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One recommendation - just like sellers use brokers, as a buyer you can use a broker too. Generally, they take a cut of the commission of the sale of the boat (i.e. you don't have to directly pay for their service). This may cause a conflict of interest, but most brokers are interested in repeat business. A buyer's broker can look up comparative pricing in addition to assisting in the arrangement of a survey, sea trial and the sale itself. If they are local to the boat you are looking to buy they may also know the history of the boat. If you just call up a yacht broker (any broker that sells boats) and tell them you want a buyer's broker, most will work with you. If it's a specific common manufacturer you're looking at, try to find a company that focuses on that manufacturer.
If the boat was already surveyed, for a fraction of the price of the survey you can often hire the same surveyor to walk through everything with you. They will often change the name on the survey, if you buy the boat, so you don't have to pay full price to provide the survey to a bank. This is what we did. Our boat had been surveyed 4 weeks before we bought it and we paid about 50% of the full survey cost.
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