price check/ engine hours question

[Mr.O]

I'm thinking about a 1999 supersport Vdrive with almost 500 hours for $25 000. the boat has tower, ballast, and not sure what else. my NADA check came in at $22 000 to $25 000. would this number of hours put the boat at the low end of the NADA? i sure as **** hope so.
i put on almost 100 hours a year. i hope i will keep this boat for a long time, but if i had to sell in lets say 5 years, i would have 1000 hours and no one would want to touch the boat. so, i'm trying to factor in the huge discount i'll have to give if i had to sell in 5 years.
i know there are all kinds of stories about people having several thousand hours on their machines 'without needing a rebuild'. but if you're wakeboarding with a few people and ballast, i'm sure theres a point much sooner than 2000 hours where the lower compression will become an issue. do v'drives have the same reliability claims as the motors themselves?

thanks for any advice

[2gofaster]

RE: price check/ engine hours question

Well, I would say that 500 hours on a 9(almost 10) year old boat is not much. NADA values don't consider hours, only condition.

Engine hours on boats is a non issue as far as I'm concerned. Even if you figured a 30mph average speed, that'd only be 15000 car miles. Factor in 2x mileage due to a boat running cooler(which is harder on an engine) and you're still at only 30,000 comparable miles on an engine. So at 2000engine hours, you'd be looking at 120,000 comparable car miles. If you have low compression at that amount of hours, then you've not taken care of the engine.

The V drive is much more prone to breakdown than the engine will be.

[tadelfio]

RE: price check/ engine hours question

I agree totally with Shane. Condition is far more important than hours. And hours is not considered in NADA values. I've posted a couple of other times regarding the accuracy of hour meters. IMO never trust an hour meter.