Originally Posted by
flyallnite
I know there are a number of guys on here who own or owned light airplanes, and it's been a while since I've had anything to do with GA flying. What I've noticed it that the days of showing up at an FBO and renting a plane seem to be gone, replaced by clubs, fractional ownership, and outright ownership. How does one go about obtaining an aircraft that can be flown fairly economically about 100 hours per year, carry 4 + bags at least 300nm, and so on and so forth?
Heyas FAN,
Yea, let me bore you with a bit of history if you've been gone from the scene a bit....
After 9/11, something wonky happened in the GA biz. Insurance rates went into orbit, and everyone got very, very tight a$$ed. It never recovered from that.
FBOs no longer wanted the liability of rentals (or schools) and changes to the tax laws eliminated many of the "good deals" for leasebacks. As a result, stuff that was nominally free (office space) or at cost (fuel, MX) when FBOs ran the rental line turned into "profit centers". The costs and hassles really spooled out of control. Because leasebacks now sucked, the number and diversity of the rental fleets plummeted.
As you found out, what rentals are available are limited, the costs high and there is lots of hassle.
Finding a good club is a not a bad deal. They tend to have fewer restrictions that what most rental places have and the availibily much better. The airplanes also seem to be better kept. I'd ask around or post on some of the GA boards.
Airplanes themselves are actually very affordable if you don't care about avionics. A lot of GA types are absolutely hardover for GPS, and the cost to upgrade is pretty dang high. Something that doesn't have the latest and greatest takes a big hit. So if you are comfortable with a VOR, and the airplane is otherwise sound, there are some screaming deals to be had for airplanes with "old radios" (IE 2 KX155s..what we used to consider as pretty dang nice). A good app running on your iPad with a portable ADSB receiver will get you more info than you ever need.
Nu