Before You Sign

New A surveyor's guide Before You Shop Should You Own a Boat at All? Frank Pellerin45 pages · worksheets

Not ready to look at boats yet? Start here

Before You Shop

Should you own a boat at all? The guide for before you start shopping.

Before You Sign is for buyers with a shortlist. This one is for the step before that, when you're still asking whether a boat is right for you, and which one.

What a boat really costs a year, line by line, and per day you use her
Trawler, cruiser, motor yacht or Downeast, and the smallest size that does the job
Try before you own: charters, lessons, courses and clubs, with 2026 prices
The kitchen-table conversation, and planning the exit before you buy
The readiness scorecard: not yet, try first, or go

45 pages · 10 parts · three printable worksheets · instant PDF

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Instant PDF · today $14.99, was $29.99 · Secure checkout by Gumroad · 7-day money-back guarantee

Best valueBoth guides, Before You Shop and Before You Sign, $24.99 ~~$34.98~~ Get both · $24.99

ITEM 01

How it works

Three steps. Nothing to wait for.

You can be reading part one tonight and standing on a deck with it on Saturday.

Tap the price

One payment — $19.99 for the guide, or $24.99 for both guides — through Gumroad's secure checkout — card or PayPal. No subscription, nothing renews.

The download opens on the next screen

The guide and its three extras are there the moment the payment goes through. Read them on a phone, tablet or computer, or print them.

The link is in your inbox too

Gumroad emails the download link within a minute and keeps the files in your library, so you can download them again any time.

Digital PDF · nothing ships · one payment · 7-day refund

ITEM 02

The honest math

Shopping three boats, two ways.

The guide doesn't replace the survey on the boat you buy. It stops you paying for surveys on the two that were never going to pass.

The usual way — survey every boat you like

Survey three boats, two of them fail	$9,000–13,500
Trips to boats that never had a chance	3
Weeks lost to boats that were never going to pass	6–10
Spent finding one good boat	$9,000–13,500

With the guide — walk it first

The 30-minute walk-through on all three	3 × 30 min
Two ruled out before anyone books a survey day	$0
Full survey on the one that passed	$3,000–4,500
Kept in your pocket	$6,000–9,000

One boat ruled out before its survey day pays for the guide a hundred and fifty times over.A full survey day — hull, engine, haul-out — runs $3,000–4,500. The guide is $19.99.

What the walk-through is built to catch — 40-foot range

$8,000–30,000Wet deck core, re-core one section

$15,000–60,000+Stringer repair, engines out

$20,000–35,000Osmotic blistering — peel, dry, barrier coat

$120,000–220,000Repower, twin diesels, turnkey

Yard ranges and published rate cards, current for 2026. They move — sometimes by a factor of three — with region, yard rate and what turns up once work starts. The shape of the number, not a quote. Get three local bids.

ITEM 03

Look inside

Four pages, before you pay a cent.

Plain pages, written the way I'd talk you through it across a desk. Tap any page to see it larger.

Part one — the walk-throughThe part you can use tomorrow morning without reading anything else first.

Part two — the eleven placesEvery place water hides on a motor yacht, and what each one costs.

Part five — the reportSo you can tell a bargaining chip from noise when the findings arrive.

Part seven — the re-offerIncluding the re-offer letter, word for word.

Page layouts shown are set from the guide's own contents. Labelled by part.

ITEM 04

What's inside

Eleven parts. Each one ends a problem.

Written for trawlers, express cruisers, cabin cruisers and motor yachts — the boats people buy to retire onto. Work the parts that fit the boat in front of you and skip the rest.

64Pages

11Parts

53Checks

11Places water hides

Part one · 6 checks

The 30-minute walk-through

You're about to pay for a survey on a boat you could have ruled out yourself.

Sounding a deck with a plastic hammer
The four things that end the visit

Part two · 11 places

Where water hides on a motor yacht

Rot under the sole doesn't show on a viewing. It shows two seasons later.

Deck core, side decks, cabin sole
What each one costs to put right

Part three · 5 checks

Engines, hours and service records

Low hours look like a selling point. On a diesel they're a question.

Six signs the records were written last week
The gearbox check nobody does

Part four · 6 checks · New

Systems the hull survey skims

The hull passes, and then the generator, the air conditioning and the fuel tanks send the five-figure bills.

Shore power, generator, air, steering
Black iron tanks, hoses and teak decks

Part five · 4 checks

Reading a survey report

The report arrives and you can't tell routine wording from a warning.

What a surveyor won't put in writing
Hiring a surveyor who works for you

Part six · 4 defects

Blisters, delamination, rot, corrosion

You can't tell cosmetic from structural — or what either one costs.

Yard ranges for each, 2026
Bargaining chip, or reason to walk

Part seven · 5 moves

Negotiating off the survey

You have a findings list and no idea how to turn it into a number.

Ask for the repair, or the money
The re-offer letter, word for word

Part eight · 6 checks · New

Contract, title and closing

A good boat bought well can still go wrong in the paperwork.

Deposits, liens, documentation and sales tax
What to collect on closing day

Part nine · 3 checks

The questions insurers ask

Some hulls and ages are quietly being refused — people find out after they own one.

What underwriters want from a report
An indicative quote before you offer

Part ten · 3 checks

Buying at 65, selling at 70

Some boats lose half their value in three years. One day you'll want out.

The paperwork that makes a boat easy to sell
Buying one you can get out of

Part eleven · Worked case · New

One boat, start to finish

It's hard to see how the pieces fit together on a real deal.

$289,000 asking to $250,000 closed
Every number and every letter shown

ITEM 05

The offer

Everything you take to the boat.

One payment. No subscription. Yours to keep, and every future edition comes free.

A surveyor's guide Before You Sign The Used Boat Buyer's Survey Guide Frank Pellerin64 pages · 53 checks

What's included

Instant PDF download · read on any device or print it

The guide — eleven parts, 53 checks, 64 pagesThe walk-through, the eleven places water hides, engines and records, the systems the survey skims, reading a survey, the four defects and what they cost, negotiation, contract and closing, insurers, resale, and one purchase worked start to finish.
The dockside inspection checklistOne page, printable, in the order you actually walk a boat.
The sea-trial checklistWhat to insist on before you leave the dock.
The survey-report decoderTwo pages of surveyor's phrases, in plain English.
Every future revisionNew editions free, in the same place you downloaded the first.

Launch price

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Save $20.00 today $19.99

Secure checkout by Gumroad
Visa · Mastercard · PayPal
7-day money-back guarantee

Seven days. No argument, no form to fill in.

If the guide isn't for you, open your Gumroad receipt and ask for a refund inside seven days. One line is enough — you don't owe me a reason. The guarantee covers the guide, not the boat: nothing in here replaces commissioning a survey on the vessel you actually buy.

ITEM 06

The second guide

Not sure you want a boat at all?

Start here. Before You Shop is for the decision before the boat: what owning one really costs, which kind and size suits you, and how to try it first.

A surveyor's guide Before You Shop Should You Own a Boat at All? Frank Pellerin45 pages · worksheets

What's included

Instant PDF download · read on any device or print it

What a boat really costs, per year and per dayA full year for a $200,000 forty-foot trawler, line by line: slip, insurance, haul-out, fuel, maintenance, depreciation.
Which kind of boat, and what sizeTrawler, express cruiser, motor yacht or Downeast — matched to the days you'll really have, and whether the two of you can handle her.
Try before you ownCharters, lessons, courses and clubs, with 2026 prices, and a one-year trial plan.
The kitchen-table conversation, and the exitEight questions for the partner who's less sure, and what selling costs before you buy.
The readiness scorecard and three worksheetsTwelve questions that say not yet, try first, or go. Plus the annual cost sheet and a trial-year log, printable.

Launch price

$29.99$14.9950% OFF

Save $15.00 today $14.99

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7-day money-back guarantee

The bundle · both guides

From "should we?" to "sold."

Decide whether a boat is right for you, then buy the right one without getting burned.

Before You Shop — 45 pages, with worksheets
Before You Sign — 64 pages, 53 checks
Dockside & sea-trial checklists and the report decoder
Every future revision of both, free

Both guides

$34.98$24.99

Save $9.99 vs. buying both $24.99

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One payment · both PDFs instantly
7-day money-back guarantee

Frank Pellerin at a workshop bench in a boat shed, with cut-out hull core samples, a moisture meter, a sounding hammer and calipers; a hull sits on stands behind him.

In the shed, with core samples cut out of a hull. Boatyard mechanic in the seventies, accredited surveyor from 1990, retired 2024.

ITEM 07

Who wrote it

I was the man paid to find the reason not to buy.

I started in a boatyard in the seventies with my hands on engines, and I became a surveyor in 1990. For thirty-four years I inspected boats for the people about to buy them, the banks about to lend on them and the insurers about to cover them. Trawlers, sport-fish, express cruisers, motor yachts up to eighty feet. Somewhere north of four thousand hulls.

I testified twice in lawsuits over hull damage a seller knew about and didn't disclose. I told buyers to walk away from boats they had already named. I retired in 2024, when my knees stopped letting me crawl bilges, and I keep a thirty-four-foot trawler I bought at a bank auction for a third of what she was worth — because I knew what to look at.

I'm not selling you a boat. I get no commission and I don't care which one you buy. That's the whole reason this is worth reading.

Do the hard looking first. Fall in love second.— Frank Pellerin

ITEM 08

Questions

Answered honestly.

What buyers ask before they click — and the straight answer to each.

Is this a printed book?

No. It's an instant digital download — a PDF. The moment you pay you get a link. Read it on a phone, a tablet or a computer, or print the whole thing on any home printer. Nothing arrives in the post.

Does this replace paying for a survey?

No, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. On a boat you're serious about, you hire a surveyor. What this does is stop you paying for surveys on boats that were never going to pass — and make the survey you do commission worth far more, because you'll understand the report and know what to do with it.

I don't know anything about boats. Is it for me?

That's exactly who it's written for. Every term is explained once, plainly, the first time it appears. You don't need to know what a stringer is before you start — you will by page nine. If you can hold a plastic hammer and follow a list, you can do everything in part one.

What's the difference between the two guides?

Before You Shop is for before you've decided: what a boat really costs each year, which kind and size suits how you'll use it, how to try it first, and the questions to settle at home. Before You Sign is for when you have a shortlist: walking a boat, reading the survey, negotiating and closing. Most people should read them in that order, which is why they come as a bundle.

Is there a subscription?

No. One payment, and nothing renews. Future revisions of the guide come to you free, in the same place you downloaded the first one.

What if I lose the file?

Checkout is through Gumroad. It emails your download link immediately and keeps the files in your Gumroad library, so if a link ever fails you can download them again.

I'm looking at a boat this week. Is it too late?

No. Start with part one, the 30-minute walk-through, and the dockside checklist. That's the part you can use tomorrow morning without reading anything else first.

What's the refund?

Seven days. Open your Gumroad receipt and ask — one line is enough, you don't owe a reason, and there's no form to fill in. The money goes back to the card you paid with.

What do I need to read it?

Anything that opens a PDF — a phone, a tablet or a computer. The checklists are made to print on a home printer and go in your back pocket.

Is it for sailboats?

It's written for powerboats — trawlers, express cruisers, cabin cruisers and motor yachts. Roughly two-thirds of it (deck core, hull structure, water intrusion, survey reports, negotiation, insurance, resale) applies to any fibreglass boat. The engine and systems chapters are diesel-powerboat specific.

I already have a boat under contract. Anything in it for me?

Parts five to eight of Before You Sign. Reading the survey report, knowing the real repair ranges, turning a findings list into a number, and closing cleanly are the things that decide what that contract ends up costing you.

I bought the first edition. Do I get the new one?

Yes, free. The second edition of Before You Sign is in your Gumroad library, at the same link you downloaded the first from.

Are the repair figures right for where I live?

They're ranges, not quotes — from thirty-odd years of yard work and estimates, updated for 2026, and they move with region, yard rate and vessel. Use them to know whether you're looking at a four-figure problem or a five-figure one.

Give me thirty minutes on the boat. I'll save you a survey on the wrong one.

Before You Shop

Three steps. Nothing to wait for.

Tap the price

The download opens on the next screen

The link is in your inbox too

Shopping three boats, two ways.

The usual way — survey every boat you like

With the guide — walk it first

What the walk-through is built to catch — 40-foot range

Four pages, before you pay a cent.

The 30-minute walk-through

Where water hides

Reading a survey report

Negotiating off the survey

Eleven parts. Each one ends a problem.

The 30-minute walk-through

Where water hides on a motor yacht

Engines, hours and service records

Systems the hull survey skims

Reading a survey report

Blisters, delamination, rot, corrosion

Negotiating off the survey

Contract, title and closing

The questions insurers ask

Buying at 65, selling at 70

One boat, start to finish

Everything you take to the boat.

What's included

Seven days. No argument, no form to fill in.

Not sure you want a boat at all?

What's included

From "should we?" to "sold."

I was the man paid to find the reason not to buy.

Answered honestly.

Walk the boat before you sign for it.

The boat will still be there on Saturday.