Owner looking for a new plane
 

Hi all,

I hope I'm posting this in the right sub-forum!
I am looking for a new plane (after having sold my XLS).
However, choosing the correct plane has been daunting and I'm being inundated with choices from my broker, jet management company, and peers.

My Business Missions (1 pax): Seattle --> Miami, Austin, San Diego, Atlanta (14 yearly)
Family Mission (6 pax): Seattle --> Mexico, NY, Florida (4 yearly)
Random Trips (2-4 pax): Seattle --> Denver, Nashville, Phoenix, others.. (10 yearly)
Large F/F Trip (8 pax): Seattle --> Vegas, 31A, etc.. (2 yearly)

I prefer no fuel stops, prioritize reliability, prefer something in the 2010-2016 vintage, and is pilot friendly.

Thank you for your attention!

get yourself a share or card from NetJets, the your cabin size can fluctuate to your flying needs :ok:
https://www.netjets.com/en-us/private-jet-programs

Yes, try Netjets and/or Flexjet. If you insist on your own aircraft, which I understand, what about a Citation Sovereign/Sovereign+ ? If you want to have some more space, a Falcon 2000EX EASy would be a nice choice, too. The purchase price is quite okay at the moment (20 year old plane, 10k+ hours for up to 10mio USD is not a bad deal. The maintenance is more expensive than what you were used to from your XLS. What is your budget?

Guessing you wish to 'upgrade' from the XLS?
Falcon 2000x, or maybe one of the Challenger 6xx series?

G280. Should give you some flexibility and doesn’t sound like you will outgrow that. You can also run it across the pond if you want to.

Pilot friendly and mission minded
 

I would look for a:

1. Falcon 50EX or Challenger 300
2. Citation X
3. Sovereign
4. Legacy 650 (and give it for charter)
5. late model Hawker 900XP

But I would consider a Legacy 500 if with a good budget,

With that mission I’d honestly be looking at a fractional, its just not that much flying and fractional will provide you with another aircraft if the first one goes tech, no headaches finding and training crew, or having to deal with maintenance issues.

If you MUST own and do not want to charter.

An XLS+ or a sovereign may be a good shout unless your previous XLS wasn’t right for a reason?

Otherwise I was think Challenger 300 too, reliable, can complete all those missions comfortably so long as you don’t have lots and lots of bags. Quite a bit more expensive than an XLS to run though.

If you must own and want to charter
Id be looking at a Legacy 650, it has heaps of room, very reliable with a sensible maintenance programme and a huge hold.

If you are on a tight budget and can live with the runway performance you might want to evaluate the G-200.

How many hours of use per year? That will help determine if a share is a better solution.

"I prefer no fuel stops, prioritize reliability, prefer something in the 2010-2016 vintage, and is pilot friendly."

Sovereign. 16 years/4000hrs+ on it as chief pilot and mx manager for a corporate flight department. Its not a totally "sophisticated" airplane, but certainly a workhorse. And one often overlooked item is training costs - were the Sov was (off the Cessna since 2 years, so cant vouch for the current prices) - was roughly half the price a annual refresher and initial of the airplane it was replaced with at our ops, which is not that much bigger. Plus the current airplanes sims are always booked to the brim, it seems.

From a European perspective (might be different in the US) I´d say, fractionals are more expensive from a certain point on (the break even for varies of course a lot, my guess is about 80-100hrs) and sometimes - I´m told by actual clients of the biggest dog in that business - they seem not to be really that focused on customer satisfaction. These clients have now ordered a new airplane and will start their own ops as soon as they get it.

Challenger 604/605, great cabin, range.

So, you came to pprune?

Sovereign.