Ranger 23 Buyer's Guide
Shopping a used Ranger 23 means looking at a Gary Mull-designed cruiser-racer built in Costa Mesa between 1971 and 1978, with 739 of them afloat. The boat’s small size and performance pedigree make it a candidate for a first serious small cruiser or club racer, but its age means every surviving example lives or dies by how its deck penetrations were maintained.
What to Inspect
The mast step is the first place to look. Built as a 6061-T6 aluminum fabrication bolted to the deck, it was meant to sit in flexible bedding that on many boats has since gone dry and brittle, letting water enter the bolt hole in the balsa-cored deck. Press around the step and smell for musty damp; softness in the surrounding deck suggests core invasion. The deck-stepped mast itself also means you cannot crank the stays up to racing tension without risking compression loss, so check the deck under the partners for crazing.
At the hull-deck joint, inspect the toerail line for staining and gently test the bolt heads; adhesive and bolt failures there are a known leak path. Chainplates should be pulled and the bedding renewed if it is older than a couple of years—many owners treat this as routine, and neglected ones weep into the lockers. Finally, examine the keel bolts from inside; some owners have seen leaks here, and Mull’s own remedy was a re-bed of keel and bolts with elastic compound to quiet hull-keel movement. A few hulls show dime-sized blisters, so a close bottom survey is warranted, though total bottom replacement is not a known class defect.
Availability and Buyer's Takeaway
These boats are found in the United States. A short pre-purchase checklist:
- Check the mast-step bedding for dryness and deck core softness.
- Test the hull-deck joint toerail bolts for leak stains.
- Pull and rebed chainplates if bedding is aged.
- Inspect keel bolts inside for signs of seepage.
- Survey the bottom closely for dime-sized blisters.
Price & volume trends
Monthly asking-price and listing-volume trends for the Ranger 23. The line shows the median ask each month; the bars show how many listings appeared.
Monthly breakdown · 1 row
| Month | Listings | Median ask | Δ vs. last mo. |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apr 25 | 1 | $5,000 | — |
Comparable models
Similar length, displacement, and era. Open a row to compare that model's market page.
Similar boats to compare
2 similar designs| Model | LOA | Median ask | Listings · 12 mo | Active · 90 d |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hunter Boats 23 | 23.25' | $ 7,750 | 19 | 14 |
| Ranger Ranger 265 | 25' | $ 20,396 | 13 | 4 |