FormerHangie
En-Route
I think I might have been misunderstood or misspoke. I'm not necessarily concerned about losing money, I'm prepared for that as it is aviation we're talking about here after all. With the regulatory changes, rapid innovation in cockpit technology, and electric/alternative power plants coming, I think the period coming up will be unlike anything we've seen in 40+ years. Or not, who knows. It seems like the general consensus is you can't just keep waiting because something new might come along, if that's your attitude you'll never make a move and you'll die a sad old man wishing you'd made better decisions. I suppose my real issue is I'm stuck trying to find the perfect plane for my mission and I figure if I just keep waiting, that perfect plane might come along, or I'm afraid it will right after I finally make a move. Alright, that's enough, thanks for letting me vent.
If you're worried that technical innovation is going to make the plane you buy not obsolete, don't. Innovation comes very slowly to the aviation world. If you go out on FlightAware right now and search what is flying by type, you'll see 126 747-400s and 118 757-200s in the air, and they're all in the 25+ year old range. Innovation comes more quickly to airliners than it does to GA airplanes, yet these older airplanes haul millions of passengers. Hell, there's a Beech 18 showing up, on a cargo run from Fort Lauderdale to the Bahamas, and that airplane is older than most of us! If the airplane you're going to buy doesn't have ADS-B, you'll probably want to allow for that, but if you buy a good airworthy older airplane, if you decide you don't want it or can't afford it any longer, you'll be able to sell it for most of what you paid for it.