Kenny Keller and Chris discuss whether buying a helicopter makes sense. Insurance, maintenance, and hangar fees run high, unexpected repairs cost thousands for small parts, and most people should set aside money per flight hour for future maintenance. Kenny warns that ownership is financially punishing for most.
Questions this video answers
January 21, 2021
Four years
Three aircraft total: two airplanes and one helicopter
About $10,000 per year
About $700 per year
Chapters
Awesome. That's Good. All right. Dog's Daily Brief Episode 9 Should I Buy my own helicopter? I've done this video. I've done this video in the past. I'll put the links down below if you want to see the older videos. My first instinct normally is, no, don't do it. Okay. There are some times where it might be feasible. Let's hear your. Let's give us a fresh perspective. Chris, what do you think on this? When somebody says, should I buy my own helicopter?
I think sometimes people don't know what all goes into aircraft ownership. So you really got, again, do your research, look stuff up, you know, answer those, get your questions answered before you go out there and do it. I've owned three aircraft. I've owned two airplanes, and I've owned a helicopter. And I've always done it with a partner or multiple partners. I'm not one of those guys that could afford an aircraft just by myself. So I got into partnership. Should you own your own craft? Aircraft, it's all about, do you have the money to do it? Of course there's going to be things like maintenance is your big one. Storage, hangar fees.
Yeah.
Insurance. Yes, insurance. If you have to have insurance or if you want insurance. That's always the big one. That's usually the biggest part of aircraft ownership. If. If you can afford the insurance. Yes. So I'm not saying no because, you know, I. Because that was part of the reason why I bought an aircraft or bought aircrafts was the time build, you know. Right. But I did it with a partner where I was splitting cost. And of course that gets into a whole nother thing, too. If you have a partner, you know how to, you know, split and whatever for maintenance or whatever.
Sure.
So I'm not saying not to, but also do research to see what all goes into it. Insurance, maintenance, hangar fees, you know, that kind of stuff.
And unexpected maintenance.
Unexpected maintenance is a big one.
You have your annual inspection. You know approximately what that's going to cost.
Correct.
But it could be more per year, depending what they find. But that's. You can kind of figure that one. But those unexpected things that pop up for my four years of ownership, what ate me up was those mixture cable that breaks. It's nothing more than a damn PTO cable. Like on a. On a tow truck.
Right.
But it's, you know, a hundred dollars at Napa for a truck in your. And your helicopter next to your cable is eighteen hundred dollars.
Yeah. Yep. They get you. Yeah. So it's. It's a Good way to build time. I would highly recommend if you, if you're a normal Joe like myself, you know, find someone that's that interest that likes it too and go in partners that way. It's the cost is that keeps the cost somewhat down. Insurance is, you know, I said unexpected. Maintenance is one, but insurance is probably the biggest one. If you had to have insurance, I have known, I have known guys that have bought an aircraft and realize they can't afford the insurance on it.
Yep. And we're going to talk about insurance more tomorrow in episode 10. And I want to say my first answer is when somebody says, shot by a helicopter, I say, no, no, run away, run away. Don't do it. Okay, number one. Number two, if you got money to just throw out the window, you got money to burn, you got unlimited funds and it isn't going to matter. Okay, buy one. People say, well, I'm going to buy this helicopter. And I've done the math and if I lease it to the flight school and they fly it this many hours per month, I can afford. Oh man, don't go down that path because other people flying your aircraft, who's gonna. Nobody's gonna maintain your aircraft as well as what you do yourself. God, we could go on and on, but you gave him a lot of good food for thought. Do your research. I don't recommend the average person buy a helicopter. I really don't. I owned one for four years. It ruined me. But that was my stupidity for not failing sooner. I should have bailed long before I did. But when somebody, two years in, somebody said, you know what? You should just sell that damn helicopter. And this was a guy was the CFI in airplanes that owned several aircraft. And he's like, kenny, sell that son of bitch.
Right?
And I'm like, sell my baby? Yeah, sell my baby. Are you kidding me? Well, two years in, I could have maybe recovered a little quicker. Do your research. There's so much to look at. People say, what's it gonna cost me? Oh, man, you gotta research. There much to cover. And again, several upcoming videos, we're going to talk more about insurance and some other things.
And just, I just had this thought real quick, is even though you're flying your own aircraft, each time you fly it, I would put some money back, you know, so you're not really flying for free because it's your aircraft. Like when I owned, I owned a Hiller with three other guys, so there's four of us. That was, that was an experience. Anyway, each time we flew we all decided for every hour that we flew, we would throw money into an account. So, you know, we'll just say I flew for an hour. So I threw 100 bucks into the account, and that was just to have money there in case of unexpected maintenance. So even though you're gonna, you know, own your own aircraft, you still would want to kind of charge yourself, you know, for those unexpected maintenance or whatever.
Okay, that's my thought. I agree. Because it's easy in your mind. Oh, well, I go out and fly. It's not costing me anything. Yes, it is. Every hour you're flying it, you're gonna pay.
Correct.
You're not paying today, but you're gonna pay later.
And insurance, maintenance, and you always have that annual anyway. So even if you don't fly it and it's sitting there, you're still going to pay for an annual once a year, which could be anywhere from the airplane that I owned. It cost us 700 bucks for an annual. The helicopter, I don't remember what it was.
Mine was ten grand if there was nothing wrong with it. Yeah, every year.
And you own an instrument, right? The F28F. So 10 grand for an annual. Right there. So there's a. There's a number for you.
Absolutely. All right, so comment below on what you think about helicopter ownership. We'd love to hear it. Subscribe the channel. Click the bell. Tomorrow is helicopter rental after training. Very discouraging in parentheses, because that comes from one of our viewers asking about that, and we put two of them together. Somebody else asked about insurance for an R22 ownership. We'll cover that tomorrow in episode. Is that 10 or 11? I'm confused. That's 10. All right. Subscribe. Click the bell. Oh, down below. Free Maneuver Guide, built by our operations manager, Brian Rutledge. It's free. That was 10. That was nine. Oh, well, don't mind me on the numbers.
