I just got hired as an A&P mechanic at an airline and just wanted to get some pointers from pilots. I’m currently weighing my options between buying a plane versus rental costs. I eventually want to fly commercial and have no flight hours at the moment.

I don’t know what the best path would be to build my hours, I figure I could make work as a CFI part time while still working A&P (I will be working 3 days on 4 days off) and I feel like that gives me ample time to build hours.

I would love to hear what you guys have to say!

 

Depends. The math favors buying a plane for getting to 300-ish hours for all your rating including CFI, assuming you're going to do it fairly quickly and not drag it out over many years, since many airplane costs are calendar based (annual, tie-down, insurance, etc).

The usual caveat to buying is that if you end up with a big unexpected mx issue, then it can end up costing more than renting. But being an A&P you can mitigate routine mx costs and also even a big surprise if it comes to that.

Another advantage is that you're not at the mercy of a school or club for scheduling, just need to find a CFI whose schedule fits yours.

So in your case I'd buy something. Going to need an ASEL that's large enough to take two grown adults without W&B issues in your climate, and also decent IFR equipment. So probably not a C-152, unless you weigh 110 lbs and live in a cool sea level climate. And can find one that's IFR rated.

That's what I would have recommended ten years ago, to avoid debt, and it's what I would recommend today.

The industry went through a period of such crazy hiring that you could make a case for spending a lot of money up front and incurring debt to grab a fast-moving seniority slot while the getting was good. But that era looks to be done, so I'd take a fiscally conservative approach. That fact that you can work with flexible scheduling, and do your own mx is in your favor.

With that said, I wouldn't waste any time unnecessarily, seniority matters and the sooner you get hired at your career-destination major the better. You can relax at that point.

 

Aircraft acquisition costs, and ownership costs have gone out of sight, since the start of the pandemic. Lunacy.

Experimental aircraft are still far more reasonable than production aircraft.

 

That's probably a good point.

 

What general area do you live? I’m in S WI, own a plane.

Much depends on rental availability near you. I know renting costs $$, but so does owning.

You need to break it down, like getting your private pilots license as a starter.

 

One option is to purchase an aircraft. An aircraft with a bit more horse power than a C-152 would be recommended. Enter into a lease arrangement with a flight school.

Put your talents as an A&P, to conduct a thorough pre-purchase inspection.

An arrangement such as barter and financial or a combination of both can be agreed upon. Maintenance for a flight instrucor.

At the end of the day, you can sell the aircraft to move up to a high performance single or multi-engine.

 

All sounds nice, not gonna work.
A flightschool is not going to need anything you can buy for less then $100k.
They really don’t need anybody dragging in a hunk of junk.
The whole purchasing a plane is cheaper - a fallacy.
You need different aircraft for different stages of your training.
Apply yourself in training.
Show the school you’ll make a good CFI when you’re done.
Keep your big airplane job for motivation.

 

Debt has value at times. Can't afford a car? But need one to work? Car payments make sense.

Same with getting to become a professional pilot. Drag your feet getting your qualifications, all to avoid debt, and it takes you another year to start your career? If the hiring boom stops in that year you are SOL. Ask the airline pilots who didn't upgrade in the summer of 2001 because they wanted to enjoy their last summer as a senior FO. Upgrade cancelled post 9/11. Took him 6 years to upgrade. If going debt free costs you the best year of you career (the last year), and being one year more junior every day of your career, you've made a huge mistake if you choose debt free but the price to pay was a year less as a professional pilot. The delays hurt. You won't see it until later.

 

Not so much anymore, they've made some changes. And you only need 25 hours ME.

 

I would also be sure to weigh the opportunity cost of putting money toward a plane vs investing it. If you buy a plane, you'll probably be putting $100-200k down I'd assume. Investing that money in the S&P 500 or similar diversified investments has historically yielded around 8-10% per year. Even $100k at a 6% interest rate will turn into $130k over 5 years. So by putting that $100k toward the plane, you're forgoing the opportunity to make $30k.

I'm not sure what the right answer is, I just thought I'd throw that out there because I've noticed a lot of "rent vs own" models leave that part out. A diversified investment portfolio is probably a safer and better investment than a plane, and thus the opportunity cost has to be weighed