Cessna 172 Cost of Ownership!

Thinking of buying a Cessna 172? Wouldn’t it be helpful to know the costs of ownership from an actual cessna 172 owner.

Watch until the end where I breakdown all the costs of ownership

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Disclaimer
Ownership costs can vary widely depending on factors like location, owner pilot rating and experience, hours flown in a given year and on and on.

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[NWP]

Kerosene is more like Jet-A fuel. 100LL is a more like old leaded hi-test gasoline.

[MadcapActivityDomain]

Stumbled across your vid as my lifelong interest in aviation was recently reignited. I was happily surprised when you mentioned Yeager. I live on the west side just beneath the approach to runway 5. At 47 yrs old, I still hold out hope that I can earn my pilot’s license someday. I suppose I should be grateful sims have come so far. Thanks for the education on small aircraft ownership costs! All the best.

[jnick]

So in conclusion it's about 25, 000- 30, 000 a year for you to own the Cessna when you include the hangar, subscriptions, insurance, and annual.

[charleswesley]

The cheapest way is to build an experimental aircraft and you can use auto conversion engine and be very reliable. You can then sign off your airplane inspection as a builder.

[kristopherdetar]

The annual is only the inspection. Parts are crazy expensive, and add to the total. A selector switch fuel valve for my Piper Comanche 250 was $497 back in 2004. I’m sure it’s gone up much more than that these days.

[beezhonda]

Nice Plane, my dad used to keep his 172 at Yeager Airport back in the 70's.

[steve]

Private pilot here. You've detailed well the associated costs. Two others to consider are depreciation and annual personal property taxes. The later of which is brutal depending upon where you live.  

It's a grim fact of aviation life, being truly honest and open, that it was NEVER meant to be universally affordable or even attainable. And for any young person contemplating this arena as a career I would advise them to seek other avenues quickly. The frustrations are many and unending, the financial costs are stratospheric, and the payback is slow and often meager. Cheers.

[rogue]

In my experience its not the rising cost of fuel or parts but the hanger space and costs that are the biggest issues people run into that they underestimate.

[zachschaneberger]

Good video! Just an FYI kerosene is in the same family as diesel vs 100LL is in the same family as gasoline. That's why if you put kerosene or diesel in a jar you have to use a torch to catch them on fire. However, with 100LL and gasoline, it will catch on fire with just a match. you can also run a diesel on kerosene just fine in fact I've done it without an issue.

[atypocrat]

Yeah, many don’t have $13k a year to play with. Been doing the numbers like this for years. It never made any sense. I’ve been in a club that shares the cost of flying a pietenpol aircamper. Costs are nowhere near this of course. Plus we have a club atmosphere. Friendships. Nice VFR daytime only. Keeping it a cheap safe-ish sport.

[xspeedy]

I’ll never understand the high price of something like a 172. It is low complexity and the development costs have been recouped long ago. I get the efficiencies that come from volume, but can’t help but compare to automobiles.

[Nikita_Andreyev]

Then 100 hours will cost you 20.000 = $200 per hour. The speed is 150 miles per hour. Then 1 mile cost will be about $1.33
It's a damn expensive! It's a really money to noise converter!

[Rosspilot]

Regarding insurance . . . what is the hull value? what are your liability limits and exclusions?

[waltmooredanwilson]

Thanks for sharing your video. I enjoyed watching. Take care and God Bless.

[leehowson]

And there I was, just about to put my deposit down on a Boeing 767 and then I watched this video 😭
I guess I'll have to put my £100 back under the mattress for now

[trashysworld]

Did you mean to say $500 per hour for insurance? I think I maybe misunderstood that. So if you fly an average of 10 hrs per month you're going to pay $5k??

[joestaton]

Sir not to be too critical but you need to make sure the information you are relaying is accurate 100 low lead is not kerosene or diesel

[MikeRetsoc]

Seat stops are not sufficient to comply with the AD on seat rails. Not a bad idea, and a very good backup if wanted. But not compliant.

[hornitorrincoperezoso]

The entire engine has to be replaced every 1800 hours? Did I hear that wrong? That's less than a year for a plane being used full time 8 hours a day. And every year you have to pull the engine out and put a new one in that sounds ludicrous.

[BillSmith-rxrm]

So even to own a 60-year-old used basic trainer airplane requires you to have a significant amount of lettuce in the bank. Wow. And they wonder why GA is stagnant?