Your opinion on boat purchase

[hobby10k]

I am looking to buy a new boat, our sea ray needs some fixing so we are just going to buy a new boat and put the sea ray on the back burner.

The two main boats that I am looking at on our local classifieds are:

2000 reinell 203 bow rider with a 5.0 Volvo Penta set up. a few seams coming apart on interior, however easy fixes on the seams, think I could easily get those sewn. The rest looks good from the pictures. dual axle trailer, and snap on boat cover. comes with water toys, and stainless prop. asking price $7000

Other:

2000 Bluewater 21' with 5.7 GS Volvo Penta. 100 hours on rebuilt engine. Interior clean and good shape. full boat cover, dual axle trailer. stainless prop. asking $10,400. said he is flexible on the price.

would like your opinions between the two boat makes, and opinions between the 5.0 and 5.7. I feel the engines are pretty similar.

thanks in advance.

 

[tpenfield]

I like the 5.7 over the 5.0, but also am wondering if there is a third choice :noidea:

 

[alldodge]

Agree there is no replacement for displacement, ones 20ft the other is 21ft. Found the Bluewater on CL in Tacoma. It says rebuilt motor but then you would need receipts. Even with receipts there can be issues, here at iboats we hear quite often about folks having rebuilt engines fail. Look them both over real good and just because someone says something has been done, don't believe it without verification

 

[hobby10k]

Well there are other possibilities, these two just stuck out at me.

As far as the rebuild, I guess I'm too trusting. He said previous owner rebuilt it.

As far as between the two boats, other than the engine, does anyone have any opinions between the two?

 

[alldodge]

IMO Bluewater makes a good boat, the Reinell not so much

 

[hobby10k]

IMO Bluewater makes a good boat, the Reinell not so much

Is it the build quality, reputation or customer service that isn't that great on the reinell?

 

[alldodge]

quality and reputation, have no knowledge of customer service

 

[hobby10k]

sooooo..... The wife was the one that suggested we get a newer boat, I was totally on board and was pumped. I spent hours over a few days looking for boats and messaging you guys. I narrowed it down, and then all of the sudden she got cold feet when it was time to tell the guy that we would like to come up to look the boat over and most likely buy it.

She now after all that, said she is hesitant to spend 10k out of our savings for a boat... what the heck! (I know blowing cash on toys isn't the greatest idea but still LOL) so, now she wants me to fix the Sea Ray up now instead of just getting out and start boating NOW like we planned... UGH women sometimes LOL

So now I have a lot of work ahead of me sooner than I thought. I though the Sea Ray would be on the back burner till winter.

 

[tpenfield]

Tell us more about the SeaRay . . .

Give the wife (Admiral) credit . . . a new-to-you boat is going to require some additional investment beyond the purchase price. So maybe fixing up an older boat is a better route ?

BTW - I was under the impression that both Reinell and Bluewater were both made by Kal Kustom Enterprises in California. So, I am not sure there would be any difference between the 2 in terms of quality, etc.

Campion just bought both product lines from Kal Kustom last year. . . .