The amount of obvious confusion in this thread regarding Seawinds is surprising.
Number #1....If you can find a Seawind for $10,000 that is not an absolute basket-case...snap it up!!! Seawinds are worth far more than that.
I really had to laugh at the one commenter that suggested you'll never get your money and intimated that it would be an upside-down investment.
NEVER, EVER buy a boat as a financial investment. That is ludicrous. You don't buy and equip a boat for offshore use with an eye to what you'd get for it if you ever sell it any more than you'd raise a child with an eye to what his/her net material worth would be in 30 years. I find that type of thinking myopic and almost offensive.
When the surveyor (a very knowledgable, experienced blue-water boat specialist) looked over my 1963 Seawind ketch, he gave it a replacement value of $145,000. Granted that is not "market-value", but instead, the amount it would cost to build a boat of similar quality and workmanship today...he also stated that was a very conservative amount, noting the sales prices of inferior vessels such as Catalinas and Hunters.
Seawinds are extremely robustly made....I've tested out that robustness many times now. To compare it with what 30 foot clorox-bottles are going for is merely specious and shows a lack of consideration as to the build quality of the hull, deck and house.
Many boats built in the sixties were built with end-grain balsa deck core. As stuff like Air-X and keflex(sp), and other high-end closed-cell foam core didn't exist at that time, end-grain balsa was the best you could get back then. But anytime you have balsa-core, you have to properly re-bed all deck fittings religiously....do that, and balsa will last a LONG time. Don't do that and the balsa will soak.
Note that there is a difference in interior layout between a small 30 foot or less offshore boat and a 30 foot coastal cruiser...as looking at any Catalina 30 would show you - they are HUGE down below. But huge down below is NOT a good thing in 20 foot seas.
For reasons I cannot fathom, Allied Seawinds have always had ridiculously LOW used market prices. Far too low for their quality and type of UN-modified full-keel offshore hull with beautiful sailing characteristics.
I think they remain low beacuse people now expect sailboats to be more like Catalina, Hunter, Benetau floating Winnebagos, albeit fairly fast, with big wide interiors and swivel seats down below. Sad. Thomas Gillmer designed the Seawind as an offshore boat that would and could take you anywhere in the world. That is the Seawind's primary directive. Too compare them to a clorox-boat just because they share the same set of build-years is like I said...specious and shortsighted.
One thing....Seawinds were essentially a product of the sixties and seventies...and as such they have one drawback: Formica!!!!!! Get rid of that horrible Formica counter-top and table-top and you'll be good to go!
I replaced the Formica countertops on mine with cobalt blue tile and replaced the table formica with an antique world chart under about 20 coats of clear epoxy...and put in maple and ash veneer in the fore-cabin and chain-locker access hatch, and put copper sheeting for the galley surrounds. Interior looks really nice now...like the cabin on an old pilot schooner.
The point is Seawinds are worth FAR more than their market-value, as long as they are well maintained with forethought. I would put them in the same build-quality and ruggedness category as Cape George, or Ingrid or Bristol Channel Cutter (without the custom cabin-roof, though)...and so as far as current selling prices, they present an awfully good deal for one wanting a small ketch to comfortably cross oceans, and one that also sails the bay like a dream.