I presume you have seen my previous post regarding the responsibilities of surveyors, brokers, buyers and sellers? That should answer most of your questions. It sounds like you are saying you were going to pay a broker to find you a prospective boat. You had hoped that this broker would be your "buyers broker" and he was supposed to be acting for you? Was he being paid outright by you or did he ask for a percentage of your purchase price? If he was being paid as a percentage of your purchase price then you immediately have an obvious conflict of interest because it is to his benefit to sell you a boat, at the highest possible price. Which means he is really the sellers broker and not representing you at all. What brokers usually do in these circumstances is arrange to share the commissions that are always paid by the seller of the boat. What the person you call "your broker" will do is check all his resources to find a boat for sale similar to what you want. He will call the broker who is selling the boat and say, "let's make a deal. I have a hot prospect up here and so I think I can sell that boat. But you are the primary broker with the listing so let's share the commission if we sell it." Usually that's the deal. There are no rules about this, just an accommodation between brokers. So in this example you can see that you have NO one protecting your interest at all. Both brokers are trying to sell you the boat. Then it sounds like you made classic mistake #2 by letting the broker(s) choose the surveyor. That seems a common mistake here. The only time I have ever seen a "buyers representative" arrangement work is when you, the buyer, commission an independent marine surveyor to find you a good boat. Actually you usually find some boat candidates yourself and then you pay a really good, independent, marine surveyor to do the preliminary phone calls and ask all the right questions. If the boat seems promising to the surveyor you then take that same marine surveyor with you to survey the boat. If the first look at the boat is promising, then let your marine surveyor choose a good engine surveyor. Now they are both working for you exclusively and they have no vested interest with the brokers or the seller. I had friend recently fly "his surveyor" from Portland OR to Florida for a full week to survey a boat. He saved far more than the cost of the surveyor in the final price and saved himself mega-bucks worth of expense and heartache. An engine surveyor will not usually tell you HOW to fix a problem like your oil blowby. He will describe the symptoms to you. In your case, if the surveyor is a mechanic from the local Caterpillar dealer for example, he will probably be more than happy to furnish you with an estimate of the repair costs if you ask him. If your marine surveyor has chosen the engine surveyor, they will usually talk it over and give you a very realistic (sometimes brutal) assessment of the pros and cons. Usually your marine surveyor can make some estimates of the cost of all repairs or he may refer you to a boat yard for estimates. You need these INDEPENDENT estimates to negotiate. Don't take any broker's word for the cost to repair. If you commission the surveyor, then the resultant survey is yours exclusively and completely. Neither the brokers, nor the seller, have any rights to see it at all. You probably will want to use it as a negotiations lever to get a value returned for the deficiencies in the boat. So you might want the broker to temporarily have a copy because the broker will have to go back to the seller to try and get the lower price. But you can make it crystal clear that the broker is NOT to copy or distribute your survey and you want the broker's copy back. It's your property. Re: Governing bodies for brokers and surveyors. There are organizations that these folks may or may not belong to. And these organizations try to impose voluntary standards. So you can file a complaint with these organizations if you feel wronged. And these organizations may or may not impose sanctions, the most dramatic of which is expulsion from the organizations and perhaps some bad publicity. But that's about it. There is no legal reason why any expelled or discredited broker or surveyor cannot continue to do business. They do it all the time. There is no Bar Association or AMA that can legally prevent the practice of brokering for malfeasance. Your only legal recourse would be civil suit where you would have to prove intent. That's hard to do and expensive to pursue. If you are talking about a $150,000.00 purchase (or more) then pay your surveyor to be your representative. Even if it costs $5,000.00 over the course of several boats looked at, it's still a bargain if the surveyor is good. A good surveyor will do the work in stages so you don't waste money. He asks the hard questions on the phone so you don't waste time going to the potential boat if it's not right. Then he physically does a quick run-through at the dock to see if it's still as described and still a candidate. Then if it's still a contender he can do a more thorough survey. If it makes it that far then maybe you will want to join your surveyor for a quick sea-trial with an engine surveyor also aboard for a cursory evaluation of the engines. If it's still OK, then haul it out and do the below waterline and also a major engine survey if that is indicated. At any time you can abort the process based upon your surveyors recommendations. You don't even need to be there until sea trials time. There are some great surveyors out there. Sometimes they are not even officially "surveyors" but maybe the owners of a very good boat yard. Joe & Debbie Engel Marine Computer Services & JRE Consulting, Inc. MV Freda Fly - 40' Tollycraft Tri-cabin Portland, OR -----Original Message----- From: Priscilla Yonemura [mailto:pjy666@macconnect.com] Sent: Friday, November 27, 1998 9:34 AM To: trawler-world-list@samurai.com Cc: John Yonemura Subject: Brokers and Surveyors Responsibilities Hi, I have a question about the roles and responsibilities of both surveyors and brokers. <SNIP>