[Shortnsalty]

would a boat report be worth the $30 ?will it tell history of sales, accidents, claims etc.? Or can people hide stuff from being reported? I ask because with the stains that look like water damage from what i'm gathering and possible hull damage i would like to find info on the damage it might have suffered in the past.

 

[findrichard]

I don't know of any requirement to report boat damage by repair facilities like is required with auto repair facilities. Even DIY automobile repairs are not reported unless the insurance company was involved.

 

[Shortnsalty]

Thats what I figured. However if a boat is in an accident on the water i imagine it is reported.
Does a boat report however cover sale and resales of a vessel, which more or less have to be reported for title transfers.
I would guess any insurance claims would be on a report. Thats why i was asking if anyone might have used one or knows someone who has and might know if the reports are worth it.

 

[miatapaul]

Just like car fax completely useless. OK thy are not useless they do help empty the wallet.

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using Tapatalk

 

[eherlihy]

would a boat report be worth the $30 ?will it tell history of sales, accidents, claims etc.? Or can people hide stuff from being reported? I ask because with the stains that look like water damage from what i'm gathering and possible hull damage i would like to find info on the damage it might have suffered in the past.

I might pay $5 for one BEFORE the sale, but that's about it. I believe that it would show any history of insurance claims for said vessel by HIN. The report would not count any damage that was not reported to the insurance company. People could easily hide damage from being reported by simply not reporting damage to the vessel, and/or not filing a claim, with the insurance company.

If you suspect hull damage to your vessel, either hire a surveyor, or have a knowledgeable boat owner friend come and look at the vessel and the suspect area. It is fairly easy to peel back the hull liner, or look behind the lockers, and spot repairs to fiberglass from the inside of the hull.

 

[kd3pc]

absolutely useless....it is bad enough that the car "value" guides pretend to know about boat sales, without the "carfax" thingy coming in.

I have two cars, one a 1992 and the other a 2005, that I am the original owner and have ALL the paperwork....carfax shows 13 owners on the 1992 and 5 on the 2005. All crap.

 

[Shortnsalty]

Thx all.

 

[miatapaul]

absolutely useless....it is bad enough that the car "value" guides pretend to know about boat sales, without the "carfax" thingy coming in.

I have two cars, one a 1992 and the other a 2005, that I am the original owner and have ALL the paperwork....carfax shows 13 owners on the 1992 and 5 on the 2005. All crap.

Yes, I had a car that I bought knowing it had been totaled and fixed. I got hit by a teenager and totaled it again and bought it back from the insurance company then sold it as it was and the car fax came back "clean" last time I ran it on the car. So totaled twice and showed none.

 

[findrichard]

When I was selling cars we handed out car fax's like candy.

 

[abrahamx]

Well its $30. I'm a broke m f er but one can not go wrong spending $30 on a sailboat. That being said, I would not do it.

 

[hellosailor]

"When I was selling cars we handed out car fax's like candy. "
Yes, because most dealers buy an annual subscription so the incremental cost of any one carfax is zero. And, it makes the rubes happy. It is somewhat better than nothing--because of the reporting and record keeping regulations for cars, that aren't in place for boats.

$30? I'd rather give it to the surveyor and say "Here's something extra, please work slowly and carefully."

 

[jzk]

I just bought an Acura MDX a couple of months ago. I looked around on craigslist, and using autocheck, I found the first two people had altered their odometers. Finally, I found a one owner car that had been owned locally. Other vehicles had been sold at car auctions, etc.

How is this information not helpful?

"When I was selling cars we handed out car fax's like candy. "
Yes, because most dealers buy an annual subscription so the incremental cost of any one carfax is zero. And, it makes the rubes happy. It is somewhat better than nothing--because of the reporting and record keeping regulations for cars, that aren't in place for boats.

$30? I'd rather give it to the surveyor and say "Here's something extra, please work slowly and carefully."

 

[boatpoker]

What BoatUS has to say about boat history report , not complimentary

 

[findrichard]

Car fax reports have their uses beyond the sales pitch. They are just no guarantee of catching everything. Our used car manager always went over the used cars looking for unreported body repair work. It was not uncommon for him to find evidence of body repair work not reported on car fax. New cars can have minor body damage and repair that is not reported to the customer. All legal pending on cost of repair. Boat fax - forget it, as mentioned already, use a surveyor.

 

[hellosailor]

"How is this information not helpful?"
Because that information is about a CAR not a BOAT. There is no equivalent of Carfax for boats, because the states and insurers do not keep and exchange data on boats the same way that they do on cars. And it is might simpler to not report a boat accident, as compared to a car where someone always see the accident, calls the police, and the incident is now reported and on file, like it or not.

I never said Carfax wasn't useful--but even for cars, it is not what you think it is. There are large gaps, errors and omissions, and Carfax does not respond to them. They showed a duplicate title issued for my own car, which surprised me since I was the only owner. I tried to contact them to ask what was going on and if in fact someone had pulled a duplicate (which can be used to "wash" the forged VIN number on a stolen car) and never got any response from them. Proving that they sweep data bases, garbage in garbage out and nothing more.

 

[miatapaul]

The thing with car fax is it may catch some things, but lots of others it will miss. I think it gives a false sense of security. There is likely, but not certain, that there is an issue, but I feel no confidence when it says it is clean. So you can perhaps weed cars out by it, but you don't get much to go by with a positive report other than knowing they did not happen to find anything, not that there was nothing to find. And I have read of too many false negatives to really even trust that it is accurate enough to bother with.

 

[findrichard]

Just as with boats the more you know about cars the better you can determine its condition and structural integrity.

 

[jzk]

That is exactly how it is used.

The thing with car fax is it may catch some things, but lots of others it will miss. I think it gives a false sense of security. There is likely, but not certain, that there is an issue, but I feel no confidence when it says it is clean. So you can perhaps weed cars out by it, but you don't get much to go by with a positive report other than knowing they did not happen to find anything, not that there was nothing to find. And I have read of too many false negatives to really even trust that it is accurate enough to bother with.