hello, 1990 arriva 2001 info, opinions please?

[meandmyz]

hello everyone...new here....and new to boat ownership....I am looking at a 1990 bayliner arriva 2001 with evinrude xp 150 on it for 1500....I grew up fishing with my dad in a 14 ft aluminum and then a 89 bayliner 2155 Cierra since about 13...now 35....this boat looks to be faded, hull looks to be pretty decent with a few good scratches but could be easily fixed, from what I remember with patching my dads gel coat...but I am looking to know what else to look for in this boat...I read about potential floor and transom issues and will try to look at that as best as possible, but is there anything else I should check into?? also I plan on doing a compression check on all cyl...I am a 2 stroke fan (sleds, love my 99 mxz 670 ho th) but what else should I look for, says it runs good and is gonna fire it up with muffs on for me, but I am a newb when it comes to ownership....so any advice and info would be great before I make my potential first boat purchase....I am a family of 4 with two boys 10, and 3 and hoping this will get us out on the water....I live in the middle of great lakes on st. Mary's river and wondering how this boat can handle waves as it looks pretty shallow, I don't plan on being out on superior much at all but might see myself in a 2-3 ft chop once or twice....hopefully not though

also the two captains chairs and rear curved bench seat are in rough shape too but he claims he got a quote of 400 to get everything re done....don't know what a value is on these in avg shape, as I have never seen one before
thanks everyone for any ideas, advice, opinions, and help that they can offer....
cheers

 

[meandmyz]

so I geuss these are a pretty rare boat, well I used my mechanical experience in checking this thing out and with the help of the sticky on this forum, a few red flags, one being the ski locker full of water, two the rot of the floor right behind it, three, all the little gel coat patches that were horribly done....I grew up on water and around boats and remember helping my dad patching gel coat holes, from our downrigger balls meeting the hull....after I saw a few things that made me want to walk away I went to the motor and noticed the chipped up prop, bents, broken skeg, and broken tri plate, and the too short brand new steering cable laying underneath the seats cuz it was too short to be run in the proper spot.....1 thing I learned from this site is to expect the worst so I read other post about rebuilding the stringes, and floor of these things, I know I should be walking away from this boat but I absolutely fell in love with the lines of it.....this thingis no way worth the 1500 offer he accepted, and no where near passed the conditional expectations, but I am still thinkin of offering 500, and go up to 750....if he counters....I figure the motor and controls are worth that worse case scenario....here are some of the pics I took, and hopefully someone can give me their opinion on this thing before I potentially get myself in deep with the wife on making this purchase...cheers!

 

[WIMUSKY]

Being a new boat owner do you really want to do a complete rebuild? Looks like that poor boat has been abused most of its life.... There would be a ton of work getting it back in shape. Best part is the trailer looks to be in good shape and it's an Evinrude(providing there are no major issues. Skeg can be fixed, tab can be replaced.) not a Force.

That's what is attractive about Bayliners, they have nice lines and are cheaper to buy when new, but are poorly constructed. I've heard they had some good years. But, this one appears to be a mess.....

 

[meandmyz]

don't really want to do a full rebuild, but figure it might be worth it if I get it for the right price, even if I spend a year to do it, I usually have to rebuild most of my toys(cars,sleds, quads, pwc, bobber....my moto is build'em to break'em) a few times during my ownership so I figure why not a boat too...I am looking to get rid of my toys as life is leading down family path for a few years....worst case scenario I can throw motor on gv17tc Grumman that I can grab for 500 that is sitting at my cousins cuz had a black max on it and it got sold off of it cuz was too thirsty...or operator liked to go fast...so I have outs if I can get boat for a good deal.....