Has anyone done this?

[wouldulikefrieswiththat]

and succeeded?

I'm fairly short on hours although I am confident that with effort I could land another job somewhere west or north. However, I do have reasons to stay in Brisbane, for the time being at least, and have come up with a crazy idea involving buying my own twin. I would like to fly it for anywhere between 200 and 500 hours of command time and then maybe sell it off if that is the right thing to do at the time. First and foremost it would be fun to own my own twin and get to fly whenever I feel like it, but also hopefully this might give me a running start at a twin gig somewhere around the country.

So the upside would be the 200 to 500 hours of twin command time however a downside might include that this time is not "commercial exposure". Would this really matter as I would have experience at running my own aircraft?

Has anyone else gone down this path?
Any hints or tips / pro or cons to consider?

Am I stupid? Can it work?


In addition
I'm thinking ... has to be affordable (of course) and have good resale probability. Possibly something like a twin comanche or seneca. With good hours to run on both engines and props. Not sure whether it would be wise to have it run online with a flying school to help subsidise a little?

It is only a "thought" at the moment

Any help from anyone ... much appreciated :D

[tinpis]

After you have shaken the hands of the nice aircraft saleman types in Queensland be sure to count your fingers.....:uhoh:

No....if you are serious , get in touch with Bob Douglas on the gold Coast he may be able to help.
That is if he hasnt become a pro golfer. :hmm:

[gaunty]

yer what tinny said

As gently as I can lad it's like this.;)

Am I stupid yes it's cheaper to hire the same for the same number of hours.

Has anyone else gone down this path? yes and down the gurgler with it.

It is only a "thought" at the moment have a Bex, a nice cup of tea and a lay down until the feeling goes away.

Now if you have plenty of money and can afford to shoot it up on your hobby by all means go ahead, you will need lots of it (close to $200,000) and a great deal of determination to rack up 500 hrs "command time" just tooling around.

Whether it wil get you closer to your dream is seriously moot.

Otherwise go see our friend Bob he will be the only person making money going in and going out.

And we ask ourselves why this whole GA charter business is in extremis?

[KID Quality]

Why not get a 747?

[DeltaSix]

Someone said to me that a guy bought a twin ( seneca ?) with his old man's money and used it to build up his hours. At the end, he sent his father broke because they couldn't sell the twin as it has racked up a lot of hours.

You have to take into consideration things like maintenance costs, hangarage costs, rising fuel and oil costs, insurance (if they'll insure it and how much ), depreciation of it's value - its like a car. Do you have enough spare cash if you prang it on the runway or have a prop strike ? I guess you can always claim on insurance if you crash it but that only means that your next premium would be astronomical. If worse comes to worse, nobody will insure you because you don't have their flying hour requirements and so on. This on top of your normal monthly repayments for it. Did I forget anything ?....... maybe registration ?

My suggestion is, work with your accountant and do the sums and see for yourself what it will really cost you against paying for 500 hours of ME @ $300/hr = 150k. Against a 200k aircraft plus all the other costs. It might set you back around 300k at least.

Invest 10k, do a ME FIC and do it that way. If you are already working in aviation - doesn't matter what it is as long as you are flying - even a gazelle, the cost of 10k can be claimed against your tax liability....check with your bean counter, I'm sure it can be done.

Even better if you can justify it as an expense in your business.


D6

[gaunty]

Wot he said.

Thats what I meant, spend the money on hire we both pretty much agree on the cost 150-200k and it's somebody elses problemand you get to walk away free and clear at the end.

In another life I lost count of the number of young uns who came to me with the same question, the answer was then and is still the same.

Which way do you burn the money, hire or buy?
The net result is certain on hire and an unlimited unknown on buy.

But then if ya got a rich poppa or money to burn, who cares, the likelihood or not of whether you get the job will not change and my instinct says a future employer is more likely to put you at the bottom than the top of the queue if the "experience" is unsupervised.

[185skywagon]

an acquaintance of mine just bought a B58 for around $85000 and put it straight to work on cross hire. it needs engines soon. he is a lame so most of his maintenance work will be at cost. what you are suggesting, is possible to do, if you have a very good understanding of the pitfalls. you are unlikely to have this if you are just starting out in aviation. you need to be doing more than 200 hours per year to justify your own machine. just spend the money on hire. all care no responsibility. i have owned and operated 3 aircraft commercially over the years, and have found that below 150 hours per year is not worth the hassle. thankfully, i manage around 500-700 per year. you do not need much to go wrong to end up with unexpected bills that you can't cover.
pm me if you want any actual real info for bigger (185-210) cessna single running costs.

[Transition Layer]

What hasn't really been touched on is the fact that it isn't commercial experience.

Would anyone really employ someone with 500ME CMD that had been racked up in your own aircraft flying you and your mates to golf/fishing weekends away? The realities/pressures of a commercial charter or rpt operation just isn't there.

Hang on, why not get daddy to buy you a Baron and then set up a charter company complete with AOC - a boyfriend with the CASA multi requirements for CP will help. Oh wait, that's already been done!

:yuk:

TL

[tinpis]

I have three teenage children.
All of them concur that being a pilot is a huge wank.


thank you god..thank you god..thank you god....

[Jawz]

why not get an IR and do meat bombing near brissy or something?


get a grip mate. what do you expect? getting 500 multi and onto a VB 737? all cause you dont wanna leave Brisvagas?

Sorry to say but chances are youll have to move one day. Im on my 4th move in 5 years and dragged the wife and kids every time.

Good luck

[QSK?]

QSK? Snr (RIP) had a good piece of advice for anyone contemplating such madness:
If it flies, floats or fornicates - RENT IT!

[currawong]

Why not consider getting into an existing syndicate?

As close to cost as you will get, limits your exposure to big expenses, sell on your share when you are finished.

Worked for me.

Good luck

[OLD TRAFFORD]

Is daddy paying ?

[masseygrad]

wouldulikefrieswiththat,

Mate,

If you can buy an aeroplane thenn why not find some work for it?

All you need to to is find an exisiting operator, e.g. charter company, and lease it to them. They would of course have to put it on their air operating certificate. Better still, get it put on to the AOCs of a number of different companies and you sell yourself as a free-lance pilot. In some cases the charter company may want their own pilots to do the flying. Fine, get them on the insurance. At least the aeroplane will be paying for itself (contribution to overheads at least). You might be then be able to fly with more experienced pilots and learn a lot, and with more experience those charter companies (for example their insurance may say that they need 1000 hr + pilots) may then be able to let you do the flying for them.

If you can find 20 hours a month for a light twin it can (probably) pay for itself.

Maybe find a few non-aviation companies who need to fly their executives around - i.e. corporate flying? Although that may require you (or the company) to get your own AOC (expensive).

The bottom line is that if you can afford to buy an aeroplane outright then you should have an investment that can actually pay for itself. Many charter companies use leased aeroplanes so their costs include the lease of the aeroplane. Or, they're in the process of paying off a loan taken out for an aeroplane.

I don't know what the aeroplane re-sale market is like in Oz at the moment, but I do know that you can get yourself in to trouble if you bank on being able to sell an aeroplane at a certain figure. Due to changes in the market, engines not lasting as long as expected and all sorts of factors.

If you decide to buy a twin and find some work for it, and need an extra pilot, then I can help with the flying!!

[gaunty]

And you all wonder why the industry you want to work in continues down the gurgler, when you have the number of wannabes tricking up jobs for themselves by predating the very hours they need from the very same operators they want to present themselves to to get "the job".

There is something wrong with this picture but I wouldn't expect many to work it out anytime soon.:rolleyes:

QSK is there no end to it.?:ok: the qicker we move to the UK system or something similar for training for airlines the quicker the bona fide GA operators will be able to recover.

Uhoh here comes bushy waving his white stick again :p better go put on my white shoes:=

[KID Quality]

THERE'S ONE WAY FOR YOU TO MAKE THIS A SMART INVESTMENT.................invest wisely then use the return help pay...........do NOT invest directly!!!!
Unless your rich like me:ok:

[masseygrad]

Gaunty,
What I was essentially saying is that if you can afford to buy an aeroplane then you can afford to have your own aviation business. Although one of the big barriers to starting up an air charter company is the Air Operating Certificate / Air Service Permit, but one option is to join forces with an established operator. One who may already be leasing aircraft anyway.

Please enlighten me as to what is so wrong with this picture? (It may well be wrong I just don't get it).

Cheers,
..MG

[tinpis]

Hold the 'phone ! Tin has found a suitable twin (http://www.thorntonaircraft.com/body/body.cfm?page_name=mil)

Straight into the left seat of kwantas with one a these lad
PM me If yer a bit short on finance :E

[gaunty]

tinpis bring on the next Lotto jackpot.:ok: Think of the bragging rights with one of those as your coporate jet.:cool:

Loved the bit about the F5 having less buffet in the circuit, now that's a real mans aircraft.:E

masseygrad

An AOC is the least of your problems.

The ownership of an aircraft does not in and of itself mean you also have an aviaton business run by yourself or hired to an operator who leases aircraft.

Successful businesses start by researching the market establishing there is one, or room for another competitor, or aircraft or the opportunity to stimulate it further.

Starting a business with it or leasing it out simply because you've bought one so you can get some hours is the least smart/most dumb way to spend your money.

Is there a market, what type and standard of service does it demand and is prepared to pay for. With respect not many are going to pay big dollars to be flown around in a light twin flown by a learner pilot. He is a learner pilot because he can't get a job with a bone fide operator with the hours he's got.

If the market is already overserviced, which is most likely given all the others chasing hours and predating the available revenue, with another is simply going to make it worse.

Hiring it to an operator without him also being able to justify it on the above criterion is an equally dumb idea.
The margins are tight enough as it is without two people trying to get one out of the same aircraft.
Who's aircraft does the operator give the "work" to if he has a fleet full of hired aircraft and why should he employ you to fly it if you haven't got the experience in the first place.

If you're going to stimulate the market, you have to do something different or offer something that is demonstrably different, further, faster, higher than is currently available. Clearly even if you have the capital, driving it is going to be beyond his current skillset assuming he would know how to market it.

If he does know how to market it he will make way more money doing so than he ever could flying the sucker.

The ground is littered with experienced drivers.

And therein lays the problem.

It has been thus since 1967, the economic barriers were way higher then and we new the moment we replaced the new aircraft with other new ones as part of keeping the fleet up to date, we were immediately creating the means for others to do the repaint and refurb routine and compete against us on price alone. They in turn knew that the moment they did likewise they were creating the means for others to do the repaint and refurb routine and compete against them on price.

Ad nauseum right up to today. look around at the fleet and tell me that this is not so.

Most would have you beleive that it was big bad CASA. In many cases deservedly so.

In the meantime they have trained the marketplace to the view that they can hire the same aircraft cheaper today than they could the day before. Neat trick huh, seeing that we have the an average age of 10 years for new motor vehicles.

The poor long suffering investors in the enterprise , usually the finance companies have been subsidising the market big time.

In my direct experience to the tune of $200,000,000 during the period up to 1995.

Why do they not now rush into the market with more money, when it is clear that the capital base has deteriorated even further since.:confused:

Certain flight school owners who make the most noise about regulatory and service provider costs have the least actual capital investment of their own, relying on using a large collection of owners antique aircraft to make their business look like its a big one.
The real answer regardless of how you feel about the regulatory thing is increasing revenue (putting the rates up) to the point where they are profitable and are able to reequip with modern maintenance efficient aircraft.

When they stop whingeing and spend more time educating their users that they must pay more they may be able to go forward.

What frightens them most is that if they do so a significant proportion of those they fondly imagine are their clientbase will go away.
It will and will hopefully make way for properly resourced operators to concentrate on the people who actually can.

You can either afford to fly or you cant, it is NOT a right, pick the level at which you can afford to participate and go play whereever that is, if you cant afford to hire say a new Cirrus at $400 ph then don't expect somone else to subsidise it your fantasy and blaming every one else because you can't fulfil it.

Let's start a campaign against whoever it is that makes hiring a Fairlane Ghia/Statesman/BMW or Ferrari when I pick up my car at the Avis/Hertz/Europcar airport sooo expensive. Who de we pick on eh

And this is where the gaunty is anti GA and CASA is trying to kill it off loonies step up.:rolleyes:

[masseygrad]

My point is that if an inexperienced pilot who owns an aeroplane operates it under the AOC of an experienced operator then the responsibilty of and how its flown goes to the experienced operator. The operator may for example decide that all IFR charters are done by one of their own, more experienced pilots. But perhaps the owner may be permitted to fly VFR dead-legs. Who knows?

Sure, you're more likely to lose money than make money if you go and buy an aeroplane and start your own charter company. But if you can afford to buy an aeroplane and find someone who has 20 hours per month for it then at the least the aeoplane is flying and paying for itself. For sure you would want to get an idea of how likely you could find 20 hours p/m for it first!

Just because there are many low-houred pilots chasing hours doesn't mean the market is overserviced! Consider an operator who is using an aeroplane that he is in the process of paying off. Either the price he charges the customer reflects the interest or his profit margin is less. If someone comes along and offers him lease of a free-hold aeroplane at cost price then who is the loser? The bank is! What's wrong with that, from an aviation perspective?

Cheers,
..MG

[QSK?]

gaunty:

Your assessment of the commercial dynamics and drivers of GA business is, as usual, spot on; both on this, and other Pprune fora.

But don't be too hard on wouldulikefrieswiththat. Unlike some other young pilots, at least he's come up with a different angle and prepared to have a go; instead of just whingeing about the fact that no-one in the industry will give him a job.

[gaunty]

QSK thank 'tis but common sense.

And I applaud wouldulikefrieswiththat get up and go.

It's the "greek chorus" or is it the "sirens" that would lure him onto the rocks that I worry about for him.

Sorry wouldulikefrieswiththat it's not personal just serial deja vu. :*

I sincerely wish you the best in the prosecution of your dream, just keep a level head and don't get sucked into the vortex.

If you are what "they" are looking for you will eventually get there, just don't rush your fences.:ok: :O

Good luck.

[CHAIRMAN]

gaunty,
Your posts are to the point and very educational, and I cannot agree more.
What I have noticed over the past 3 to 5 years is the escalating cost of maintenance of our GA (single and light twin) aircraft.I have never seen a sadder light GA fleet.
When you look at the cost of corrosion repairs, together with the cost of refurbishment parts and labour, the time has arrived when new machinery (if the Aussie dollar continues to hold up) is the ONLY way forward.
250k to 300k for new Cessna light singles is good value for proven training/pleasure aircraft, when the alternatives of maintenance/refurbs are considered.
The breakeven utilisation for these new aircraft is about 500 hours per year (without tax man subsidy) at reasonable charge out rates - anything less cannot be justified, but a well run outfit should have no trouble, and I'm talking tach/maint hours here not VDO, which will run about 25% more than tach in the training environment.
Let's hope the Aussie holds up.
What the posters here need to know is that any older GA (70's) machine for sale that has not had SERIOUS MAJOR maintenance within the past 5 to 10 years (at least 20k to 30k for a simple single spent with a reputable outfit ) is an open cheque book - and this is in addition to 100 hourlys.
200 hours cross hire p/a on an old banger will not work any more, the aircraft will be a wreck when you try to get your money back.
Give up now.
Gaunty, I think the future is bright if the regulators will get behind us.
The opportunity is the best it's been for 20 years. It's a shame the guvmint sold our aerodromes. But we can find other ones.
CHAIRMAN


:ok:

[gaunty]

CHAIRMAN

Thank you.

What the posters here need to know is that any older GA (70's) machine for sale that has not had SERIOUS MAJOR maintenance within the past 5 to 10 years (at least 20k to 30k for a simple single spent with a reputable outfit ) is an open cheque book - and this is in addition to 100 hourlys. and our friend Dick dares to get all righteous about the $78k on his million dollar aircraft.

Clearly you have been to the same places and written the same cheques as I.

Some would have us believe that 30+ years on the learning curve has come to nought.

Why are that end of the market surprised and outraged when the regulatory requirements are stiffened a little to ensure the old clunker stays airworthy.