With the recent economic changes many Canadian buyers are looking at the lower prices south of the border. While there may be some pretty good deals there are a few things to be aware of. If the boat was built outside the NAFTA countries it is going to be subject to duty and if built within, it will still pick up a customs brokerage fee, PST and GST tab and then there is the high cost of transporting it home after you have done lien checks. So you figure in the costs and still think it's a deal. Dig a little deeper before you hand over your money. Just because you are buying a boat from Michigan does not mean it didn't come from Louisiana or Florida. I have seen boats advertised as fresh water boats which turned out to be salties under the shine. How do you choose a surveyor from across the border ? The yellow pages or how about using the one the broker recommends or how about the broker who does the surveys himself .....can you spell conflict of interest. Yes there may be a few deals but you had better do your homework.

You will be better off working through a broker but only if the broker is familiar with importing boats to Canada and knows how to deal with Canada Customs, applicable taxes, lien clearance and USCG documentation releases. This can be complicated stuff if you or your broker are unfamiliar with it. Choose your broker as carefully as you choose your surveyor.

HURRICANE BOATS

The last few years have seen a large number of "hurricane" boats brought north into the upper US states and Canada. One southern broker told me half the hurricane boats he sold were sold to Canadians. Several dealers and individuals have bought many of these boats, patched them up

and a large number of them are showing up on the market with very attractive prices. I want to emphasize that some of these are reputable people doing an honest repair job and making a fair profit. Other less reputable people are doing cover up jobs and flogging shiny junk with fresh paint.

(she ain't pretty she just looks that way).

Some of these boats are turning up in auctions where buyers only get a very limited looksee before bidding.....if they won't let you crawl all over and through the boat keep that bid card in your pocket. I have seen some with very good cosmetic cover-ups and it can be very hard to detect problem areas under the new shine.

This example shown in the next photo had just been totally re-finished by one repairer in Ontario who had bought a number of current model year write-offs to rebuild. They disagree with my opinion of this vessel but percussive sounding revealed several areas of hollow soundings suggestive of core separation or delamination. One spot was opened up and it turned out to be much more extensive than percussive soundings indicated as so much new material had been added on top that the soundings were affected.

There is another rather ugly scenario that I have yet to see play out however, I am keeping an eye out for it. Many of these boats came from the gulf coast where sewage treatment plants are of questionable efficiency and few marinas have pumpout stations (those that do exist rarely work) and even fewer boats bother to use their holding tanks. One must also consider the massive pollution of southern water during the last few years of hurricanes. After a boat has taken on a couple of feet of this sweet harbour water in Louisiana, how long before mould and bacteria starts to creep out of those freshly varnished plywood bulkheads ? Combine some sewage with the bacteria in much more organically active salt water and you could have a very unpleasant brew fermenting in those stringers, bulkheads and teak paneling.