killbilly
Vocals, Lyrics, Triangle, Washboard, Kittens
My club just raised the rates a bit. I believe we're fast approaching the point where my rental rate per hour could exceed the overall costs per hour to own, so I'm looking harder at ownership lately.
My needs are pretty simple. I want a decent, reliable, piston single that is IFR certified. Ideally, I'd like a 4-seater, and I'd like to spend less than $40K on one. There's a bunch of 172s, Cherokees and Grummans out there. I'd love a Cardinal but I think they're out of my price range.
I'd probably only keep the airplane for 300-500 hours, possibly more, to complete my ratings up through CFII, and just rent a complex for the Comm. portion. At that point, I'd probably sell it, or possibly re-invest in it to freelance CFI on the side. That's a long way off, though.
I've been doing lots of reading on the AOPA website about ownership and taxes and things like that, and I'm getting a rough idea what the costs are. I have some questions now for the forum:
1) Do any of you have a spreadsheet that you've used to track ownership costs and reserves? Are there any escrow services that can be used for cash reserves on the airplane?
2) Is there a resource that can give me ballpark costs on common repairs, like radios, transponders, vacuum pumps, brakes, etc?
3) Are there any models that fit the bill that I'd want to stay away from? For example - I found a couple Bellanca Super Vikings for sale which were nice and reasonably priced (and complex, no less) but I believe they are partial-fabric airplanes...I don't know anything about the costs involved with those and I'd be concerned about it. Plus, parts availability for a less-common airplane like that frightens me a bit.
I don't know yet if I can afford to own a plane like this for training or not. I've thought about going WAY cheap and picking up a 152, but I'd really like to have better cargo capacity and IFR so I can get the most out of the airplane.
Thoughts?
My needs are pretty simple. I want a decent, reliable, piston single that is IFR certified. Ideally, I'd like a 4-seater, and I'd like to spend less than $40K on one. There's a bunch of 172s, Cherokees and Grummans out there. I'd love a Cardinal but I think they're out of my price range.
I'd probably only keep the airplane for 300-500 hours, possibly more, to complete my ratings up through CFII, and just rent a complex for the Comm. portion. At that point, I'd probably sell it, or possibly re-invest in it to freelance CFI on the side. That's a long way off, though.
I've been doing lots of reading on the AOPA website about ownership and taxes and things like that, and I'm getting a rough idea what the costs are. I have some questions now for the forum:
1) Do any of you have a spreadsheet that you've used to track ownership costs and reserves? Are there any escrow services that can be used for cash reserves on the airplane?
2) Is there a resource that can give me ballpark costs on common repairs, like radios, transponders, vacuum pumps, brakes, etc?
3) Are there any models that fit the bill that I'd want to stay away from? For example - I found a couple Bellanca Super Vikings for sale which were nice and reasonably priced (and complex, no less) but I believe they are partial-fabric airplanes...I don't know anything about the costs involved with those and I'd be concerned about it. Plus, parts availability for a less-common airplane like that frightens me a bit.
I don't know yet if I can afford to own a plane like this for training or not. I've thought about going WAY cheap and picking up a 152, but I'd really like to have better cargo capacity and IFR so I can get the most out of the airplane.
Thoughts?