Cost of ownership for RV 4, 6?
 

I read in AOPA magazine the estimated cost for a private owner flying a C-172R 50 hours annually is $85 an hour which includes fuel, maintenance, tiedown, and $10 per hour engine reserve fund.
Does anyone have similar estimates of cost of ownership for a RV 4 or RV6? I realize there are variables but just wondering about a general rule of thumb for cost of ownership.
Thank you

I don't amortise all the costs into an houly lump because I don't pay for them that way.

A lot of things are annual: insurance, condition inspection, etc.

Transponder recheck and ELT batteries are biannual.

Fuel is hourly but oil and filter are, well, just shop consumables. These things are out of pocket.

Dave

Cost
 

I consider ownership a $1000 a month habit
Give or take $100 depending on hangar cost and other variables .

Same here, I budget $1k/month. With my 100-150hrs a year average, it works out to around $100/hr. I have full insurance coverage and burn mostly avgas. I don't maintain any sort of maintenance fund, but as a non-builder, I must hire out the condition inspection. I only 'run the numbers' once a year, so there's usually some toys that get added in. And XM subscription.

-jon

With full insurance, a shared hangar, $10 engine reserve, burning only 100ll, and 100 hours a year it works out to be about $95/hour for me.

But going to a tie down (which I would not do) it would reduce it to around $75/hour.

But this does not include hamburgers or toys for the plane. :)

I think one of your biggest variables is going to be tie down versus hangar in particular if you live in a densely populated area like I do. Hangar rents around my area run 400-500$ monthly so that alone would get you 96$ -120$ per hour if you only flew 50 hours a year independent of what plane you are putting in the hangar. Tie downs are of course much much cheaper.

If you get full hull insurance let's say on a 80k$ value I would assume you pay something in the 1000-2000$ range depending on your flying experience. So that would be 20-40$ an hour.

Fuel depends heavily on your flying style and airport. Around here it's somewhere between 4.80$ and 7$ and depending on if I just fly slowly to get a coffee or have some fun between 7 to 12 g/h. So that's from 33$ to 84$ an hour based on where I fuel up and what I do.

With 50 hours you will change your oil based on time. Assuming you do it yourself that's about 6$ per hour on 50 hours including filter. If you do oil analysis etc.. add a dollar or two.

Last big item is maintenance/annual inspection. Builders generally do that themselves so it's material but if you have to pay somebody for an annual it really depends on area you life in and who you pick (if you get somebody with little RV experience it could get really expensive) but I would think you are probably paying at least 1k$ if you do nothing yourself and close to 0$ if you do everything yourself. So that's between 0$ and 20$ per hour.

You also mentioned 10$ for an engine fund which seems about right.

So what does that add up to.

Well if you are an unexperienced pilot flying high power settings a lot which outsources the annual with his RV in a hanger close to NY city and fly 50 hours a year you pay 280$ an hour.

On the other hand if you are an experienced pilot parking outside on a cheap airport doing everything yourself slowly flying to get a burger on the weekends you could be in for 69$ an hour.

So if you look at that I think there are just to many variables to have a meaningful "rule of thumb".

As some of the others said I personally look at it as a 1k$ a month habit not as an hourly thing.

As Oliver points out, they are essentially the same (172 vs. RV) since he has a pretty comprehensive list and almost all items on the list will be the same for either. The one difference may be in the cost of the annual, but that won't significantly change the numbers.

Tim

The cost of RV parts vs. the costs of Cessna parts might add up to a large difference over the years if the Cessna is an older model....

The 2 Rules...
 

I've always simply believed in and followed the "Two Fundamental Financial Rules of Personal Airplane Ownership" and despite only having the income of a city employee, have somehow managed to learn to fly, owned and flown a Cherokee 140 for nearly a decade, sold the Cherokee and now have bought, owned and flown my RV-6 for nearly 3 years.

Those two rules are:

Rule #1 - Don't bother trying to cost-justify owning a small personal airplane. It is not possible.

Rule #2 - Never ever add up all the money you've ever spent on owning and flying a small personal airplane. You don't want to know.

:D

Exactly Neal... I always add And Who Really Cares to that list of rules. :D