AutoTrader Find of the Week: The 1986 Lamborghini Jalpa is an Important Supercar

Lamborghini is crushing it.

The Italian automaker ended 2023 with its most profitable year ever, delivering more than 10,000 vehicles globally — a 12.1 per cent increase in sales. It broke that record again in 2024, and while total deliveries rose by only a handful of units, revenue still jumped 16.2 per cent. As of the second quarter of 2025, Lamborghini was on track to do it all over again, with sales up two per cent year over year.

Long gone are the days of “they lose money on every car that leaves the factory.” Today, Lamborghini boasts a healthy overall profit margin of 26.6 per cent.

Why all the boring finance bro math talk?

Because there was a time — more like several decades — when Lamborghini struggled to turn a profit. In its first 50 years, the brand sold an average of just 500 vehicles per year, with some estimates dipping below 100 units in particularly rough stretches. You could argue that’s because Lamborghini is best known for building fire-breathing monsters aimed only at the bravest drivers, with price tags far out of reach for even the average white-collar professional. The Miura, Countach, and Diablo all come to mind.

But the truth is, that wasn’t exactly how Lamborghini wanted it to be. Over the years, the company repeatedly tried to build a more accessible, mass-market-friendly car in hopes of shifting more units. The Jalpa (pronounced “Yahl-pa”), produced from 1981 to 1988, was one of those attempts.

Enter this pristine 1986 model offered for sale on AutoTrader through Marianetti Motors in Vaughan, Ont.

This little Lambo is only showing a mere 33,800 original kilometres on the dash, and it has received regular service by exotic experts Engineered Automotive to maintain its time capsule-like status.

Recent work includes repairs to the cooling, fuel and ignition systems, a new battery, and wiring restoration — basically a greatest-hits list of mechanical upkeep that’s kept the car reliably road-ready and, crucially, feeling much like it would have in 1986. (There’s a modern stereo head unit in there now, but we can forgive that.)

Mounted behind the driver is a 3.5-litre V8 producing 250 hp and 230 lb-ft of torque, paired with a five-speed manual transmission and a glorious gated shifter. All of that was enough to send the Jalpa from zero to 100 km/h in around six seconds.

Hardly what we’d expect from a modern Lamborghini, but in the context of 1986, the Jalpa was a very respectable performer. It could theoretically outrun a Buick Grand National in a drag race, as well as its chief rival, the Ferrari 308 — over which it enjoyed a cheeky 10-horsepower advantage in North American markets. Car magazines of the era praised the Jalpa as a rowdy but legitimate entry, especially considering its asking price was roughly half that of its Countach big brother.

In 1986, the Jalpa carried an MSRP of US$57,850, about US$171,000 in 2025 dollars. The Countach, meanwhile, commanded closer to US$105,000 at the time, roughly US$310,000 today.

And yet, between 1982 and 1988, Lamborghini managed to sell just 410 Jalpas. By comparison, more than 900 Countachs were delivered during that same period, followed by another 650-plus examples of the 25th Anniversary edition from 1988 to 1990.

Despite sharing much of the Countach’s design language, being a relative bargain, and even making a cameo in Rocky IV (arguably the most ’80s movie of all time), the market for the Jalpa simply didn’t exist. That was true even though, unlike its predecessors — the Urraco and Silhouette — the Jalpa was readily available in North America.

The good news? Today, the Jalpa may be the rarest, most collectible, and possibly most desirable Lamborghini you can buy for roughly the price of a new Chevrolet Corvette.

Options were limited, but this example was ordered without the Countach-style rear wing. The original buyer did, however, tick the box for black contrast stitching on the cream interior.

Production records for the Jalpa are spotty at best, but independent public registries suggest roughly one in 10 were finished in Nero black, and very, very few were specified with a cream interior.

So, is this a one-of-one Jalpa? No. But good luck finding another one just like it.

While it may have been overlooked in its day, the Jalpa ultimately got the last laugh. Its DNA lives on in the Gallardo, Huracan, and upcoming Temerario.

And actually, it was the Gallardo that finally cracked “mass” sales success for Lamborghini. Today, the Urus SUV accounts for roughly two-thirds of the brand’s sales and is the true runaway hit. But before the Urus, the Gallardo did the heavy lifting, selling more than 14,000 units over its production run — the first Lamborghini model to come anywhere close to those numbers.

In many ways, it saved and revitalized the company, guiding Lamborghini into an era where more buyers were willing to take a chance on the brand.

Had Lamborghini continued as just the “Countach company,” there’s a very real chance it wouldn’t exist today. And while it may have been a little ahead of its time, ideas like the Jalpa — a more approachable car that still fully encapsulated the brand’s spirit — ultimately defined the way forward for the world’s most outrageous automaker.