Boat visits in Croatia- Scam Alert!

We took a trip to Croatia to visit the last two boats on our list before making our grand final decision.

But it didn't turn out the way we wanted.

We were supposed to visit the Bavaria 41 Exclusive of my dreams and an Oceanis Clipper 411. 

Unfortunately, we ended up only visiting one of them.

NVP Marine, legit?

We saw this boat listed on several websites, promoted through multiple brokers in Cuneo, Italy, in Croatia, and in Montenegro via NVP Marine.

We reached out to all of them, but only NVP Marine, a certain Evgen, replied. 

Everything listed below is full of red flags, but since it's my dream boat, we tried to dig into it for weeks.

So, we corresponded with NVP Marine:

1-Strange email: He replied through a weird email "workautbox777@gmail.com", which immediately raised a red flag.
I thought his name was Jonny, but it’s actually Evgen K.

2-Annoyed by questions: He seemed annoyed by all my questions regarding the age of each sail, the refit work done on the engine, etc. Apparently, I asked "too many questions", and his client was reluctant to answer. However, he eventually replied to some of them.

3-Agreement: Right away, he sent me an agreement to pay a deposit when visiting the boat. The agreement asked for private information like full name and passport number, but nowhere did it state the name of his company.
I told him I wouldn’t sign any agreement until I saw the boat.
I would recommend you check agreements with AI like ChatGPT for an unbiased point of view (which I did).

4-No address or registration number: 

This company doesn't have a proper address, no website, and no company registration information.

5-No proof of VAT paid: 
The boat is sold as VAT paid, but the client had no proof of this. Although it was a Croatian-flagged boat turned into a German-flagged one (current owner), where such proof should have been recorded during the flag change.
He mentioned going to the "Capitania" to get the proofs when we visit (not sure if it's even possible).
He also said if the VAT wasn't paid, the client would cover it, which we would include in the agreement.

6-Phone calls: 
We had several calls with him discussing the boat. He has a Russian accent and doesn't really answer questions directly, but he keeps talking. We were somewhat reassured to have a real person on the other line, so we continued.

7-Video Visit: He was in Croatia and sent us videos of the boat, which looked great, so we decided to set up a visit.
Here's where things went south.

8-Mysterious Port:
We booked our tickets to Croatia for two days to visit the two boats after agreeing on a date with Evgen.
It wasn't cheap, showing our commitment.
I started checking car rentals and hotels, but Evgen refused to reveal the location of the boat!
This made it impossible to book hotels, knowing the boat was an hour from Split (where we were landing).

9-Biggest red flags:
 -  Passports:  He asked for our flight ticket proofs (which I provided), but also wanted copies of our passports (which I did not provide).

   - Hotel: Since he wouldn't disclose the hotel name, he offered to arrange accommodation for us, which I politely declined, citing that I didn’t know him.

   - Cash: He insisted we bring cash (10% of the boat's price) for the visit, which we had never heard of before. Why bring cash before seeing the boat?

10-Video call: 
The day before our flight, he asked us to pay for his trip from Montenegro to Croatia to prove our seriousness.

11-Final blow: 
The day before our flight, he sends this below message, saying that he wants us to pay for his trip from Montenegro to Croatia to prove we were serious!

I didn't even bother to respond to his message...

Oceanis Clipper 411

We finally visited this boat in Milna, it was in an island. 

We finally visited this boat in Milna on an island. The photos from the owner were quite different from what we saw in person, and it had been used as a charter boat without prior mention. We didn't pursue it further.

But we managed to enjoy a nice weekend in Croatia before Valentine's Day! The Plitvice Lakes were wonderful!!

Our photos here on Polarsteps