Re: sharing a boat and limiting liability
Never get a legal document off a website, unless you are a lawyer. You may as well do your own knee surgery.
I own a boat with my sister (it was our dad's) as well as another boat with 6 other families. ALso own a beach truck with 9 others (all members of a hunt/fish club). It works out, but I agree there is great potential for problems. And our stuff is right beat up from hard use. Here are a couple of things to consider, and agree on:
If someone damages the boat, he fixes it. But you have to let "wear and tear" go--the stuff that can happen to anyone. So don't share the boat if you are one of the anal types around who have to keep it looking new. Me, I've been around hard use on old boats for too long to be that way--and I think I have a lot more fun.
If there is a "happen to anybody" problem, you share the expense no questions asked. I had an oil system fail; we split the rebuild cost. Got water in the motor, we split the repower. If a stranger smacks the boat at a dock or beach and you can't get him to pay, you share it.
Decide who gets to use it. I like for the children to learn how to operate a boat. That will necessarily entail some mistakes. Will you let older children take it out by themselves? Friends? Other relatives? Children over a certain age (at our club there are 50 year old children and 80 year old members, so a "no children" rule is absurd)? There's no right or wrong, you just have to decide up front.
Avoid problems by getting a boat that handles hard use and cleans up easily--best is one that is already 'broken in."
Decide in advance how you will maintain it. Does it have to be washed and waxed after every use? (don't). Hosed off on a weekend with an annual cleaning? (do). If a little feature gets broken can you live with it? If not, you both have to be on the same page for whether you fix stuff back to brand new, or not. Do you buy top of the line extras (stereo, fish finder) bottom priced, or none at all?
Do you do your own work or pay someone? Do you both have the time? For me and my sister, I do all the work but I use it a whole lot more, so for us it balances. For someone else it would create big resentment.
Decide in advance how you will buy each other out, if one owner wants to sell and the other doesn't (which can happen if one person can't use it any more--moves out of the area, for example). The easiest is to say "blue book" without any subjective adjustments, or 80% of bluebook. It is not an investment it is a money pit.
So I wouldn't advise someone not to share a boat; I know lots of joint owners. But you have to go into it onthe same page, and be forgiving and tolerant afterwards. if that is not your personality, you probably don't have many friends who would want to share a boat with you anyway.
