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Seller survey


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Any proper  marine surveyor is independent of whoever commissioned the survey. He may comment on the boat's conditioned or more properly request a fee for a copy of his report and for which he would be liable.

That's my understanding - but others may counter or confirm what I've written.

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You cannot rely on a seller survey. If you do, ad something is wrong, or has been missed, you have no comeback to anyone for the error or omission.  Only the person who paid for the survey can rely on it, and this is usually stated clearly right at the start of the report. 

 

Certainly  you can call the sellers surveyor, but expect them to charge fee, so that you have 'bought in ' to the survey and can then rely on it, and the surveyors indemnity insurance.

 

That said, even if you pay for your own survey, the chances of making a survey complaint stick are akin to those of the proverbial snowball in a bonfire.  Survey reports are well hedged around with caveats, weasel words and general disclaimers.

 

N

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  Is the survey recent and why did the seller get it done?

  If the boat is over a certain age 25 years ish, was it an insurance requirement survey?

 The first thing I would do is find out why it was done and find out what relationship the seller has with the surveyor, are they friends? This is the thing to find out.

  Sellers don’t usually get a pre-sale survey? Is he selling it because of this survey, has it highlighted issues?

  Have you seen it?

  Sorry for the questions but the more info you add the easier it is to suss the situation/reason for survey the out, as I said sellers don’t get surveys done.

  

  

 

Edited by PD1964
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The vendor has paid the surveyor, it would be pointless to phone the surveyor, as he has given his report on the boat at the time.

Having said that, I did phone a BSC inspector who was highly qualified and experienced surveyor, to complain that the boat had several fails.

He came out straight away and gave me some cash.

I did not use him when my boat needed next Certificate. I would not use him if I needed a survey, well I might if I wanted an insurance pass!

If the boat has an excellent survey, recent, and all looks OK, and I was experienced etc etc, I might waive a new survey.

If in doubt, get your own. Use a different surveyor.

Edited by LadyG
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9 minutes ago, BEngo said:

You cannot rely on a seller survey. If you do, ad something is wrong, or has been missed, you have no comeback to anyone for the error or omission.  Only the person who paid for the survey can rely on it, and this is usually stated clearly right at the start of the report. 

 

Certainly  you can call the sellers surveyor, but expect them to charge fee, so that you have 'bought in ' to the survey and can then rely on it, and the surveyors indemnity insurance.

 

That said, even if you pay for your own survey, the chances of making a survey complaint stick are akin to those of the proverbial snowball in a bonfire.  Survey reports are well hedged around with caveats, weasel words and general disclaimers.

 

N

There is a recent case highlighted by cruising the cut, and discussed on here, boat in poor condition, survey wrong.

As a purchaser, I'd have boat out, and would do a hammer test at the very least, but as a vendor, I'd not be too happy about such an unscientific method, but then I would not want my two pack epoxy scraped to bare metal either.

Edited by LadyG
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1 hour ago, LadyG said:

If the boat has an excellent survey, recent, and all looks OK, and I was experienced etc etc, I might waive a new survey.

If in doubt, get your own. Use a different surveyor.

Would you, Even if the boat was in the water? The surveyor could be the sellers best friend.

If it was an in water survey I would say absolutely pointless and useless, I would want a current out of water survey to be no older then possibly 2-6 month and would check that all the remedial work/recommendations on the survey had been done to a good acceptable standard.

  We need to know why the survey was done as sellers don’t get pre-sale survey’s done on boats.

Edited by PD1964
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57 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

 

  Sellers don’t usually get a pre-sale survey? Is he selling it because of this survey, has it highlighted issues?

   

 

From posts I have read on Facebook it is getting more common, also buyers asking if there is a recent survey.

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3 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

From posts I have read on Facebook it is getting more common, also buyers asking if there is a recent survey.

I take no notice of Facebook groups, they’re normally young inexperienced London type boaters. 
  Very easy to alter dates and cut and paste to create a good survey from an old one, especially if original had been sent electronically. I would rather do my own.

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Not quite at the point of selling but I fear it may be on the horizon (knees, back etc,etc,etc) note this is NOT an attempt to sell.

The boat's out for blacking in September and I intend to get a hull survey. That way, come the inevitable day I will have an idea whether I'm trying to sell a boat or a colander and pitch my approach accordingly. Just my view.

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51 minutes ago, Slim said:

Not quite at the point of selling but I fear it may be on the horizon (knees, back etc,etc,etc) note this is NOT an attempt to sell.

The boat's out for blacking in September and I intend to get a hull survey. That way, come the inevitable day I will have an idea whether I'm trying to sell a boat or a colander and pitch my approach accordingly. Just my view.

Why not buy a hull thickness tester and test the hull yourself? if a reputable yard you could ask a member of staff to double check if you find places of concern and advise, cheaper then a surveyor and if your friends want to use the tester when they black their boats, just help them out for say a tenner or a couple of pints. The thickness testers are easy to use and not that expensive.

  

Edited by PD1964
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1 hour ago, PD1964 said:

 
  Very easy to alter dates and cut and paste to create a good survey from an old one, especially if original had been sent electronically. I would rather do my own.

 

I've seen an example of that myself. It was about 18 years ago and the vendor had tippexd over actual ultrasonic measurements and written in new figures before photocopying and giving it to the buyer. By the time he found out the vendor was long gone and he ended up losing about £10k in overplating coats.

 

The only survey you can trust is one you commission yourself and often not even through a surveyor recommended by a brokerage.

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56 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

Why not buy a hull thickness tester and test the hull yourself? if a reputable yard you could ask a member of staff to double check if you find places of concern and advise, cheaper then a surveyor and if your friends want to use the tester when they black their boats, just help them out for say a tenner or a couple of pints. The thickness testers are easy to use and not that expensive.

  

 

If I was selling my boat and a prospective purchaser with no experience told me he/she was conducting the hull survey themselves and approached my boat, angle grinder in hand to take paint back to bare metal in order to take ultrasonic measurements, I think I'd probably tell them it was no longer for sale.

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1 hour ago, blackrose said:

 

If I was selling my boat and a prospective purchaser with no experience told me he/she was conducting the hull survey themselves and approached my boat, angle grinder in hand to take paint back to bare metal in order to take ultrasonic measurements, I think I'd probably tell them it was no longer for sale.

I know, No I’m saying if @Slim is going to get a Surveyor in when he’s blackening his boat, it would be cheaper for him to buy his own tester and check his hull himself and lend it to his boating friends so they can check their own hulls.

  Yes I wouldn’t let a couple of young Newbies do it after they’ve watched a couple of YouTube Vlogs.

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3 hours ago, PD1964 said:

Why not buy a hull thickness tester and test the hull yourself? if a reputable yard you could ask a member of staff to double check if you find places of concern and advise, cheaper then a surveyor and if your friends want to use the tester when they black their boats, just help them out for say a tenner or a couple of pints. The thickness testers are easy to use and not that expensive.

  

I'ma great one for gadgets but everything I've read suggests that most DIY testers are rubbish. Tell me a good one and it can join all the rest of my must have tools. 

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4 hours ago, PD1964 said:

I take no notice of Facebook groups, they’re normally young inexperienced London type boaters. 
  Very easy to alter dates and cut and paste to create a good survey from an old one, especially if original had been sent electronically. I would rather do my own.

I do like being referred to as a young. Well I do use Facebook.

There are far more people on FB both looking to buy and sell boats than there are on here. I don't disagree with your comment how easy it is to fake things. It still doesn't stop potential buyers asking the question or sellers having it done before they put them on the market .

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33 minutes ago, Slim said:

I'ma great one for gadgets but everything I've read suggests that most DIY testers are rubbish. Tell me a good one and it can join all the rest of my must have tools. 

This is true! 

Bought a cheap tester and tried it out on various bits of metal and boat hull.

On heavily blacked hull, couldnt get any reading.On unpainted rusty bits the reading varied from no reading to differences  as much as 4mm. On clean bare steel, it was about right.

A surveyor will use a very expensive tester that can be set to take account of different surfaces, and he will be experienced using it.

I don' t think a cheap tester is any good for corroded surfaces. 

They are only good for checking thickness on perfect metal on a bench with an experienced user.

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42 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

I do like being referred to as a young. Well I do use Facebook.

There are far more people on FB both looking to buy and sell boats than there are on here. I don't disagree with your comment how easy it is to fake things. It still doesn't stop potential buyers asking the question or sellers having it done before they put them on the market .

Seams to be a lot of crap on there.

https://m.facebook.com/groups/narrowboatsforsaleuk/

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23 minutes ago, Mad Harold said:

This is true! 

Bought a cheap tester and tried it out on various bits of metal and boat hull.

On heavily blacked hull, couldnt get any reading.On unpainted rusty bits the reading varied from no reading to differences  as much as 4mm. On clean bare steel, it was about right.

A surveyor will use a very expensive tester that can be set to take account of different surfaces, and he will be experienced using it.

I don' t think a cheap tester is any good for corroded surfaces. 

They are only good for checking thickness on perfect metal on a bench with an experienced user.

I’ve seen surveyors using the same as I bought off Ebay for £100 ish. I think you need to get a good clean metal surface and use the grease compound to get an accurate reading. As you said on good clean metal, it was about right. Why would you not clean/derust a surface to get to clean metal? Sort of defeats the object of thickness testing, They seam quite easy to use and come with full instructions.

Edited by PD1964
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Young Ditchcrawler is right Pre sale surveys are becoming more common, three of the four boats we looked at last year came with them, one done a week before it had come into the market. One the vendor had just done after it had come into brokerage and organised by them. The third was a few weeks earlier and done by a private seller. 

It was at the time last year that getting any survey was months away. I’m not sure how long the wait for a survey is now but seeing a number of boats under offer and presumably waiting for a survey it’s possibly still fairly long. 
 

it does therefore mean no wait for a sale or less price haggling for the vendor so it does seem to make sense.


You can try speaking to the surveyor but as it wasn’t commissioned by you they may not speak. It depends so much on what the survey says what the boat age is why it was done, if it was taken out of the water  if it’s a private sale or through a decent broker  before much more advice here can given.
 

Some on here wouldn’t have a survey at all so a second may appear overkill in any case. 


 


 

 

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It may come down to all the promotional work done by Whilton as part of their 'cheap way to get onto the housing ladder' propoganda.

 

They 'strongly suggest' that any seller should have a survey done as it makes it easier for the purchaser to see what they are getting without the delays and costs of having their own survey done - Whilton just happen to have a family member who is a surveyor and can offer reduced prices if the boat is to be sold by Whilton.

 

It is a sad fact that 'more than one' boat that has been surveyed by said surveyor and, subsequently purchased on the strength of the survey, has actually sunk on the way to London

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