Buying a plane versus renting

You bought on the wrong side of the depreciation curve. I bought my
Cherokee Six 9 years ago for $44.5K. It was appraised last fall for
$87K, and I've put about 1000 hours on it in the mean time. Granted,
I've put some money into it, including an unexpected engine overhaul
last year, but I would have spent over 2x what I've spent for
maintenance and upgrades renting a lesser airplane for the same hours,
plus would not have been able to go off for a week somewhere with the
plane. The airplane has far surpassed any of my market investments, and
it was never intended as an investment.

ArtP wrote:

I bought a 2002 Cirrus SR20 "C" for $226,000. I just sold it for
$145,000. It cost an additional $43,000 for insurance, hangar, and
maintenance. It was flown 250 hours (50 of that was to and from the
service center which was in a different state). You can do the math,
but bottom line it was the worst "investment" I ever made.

--
--Ray Andraka, P.E.
President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
401/884-7930 Fax 401/884-7950
email
http://www.andraka.com

"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little
temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-Benjamin Franklin, 1759