I have a friend with the Marlin rifle and it is, to me, a nice looking rifle. If I was looking for another rifle I'd certainly look at them. But the best even for the money you'll never get a right answer to until he goes out and look's them over for himself. I don't think he'll find a rifle that won't work well for him, most rifles are good rifle's. Unless he'll be shooting quite a bit, why spend more than he haws to on a rifle except, he need's to like it! That a personal thing.
Where he live's will make a difference too. I like my friends Marlin but have never seen one in any shop or store within about a hundred miles of here. if it were me I'd get him into a Bi Mart or Walmart and let him look over what they have. I wouldn't worry about 2nd hand rifles. I have a very old 30-06 that had to many corrosive primer's through it and the barrel is pitted pretty good but, you can't tell from the way it shoot's. My 25-06 and 308 were both bought 2nd hand, very good rifles, both of them. The 25-06 is a 700 ADL and the 308 a Rem 788. But he's gonna have to go look at what's there where he live's.
