Plane Cost Calculator

[Austintatious]

40 flight,

thanks.  I got a headache looking though all those formulas trying to figure out what was going on.  I cant for the life of me figure out were 3500 dollars a year in financing cost are coming from.

The problem is that if you do have a note, the total cost per year is off by 3400.00... the only solution I see is to ignore those boxes and add your yearly payments to total cost per year.... then a bit more math if you want to know the actual cost per hour including the note.

Also, IMHO I would like to be able to split the payments out into Principal and interest, as the interest is really the cost of the financing.

 

The good news is that if you can find and fix the issue, it will make aircraft ownership look jsut a tad more affordable!

Edited March 1, 2019 by Austintatious

[40-0Flight]

1 hour ago, Austintatious said:

yea yea, I get that... I am just playing with this spreadsheet and noticed the problem.

 

 

you were correct, I had a typeo in my calculation for financing....   I corrected that and added some error chekcing.  Now, when you put in a purchase price of 0 inspection of 0, transport of 0 loan of 0.  Your Total Costs w/ Financing will equal Total Cost no Financing as you would expect.   Also it will accept an interest rate of 0% and handle it correctly too

[40-0Flight]

34 minutes ago, Austintatious said:

Also, IMHO I would like to be able to split the payments out into Principal and interest, as the interest is really the cost of the financing.

 

The good news is that if you can find and fix the issue, it will make aircraft ownership look jsut a tad more affordable!

I see what you're saying with the interest vs the principal.  That might be a little more granular than i was thinking.. .but I'll look at it.

 

Also I found and fixed the 3400 problem   Feel free to throw away that last download! lol

[40-0Flight]

1 hour ago, Austintatious said:

Also, IMHO I would like to be able to split the payments out into Principal and interest, as the interest is really the cost of the financing.

Done.  

[Austintatious]

wow, you are fast!

I wish I new how to do something of value other that fly an airplane!

[40-0Flight]

5 minutes ago, Austintatious said:

wow, you are fast!

I wish I new how to do something of value other that fly an airplane!

I'm just at my computer currently.  Makes it easy to change...  After I'm happy the data is behaving the way it is supposed to.  I will probably turn it into a public web app for anyone to use online.  Maybe next week or so.    I appreciate you playing around with it and beating on it.  Helps finding bugs easier.

[Austintatious]

yea it is a great spreadsheet.... Currently I show 200.00 per hour including financing to fly 200 hours a year in a Rocket.   Thats 40k a year.  Good news is I have a partner so 20k each.... pretty affordable!

Sounds low but I made my best guess as to what everything will cost. 

[40-0Flight]

3 minutes ago, Austintatious said:

yea it is a great spreadsheet.... Currently I show 200.00 per hour including financing to fly 200 hours a year in a Rocket.   Thats 40k a year.  Good news is I have a partner so 20k each.... pretty affordable!

Sounds low but I made my best guess as to what everything will cost. 

Glad ya like it and thanks for the feedback!     Hope you find a Rocket that works for you! 

[Yetti]

On 2/28/2019 at 10:16 AM, bob865 said:

The poblem never goes away.  It just moves. 

LOL!

This is a pretty good thread on costs 

@40-0Flight on one post you were talking about how buying the plane is the scary part.   Nope that is the easy part.  Buying the plane then having to drop $40K is the scary part.   Since you got a good handle on costs, the next thing is how you can reduce some of those costs.  Making friends with the IA and building a trust relationship is probably one of the best.  It's not that we are blissfully unaware of prices, it's more that we actively manage to keep costs down while not skipping on safety.   Like I did not need to buy the $500 406 ELT.   But is makes sense.  But I am also funding this annual by selling my Grandfathers half dollar collection on ebay.   So I just sold some more old coins to people who want them to add to my safety numbers.  The Fuel Servo was working fine, but after sending it off, we find that it was a ticking time bomb.  Probably going to be $2000.  So the concept of scheduling maintenance and focusing on an area per year is what is working for me.  The other thing that does not make sense is for me to work on the plane.  But I enjoy it and I know it is done properly.   Since I see you are on the other side of Houston we will have to go up sometime.  Get to working on your ground school.

[Yetti]

Also I would not put interior into your maintenance fund and If you are a do it yourselfer, you can do it for alot less.  It's one of the things you can do as an owner. 

Oil change is $75 if you do it yourself

Battery is $300

Tires are $300

Set of hoses is $1100

 

Edited March 2, 2019 by Yetti

[40-0Flight]

2 hours ago, Yetti said:

Also I would not put interior into your maintenance fund and If you are a do it yourselfer, you can do it for alot less.  It's one of the things you can do as an owner. 

 

Its funny you commented on the "interior" part of this... because I had a LOT of back and forth on this one.  This is the conclusion I finally came to for why I have it as part of your Major Reserve.  Bear in mind there are a number of 'IF's here, but as a base line I feel it holds true.   

 IF, your engine makes 2000 hrs TBO.   IF, you fly 100 hrs every year.  That is 20 years.  Interiors realistically only hold up so long regardless of butt time on it.  So my thought is one would want to refresh the interior on their plane at Least every 20 years.  If not it seems you really would be doing your investment quite the disservice by ignoring something that is so cosmetically obvious, and in the scheme of things I "believe" is one of the cheaper things.

 

So be it a DIY seat cover, or a complete cabin reupholstery.  It makes sense that you plan to tuck a little away so you can handle it the day you get sick of the spring poking you in the back. 

 

As far as what the actual costs are tied to getting a planes interior redon... I sincerely don't have a clue.  But I do know I would sooner swap my own engine, and redo my entire front panel myself then claim I could build a seat cover wouldn't look like a 3rd grade art project! 

[40-0Flight]

2 hours ago, Yetti said:

LOL!

This is a pretty good thread on costs 

@40-0Flight on one post you were talking about how buying the plane is the scary part.   Nope that is the easy part.  Buying the plane then having to drop $40K is the scary part.   Since you got a good handle on costs, the next thing is how you can reduce some of those costs.  Making friends with the IA and building a trust relationship is probably one of the best.  It's not that we are blissfully unaware of prices, it's more that we actively manage to keep costs down while not skipping on safety.   Like I did not need to buy the $500 406 ELT.   But is makes sense.  But I am also funding this annual by selling my Grandfathers half dollar collection on ebay.   So I just sold some more old coins to people who want them to add to my safety numbers.  The Fuel Servo was working fine, but after sending it off, we find that it was a ticking time bomb.  Probably going to be $2000.  So the concept of scheduling maintenance and focusing on an area per year is what is working for me.  The other thing that does not make sense is for me to work on the plane.  But I enjoy it and I know it is done properly.   Since I see you are on the other side of Houston we will have to go up sometime.  Get to working on your ground school.

-Thanks for pointing that thread out, I look forward to reading through it.

-'having to drop $40K is the scary part. '  There is so much truth to that..  The hope, is that the 40k drop comes later than sooner, and with luck you have built up your Reserve enough to survive it.....  But don't get me wrong, I'm not oblivious to the worst case scenarios.  

 

-'the next thing is how you can reduce some of those costs.  Making friends with the IA and building a trust relationship'   I couldn't agree more, I'm a very hands on person mechanically, so I genuinely look forward to doing whatever work I can do.   And being new to the entire GA community, meeting the people is half the fun...  In the meantime, I help where I can, and know I have a bit of time before I purchase.

-'Since I see you are on the other side of Houston we will have to go up sometime.  Get to working on your ground school.'   Message me any time, I'm always looking for an opportunity to get some more "feel for it" while I'm waiting to pull the trigger for full on training.   Life has me on a little bit of a freeze currently so I can't push forward this minute... But I can always enjoy a peak of the future every so often. 

 

-P.S.  I have actually own and have done the Kings ground school training program 2 times now and can/could pass all their training tests with ease..   But then time passes without using it and it starts to fade... so I'm going to hold off on doing that again until I know I get to commit to training/flying on a regular basis.   What can I say... at 40, the ole mind just doesn't store information like it used to. lol

[Yetti]

My interior was 40 year old factory when I got it.   While the restoration project looked like a High school art project, Not bad for a $70 sewing machine.   Might the only Mooney with an all leather Baggage compartment.    Would have liked to explore more with seat foam, but the interior is quite serviceable and did not take that long to do. 

 

Edited March 2, 2019 by Yetti

[40-0Flight]

1 minute ago, Yetti said:

My interior was 40 year old factory when I got it.   While it looked like a High school art project, Not bad for a $70 sewing machine.   Might the only Mooney with an all leather Baggage compartment.    Would have liked to explore more with seat foam, but the interior is quite serviceable and did not take that long to do. 

 

aww man, none of your photos show up, would love to see it.   And my hats off to you!   I have to imagine my experience with a heavy leather, and a sewing machine, would probably make the news and involve a trip to the emergency room with a plane seat sewn to my arm or something! LOL

[Yetti]

Can't claim age. I started my PPC at 46.

[40-0Flight]

1 minute ago, Yetti said:

Can't claim age. I started my PPC at 46.

Fair enough.. I blame the age, but truth is, you don't use it you loose it.  And when I say I've done the kings ground school twice... that was over the last decade.  I was disappointed how much I had forgotten when I went through it the second time last year again.  Made me realize I need to have things in place to Use the knowledge, not just learn it.  So, once life "unfreezes" I feel I'll be prepared.   In the meantime, My son just finished it too, so I'm getting my use out of that training set! LOL

[Yetti]

Three years later I am surprised at how well the regular ole Rustoleum stuck to the leather trim pieces.    Many people hear swear by the other paint for the panels, but this color is Rustolem Satin Nickel.   I finally just did the hat rack a couple days ago.   The new ELT required removing stuff so got it all painted and replaced. The matching handbag for the wife was just because I could.

[40-0Flight]

@Yetti 

That is awesome!   She can't say she didn't get anything out of it! 

[johncuyle]

I have a similar spreadsheet.  It's multiple pages.  I have a summary page at front, a Wet Costs & Log page for each year of ownership, an Annual Costs page for each year of ownership, and an Acquisition and Upgrades page which has sections for each year.  I'm with Don on separating CapEx and OpEx.  I track costs on a number of different bases on it, including Pro-Rata divisible hourly, incremental hourly (what it costs me to fly the next hour with maintenance factored in) hourly costs with monthly costs factored in, total OpEx hourly costs, CapEx depreciation per hour (I like this number because it is guaranteed to drop the more I fly) and all-in CapEx+OpEx hourly.  The ones I pay the most attention to are the incremental and OpEx hourly (the latter goes down the more I fly.)  Annual costs not including upgrades average ~$18k.  It's a little difficult to share the spreadsheet since it has all my financial information on it, but I track basically every dime spent on the plane.  If there's interest I can probably share out an example version with some made-up numbers, though it would probably be difficult for anyone else to use due to the way I track annual-related maintenance costs (I apply the base annual towards a "fixed costs" for the new year while repairs get applied to maintenance costs for the ending year, but I break out mandatory inspection/AD costs separately.)  Also, it is customized for my specific aircraft.  Probably the most useful takeaway for a prospective buyer is that the "triple fuel" rule is pretty close to accurate for me, and the other rule about hourly costs being lower for owning than renting kicks in somewhere around 100 hours, excluding all CapEx (including upgrades.)

I was one of those people who bought a cheap 231.  It was "only" $75k.  I've currently spent about $156k on it, but it's a great plane at this point and I have the avionics I want rather than the avionics the previous owner wanted.  Upgrades:  GTN650, GMA350c, GTX345R, Flightstream 210, CGR30C/P, 406 ELT, a new clock, some USB ports, Lemo plugs and panel power for headsets, Intercooler, Battery Minder.  Vref for it is $119k, so if I sold it I'd lose some money (you always lose labor) but I think this is probably the right Forever Plane for me, so it doesn't matter as much as not wasting money buying what isn't what I want.

[40-0Flight]

20 hours ago, johncuyle said:

I have a similar spreadsheet.  It's multiple pages.  I have a summary page at front, a Wet Costs & Log page for each year of ownership, an Annual Costs page for each year of ownership, and an Acquisition and Upgrades page which has sections for each year.  I'm with Don on separating CapEx and OpEx.  I track costs on a number of different bases on it, including Pro-Rata divisible hourly, incremental hourly (what it costs me to fly the next hour with maintenance factored in) hourly costs with monthly costs factored in, total OpEx hourly costs, CapEx depreciation per hour (I like this number because it is guaranteed to drop the more I fly) and all-in CapEx+OpEx hourly.  The ones I pay the most attention to are the incremental and OpEx hourly (the latter goes down the more I fly.)  Annual costs not including upgrades average ~$18k.  It's a little difficult to share the spreadsheet since it has all my financial information on it, but I track basically every dime spent on the plane.  If there's interest I can probably share out an example version with some made-up numbers, though it would probably be difficult for anyone else to use due to the way I track annual-related maintenance costs (I apply the base annual towards a "fixed costs" for the new year while repairs get applied to maintenance costs for the ending year, but I break out mandatory inspection/AD costs separately.)  Also, it is customized for my specific aircraft.  Probably the most useful takeaway for a prospective buyer is that the "triple fuel" rule is pretty close to accurate for me, and the other rule about hourly costs being lower for owning than renting kicks in somewhere around 100 hours, excluding all CapEx (including upgrades.)

I was one of those people who bought a cheap 231.  It was "only" $75k.  I've currently spent about $156k on it, but it's a great plane at this point and I have the avionics I want rather than the avionics the previous owner wanted.  Upgrades:  GTN650, GMA350c, GTX345R, Flightstream 210, CGR30C/P, 406 ELT, a new clock, some USB ports, Lemo plugs and panel power for headsets, Intercooler, Battery Minder.  Vref for it is $119k, so if I sold it I'd lose some money (you always lose labor) but I think this is probably the right Forever Plane for me, so it doesn't matter as much as not wasting money buying what isn't what I want.

 

Thank you for this wealth of information, and very nice plane by the way!  I like the sound of what you have put together.  While it sounds like the focus of you spreadsheet is leaning more to tracking actual expenses.  There is definitely some good food for thought in here.

 My goal is to create a tool that allows a buyer to estimate the cost of ownership for a plane they intend to buy, and a current (low time) owner to adequately plan for the future.  Additionally this "estimate" will (hopefully) be somewhere between a "rule of thumb" and "Actual costs" in terms of accuracy.  I feel this level of accuracy can go a long way into helping answer questions like.   "GTN650 upgrade this year or 2 years from now?" 

Interestingly enough point I want to mention, is Yes..  the 3X Ga$ rule really is pretty close.  (leaning more to 3.3X but that is splitting hairs)  A number of different scenarios I've run through this sheet all come back in the 3X Ga$ ballpark.

Either way it is a fun little project for me, as my next step is to take the "spreadsheet" and turn it into a fully functional Web application where users can poke in some numbers and get an estimate back.. maybe even save/compare/price shop them with similar model of planes.

 

Thanks again for your feedback!

[Marauder]

Three years later I am surprised at how well the regular ole Rustoleum stuck to the leather trim pieces.    Many people hear swear by the other paint for the panels, but this color is Rustolem Satin Nickel.   I finally just did the hat rack a couple days ago.   The new ELT required removing stuff so got it all painted and replaced. The matching handbag for the wife was just because I could.

Now what are you going to do with that avocado exterior paint job?


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[Yetti]

12 minutes ago, Marauder said:

 

Now what are you going to do with that avocado exterior paint job?


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I prefer disco green.   I played around with some vinyl.    It flys pretty good and I can't see the green while flying