Sea Ray 290 Sundancer Boats For Sale

The Sea Ray 290 Sundancer is an express cruiser measuring 29 feet 8 inches overall with a beam of 10 feet 2 inches, built for owners who want to cruise with friends by day and stay aboard overnight. A 1998 Sea Ray 290 Sundancer carries 130 gallons of gas, 45 gallons of fresh water, and roughly 15 gallons of holding capacity, with a generator, air conditioning and heat, microwave, refrigerator and stove making it livable at the dock or on the hook. Across the years it was offered, the layout supports sleeping up to six, so families and couples looking at a 290 Sundancer for sale by owner are usually weighing it as a weekend cruiser rather than a day boat.

Power on the 1998 boat is twin 5.7-liter EFI MerCruiser sterndrives rated at 260 horsepower each, fuel-injected engines that are common and well-supported. Later model years moved to lighter twin 4.3-liter MerCruisers, while some 2006 boats run twin 5.0 MerCruisers. Engine and generator hours vary widely on the used market: one well-kept 1998 example showed only about 109 hours on the motors against 352 on the generator, and a 2006 lake-kept boat in Kentucky carried just 349 engine hours with 33 generator hours. On a 2015-refit boat, the owner replaced the transom assemblies and fitted new Bravo C-Core drives, the kind of mechanical update worth confirming when shopping.

A meaningful difference between earlier and later 290 Sundancer boats is bow access. Through the late 1990s the boat used walk-around side decks up to the top cap, while in 2006 Sea Ray switched to a walk-through windshield, which is safer to use underway and freed up cabin volume below. Both setups pair with a 16-inch bow rail, a power windlass anchor controllable from the helm or the bow, and a sun pad forward. The helm carries a flip-up bolster for standing visibility, tilt wheel, and on 2006 boats Raymarine or Garmin electronics, a Ritchie compass and Mercury SmartCraft gauges.

The cockpit is a single-level layout with a full-back aft bench seat over storage, a companion seat, a port-side lounge, and a starboard wet bar with a refrigerator and small freezer. Sea Ray built drink coasters into the cushions and fitted a wood cockpit table that flips down to a smaller size when not needed. Canvas typically includes a bimini, an aft sunshade on some boats, a cockpit cover, and a full camper enclosure that zips and snaps around the boat. The large swim platform, transom storage trunk, shore-power hookup, ski tow eye and transom shower round out the aft end.

Below, the 290 Sundancer interior centers on a V-berth that converts with a drop-down table and filler cushion into a larger bed, with a curtain across the entry for privacy. The galley sits to starboard with a single-burner stove, microwave, refrigerator, solid-surface or Corian countertop and cherry wood cabinetry, and air conditioning controls. The head compartment is fully fiberglass-lined with a vacuum-flush toilet, sink, mirror and a full-length mirror on the door. The mid cabin is a genuine enclosed space with a privacy door rather than just a curtain, large enough to sleep two and often used for storage of the camper canvas and bedding.

When buying a Sea Ray 290 Sundancer, the common areas to budget for are cosmetic rather than structural: snap-out cockpit carpet runs around $800 to replace, dash panels around the gauges can be refreshed with cut vinyl, and factory-applied bottom paint on older boats benefits from a freshen-up. These remain solidly built cruisers, and a clean, well-equipped 1998 or 2006 example with low engine hours and a generator represents one of the better-value used express cruisers in the 29-foot class.