The cost to join and fly depends on the number of club members and the consensus of minimum acceptable airplane. To provide some idea of the range of cost tradeoffs, I present below three examples. I tried to use conservative values, which means actual costs should be lower than shown.

1. Average IFR equipped 1975 Cessna 172M with 1000 left on TBO currently sell for roughly $100k.
2. An IFR equipped member-built Zenith 750 Cruzer using a Viking Aircraft engine can built for under $75k. Instead of a TBO, will pessimistically assume the entire engine is replaced every 1000 hours for $13k.
3. Average IFR equipped Cessna 150 with 1000 left on TBO currently sell for roughly $40k.

Since both AOPA and EAA suggest 10 members per aircraft as the best trade-off between lowering costs per member and minimum scheduling conflicts, I used that as an upper member count per airplane. A viable minimum seems to be around 5 members for a non-profit club. Fewer than 5 may be better simply going co-ownership.

There are several alternative options for financing a purchase besides a commercial lender, such as:

1. Owner financed loan (i.e. owner carries a note, meaning they act as the bank.)
2. Those club members with greater financial resources lend money to the club to purchase an aircraft. Note that there is no requirement that all such lenders lend equal amounts. Merely that they are repaid at the same interest rates and term lengths (no member favoritism.)

The following estimates assume use of a large ($330/mo) hangar at Rapid City Airport. Avgas is assumed to cost $6.70/hour (national average per https://www.airnav.com/fuel/report.html at time of estimate.) AOPA’s cost spreadsheet was used to generate the estimates and prospective members should use it to test changes in the assumed costs. The AOPA spreadsheet has two tabs – equity and non-equity. The equity computation assumes a purchase while the non-equity assumes a lease, which are used here to compare costs. The EAA and AOPA definitions of “equity” vs “non-equity” clubs differ and will be discussed elsewhere.

Other assumptions for all scenarios:

1. Purchase:
   1. A purchase at 30% down payment, 10 year term at 9.5% interest.
   2. One or more members are willing to co-sign the loan.
2. Lease:
   1. A lease at 10% base rate (which means paying 10% of the value of the airplane per year.)
   2. An owner can be found willing to lease exclusively to the club for at least a year. They would be required to join the club if they wish to continue using the airplane.
3. The AOPA estimates for insurance and some other values were not changed and may be either too low or too high.

Airplane Ownership	Number of Members	Joining Fee ($)	Monthly Dues ($)	Wet $/Hour	Dry $/Hour	50 Hrs/Year Amortized Rate
C-172 Purchased	10 5	4300 8600	180 360	105	45	$148/hr $191/hr
C-172 Leased	10 5	700 1400	165 330	105	45	$145/hr $165/hr
C-150 Purchased	10 5	2100 4200	125 250	80	40	$110/hr $140/hr
C-150 Leased	10 5	700 1400	115 230	80	40	$108/hr $135/hr
Cruzer Club Built	10 5	3300 6500	160 320	70	30	$108/hr $147/hr
$30k VFR (Added Nov 2)	10 5	1000 2000	80 160	80	35	$99/hr $118/hr

Notes:

• The maintenance reserve for the leased aircraft ($25/hr for the 172 and $20/hr for the 150) is paid to the owner who is financially responsible for engine overhauls. In club owned aircraft it is reserved for engine overhauls.
• Hours are tach hours. To convert the rates to dollars per Hobbs hours divide by about 1.2.
• Amortized rate includes the monthly dues but not the joining fee.
• The wet rate, dry rate, and monthly dues were rounded to the nearest multiple of 5 while joining fees were rounded to the nearest multiple of 100.
• Added Nov 2, 2022: Generic $30k purchase of a VFR airplane with 1000 hours remaining to TBO (e.g. C-150, nice Ercoupe, and some EABs) burning 6 GPH financed over 10 years with 15% down at 9.5% interest rate. Leasing such an airplane would likely cut the joining fees about in half but wouldn’t meaningfully change the monthly or hourly rates.

Personal observations:

• The Cruzer has several advantages over the 150 and 172, such as generous cockpit size, excellent visibility, zero-time airframe and engine, all-new avionics, and lower maintenance costs. However, members may not wish to invest months of time before the airplane can fly. Purchasing a recently built but used experimental in the same price range is another possibility that would provide more instant gratification.
• Assuming a willing owner is found the primary advantages of a lease is the lower joining fee. Since aircraft prices are at all-time highs and may eventually come down it may pay to initially lease and buy an aircraft later.

The numbers for the three examples were computed using AOPA’s cost estimation Excel file. The assumed values are in the following files and can be loaded into either Microsoft Excel, Libre Office Calc, or OpenOffice Calc. Feel free to download them and experiment with the values.

https://pactolaflying.club/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Aircraft-Cost-of-Operations-Cruzer.xlsx

https://pactolaflying.club/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Aircraft-Cost-of-Operations-C172.xlsx

https://pactolaflying.club/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Aircraft-Cost-of-Operations-C150.xlsx