All,
Many of you have been directing me on some outboard title issues I
have been handling with some of my dads previous possessions. Recently
I have had some movement and progress and I have gotten one of the
motors already titled in my name as well as one that I think I can
settle after speaking to the chief ODNR Watercraft personel in our
area.

This next one I am a little unsure on how to proceed;

About 11 yrs ago, I purchased a boat (Lonestar 14ft) for my dad from a
neighbor. The neighbor still lives across the street. Anyways the
neighbor originally 11yrs ago gave me a registration tag from Michigan
where he had the boat registered. I guess he has a cabin up in
Michigan. Anyways during these past 11 yrs my dad nor I have tried to
title this boat in our names as it never saw water. It has been
sitting in the side lot of our yard all this time under a boat tarp/
canvas. As I am now cleaning things, I have cleaned out and garaged
this little boat. I also began to try and title everything that is
watercraft and I came to this title/registration for this boat. The
local title bureau refused to title the boat as I had only the
registration and they mainly complained about the age of the
certificate from Michigan that was given to us by the previous owner
11 yrs ago. Anyways I had the neighbor go to Michigan and get me a
newer title and asked him to sign it off.

I come home today, after attending my Ohio boating operating course,
which by the way I passed , my wife said the neighbor stopped by
and dropped off some of the title stuff. I look at the title
information and its a bill of sale from the Michigan Secretary of
State. It was not notarized or signed by anybody other then the
previous owner of the boat. My question is does this seem reasonable?
My wife said he said they do\did not issue titles for the size/age of
that boat and they gave him this paper.

Here is a link I found mentioning Michigan laws;
http://www.dmv.org/mi-michigan/boat-registration.php

Doesn't something have to be notarized?

This just seems odd to me, after all the stuff I have been through on
the outboards that a simple Bll of Sale is going to accomplish a title
for me in Ohio of this boat.

Anybody have any input?

Anybody been through this before?

Is there a way to tell year based on HIN or some other way on this
Lonestar. It does not say anything about year of make/model.

Again thanks for the help,
Chris