Annual operating budget

[galt1074]

Hey guys, its me again. I'm still searching for an airplane and waffling as to whether I can afford the machine I really want. I was hoping some of you could share how you budget your maintenance, hangar/tie-down, fuel, etc. A guy at the local FBO told me this site http://www.planequest.com/operationcosts/op_cost_info.asp?id=175 was pretty good for estimating cost of ownership. Except for the outdated fuel price, do these numbers match what you have seen?

This is  a great forum and I really enjoy following your conversations. It's nice to see that peope outside the Air Force drag each other through the mud about miniscule topics just like we do. It shows you care about your craft and that's a good thing even though it might get painful once in a while.

As an aside, there was a gentlemen I was speaking to at one time who is here in Albuquerque. He offered me a ride and a talk but I don't have the contact information anymore. If you come across this and are in the ABQ area and would be willing to talk airplanes, please shoot me a line.

 

Greg

[Parker_Woodruff]

My former Mooney, a high time M20J, probably ran me about $90-115/hour in costs from the time of purchase to the time of sale, including capital losses at sale (upgrades, etc.). That's based on a 190 flight hour year.  That's not normal and is probably significantly less than what others on this board spend.  My airplane flew often and was mostly used for cross country flying. I bought it right and didn't have any major hiccups  during my 20 months of ownership.  I was also often filling up in the low $4/gallon range.

Your operating costs will be significantly less if you purchase an airplane the right way - get the Mooney Service Center annual inspection as part of the purchase agreement, etc.  Don't rely on some mechanic who one time saw a Mooney which he identified because of the backwards tail.

I now track my M20K to the penny.  The first 43 hours in 7.5 months has run me about $170/hour, including all maintenance, not including airframe acquisition (purchase) and airframe upgrades (Encore Conversion).  The reason I don't include those is that I could likely sell my plane for close to what I have in it at this point.

That $170/hour is very quickly on a downtrend as more than 6 months was spent in the shop undergoing a conversion and I could give you an exact number of the first year's costs here in June.

My M20J estimates on 120-200 hours per year hobbs time, not tach time, rounded up to ensure conservative numbers:

$45/hour fuel (9gph at $5/gal)

$30/hour airframe maintenance

$20/hour engine & prop maintenance & reserve

$5/hour oil expenditure (based on $250 of oil, filter, and oil change every 50 hours)

Add fixed costs of insurance, tie down, GPS updates and you have your annual operating costs.  Add in some fudge factor for any additional hiccups.

[galt1074]

Sir,

Wow, thanks for the breakdown. I'm really taking my time with this as I gather the money and shop around. Looking at an F or J model to be able to haul the family. I too would be using it for cross country trips and I'd like to be able to fly it frequently. Your information lines up with what I'm seeing in my research. My only hesitation is the annual inspections. Do your hourly airframe and engine reserves account for saving for your annual?

Thanks again for all of the information.

 

Greg

[Parker_Woodruff]

Quote: galt1074

Sir,

Wow, thanks for the breakdown. I'm really taking my time with this as I gather the money and shop around. Looking at an F or J model to be able to haul the family. I too would be using it for cross country trips and I'd like to be able to fly it frequently. Your information lines up with what I'm seeing in my research. My only hesitation is the annual inspections. Do your hourly airframe and engine reserves account for saving for your annual?

Thanks again for all of the information.

 

Greg

[galt1074]

Okay, so your $30/hr airframe reserve is for annual and upgrades and the $20/hr engine/prop reserve is for overhaul savings. I can live with those numbers I think. What I'm quickly realizing is that it doesn't get a whole lot cheaper than $15k a year to fly any airplane 150-200 hrs/year so it might as well be in an airplane I own and in one that can get me where I'm going quickly. The dream has been a long time coming so hopefully it is just around the corner. Thank you.

 

Greg

[Parker_Woodruff]

upgrades not included in airframe reserve.  You will put money into upgrades and get some of that money back at the time of sale.  Best buy the airplane equipped how you want it.  Or buy the nicest, cleanest airframe that you can find and ditch everything in the panel you want in favor of starting over.

I think your $15K number to fly 200 hours per year is way too optimistic.  what you'll find is that you can't beat a 180 or 200 horsepower M20 airfame on a cost per mile basis. Even my C172 cost more per mile.

[galt1074]

Thanks for the clarification. The $15k a year was a low-ball figure for what I would spend renting the local Arrow II for 100 hours. And I can't take that airplane out for a week because the FBO charges $300 for each day it isn't flying. No aircraft payments in that figure because I plan to pay cash. I guess the point I was trying to make is that I could fly around in a 172 and spend about the same per mile or hour as I would in a Mooney so why not go in style and get there before my wife's bladder explodes.

Greg

[Parker_Woodruff]

Quote: galt1074

Thanks for the clarification. The $15k a year was a low-ball figure for what I would spend renting the local Arrow II for 100 hours. And I can't take that airplane out for a week because the FBO charges $300 for each day it isn't flying. No aircraft payments in that figure because I plan to pay cash. I guess the point I was trying to make is that I could fly around in a 172 and spend about the same per mile or hour as I would in a Mooney so why not go in style and get there before my wife's bladder explodes.

Greg

[John Pleisse]

I come in at around $15k a year, flying 80-90 hours. Goodies and capital improvements aside. Realistically, you should consider a slush fund for maintenance.

(Tanks- $10k, prop $1,800k o-h, engine $0-$25k, engine top $8k, mag and harness $1,800-2,000 new, landing gear pucks $1,700, side glass $3,000, new windscreen $3000, fuel pump $700-$1800.....etc, ......etc....)

Whether it's a 182, or a 201.....fixed costs should be similar. Like all personal finance, would you have a reserve to draw from and replace funds? IMHO, this is the essence of ownership cost.

[MARZ]

Think of it in categories -

Fixed:  Loan payment - unless you buy it outright, Annual inspection, Hangar and Insurance - non of this applies to hours flown, and the annual can vary on what kind of sweat equity you or your IA allows.  At a minimum this is what the plane will cost you without even taking off.

Variable costs  ( consumables - per hour breakout)  Fuel, Oil changes, periodic inspections, tires, brakes.

Reserves (hour based)  If you are disciplined enough to set aside cash each time you fly on the happenstance that you're going to overrun TBO sometime in the next century take the cost of an engine and divide it by what you think your going to get out of your engine.   I bought my F with 230 hours on the engine SMOH - at 100 hours or so per year that's about 18 years, I'm thinking the FAA will pull my medical by the time I reach 70 so...... I don't set aside a reserve - but I do have resolve to spend what it takes if I have a catastrophic failure

Ongoing - Damn that was working last week.......  pretty much an unknown - stuff breaks and sometimes new or rebuilt stuff breaks sooner. Be ready to shell out 500 - 1000 without notice.

Modifications and toys - buy right - many of the older Mooneys have some nice upgrades - but if you buy right you have room to do them yourself.   I bought my F in the mid 30's two years ago.

[GeorgePerry]

Quote: galt1074

Okay, so your $30/hr airframe reserve is for annual and upgrades and the $20/hr engine/prop reserve is for overhaul savings. I can live with those numbers I think. What I'm quickly realizing is that it doesn't get a whole lot cheaper than $15k a year to fly any airplane 150-200 hrs/year so it might as well be in an airplane I own and in one that can get me where I'm going quickly. The dream has been a long time coming so hopefully it is just around the corner. Thank you.

 

Greg

[bd32322]

Also the first annual will be a bit expensive. Went through my first ever annual as owner and cost me around 3k - this was after a pre-purchase annual from a mooney service center. Had many small tiddly items to fix like some cracked baffles, rocker cover gaskets, magneto timing, etc etc - avoided anything major. It came close to 15k <edit> It came close to 15k for the year and not the annual </edit>

 

insurance - 1300

hangar - 1900 (group hangar 160 per month)

fuel for about ~90 hours - 6000 (actual a bit less - but I dont burn more than 10 gph and it mostly went on long distance cruises)

maintenance - bad egt gauge (required altho I have a JPI), wing walk peeling off, install and buy preheater for NE climates, oil changes - 1300

engine + prop reserve - 1800

annual - 3000

[Immelman]

My #s:

- Fixed costs: $3k/year (tie down, property tax, annual inspection, insurance). My annual inspections run consistently below $1000. That's the inspection and service, not correcting discrepancies. See below...

- Variable costs: Fuel (you can do the math here)

- Engine/prop reserve: $15hr +/-

- Airftame maintenance: This one's hard to put a number on but I will say 20-30/hr. This will budget all sorts of things - magneto rebuilds, replacing your shock-discs, landing gear parts, that #!*( Mooney induction boot that lasts only a couple hundred hours, etc.

- Now the big one: upgrades. This is what you make of it. Wil your airplane need to be repainted? interior work? avioncs? Difficult to quantify, but overtime you either do them or the value and marketability of the airplane goes down.

I am a big "owner assist" guy, and as such I don't have as much maintenace labor expense compared to a 'hand over the keys' sort of owner. This decision is up to you. It saves me a couple thousand dollars a year annually.

[Comatose]

Ignoring my avionics addiction, my C model runs about:

$2600/yr hangar.

$2000/yr annual

$1300/yr insurance

about $7000 a year in fuel

A couple thousand a year in repairs

~$500 a year in data and charts

So about $15k a year. I'd say budget $20,000 a year, because there are a lot of big "gotchas" in airplane ownership that can rear their heads at any point.

Twice that last year if you count panel upgrades, but I know I have a problem.

I can't imagine financing a plane that's a personal toy. I figure buy something you can afford to keep up.

[galt1074]

Everyone, thank you for your replies. The varied response tells me that there are a lot of ways to go about owning and maintaining a magic carpet. I'm still in the pencil and paper budgeting stage and talking it over with the better-half (who is far too supportive by the way) making my peace with spending this kind of money on what amounts to a childlike obsession of mine. Flying airplanes is all I have ever done and all I ever plan to do...it's just tough to swallow paying to play instead of being paid to do so.

George, I have bookmarked your extensive write-up on the buying process so thank you for providing your knowledge again. I hate to ask questions that have been asked a million times already but I wanted to see what people are actually spending.

Again, thanks to all of you and I hope to join you on the forum as a "real Mooniac" someday. In the meantime I look forward to being a part of the forum, somewhat on the outside but hopefully my military experience will help on some limited level.

 

Greg

[zaitcev]

Quote: galt1074

A guy at the local FBO told me (about planequest.com) ....

[galt1074]

Yeah, Kyle was the guy that showed that site to me. I have spoken to Mr. Lyons about flying with him as safety pilot in the Mooney he keeps at KAEG. Thanks for the tip on the Front Range place. I'm still pretty early in the shopping process as well so I'm just gathering data right now.

Welcome to the forum. You'll find a lot of passion and a lot of knowledge around here.

 

Greg

[Bill_Pyles]

I really like the old Richard Collins formula that says light piston airplane cost-of-ownership is about 3x cost of fuel, so if you pay $6/gallon for your Mooney, and burn 10 gallons/hour, then your total ownership cost will be $180/hour.  Using this formula, if you have the discipline to toss $120/hr into the Mooney bank account everytime you fly an hour, you should be good to go.  Obviouslly, if you live somewhere where your hanger cost is $600/month, this formula is probably on the low side, but if your hanger/tie-down costs between $100-200/month I bet the formula is still close.

I spent about $25,000 my J making everything "right" at the annual last August when I bought my airplane, (including having the tanks sealed by WeepNoMore) so with a little luck, my annual will be a non-event this August.  Of course, I could be one naive airplane owner too.

[N9453V]

For my 1970 M20-G from July 17, 2010 to January 31, 2012:

Hours Flown: 163.6

Engine Reserve: $2,454 ($15/hr for engine and prop)

Fuel Cost: $7,219.90

Insurance: $2,473.00 (two premiums)

Databases: $684.81 (GNS430)

Maintenace: $11,571.23 (two annuals: first at MSC, second owner assisted with local A&P/IA, other major items: GNS430 overhaul, new vacuum pump, new alternator)

Tie-down: $956.87 (KSQL and KBTR)

Total per hour: $155 ($140 not including engine reserve)

 

If anyone is enterested in more details, just let me know.

-Andrew

[Parker_Woodruff]

Quote: N9453V

For my 1970 M20-G from July 17, 2010 to January 31, 2012:

Hours Flown: 163.6

Total per hour: $155 ($140 not including engine reserve)

 

If anyone is enterested in more details, just let me know.

-Andrew

[smccray]

My recommendation- run the numbers before you buy so you have some idea what you're going to encounter.  Then double the number.  If that doesn't scare you away, buy a plane and stop running numbers- it's too depressing.

I know what I spend, but I choose to forget.

[Hank]

Wallet open, eyes closed, seems to be a common occurence.

Personally, I'm just afraid to add it all up. But now that I'm through with IFR training, I seem to be burning much less fuel! My hours were down last year, too; I seem to be on a rollercoaster, 100/85/125/85 for the last four years. Totalling up cost would take much time, and bring unwanted depression.

But my last annual [owner-assisted] was less than a single AMU!!  :-)  Not bad, considering she wouldn't crank. Neither a mag nor a battery issue [both recently replaced], just worn plugs since the last annual. Who'd a thunk?

[galt1074]

Quote: smccray

My recommendation- run the numbers before you buy so you have some idea what you're going to encounter.  Then double the number.  If that doesn't scare you away, buy a plane and stop running numbers- it's too depressing.

I know what I spend, but I choose to forget.