Frosty,
Good point, but there's merits of buying a boat or other things sight unseen. I've made my BEST deals that way. But, you have to know your stuff and figure out if the seller is honest.
Generally, I've had my best deal with sellers that had something with a known flaw that I could deal with... not cream puffs, but good solid stuff that can be fixed with a known quantity.
I'm still a bit of a novice with buying boats, on no 21, but mostly small, so I've seen most that I've purchased. One, I made a commitment to to buy based on a good friends recommendation. Killer deal.
I've purchased two aircraft totally unseen. One, I never met the owner, sent him a check and he left the key in the plane. Flew 600 miles, picked up then flew it 800 hours and sold it for $100 more than I paid. Another, I dickered with the guy over 4 months. Flew out to CA, gave the guy a check, he took me to the plane the next morning, checked me out, and I took off for the 2500 mile trip home. Put two new engines on and some other stuff and two years later sold it for more that all the money I put into it. Have tons of good airplane stories... but I pretty much know that stuff. Never got burned.
Now, I've had a few surprises with boats. I never realized how hard is was to deal with Volvo and paid the price and the down time.... great boat, but never again.... still sold it for what I paid, less commission.
Had a few boats that I beat the hell out of (learning) and sold for literally nothing. So much for boating costs.....
I'm shopping again, but bigger boat, and will operate it prior to purchase for sure.
Gut feeling, the market will soften once the Covid stuff is behind when people start to do other things. I may wait that long, or may not... depends on what I see out there. LOVE shopping! Like a kid in a candy store.