Just purchased a 2005 Bayliner 175 about a month ago and I must say it seams to be a great deal so far.

I paid $11800.00 with dealer prep and shipping

I had a tough time deciding between the Stingray 17 ft bowrider and the Bayliner, in the end it came down to the great traditional layout of the bayliner and it's lifetime hull warranty.

The bayliner has back to back seating instead of one long bench seat and this makes the bayliner feel open and bigger inside than many simular boats.

The stingray had one long bench seat and a sun pad but this traps all the passengers in the front 2/3rds of the boat, it was like sitting in a small hatch back import car.

As for fit and finish the bayliner 175 is really just composed of 2 fiberglass shells (the Hull and the Upper deck) so virtualy everything is made up from those two pieces, so in other words there's not much finishing to be done.

The only thing I noticed is the little edge molding used on the boat to protect you from sharp fiberglass edges in the passenger compartment, should have been used under the front bow seat storage and wasn't.

Even though it's a pretty simple boat I've gotten lots of compliments from strangers on how nice the boat looks, and it's hard to beat the new boat smell for under 12k plus the galvenized trailer is a free upgrade.

As for performance (I was worried about the 135hp 4banger) but it's been great.

Last weekend I took the boat out twice once by myself and got the boat up to 45 MPH on the speedo (I know they're not very accurate) but here's the interesting part. I took the boat out the very next day fully loaded with people and it still reached 42 MPH it handled the extra weight great.

We are not small people by any means, me 230pnds, wife 240pnds, friend 330pnds, his wife 220 pnds, children 120pnds.

So we had the boat pretty close to max capacity and it still performed great, please note it did take longer to get on plane. I'm not saying it's a drag boat by any means but for a family runabout it does really well.

Now the bonus part I've had the boat out 2 times and I still have half a tank of gas! So in 2 trips I've only managed to burn 9 gallons of gas!! My previous boat (2 stroke) I'd have easily burnt through 20+ gallons of gas on the same trips.

A nice thing I noticed the other day the Bayliner has an EPA ratting of 3 stars for low emissions, and that's a good thing being as we all drink water and breath air.

All in all it's a nice no-frills boat that feels a lot more expensive than it cost.

Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 11800
Brand of Motor: Mercruiser
Primary Location of Use: Moving rivers
Primary Type of Use: All-around recreation