also knew that meant unnecessarily dragging along the sellers, which wasn’t fair to them.

Because of our rental properties, our debt-to-income ratio looks awful on paper. We were also having a hard time finding a bank that wanted to loan us money for this boat. We decided that we’d continue our search and pay cash for a boat, so that we wouldn’t have to rely on the boat loan, and lower our price range a bit.

Knowing this in the back of his mind, Ben had already been talking to our buyer’s broker, Steve, again and was looking at some other options. Steve is an admin on an Endeavour Trawler group on Facebook. It’s what he and his wife live on. After hearing the results from our survey on the FP, he told Ben to join the group because there were a few owners getting ready to sell their Endeavour 44.

Starting out with 3 options, we slowly narrowed it down to one in Rhode Island. Ben and the current owner had been talking back and forth for about a week or so. Expressing a ton of interest, Ben told him we’d like to come look at it, set up a surveyor for while we’re looking at it, and wondered if we’d be wasting money and time to line everything up (flights, rental car, hotel, surveyor, etc.) and go out there if someone else was in line before us. He told us we’re first in line. We booked a flight to go see it and lined up a marine surveyor for the following day.

Pretty Okay

Marine surveyors are a busy lot! After Peter gave us the timeline of vessel accept/reject date and closing, we had to quickly search for and book a marine surveyor who could survey our boat in North Carolina sometime within a 2 week period. After a handful of phone calls, we finally found someone who could do it on April 6th. Ben booked his flight to go out on the 5th and return on the 7th.

Waking up on the 6th was just like waking up Christmas morning. We couldn’t wait to hear (anything!) from Ben. Knowing he was busy, and hoping he was taking a zillion photos and videos, I didn’t call or text him and waited patiently for him to call me. At 0945, while I was teaching my online class, I got an incoming video call from him. I quickly got the kids to work and muted myself on our Meet. When I answered, I saw him on the deck of our boat cruising along. I started envisioning myself and the kids alongside him on our journey south and a huge smile appeared on my face. Naturally, I asked how it was going. His reply, “Pretty okay.” 

“What do you mean pretty okay?” I cautiously asked. 

“I’ll tell you more later. I’ve got to go.”

Needless to say, I was upset, curious, and frustrated that he’d call me just to tell me things were “pretty okay” and then leave me hanging. Don’t worry. He called me back. FOUR HOURS LATER.

Apparently “pretty okay” meant there was black smoke coming from one of the engines and they thought it could easily be fixed, but it also meant that the sea trial would not be happening while Ben was there. Besides the smoke, there were a ton of other things that the surveyor found, bringing his estimated value of the boat to $35,000 less than what we offered. He even suggested we walk away. “Pretty okay” it turns out, is not actually okay.

I felt like someone died. My daydreams for the past few weeks had been based on this boat, this summer. Ben reassured me that we would still go through with the sale of the boat and that the surveyor (who he got to know and trusted) would be there for the sea trial reporting anything we need to know about our boat. Wearily, we trudged forward and waited for updates.

The diver removed the propeller, repaired it, and returned it to its home underwater. When they tested the boat again, the black smoke was still there. Ben said he thought it was the fuel injector from the start. The next step is to have Yanmar take a look at the engine. An update of our contract and timelines was necessary, moving the vessel accept/reject date to June 1 and our closing to June 6th- the day we planned to leave Colorado to begin our voyage to the boat, which no longer would be moved to Florida ahead of time by Ben and me, with some friends. This now meant we’d drive to North Carolina and get on the boat there as a family to take it to Florida to kickoff our catamaran life.

The Initial Wave of Our Journey

We recently returned from our 8-day “Boat Tour”. Ben and I took our camper through 11 states, drove 5,123 miles, and spent 80 hours in the truck on this tour. Along with the numerical stats, I feel like I learned so much about boats, as far as terminology goes. I also know that I still have so much to learn, so my lingo may not be as accurate as those that are more knowledgeable than me- please correct me if I’m saying something wrong so that I can learn!

Friday was the first day of our journey. We drove on the first two days and arrived in Nashville, TN just after the sun went down on Saturday. We had a showing on Blue Heron, a 34’ 2006 PDQ, at 0830 the next day. It was a beautiful boat and proved that the helm does not always need to be at the front of the boat. There was another PDQ in Maryland that we were interested in, so this was more of a chance for us to scope it out in person rather than rely on the photos online.

From there, we drove another 690 miles to Deltaville, VA. Again, arriving after sundown on Sunday, ready for our showing at 0800. We were stopped by a live-aboard guy after he noticed us driving around in the dark, looking for a place to park that would be out of the way. Apparently, a lot of people own boats that they live on in marinas and essentially pay marinas rent for their docking space. Spending most of my life in a land-locked state, this was a new concept to me. The 55’ 2005 Seascape was donated to a local school, so the buying process is more complicated in a lease-to-own over 3 years situation. This was the cat that Ben was most looking forward to seeing. I, on the other hand, had to keep an open mind as to what could be done to make this our boat.

Our next showing, only a 50-mile drive from where we were, was not until 1500, so we had time to spare. As we were driving, I noticed we’d be driving directly through Yorktown, so we got some ice cream and stretched our legs while exploring the historical site, waiting for a call back to see if we could see our next boat earlier in the day.

After getting the call that the owner could be at the marina at 1230, we headed to Poquoson, VA to see Pocatalico, a 2009 47’ Leopard, that both Ben and I thought would be “IT”. Neither of us said anything until we arrived in the parking lot. When Ben said, “I think this is the one we will wind up with,” I laughed and said I had thought the same, but never said anything out loud until that. During the tour, we both realized we were not accurate with our original thoughts and knew our search would continue, possibly winding up with a Leopard because we both liked the setup (and the fact that it would sleep TWELVE!), but not that particular one.

Earlier on our trip, we had been harassed by the broker (Peter) on Copacabana, a 2004 Fountaine Pajot Maryland 37, who was “making sure we had all 10 fingers and toes still” and that we were making adequate progress and would be in Wilmington at 0900 on Tuesday. He also informed us that there had been “a flurry of activity” on the boat, so if we could see it before then, he wanted us to try. Another buyer had put an offer in, but he knew we were driving so far and wanted to give us a chance to see it before sealing the deal. The two of us just rolled our eyes at this, thinking he was just being pushy. Peter’s track record with us led us to believe he was pretty scummy and that we couldn’t trust him. While our buyer’s broker was out of cell service, Ben called Peter to see if we could add this stop to our boat tour. He said it was still available and could be shown to us. Ben told him our buyer’s broker would be getting ahold of him to set it up and that’s when the claws came out. Peter told Ben that since they had already started chatting and “formed a relationship” that our buyer’s broker could no longer be in the deal. Come to find out- that’s illegal in the Florida broker world.

Because we had some time to spare after moving the Leopard earlier in the day, we decided to push the Copacabana up to the early evening on Monday. Peter agreed, but insisted that if we come earlier, it couldn’t be as the sun was going down. Waze told us it would be 1730 when we arrived at the Copa- Copacabana (sorry- I couldn’t resist throwing in the song). This shift in schedule would give us time to get to see one more boat (a 2002 Fountaine Pajot Maryland 37) in Jacksonville that we just found before we left.

Due to traffic in several places (because Ben and I kept forgetting that not everyone gets a Spring Break) we didn’t arrive at the dock until 1800. The sun was still up, so we were in luck. We met Jim who showed us the boat, told some really cool stories about his past and his family, and answered our questions. When the tour ended, I was sitting at the settee while Ben and Jim were standing near the helm. Ben told Jim he really loved it and would like to talk to me about it. I couldn’t tell if he was just paying lip service or if he truly meant it. Being accompanied by a look I hardly ever see, I felt it was genuine. I replied, “I do, too!” because I really did. After about 20 more minutes of chatting, Jim told us to take as much time as we need and talk it over, but to keep in mind that he had an offer that he hadn’t responded to because he wanted to give us a chance to see the boat after driving from so far away. He told us that if we wanted to put in an offer, we’d have to do it right away because he had to sign this other potential buyer’s offer the next day. 

(Side story: Jim asked us where we were staying and we told him in our camper. He said he knew that, but wondered where we’d park for the night. We told him we were going to start driving to Jacksonville and stop somewhere en route for the night. “Jacksonville, North Carolina?” he asked, “that’s not too far.” “No, Jacksonville, Florida,” Ben replied. He gawked at the idea and told us we could stay in his driveway. This really speaks to his character that came out even after only being there for an hour or so.)

Ben and I talked it over and walked the boat a few more times. We both really loved it. We called out a quick pros and cons list and had so many pros. My only con was I said we weren’t going to buy a boat on this trip! I took a walk-through video so we could show our family and friends. Knowing the wooden rail in the cockpit needed some attention, I peeked over the edge to see what it looked like in the rear and noticed the worn area where letters used to be, only because of the way the sunlight was at that particular moment (which wouldn’t have been the case if we came at 0900 the next day). Being as curious as I am, I looked to see what the boat used to be called. I saw the letters H-O-L-L-Y and gasped. Ben tried to see what I saw and he said that was our final sign. The boat had previously come from Hollywood, Florida, which is where I previously came from too. We walked back up to Jim’s house, Ben thanked him for his (and his family’s) service, and told him that we would call the broker and put in a full-price offer, resulting in the start of riding the wave of this journey.

From there, the rest of the trip was spent getting to know other boats and see what we could do to ours! Ben was on the phone almost non-stop the rest of the trip setting up appointments with the marine surveyors and the loan people- all of this stuff was what our buyer’s broker would normally do, but we got conned into thinking he couldn’t be part of the deal. The boat-buying world is so different compared to the real estate world and we kept (unknowingly) getting the wool pulled over our eyes. Yet another strike against Peter. 

We stopped and saw one boat in Jacksonville that was a few years older than ours and had 2 cabins instead of 3, but was the same model. Then we saw a boat (2003 52’ Portsmouth) in Vero Beach that was way overpriced for what it was, considering all of the hatches had water damage under them. Every. Single. One. It really must have been beautiful prior to whatever caused all of the water damage- a storm with the windows open, maybe?

As fate would have it, Ben remembered that one of his friends, Lance, had recently moved to Florida. He thought he moved to the west coast of Florida, but he decided to text him, in case we could see him and his new project on our way home. Turns out, he was 10 minutes north of where we stayed, so a stop was in order.

While touring Lance’s property, Ben and Lance talked about our new purchase and how difficult it was to find a slip or marina to keep the boat when we wouldn’t be on it. Lance told us we could keep the boat at dock #3, with some conditions to which we agreed.

We wrapped up our trip with a day at the Palm Beach International Boat Show. Since we already had our boat, we knew of a few things that it would need: a tender, a different refrigerator, and some sort of lift if we were to take Lance up on his offer.