Typical glider depreciation?

David Reitter wrote:
All, thanks for your replies.

I should clarify that this is about depreciation for valuation and
price calculation in our club and not for tax purposes.

What I am trying to come up with is a tariff for our club gliders.
The goal is to charge enough in glider rental to maintain the assets
of the club. Conceivably, this would mean not just to keep a fleet in
the air, but to replace gliders as they age so we have reasonably
recent gliders to fly. Depreciation may be a major component. How do
other clubs deal with such issues?

(To give more of a background: The club in question currently has a
Schweizer 2-33 as training glider, and then a 1-26, a Pilatus B4 and a
Grob 102 Astir, and a Piper Super Cub. I think this is somewhat
typical for a number of smaller clubs in the US, and worth
discussing. While I love the club and enjoy flying there, you will
probably all agree with me that a reasonable forward-looking plan has
to include an update of the fleet. That is why I'd like to figure
out reasonable rental charges for those a/c, but also for potential
upgrades.)



How long is a piece of string? You already had some great answers,
especially by Eric.

If depreciation worries you take some best guess stabs - including 0%
and 100% and run some numbers. But you have to stop fixating on this
highly variable and unpredictable number. If you want to sell some of
the current fleet you can guesstimate their value from recent ads.

More important things are likely raising money now for a new shiny
glider, recruiting new members, getting those members flying and
retaining them, recruiting/retaining good instructors and tow pilots,
getting club gliders and members to fly XC, encouraging members to
purchase private gliders, equipping club gliders for XC (pee tubes,
electronic varios, flight recorders, flight computers/PDAs etc.),
equipping gliders and tow planes with radios and PowerFLARM, paying
insurance, misc. repairs, glider refinishes, running the tow plane, tow
plane engine replacement etc., building/tie down/property costs,.... a
lot of stuff to actually think about there and much of which affects
hard cash flow now and is more useful than trying to worry about
something that is not possible to accurately answer.

Have you already raised the money to purchase the shiny glider, trailer
etc.


Darryl