Alpa 8.25 Buyer's Guide
Shopping the brokerage market for an Alpa 8.25 means looking at a 1967–1983 Italian fiberglass sloop designed by Alan Buchanan, a 27-foot coastal cabin cruiser with a fin keel and skeg rudder. These are boats now decades old, and the ones that survive have usually been refitted by successive owners, so the condition of each individual hull matters more than the spec sheet. The standard boat carries a Volvo Penta 18 hp engine, a masthead sloop rig with 352 square feet of sail, and a layout of one cabin, one head, and five berths.
Layouts on the Used Market
The 8.25 was built to a standard configuration with a single cabin and five berths served by one head anchor. A buyer should expect the convertible-saloon sleeping arrangement that the berth count implies rather than a separate forward stateroom. The 8.52-foot beam and 27.08-foot length keep the interior compact, and the 33-gallon water and 22-gallon fuel tanks describe a boat set up for coastal nights at anchor, not long passages.
Equipment and Common Upgrades
Boats on the Italian market commonly carry hot water, an autopilot, and a life raft as fitted equipment. For a buyer, hot water speaks to a functioning pressurized system and likely a shore-power or engine-heat exchanger loop; an autopilot reduces solo or short-handed wheel time on a passage; a life raft indicates the owner prepared the boat for offshore or extended coastal use. None of these are structural, but their presence and service dates tell you how seriously the previous owner maintained the boat.
What to Inspect
The known construction is solid fiberglass hull and deck, so a buyer should look at the Volvo Penta 18 hp installation for corrosion at the mounts and wet exhaust softening, since an aged auxiliary is the most likely mechanical failure point on a boat of this vintage. Inspect the skeg-hung rudder bearing for play and the keel-to-hull joint for stray cracking, as these are the structural interfaces that suffer on a fin-keel sloop over decades of use.
Availability and Buyer's Takeaway
The Alpa 8.25 is typically found in Italy. A short checklist for viewing:
- Confirm the Volvo Penta 18 hp starts cold and holds temperature
- Test the skeg rudder for axial and lateral play
- Inspect the keel-to-hull joint for cracking
- Verify the autopilot and life raft are in date if fitted
- Check hot water system pressure at the tap
Price & volume trends
Monthly asking-price and listing-volume trends for the Alpa 8.25. 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. |
|---|---|---|---|
| May 26 | 1 | $12,164 | — |
Where they're listed
Alpa 8.25 listings appear across 1 country. Italy has the most listings with 1.
Country view
1 listings · 1 country| Country | Median ask | Listings · 12 mo | Active · 90 d | Share |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Italy | $12,164 | 1 | 0 | 100.0% |
Comparable models
Similar length, displacement, and era. Open a row to compare that model's market page.