First things first - Unless you have a long history with a particular surveyor, their work in a lot of cases is only as good as their card.

You WILL find stuff that has been missed or overlooked unless the person surveying the vessel knows that type of boat like the back of their hand. Im not putting these dedicated professionals down, By no means! However there are some shady folks out there and I see the end results of their work a fair bit.

Please keep in mind that surveyors dont know every vessel that they look at. There are hundreds of designs and hundreds of manufacturers so it is impossible for any one person to know them all. Ask around and find a reputable honest and THOROUGH surveyor that has experience on the vessel YOU are looking at buying!

Beauty is only skin deep! and a cursory look at a like new boat that has been sailed hard and abused will not reveal hidden problems. An older vessel may be well kept, but if it has spent most of its life tied to the dock, it may be just as rotted as an older vessel that has seen a lot of miles. Preventative and continuous maintenance is the only thing that keeps beautiful boats alive and well. Regardless of the reputation of the manufacturer and the appearance of the vessel, there are alway things that lie just beneath the paint or upholstery.

That being said, the Hunters are FAST! They are very sleek and very quick in the water. That is why I bought one. I like speed and I love racing.

The downside of any production boat geared to the Pleasure and Charter market - of which Hunter is a large manufacturer - is that the builder of the boat has to draw the line at making a profit as well as building a vessel that a decent portion of the population can afford. On the other hand a very well built, well thought out boat that every bit of effort and conscience has gone into will not be available to any but the top echelon of the market ( a 30 foot H-R can cost well over US100K)

So, You are looking at an older Hunter and they are well built ( for their day and intended purpose) boats.

Use the most recent survey (hopefully within the past 6 months to 1 year) as a starting point and go over every item on the survey yourself. - leave no stone unturned.

What is the condition of the interior? Is it clean, neat and tidy? Does it smell of disinfectant? if so, there could be a mold or mildew problem. The boat should smell, well,... like a boat. It should smell of diesel, a little - but not to much - musty if it has been closed up, and it may have a slight smell of toilet if its a salt water boat. Every salt water boats head will smell. An ounce of muriatic acid flushed into the piping every couple of weeks ( to dissolve the calcium buildup - No, its not very environmentally friendly but it works - along with a lot - as in 30 strokes - of water being used to flush after every use and a good flushing with fresh water when you get back to the dock will help with this! Remeber Pee and Sea react to create a calcium deposit similar to a sea shell which will rapidly reduce the diameter of a 2 inch inside diameter hose replaced last week to 1 inch or less inside diameter hose in less than 2 months time.

However, no matter what you do, there wil always be some odour.
Have a good look at the mirrors, are they peeling - is the silver coming off? If so there may be moisture problems.

Has the vessel been well kept? Check the lower 16 inches of ALL the bulkheads as well as ALL the exposed woodwork for delamination - Hunter never epoxied, varnished or otherwise protected these bits. They only stained them. The entire interior is PLYWOOD, a good grade of teak and mohogany ply, but PLYWOOD. And any plywood not sealed to prevent moisture ingress soon delaminates.


Do a thorough check of the engine - use a hand mirror! If the owner will allow it, have him remove the entry stairs and the side and top covers off of the engine so that you can SEE everything that lies underneath. If this hasnt ever been done, it should be. The access panels are not big enough to allow for any proper repair or inspection otherwise. The exhaust system on these boats is not well designed (the lift muffler isnt large enuf for the system and sits too high - but is easily replaced and relocatd).

The Turbochargers tend to rot out from water remaining in the exhaust loop - a large $$$ item to replace. Also, unless there is excellent lighting and a good mirror OR the entire engine cover is off, there is no way to really inspect the turbocharger for pitting and blow thru. A finger inserted into the intake side of the turbo (without the engine running!) to let you spin the compressor wheel will let you know instantly if the bearings are seized or rough.

If the turbo is failed or rotted figure $2500.00 to replace it. The entire engine compartment is hard to get into for a proper inspection and service. Remeber, the best way is to remove the stairs and lift the lid off the engine box! You will find problems of some sort if you do.

Make sure that you have a look at the exhaust hose loop from the turbo to the lift muffler. This is buried under the liner and if it was ever run hot and dry it will be collapsed! Very hard to pull out, but you can have a suitably qualified person cut the engine bearer / liner between the engine and the aft cabin to get it out and then glass in a repair to restore the structural integrity of the area.


What is the rigging like? Check the backstay attachments and also the rear hull where the deck meets the hull. These boats tend to seperate there and leak in following seas. They werent built with a very good back stay anchoring system and the backstays do pull the corners of the hull up a bit. This can be corrected, but its costly if you have to hire a person to do it. It is easy to repair, but its anot a pleasant job - hot and tight areas.


Inspect all the wood work in and around the heads for wet rot. Get in behind the sliding doors and have a poke with an ice pick!
When was the last time any of the head plumbing was replaced? The holding Tanks? If the answer is not in the past 5 years, then you will need to replace it as the stuff in the lines hardens and makes the inside of the hoses much smaller!. Old holding tanks that were never rinsed and cleaned will also have loads of hardened crap in them - literaly! and that will cause problems
Any darkening or discolouration of the cabin sole indicates moisture and the sole WILL need to be replaced - a big job as the ENTIRE interior must be removed to do it. Same as the rest of the wood work, the sole is plywood and never treated or sealed to keep out moisture.
The water tank in these boats was built underneath the fwd berth and is made of aluminum. Have a good look around the edges of the bunk for discouloration and water stains. After 20 years these tanks WILL leak because they were not painted or otherwise corrosion proofed. You do not want to find 60 or so gallons of water sloshing around in the fwd berth one night in the dark. I did and it was a few minutes until I could relax and settle down from thinking that the hull was pierced even though I was secure on my mooring. After having a new bottom welded onto the tank I bought a sight level gauge from GRAINGER (Part # G613-12-A-1 for $25.75) and a 6 screw in deck hatch that took all of an afternoon to intall so that I could avtually view the water level in the tank. I also use these sight levels on fuel tanks after a bit of modification.

If you have the water tank out, push on main cabin bulkhead near the mast poust ( near where the head of the bed was) and see if the bulkhead moves towards the fwd berth - mine did. It had unbonded from the fiberglass matting used to hold it in place!

Have a good look at the generator - these were usually westerbekes and they are good engines as long as they were maintained. They have a few hard to get at parts and the emergency shut off solenoids tend to give problems. I have removed all that stuff on mine and relocated it all to the nav station. Removing that stuff has revealed a water drain for the block that was totaly hidden behind the circuit breaker, Emergency kill switch and the kill switch / solenoid mounting plate. If that had leaked, there would ahve been no way to fix it at sea.


Inspect the area below the sink very closely. This area rots.


The sump plumbing is usually of a low grade and looks exactly like old style vacume cleaner hose and the re-inforcing wire inside the plastic tends to rot and cause all manner of things to happen. Leaks, stuff getting caught in the wire, collapsed hose - you name it. The stuff can be replaced easily by replumbing the hoses with new fiber reinforced hose. The only problem is the the original hoses were attached to and run inside the liner before the liner went into the hull. So cut the old lines and run new ones where you can get at them or just route new lines period and dont mess with the old ones.

Is the vessel deep or shoal draft?
If shoal draft, remove the aft cabin bulkheads and closely inspect the rudder shaft area ( behind the aft cabin rear wall) for cracks. The shoal draft boats have the same length rudder as the deep keel boats and the rudder takes a beating!


Have a good look at the bottom of the boat for blisters.
All the wood work is easy and affordibly replaced if there is a problem with it if you know what you are doing. I have completely replaced every bulkhead in my legend 45 due to rot and the fact that a new bulkhead is easier to patern than trying to fix or repair an old one, easy to cut on the workbench, easy to epoxy / seal on the workbench and will be 100% reliable when it is fitted.
If there was a survey done, when and by whom? How many Hunters has that person looked at??? Was it a Dealer? If so, beware, they will hide things to make themselves money!
Does the engine and generator run? Do they smoke? are the sensors and gauges working correctly?
Test sail the vessel and TRY EVERYTHING OUT!
Look at the flares and signals? are they new or mid range dated? New and they may have been a last minute thing - if so look at the rest of the safety gear muchb closer when you go over it.
Same with the batteries for the engine / genny and house. What were they installed, last serviced and what is the colour of the electrolyte? Are they bulged and swelled? That isnt a good thing with any battery.
The engine and genny on most boats are poorly ventillated - and these are no exception. When they are running, smell for fumes and look for tell tale leaks of smoke and water dripping.
Also, have a very close look at the exhaust hoses - these will need replacing after 20 years. Do not doubt this - the wire in the hoses on my boat was so rotted I was able to cut the hoses with a kitchen knife! that hose is expensive and wil be a big cost.



I paid market $$$ for my boat because the banks wouldnt touch me - Im a foreigner in the country where I am currently living and my own bank back home wanted the boat and I to be in my hometown before they would agree to the financing. (they would have financed 100% of a new boat - but only if i met their requirement to be back home with the new boat) The arrangement that I made with the owner was a gentlemans arrangement and it worked - I paid off my boat in 2 years by myself. The problem was I couldnt really barter the price down as I was stuck in between a rock and a hard place.

My advice to you is crawl over every bit of the vessel, take note of anything and everything that you find no matter how small. Make two copies and then go over everything wiht the seller and discuss the items, get them to acknowledge and sign the list of problems. Even better. if their surveyor is there, get them to sign it if you have found things they have missed and that you have found - an honest surveyor will immediately rectify their survey and adjust the value of the vessel if they have set one.

Then take what you have found to a number of repair shops and boat yards that mostly work on sailboats (better if they ONLY work on sailboats and know the Hunters) and get their ESTIMATE of what it will cost to rectify what you have found both for parts and for labour even if you can do the work yourself.
After you have a bunch of estimates, deduct the cost of repair from the sale price and come up with a price range from the estimated work needed.

Go back to the seller and present him / her with the estimates and what you consider to be a fair price now that you have an idea of what it will cost you. - EVERY vessel will need work and repair, even one that is 6-12 months old! it is not a question of not needing the work its a question of when and how much and if the seller has actually kept the vessel up and done preventative maintenance!

You dont want to have to pay for their lack of preventative maintenance. Beware and be up front and if the seller, IF they want to sell, you can work out an arrangement and bargain to a mutual agreed upon price. If they dont want to listen - just leave very politely and dont waste another second on the sale.


The older Hunters are good boats, they, like every other older boat need some type of TLC. You can find a gem out there for a low or lower than market price, but only when you know what the market is and where that boat sits against the rest of the boats in that class and range.

Personlly - if the owner doesnt want to pay for a survey ( which would be deducted from the purchase price of the vessel) I take the owners asking price and remove 1/4 to 1/3 off of it and make that my offer. If after thoroughly going over the vessel my survey turns up lots more then I reduce my offer accordingly.


Good luck and happy hunting.