Reliability and Clubs...

Larry Dighera wrote:

As long as you overlook the price differential between the per hour of
operation cost of owning vs renting, your recommendation is valid. One
generally gets more by paying more.

The price differential depends on a lot of factors Larry. I'm assuming
that you're implying owning is more expensive than renting. In many
(perhaps most) cases, I would agree, it's cheaper to rent. However, I
think it depending on what you fly, how much you fly, whether you own
outright or through a partnership, and whether you're willing to do some
of the maintenance.

I fly a '71 Arrow and co-own with two other guys. We do as much of our
own maintenance as we can. The local cost of renting a newer Arrow
(Arrow III, they don't say what year) is $151/hr. wet. I flew 170 hours
in my first year of ownership. Renting would have cost $25,670. I
spent way less than that in my first year of ownership (even after
dividing up an $8K bill three ways as a result of the required repairs
discovered at our first annual).

Will I always fly 170 hours per year? Probably not but I'm shooting for
more than 100/year. Will we continue to have really expensive repairs?
Hopefully not but time will tell. Will I always have two other
airplane partners? I sure hope so.

--
Jack Allison
PP-ASEL-Instrument Airplane

"To become a Jedi knight, you must master a single force. To become
a private pilot you must strive to master four of them"
- Rod Machado

(Remove the obvious from address to reply via e-mail)

On Sat, 26 Aug 2006 23:09:34 -0700, Jack Allison
wrote:
The price differential depends on a lot of factors Larry. I'm assuming
that you're implying owning is more expensive than renting. In many
(perhaps most) cases, I would agree, it's cheaper to rent.

Goes back to the old saying, "If it flies, floats, or ****s, it's
cheaper to rent than to buy"... Regardless though, if you want to own,
then you just put a higher value on the 'convenience factor' until the
numbers come out the way that you want them to come out... It doesn't
make them right, but you managed to 'justify' owning one of the above
three types of money pits...

On Sat, 26 Aug 2006 23:09:34 -0700, Jack Allison
wrote in
:

Will I always have two other airplane partners? I sure hope so.

Right. But Jay is the sole owner of his PA28. He pays more per hour
of operation, and enjoys increased utility for increased cost.

The financial advantages of coownership are undisputed (unless one of
your coowners crashes into a school bus full of children, and the
liability exceeds the value of your insurance policy). The fixed
costs (except engine overhaul) of aircraft ownership (hangar rent,
insurance, annual inspections, etc) become a smaller factor of hourly
operational cost in proportion to the total number of hours flown
monthly (more owners/operators means more hours flown) and depending
on how the ownership agreement is structured, those fixed costs may be
further reduced by their division among the coowners.

In article ,
Larry Dighera wrote:

Right. But Jay is the sole owner of his PA28. He pays more per hour
of operation, and enjoys increased utility for increased cost.

He also deducts a percentage of his ownership/operating costs as
business deductions on his income taxes.