Battery and survey query

[The dog lady]

Some advice please. We put in an offer on a boat which was accepted. Our offer was based on everything we could see about the boat, including a few bits of rust which need treating and we upped our price by £1K to secure the deal. THis took us to the limit of our budget to buy.

We arranged a survey which revealed that all four batteries are seriously on their last legs and need replacing. On querying with the owner he said he knew the batteries were at the end of their life but he had costed that into his asking price.

We pointed out that our offer was based on what we could see and anything else would be negotiated after survey. The owner refuses to budge so we are faced with having to fork out for new batteries or walk away and lose the cost of survey.

Are we being reasonable to think the owner has been less than transparent with the facts?

[system 4-50]

No, you are not being reasonable.  The onus is upon you to offer what you think it is worth, with you making allowance for all the things that are not immediately visible.  The onus is not upon the seller to ensure you are as informed to the maximum degree posiible.  

Batteries are consumeables and you would expect them to need replacing fairly soon anyway.  How much have you budgeted for annual running costs for the boat?

[Alan de Enfield]

25 minutes ago, The dog lady said:

Some advice please. We put in an offer on a boat which was accepted. Our offer was based on everything we could see about the boat, including a few bits of rust which need treating and we upped our price by £1K to secure the deal. THis took us to the limit of our budget to buy.

We arranged a survey which revealed that all four batteries are seriously on their last legs and need replacing. On querying with the owner he said he knew the batteries were at the end of their life but he had costed that into his asking price.

We pointed out that our offer was based on what we could see and anything else would be negotiated after survey. The owner refuses to budge so we are faced with having to fork out for new batteries or walk away and lose the cost of survey.

Are we being reasonable to think the owner has been less than transparent with the facts?

 

Batteries are disposable. 

 

If the batteries are 'still there' then they are 'still there as you saw them'

 

The seller is under no obligation to accept your offer and under no obligation to negotiate after the boat has been surveyed.

There is an 'internet fallacy' going around that you can always get the seller to drop their price by at least the amount your surveyor cost you. 

Total rubbish.

 

It is a sellers market - they have the upper hand.

 

4 x 110Ah batteries will be about £250.
are you going to lose the boat that you really want for the sake of £250 ?

 

Edit cross posted with 4-50, but we are both on the same Hymn sheet.

Edited July 29, 2019 by Alan de Enfield

[roland elsdon]

Regardless assume at least 5-10% over what you pay in immediate additional costs.

 

assumethe engine needs as service

assume the batteries will be u s 

assume something will fail immediatly

 

i apply that to all cars houses and boats i buy. 

[Alan de Enfield]

12 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

Regardless assume at least 5-10% over what you pay in immediate additional costs.

 

assumethe engine needs as service

assume the batteries will be u s 

assume something will fail immediatly

 

i apply that to all cars houses and boats i buy. 

I work on having a £5000 'slush' account because you don't know what's going to happen with a 'new boat'

 

There was another thread (in the last couple of days) where the new owner 'pulled' up the bilge pump and the bottom of the boat came with it leaving a couple of small holes.

[Detling]

Boat stands for "bring out anther thousand". Seriously batteries only last a few years with careful constant nursing, you can kill a set in a few weeks if you don't look after them well, most boaters kill at least one set and often two before they get the hang of it.

[Dr Bob]

1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

 

The seller is under no obligation to accept your offer and under no obligation to negotiate after the boat has been surveyed.

There is an 'internet fallacy' going around that you can always get the seller to drop their price by at least the amount your surveyor cost you. 

Total rubbish.

 

I dont agree with Alan here. We got £2000 off our last boat as the stove was cracked and the ebersparky thingy didnt work.......you can get money off.

 

But....not on batteries. Batteries as consumables as Alan says and you have to assume you will need new ones very soon anyway.

Again, I agree with Alan on the £250. If you cant afford this then how are you going to pay for the next £1,000 £2000 of repairs/improvements you will need to do this year? Your budget needs to cover the unexpected.

[jonathanA]

You haven’t said how much less than the asking price your offer is? The seller may well think he’s moved a lot already and if the only thing the survey threw up was batteries then that suggests there isn’t really any reason for him to move more. 

 

Did you ask him about the batteries ? A simple when were they last replaced question could have been quite illuminating....

 

tricky situation but only you know how many boats you have looked at and what’s important to you... replacing batteries is not a big issue. 

 

 

[Alan de Enfield]

38 minutes ago, Dr Bob said:

I dont agree with Alan here. We got £2000 off our last boat as the stove was cracked and the ebersparky thingy didnt work.......you can get money off.

I did say ALWAYS, some you can, some you can't.

 

1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

There is an 'internet fallacy' going around that you can always get the seller to drop their price by at least the amount your surveyor cost you. 

 

When I quote a price its the price I'll sell it for. If you come back and say "I need to re-paint it so I need to knock off £10k" Tough !!

 

I blame all of these house buying programmes - those who want to put in new windows, knock down walls etc. You are buying what you can see in front of you, not what you would like it to be like.

[Richard10002]

2 hours ago, The dog lady said:

Some advice please. We put in an offer on a boat which was accepted. Our offer was based on everything we could see about the boat, including a few bits of rust which need treating and we upped our price by £1K to secure the deal. THis took us to the limit of our budget to buy.

We arranged a survey which revealed that all four batteries are seriously on their last legs and need replacing. On querying with the owner he said he knew the batteries were at the end of their life but he had costed that into his asking price.

We pointed out that our offer was based on what we could see and anything else would be negotiated after survey. The owner refuses to budge so we are faced with having to fork out for new batteries or walk away and lose the cost of survey.

Are we being reasonable to think the owner has been less than transparent with the facts?

whilst I might be repeating what others have said:

 

1) The survey cost you £400-£600?, and 4 x new batteries could cost £250 for really cheap ones, or £400 for those which might be a bit better.

 

Why would you want to risk having to walk away, spend ages finding another boat you like, where your offer will be acceptable, where you will spend another £400-£600, and which might have much more wrong with it than the batteries are shot.

 

2) If the only thing the surveyor could find that was wrong enough for you to consider it worth negotiating over, the boat is a pretty good boat, and you ought to be handing over the money as fast as you can, before he sells it to someone else.

 

3) It is not for an owner to make you aware of everything that is wrong with a second hand boat - it's a second hand boat!! If he had said the batteries are perfect, replaced a couple of m,onths ago, and your surveyor condemned them, you may have a case...... but it would still be short sighted to walk away for the sake of the cost of new batteries.

 

As a matter of interest, how did the surveyor establish that the batteries are shot? What were the words in his survey that told you this?

[mrsmelly]

3 hours ago, The dog lady said:

Some advice please. We put in an offer on a boat which was accepted. Our offer was based on everything we could see about the boat, including a few bits of rust which need treating and we upped our price by £1K to secure the deal. THis took us to the limit of our budget to buy.

We arranged a survey which revealed that all four batteries are seriously on their last legs and need replacing. On querying with the owner he said he knew the batteries were at the end of their life but he had costed that into his asking price.

We pointed out that our offer was based on what we could see and anything else would be negotiated after survey. The owner refuses to budge so we are faced with having to fork out for new batteries or walk away and lose the cost of survey.

Are we being reasonable to think the owner has been less than transparent with the facts?

Personaly whenever I by a boat I dont look at the batteries, experience of boat buying tells me they are usualy buggered. When I bought the present boat before I even went to pick it up I purchased a full set of batteries and took them with me together with a new water pump. The water pump was working but jacked in a after a couple of days so I replaced with new. Batteries are to be treated like diesel.

[blackrose]

I think you're being reasonable in wanting decent batteries with a boat that's costing many thousands. I also think the vendor is being reasonable in not wanting to buy a new set of consumables that he's not going to use. Nobody has a monopoly on reasonableness or righteousness here and there are no rules as some on this thread seem to be implying. If you want something ask for it, if he doesn't want to give it to you he won't. You've both got to try to conduct the conversation in a polite businesslike manner that results in a deal and leaves you both feeling happy. It's called negotiation.

 

Edit: and there are thousands of boats on the market so it's only a seller's market if you've set your heart on it and aren't prepared to walk away.

Edited July 29, 2019 by blackrose

[TheBiscuits]

25 minutes ago, blackrose said:

I think you're being reasonable in wanting decent batteries with a boat that's costing many thousands. I also think the vendor is being reasonable in not wanting to buy a new set of consumables that he's not going to use

Asking the vendor to split the difference on half the cost of the new batteries would be reasonable ...

[The dog lady]

OK so we have to cough up for new batteries. Anyone recommend a good brand? The ones on the boat are Numax 110 I think. 

[matty40s]

The only things you can expect the seller to pay for on survey findings are Boat Safety issues (such as cracked stove), and plating if needed. The owner will have to do these anyway - even if you walk away - as once the problem is highlighted, they cant really sell the boat without stating the problem exists.

[MHS]

3 hours ago, The dog lady said:

OK so we have to cough up for new batteries. Anyone recommend a good brand? The ones on the boat are Numax 110 I think. 

Our 8 Numax 110ah batteries are 5 years old and are still working well. Mind you we cruise a lot, and have solar to help keep them in good nick. 

[Mike Todd]

9 hours ago, Richard10002 said:

whilst I might be repeating what others have said:

 

1) The survey cost you £400-£600?, and 4 x new batteries could cost £250 for really cheap ones, or £400 for those which might be a bit better.

 

Why would you want to risk having to walk away, spend ages finding another boat you like, where your offer will be acceptable, where you will spend another £400-£600, and which might have much more wrong with it than the batteries are shot.

 

2) If the only thing the surveyor could find that was wrong enough for you to consider it worth negotiating over, the boat is a pretty good boat, and you ought to be handing over the money as fast as you can, before he sells it to someone else.

 

3) It is not for an owner to make you aware of everything that is wrong with a second hand boat - it's a second hand boat!! If he had said the batteries are perfect, replaced a couple of m,onths ago, and your surveyor condemned them, you may have a case...... but it would still be short sighted to walk away for the sake of the cost of new batteries.

 

As a matter of interest, how did the surveyor establish that the batteries are shot? What were the words in his survey that told you this?

The comments made in several posts about the seller not having to tell you about all the faults is not the whole story. In particular, the seller must answer truthfully any question that you ask so if you ask about the batteries and are told that they are as good as new, when in fact they are 5 years old and don't hold charge then the seller has not complied with the law. Hence, when buying from a private individual the key is to ask all the right questions and, preferably, to get the replies in a recorded format.

 

Important to realise that a broker is not he seller, even though some of them go a long way to creating that impression.

 

So how do you know that you are asking all right questions? You may well have sufficient experience, may be even more than a professional expert, if you have been a boater for some time. You may well have a friend who is more experienced than you are, but in both cases you have no come back if you omit a vital question. However, you could ask a professional to do it for you. Again, be careful what you are commissioning. A surveyor, I guess, does just that - he/she will report what they have seen, but they may have more discerning eyes that you have so will know what to look for or what some signs might indicate. If you want them to quiz the seller (somewhat in the way that a solicitor does when buying a house) then you will have to specify that and make sure that the professional you employ has the right skills to do that. All of that costs money (hence the fees) and may, in the end, buy you no compensation ion the event that something is missed.

 

Sometimes, trust becomes a key component in a purchase, so always worth spending time in idle chatter with the seller - you will soon pick up what sort of person they are.

[mrsmelly]

6 hours ago, The dog lady said:

OK so we have to cough up for new batteries. Anyone recommend a good brand? The ones on the boat are Numax 110 I think. 

I use Brit marine at present, they do a good job. Its more to do with your charging regime than anything else that dictates how long your batteries will last. You can buy crap ones and be very good at charging and they will last a considerable time and you can buy expensive ones that you leave partialy or fully charged and wreck them in a few short weeks.

[MtB]

13 hours ago, The dog lady said:

We arranged a survey which revealed that all four batteries are seriously on their last legs and need replacing.

 

As mentioned before, he may be right but I'd be wanting to find out how he knows. If the batts are down at 10.5v and have been for weeks then he is prolly right, but I'd still be wanting to know how as unless he measured the terminal voltage, he isn't going to know. 

 

On the other hand the seller doesn't seem to have contradicted the surveyor and claimed they are fine. 

 

 

[The dog lady]

He measured the terminal voltage. Are Numax good quality? Am new to all this as you're probably aware!

[Lily Rose]

48 minutes ago, The dog lady said:

He measured the terminal voltage. Are Numax good quality? Am new to all this as you're probably aware!

I wouldn't worry too much about "good quality" at this stage. If you fork out more for "good quality" replacements you might knacker them quickly if you don't (know how to) look after them. Buy cheap ones (c £70 to £80 each) and then if you knacker then as part of your learning experience you haven't wasted loads of money on them. If you don't knacker them you should get at least 2 to 3 years out of them - exactly the battery purchase/replacement strategy many boaters adopt. Others shell out more and expect them to last longer, but if not managed well then they are an expensive mistake.

 

I have experience of Numax 110s.

 

I bought my 15 year old boat 4 years ago. I was a complete newbie to boat ownership. The surveyor said the Numax batteries were knackered - no surprise with the boat on brokerage for several months with the batteries self-discharging. They may or may not have been in good nick before this.

 

After buying the boat I arranged for a professional engine service and replacement of the leisure batteries. At the last minute I cancelled the battery replacement and decided to charge them up and see how they behaved.

 

I got another 18 months usage out of them, the first 9 months without help from solar which I then had installed.

I then replaced the batteries. I was going to buy Numax again (online from Tayna) but ended up buying Albion from Midland Chandlers as they were a bit cheaper and appeared to be almost identical. Two and a half years later they are still going strong.

 

I suggest you buy the boat, if you really want it, and then give the batteries a good charge with a smart charger and see how you get on. You might be surprised! If you have some way of monitoring the voltage you should soon be able to tell whether they still have enough left in them to cope with your demands.

 

 

 

 

Edited July 30, 2019 by Lily Rose

[Horace42]

Lots of good advice already given. But look at it from the logistics angle. How many boats have you looked at? How long have you been looking?

How many more will you have to look at, and how long will it take to find another boat you like?

If the batteries are the only 'sticking' point here, then it is easily fixed by replacing them - a few minutes work (metaphorically), and you're as good as new -

and something you can leave until later.

It is all very well measuring the voltage - but the question is how long they hold their charge - which a lot depends on the load. 

The basic test is to see if the engine bursts into life instantly when the start button is pushed - or does the engine struggle - or worse just an ominous click?

....and for fun, put the gearbox in drive to give some extra load for starting. Try it a few times in quick succession. 

If the engine starts OK, you have a functional boat.

I appreciate this is a test for the starter battery, but very important because everything else falls into place, where the domestic batteries (how many?) are usually separate from

the starter battery, thus can be charged and kept going until it becomes a nuisance - especially if you have to run the engine whilst moored in order to watch TV at night.

That will be the time to replace them....as other boaters are likely to tell you.........

 

If however,  the engine does not start, then you might have grounds for a reduction in price, albeit the seller will need to fit new batteries to get the boat running

 - so you pay the full price, but at least you know the batteries are good.

 

[Nightwatch]

Batteries. Try ABS (Advances Battery Supplies) on the Internet. We have used them. They're a good supplier. Next day free delivery. But please shop around. 

[Richard10002]

1 hour ago, Lily Rose said:

I suggest you buy the boat, if you really want it, and then give the batteries a good charge with a smart charger and see how you get on. You might be surprised! If you have some way of monitoring the voltage you should soon be able to tell whether they still have enough left in them to cope with your demands.

This is the best advice you could get.

[cuthound]

17 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

Batteries are disposable. 

 

If the batteries are 'still there' then they are 'still there as you saw them'

 

The seller is under no obligation to accept your offer and under no obligation to negotiate after the boat has been surveyed.

There is an 'internet fallacy' going around that you can always get the seller to drop their price by at least the amount your surveyor cost you. 

Total rubbish.

 

It is a sellers market - they have the upper hand.

 

4 x 110Ah batteries will be about £250.
are you going to lose the boat that you really want for the sake of £250 ?

 

Edit cross posted with 4-50, but we are both on the same Hymn sheet.

 

16 hours ago, Dr Bob said:

I dont agree with Alan here. We got £2000 off our last boat as the stove was cracked and the ebersparky thingy didnt work.......you can get money off.

 

But....not on batteries. Batteries as consumables as Alan says and you have to assume you will need new ones very soon anyway.

Again, I agree with Alan on the £250. If you cant afford this then how are you going to pay for the next £1,000 £2000 of repairs/improvements you will need to do this year? Your budget needs to cover the unexpected.

 

I think it depends on the cost of having the faulty items replaced or repaired.

 

In Dr Bob's case (and mine) the cost was slightly more than the cost of the survey, so the seller risks losing a buyer unless he repairs or reduces his price.

 

In the OP's case, the cost is considerably less than the cost of the survey, so the seller knows his buyer is unlikely to walk away and lose the cost of the survey.

Edited July 30, 2019 by cuthound
Spillung