Looking to purchase Beneteau Oceanis 411

[Peter]

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I plan to make an offer on a Beneteau Oceanis 411. I will do a detailed personal inspection and if things look promising proceed to survey in and out of water plus sea trial. Can someone familiar with this model advise me what to pay special attention to? I don't want to incur the cost of survey and haul-out, if I am able to find significant deficiencies on my own. I'm particularly interested in serious problems that may be expensive to repair down the road. As background, we had been focusing on the Sabre's, but now believe the Beneteau will give us a lot more boat for the money. We plan to do mostly coastal cruising with a trip or two from Virgin Islands to the States. Thanks

Pete

[Mike Brown]

Pete, we own a B43 but are familiar enough with the 411 to tell you that they are nice boats and Beneteau sold quite a few of them. I'd suggest, if you haven't done so already, doing a search on some of the other sailing forums, such as "sailnet.com" and "beneteauowners.com" for any owners with a 411. I'd also consider using a surveyor and conducting a sea trial before making the purchase. Good luck.

Mike

[Peter]

Thanks Mike. We did follow all your advise and completed the sale of a 2001 Beneteau 411 (2 cabin/shoal draft) boat about a week or so ago. We are now busy doing a refit here in TX before sailing her to FL for the final outfitting. After that we plan to sail her to Puerto Rico.

Pete