I live in the Seattle area and have bought 3 different boats over about a 4 year period, all of which oddly enough were located in Maryland, and then I did the road trip myself to pick up each one. In regards to the purchase itself... the first and last boats were from dealerships/brokers and the second one was a private party. I prefer dealing with a dealership/broker, as I financed each boat and having my credit union wiring/overnighting the funds to a dealership as opposed to a private party was a bit better for my peace of mind. Also, with the boats being under contract from a dealership, if the deal were for some reason to go south, the company didn't want to release the boat or give you the funds back, then my credit union would be able to go after the dealership directly. Anyway, for the first boat I did what you're wanting to do, where I made an offer on the boat with the seller contingent upon a favorable survey, had a surveyor go out and inspect the boat for me, said that I was still interested in buying the boat after the favorable survey and basically had the surveyor acting on my behalf. We drew up a bill of sale, my credit union wire transferred/overnighted the funds to the seller and the deal was done. At that point when the funds had cleared, the boat was mine and it was then my responsibility to either arrange shipping or to pick up the boat myself in person. I checked with UShip and other companies for all 3 boats that I purchased over the years, most of the time it seemed like the shipping costs were almost double what it would cost to do the trek myself, and it would take 2-3 weeks just for them to get to the boat, and then another week to get it out here to Seattle from Maryland.
So, each time I did the trek myself, the first time it was out and back roundtrip, the second/third times I flew out, bought the boats, rented a truck/U-Haul and then trailered them back the 3,000+ miles across the country myself. Check with the two below websites and find an accredited marine surveyor that you trust and has good reviews online. Do the same with UShip and/or other shipping companies if you're wanting to have the boat shipped for you. Go with a company that you trust and also has good reviews online as well. There have been a few, one member of which was on here and another was my neighbor, where they had a company ship a boat for them and the shipping company did either minor or considerable damage to the boat, to where the one boat ended up getting totaled. The one that was totaled was a member on here that had a shipping company do a transport for him, to where the company was for some reason trailering the boat down the highway in the middle of a snow storm, flipped the boat and it ended up off the road in between the lanes of the highway. Obviously that occurred during the wintertime and tomorrow is the 1st of June, so I don't imagine that will be the case for having any snow during this time of year, but do you due diligence in looking at surveyors/shippers to do the work for you, make sure each is insured, pay the extra for the additional insurance or whatever their coverages/costs are so that you have full coverage in the event that anything happens. Or as mentioned above, depending on the location of the boat as well as your desire to do so, you could always do the trek yourself, save a few bucks and have some fun while doing so? If the boat is say 1k miles or less from you, you could always drive that yourself, saving yourself some money, do it over a long weekend or less and maybe have some fun while doing so? For my first boat, it was right before the 4th of July and I was trying to do the trek as quickly as possible. There were two different days where I put in just under 1,200 miles of driving each day, of which I wouldn't recommend doing that. But 300-500+ miles a day, especially at highway speeds shouldn't be too terribly difficult and to where as mentioned above, if it's less than 1k miles total, you could easily do that in 2 days while going 60-70 mph. Either way, good luck with the possible purchase, below are two links for sites where you can find accredited marine surveyors in the area where the boats are located. Then there's UShip.com and the thread for when I bought my Grady White back in October of 2021. Good luck!
NAMSGlobal members are marine surveyors who inspect, and provide a broad variety of consulting services for the maritime industry. Our members are certified based on their knowledge and experience, with designations for: Yachts and Small Craft, Cargo, and Hull and Machinery (including Fishing Vessel
www.namsglobal.org
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marinesurvey.org
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www.uship.com
For those of you that "know" me, I've been looking for a GW 228 Seafarer now for just over the past year. I live in the Seattle area and have a beach cabin on Whidbey Island here in the Puget Sound. For about 4 years, I'd owned a 21' Arima, that I also ironically bought in Maryland, and that boat worked well for what we needed it to do in front of the cabin. The majority of what we do is salmon fishing, crabbing, cruising, halibut fishing on occasion as well as shrimping on occasion. The Arima for being only a 21' boat had a good deal of fishing room in it and it was a very light...
