Ideally a strong alternative to ownership would be a flying club with around 50 active members and half a dozen types. A couple of IFR tourers, two or three simple four seaters and a nice aerobatic tailwheel trainer (Cap 10). The club to have its own maintenance shop, hangars, nice club house and swimming pool, and in a relatively central, sunny location.
Am sure there are examples in France and Germany, possibly Italy.
This model existed once in the USA promoted by the leading manufacturers. Beechcraft had the Musketeer and Duchess as the basis for the Beechcraft clubs.
Blackbushes flying group? they have rental cars in few places in Europe & Islands, they just need a PA18 & Cap10 
If you go to retire in Annemasse you can fly with these guys, pricey compared to rest of French aeorclub but 1/2 price of Swiss Clubs !
@RobertL18C what you describe is pretty close to our – and a few other – clubs in SoCal. Granted, no club house or swimming pool though. We do, however, have a thing called the Pacific; does that qualify? I also know of a few in Europe that come pretty close. They exist, and not only south of the Alps.
RobertL18C wrote:
Ideally a strong alternative to ownership would be a flying club with around 50 active members and half a dozen types. A couple of IFR tourers, two or three simple four seaters and a nice aerobatic tailwheel trainer (Cap 10). The club to have its own maintenance shop, hangars, nice club house and swimming pool, and in a relatively central, sunny location.
Isn’t that roughly how most clubs are? But IFR tourers? They certainly wouldn’t be used much. IFR capable – certainly. We also have one Cub, one C-185, one Safir (instead of the Cap 10, but would much rather have a Cap 10 for aerobatics 
), and several ULs. No maintenance shop, but a dedicated mechanic. A club house, but certainly not a nice one cannot even be called a house.
As for swimming pool, central and sunny location; You got to use those IFR tourers for something IMO
We have around 50 aeroclub members. We have two near-identical Robins and a Microlight. Its not clear if the microlight is paying its way yet as it was purchaced only 6 months before C19 hit. The 2x Robins do pay their way. The main issue with a bigger fleet is the fixed costs spread over fewer members.
Ibra wrote:
https://sites.google.com/view/caa-asso/tarifs
Those prices are at least double what clubs around here charge. I guess that’s why we can’t afford as many airplanes.
Ibra wrote:
If you go to retire in Annemasse you can fly with these guys, pricey compared to rest of French aeorclub but 1/2 price of Swiss Clubs !
That’s half the price of Swiss clubs. Gosh…
Are these clubs with employed staff (except technical staff)?
These rates of the Annemasse club are very much the norm, for a “city aerclub” in central Europe. Maybe in some rural parts of Sweden or France you find rates which are a bit lower, but not by all that much.
Of course, most Swiss aeroclub rates are higher than this, but not double that. One can easily google the websites of several Swiss clubs.
RobertL18C wrote:
A couple of IFR tourers, two or three simple four seaters and a nice aerobatic tailwheel trainer (Cap 10).
It’s quite difficult for a club to get the required utilization if they do not offer training. Therefore the backbone of almost all flying clubs in Germany is the training fleet.
IFR-Tourers is a difficult segment: Few pilots that actually use them and the few you have are split between two very distinct groups – the ones that want to fly a Cirrus and the ones that want to have the cheapest IFR ride available. So practically many flying clubs end up with a few Aquila’s, some C182/PA-28 and a SR20 they have bought used.
Ideal lineup would, however, be more like: A Phenom 100, a DA-42, a Malibu, an SR22T a SuperCub and an Extra ;-)
