To a large degree boats like cars have evolved to provide greater interior space relative to overall length. Many older boats in the upper 30 ft range have less usable living space than current boats in the low 30 foot range. If you anticipate doing most of the handling yourself go for a more current design offering maximum space in a boat that you can manage single handed. I took delivery earlier this year on a new Beneteau 331 (34 FT) which I handle often without crew. The interior is spacious and with
furling main and all
lines located conveniently to the helm it fit the bill nicely at a price that I think offers pretty good value for money. Performance wise the Beneteaus tend to do fairly well. Catalina offers similar boats in this range. The Hunters I''ve encountered tend not to be as fast - they seem to trade off ease of sail handling for performance.