What you could do is lease it back to a flying school while you're away from the US. I've thought about this, you'd get the tie down / maintenance / insurance paid for, and MAY even make a little profit. Just inform the FBO when you want to aircraft available.
Saw a C150 Aerobat for sale for $12000, which would be a right laugh, nice clean looking aircraft....
Maybe a couple of ppruners should get together and do this? I'd be up for it if it was based in California, and it tends to be fairly cheap to fly into LAX....
Cheers
EA