On Fri, 25 May 2007 19:14:32 -0400, Kyle Boatright wrote:

Beyond the equity issue, there is something to be said for being able to
schedule the aircraft at your convenience and for the ability to maintain
and upgrade the aircraft to your standards.

This is why I like the "compromise" of a club where all members are
owners. It has the best of rental and ownership characteristics; in fact
it looks like a large partnership over multiple aircraft (or perhaps
multiple single-airplane partnerships).

The members/owners control issues like MX, upgrades, paint schemes, etc.
Scheduling is, in theory, more complex than with a single-owner aircraft.
But as the number of aircraft in the fleet goes up, this becomes less of
an issue.

And with multiple aircraft, the impact of any given aircraft being down
for MX drops.

It's not the perfect replacement for single-ownership. You have to adjust
the seats, and there are limits on scheduling (ie. you cannot keep an
aircraft at your vacation home for "the season"). But it's also cost
effective at under 300 hours/year (or whatever number is considered the
proper break-even point nowadays {8^).

The final benefit is that you're never making choices in a vacuum; there
are always older and more seasoned members of whom to seek advice. It's a
terrific way to learn about the care and feeding of aircraft from people
that are just as invested as yourself.


- Andrew
http://flyingclub.org/