Yes.
Would I rent out my yacht – no.
Would I rent my house – no.
An aircraft is a tool. I have never considered it to be personal in the same way as a yacht or a house.
Would I set parameters – very definitely yes, and the majority would not meet those parameters.
Would I choose to rent my own aircraft – no, but that is a different question. If I needed the money to make it viable I would. If I neeed the money to make a yacht viable, I would buy a smaller yacht. If I needed the money to stay with the aircraft I wanted, I would rent it out.
I have just paid a deposit for two of us to buy a c172sp to be based in Sussex, possibly moved to shoreham over the winter. Our plan is very much to rent it to help pay the costs. I will be using it for a bit of casual training.
Would I rent out a spam can? Maybe.
Would I rent out something like the Auster? Never in a million years.
Malibuflyer wrote:
- Cost: I clearly do not use my plane as much as a professional charter operation would. Therefore my “avg. cost per hr.” is clearly higher than it would be as a professional charter operation. That leaves me with 2 bad choices: Either I ask for a “competitive price” leading to the very uneasy situation that I pay more for my flight hrs. than I would get from a renter, or I ask for my average cost which would be declined by almost all renters and would lead to stupid comments.
This is very true! I have advertised a share my Mooney on this forum and most reactions I had were from people asking me if I would rent her out. Litteraly telling me they do not want to bother with the hassle and risk of ownership (hey, I would love that too!) I would need to take well over € 500,00 per hour, if I even wanted to do so. This doesn’t cover the cost of me looking nervously on FR24 the entire time 
. If I need a top end overhaul due to engine mismanagement at one point, the renter is long gone and any discussion will be pointless. Then there are all the little things in the interior, stains, scratches, stuff you probaly won’t repair but are there for you to look at. I rented out a motorcycle through a sharing website here in Holland, as a sort of social experiment. I would always get my bike back in lesser shape than it was before, often subtle, but sometimes not so subtle, even if the renter was super friendly and honest. The nicest people turned out to be the ones proposing insurance fraud. I stopped renting out that motorcycle.
Bobo wrote:
This is very true! I have advertised a share my Mooney on this forum and most reactions I had were from people asking me if I would rent her out. Litteraly telling me they do not want to bother with the hassle and risk of ownership (hey, I would love that too!) I would need to take well over € 500,00 per hour, if I even wanted to do so. This doesn’t cover the cost of me looking nervously on FR24 the entire time . If I need a top end overhaul due to engine mismanagement at one point, the renter is long gone and any discussion will be pointless. Then there are all the little things in the interior, stains, scratches, stuff you probaly won’t repair but are there for you to look at. I rented out a motorcycle through a sharing website here in Holland, as a sort of social experiment. I would always get my bike back in lesser shape than it was before, often subtle, but sometimes not so subtle, even if the renter was super friendly and honest. The nicest people turned out to be the ones proposing insurance fraud. I stopped renting out that motorcycle.
Of course, as many of us know, this goes to the heart of the problem. So many people have had bad experiences. There is also a pretty small pot these days of people who want to pay a realistic hourly rate for a really nice aircraft. They of course totally forget what the rate should include for all the routine stuff, not withstanding the unexpected and those things that are just nice to do.
All I can say is that it can be made to work. You just need to be very selective. There are really good people around who will look after things as if they were there own – and better, so it does work.
My view is still and aircraft is a tool. Unlike my comparison earlier it doesnt have all the personal possessions withing, and the things that even accidentally you wouldnt wish to see damaged. You simply ask that people are honest, treat it well, and probably know the “right way” to use the tool. There are those that do, and those that are willing to learn.
As a renter myself, I understand any aircraft owner who does not want to rent their plane to others. Especially if it is a type that needs special treatment. A Rotax plane is mostly immune to engine mismanagement, but may have other problems. The widespread Aquila A210 has a history of nose gear collapses, for example, and as an owner I would worry about renters making hard landings with it.
I equity share two aircraft. Surprisingly insurance for any pilot with over 100 hours costs very little more. But I and other syndicate members would NEVER consider renting. Both are exotic enough that there are few instructors to do check-outs, and not similar to C150/172/Pa28/38. The DR1050 after landing has defeated shareholders, forcing them to sell, and the Bolkow BO208 has a very different view over the cowling.
As I wrote previously, I did this 2002-2006.
I would not do it again with a plane which I actually flew for real. Rented planes usually get trashed; if not quickly then gradually. I have known people who rented their planes out; it worked for them in specific scenarios – some examples:
It is very difficult to put together a small group of “good” renters. Most IR holders already have their own plane (or have nil currency).
There are great advantages in you being the only person who flies it. You can leave all your personal stuff inside and it will be found where you left it. There will obviously be less wear on everything. The downside is that your flying is more expensive.
You can’t make money renting a plane out, unless it is a real heap of junk and is rented to a school or a syndicate which runs it with minimal maintenance. The cases where I have seen it work were where a mechanic (EASA66, Part M) had a fleet of identical planes which he maintained, and rented them out to schools or syndicates. He could maintain them himself, cost effectively because all the parts were common, and purchased in bulk directly from the US where possible.
Fuji_Abound wrote:
Would I rent out my yacht – no.
…
An aircraft is a tool. I have never considered it to be personal in the same way as a yacht or a house.
Thanks for sharing! It’s so insightful as I would feel exactly the opposite.
I wouldn’t care about renting out a yacht (which is one of the reasons why I don’t own one but rent one when I want to use it). But my plane – that’s my plane ….
…I don’t see the need for that distinction. I also wouldn’t rent out any of my tools for much of the same reasons I wouldn’t rent out the plane.
