I’m calling the peak

Until people draw a line in the sand prices will keep being crazy. There are enough rich people that don’t care about 30-60k or more pricing swings. They just buy and will worry about it later. Some how we have gotten to the point that people treat 10k like it’s 30k and 60k like it’s 30k. Oddly it’s harder than ever to save the money at least for me. This I treat it more dearly while most the country seems to throw it away.
 
I have noticed a large uptick in listings for AC with TT of around 10k and much higher. Are flight schools getting rid of their fleets or just upgrading? The former will indicate diminishing demand.
 
Ashara Keliyn said:
I have noticed a large uptick in listings for AC with TT of around 10k and much higher. Are flight schools getting rid of their fleets or just upgrading? The former will indicate diminishing demand.
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They big operators are depreciated out and usually replace around that TT as is four or more OH’s in on top of normal wear and tear, 100hrs, and annuals.

10K hours in a flight training environment is a lot of beating done to that airframe.
 
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Ashara Keliyn said:
I have noticed a large uptick in listings for AC with TT of around 10k and much higher. Are flight schools getting rid of their fleets or just upgrading? The former will indicate diminishing demand.
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USEIA Product Supplied data for avgas consumption indicates that the amount of flying done last year is very similar as what was done in 2022 and 2021.
 
FormerHangie said:
USEIA Product Supplied data for avgas consumption indicates that the amount of flying done last year is very similar as what was done in 2022 and 2021.
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Thanks for sharing that. I bookmarked that dataset.

Out of curiosity I plotted out the months. The axis is deceptive since it doesn't start at 0.
But people fly quite a bit less in winter. Surprise!
1707459630029.png

This axis is deceptive, too. But I wouldn't have guessed AVGAS consumption has dropped that much compared to previous years. Is flying less popular or did we move to more fuel efficient LSAs? :)
(Also I excluded december from each year since only November '23 data was available in 2023, and I wanted apples-to-apples comps on per-year avgas consumption -- looks on par w/previous cpl years)

1707459098645.png
 
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ArrowFlyer86 said:
Thanks for sharing that. I bookmarked that dataset.

Out of curiosity I plotted out the months. The axis is deceptive since it doesn't start at 0.
But people fly quite a bit less in winter. Surprise!
View attachment 125211

This axis is deceptive, too. But I wouldn't have guessed AVGAS consumption has dropped that much compared to previous years. Is flying less popular or did we move to more fuel efficient LSAs? :)
(Also I excluded december from each year since only November '23 data was available in 2023, and I wanted apples-to-apples comps on per-year avgas consumption -- looks on par w/previous cpl years)

View attachment 125210
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No more check runners and the high rollers moving to Jet A (proliferation of turboprops) instead of Avgas.
 
NealRomeoGolf said:
No more check runners and the high rollers moving to Jet A (proliferation of turboprops) instead of Avgas.
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Yep, Check 21 became effective in late 2004. Looks like the 08 recession had a decent impact as well.
 
I had to Google check 21, curious how that would have an impact on avgas sales?
 
TCABM said:
Prior to electronic clearing, checks would be overnighted by local banks to the regional Fed for redistribution to the clearing bank. This was primarily done in piston singles and twins.

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I wouldn't have guessed that'd be a significant impact on the overall aircraft market. But I guess if you've got a fly from a ton of different locations... Interesting!
 
ArrowFlyer86 said:
I wouldn't have guessed that'd be a significant impact on the overall aircraft market. But I guess if you've got a fly from a ton of different locations... Interesting!
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That's just one example of a business process made more efficient by modern IT. Multiply by numerous other examples and I can see it all adding up over time.
 
I’m not sure about the check theory, but I do think it’s a combination of a number of factors. Two that come to mind are the simple fact that twins are sitting more and more and unfortunately, many being left to rot The mission space of the light twin is being flown mostly by singles. Next, MOGAS expansion has really grown in that same time frame.

It’s anecdotal, but I used to use MOGAS if it was available. Now, I can almost always fly long XC and avoid 100LL.

PS - I don’t think we’re at the peak at all. As a guy that recently bought, the competition to get a quality aircraft under contract is a bit of a hunger games. Supplies of nice a/c are low…and there are plenty of cash buyers.
 
ArrowFlyer86 said:
I wouldn't have guessed that'd be a significant impact on the overall aircraft market. But I guess if you've got a fly from a ton of different locations... Interesting!
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You may not recall how things were 30+ years ago, but rather than pulling out credit cards in stores, people often pulled out checkbooks. Imagine if even half of today's credit card transactions were made by paper check, and you can see that's a serious tonnage of checks every day.
 
Ed Haywood said:
That's just one example of a business process made more efficient by modern IT.
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Ah, but what we've lost.....

A few years back, I was riding motorcycles with some buddies in the N. GA mountains, and one afternoon we stopped for lunch in Dahlonega. We started talking with another rider who was retired but now had a part-time job working for his son. The son owned a title company and needed to have various deeds and titles and so forth picked up or delivered all over north Georgia, so this happy retiree was getting paid to ride his motorcyle over wonderful mountain roads for a few hours every day, hauling a$$ and hauling paperwork and having the time of his life.

Yeah, throw me in that briar patch! :happydance:

Sadly, it now all goes electronically. :(
 
bigmo said:
As a guy that recently bought, the competition to get a quality aircraft under contract is a bit of a hunger games. Supplies of nice a/c are low…and there are plenty of cash buyers.
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If you don't mind me asking, what did you buy? Just curious about anecdotal evidence on the strength of more popular models (172s, 182s, PA28s, ...) vs the more expensive kinds (SR22s, Malibus, A36, ...) which seem to be weaker in the data.
 
ArrowFlyer86 said:
If you don't mind me asking, what did you buy? Just curious about anecdotal evidence on the strength of more popular models (172s, 182s, PA28s, ...) vs the more expensive kinds (SR22s, Malibus, A36, ...) which seem to be weaker in the data.
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Three grown kids in three sperate states. And, my wife and I are not getting any younger. It's not like money is no object for us, but I'd rather have it now and enjoy it than wait 3, 4, 7 years for prices to stabilize.
 
Going back to real estate, I spent the last 3 years waiting for the Covid bubble to pop so I could buy a vacation property. Seemed obvious that what goes up must come down, but it never did. Finally realized I was going to wait myself right out of my dreams, and pulled the trigger in December. Closed last week. Murphy being Murphy, I fully expect the market to plummet this spring. But it actually seems like it is accelerating again, as the Fed hints that rate hikes are probably done. The stock market has gone up 25% over the past 12 months, so people with extra money are feeling even richer. Some of that gain gets spent on discretionary items like boats and planes.

Keep in mind the latter half of the boomer generation is still in their 60's. I'm tail end Charlie for the boomers, having been born in 64 and turning 60 this summer. We've been working, saving, and investing in the market for a long time, and now we are inclined to spend it while we can.
 
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Half Fast said:
Ah, but what we've lost.....

A few years back, I was riding motorcycles with some buddies in the N. GA mountains, and one afternoon we stopped for lunch in Dahlonega. We started talking with another rider who was retired but now had a part-time job working for his son. The son owned a title company and needed to have various deeds and titles and so forth picked up or delivered all over north Georgia, so this happy retiree was getting paid to ride his motorcyle over wonderful mountain roads for a few hours every day, hauling a$$ and hauling paperwork and having the time of his life.
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Definitely not apples-to-apples, but a lot of the last mile amazon delivery stuff in Mexico is done on motorcycles.
 
MoM Data Update. Prices climbed on both avg/median basis.

Notably the venerable 172 continued its inexorable price climb. It ain't getting any cheaper to get into a plane, at least from the asking price POV.

1708019838036.png

(excluding newly collected 210 Turbo in the median chart for comparability reasons)
1708020132973.png

EDIT: Adding in used cars values just for fun since I take a gander at that anywho.
1708022083638.png
1708022059652.png
 
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SFDukie said:
@ArrowFlyer86 -I have no market insights- but want to thank you for your charts.
They help those of us who contemplate buying!
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I’d be careful reading too much into the data.

Some planes have a large variety of prices, not just based on year but model has well. 172N vs 172SP (G1000 version), so if 2 years ago there was only 2 SPs for sale versus 10 today, the average price is going to be higher.
Especially true for Mooneys, a 72 C can be $50K, and a 82 J $200K.

The higher prices may be enticing owners of more expensive planes to sell, creating even higher prices.

He’s using average, median might be substantially less.
 
NealRomeoGolf said:
No more check runners and the high rollers moving to Jet A (proliferation of turboprops) instead of Avgas.
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Due to no real piston twins being built anymore (think Navajo/300-400 series Cessnas not Barons) and the near impossibility of replacement engines for some of the ones that are left (GTSIO, yikes), the aerial mapping world is increasingly transitioning to kerosene burners.

Not that we're as big in terms of number of airframes across the industry as the former check runners, but the airframes we do have fly ALOT of hours annually at 30-40 gallons an hour.
 

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MooneyDriver78 said:
I’d be careful reading too much into the data.

Some planes have a large variety of prices, not just based on year but model has well. 172N vs 172SP (G1000 version), so if 2 years ago there was only 2 SPs for sale versus 10 today, the average price is going to be higher.
Especially true for Mooneys, a 72 C can be $50K, and a 82 J $200K.

The higher prices may be enticing owners of more expensive planes to sell, creating even higher prices.

He’s using average, median might be substantially less.
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All valid points to be cognizant of when looking at the data. Though for aggregate data I do output the median (same for the time series trend line I posted).

Going forward I'll include a column to show median prices per series. It'll be less susceptible to the reboot Cessnas skewing the data, though not totally immune.

And for reference here's some of the biggest series and their dispersions (model year + asking price).
1708361914741.png
1708361945792.png
1708361966288.png
1708361985949.png
 
wow-those SR22 data sure graph linearly with age.
 
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