Maintenance: age, hours, or both?

[PKV]

I'm leasing 6 BAe-146-300's right now in my game...funny enough they're earning more than my 727-200's and on par with my A320-200's...  Anyhow, up until now, they had zero hours logged, but I find they're four years old.

If I were to buy them out of the lease, would I be incurring maintenance expense in line with a never-used plane just out of the shrink-wrap, or a well-used four year-old plane?  Or a little of both?  Aaaaaand...would you even suggest buying them out of the lease if they're already four years old?

[AirbusGuy350]

Small aircraft tend to be very profitable in AM if used correctly. As for maintenance when you lease you don't pay for maintenance. An unfortunately AM maintenance formula doesn't use cycles and hours it goes by age, as far as I know. I wouldn't buy them out of lease because of the costs.

[jayceon]

In a private world using small aircraft is the #winning strategy. Lower maintenance costs, lower prices, lower fuel expenses, lower turn times and as much (if not more) revenue = more profit

[pilotguy121a]

3 years for all domestic jets. Just 4 737-700s at 3 years of age caused my mx costs to jump from 7.8 to 11.2m daily. Replaced them, and it went down to about 7.9million

[PKV]

i just took a look at my maintenance, and even for a new airline (with the same planes i started with), that expense is growing by 4% each month!!  i know there have been hints of a new maintenance formula floating out there, but i'm sure that if real airlines experienced 4% M-o-M increases in their maintenance expense, they wouldn't bother being in the business in the first place!!

anyway, small commuter props / jets (fokker 50, fokker f28 fellowship, bae 146-300) are definitely the way to go.  from a margin standpoint, these aircraft (all leased at the moment) are doing much better than my a320's or 757's...

[Virgin Serbia]

I prefer the Yak-42D. It has decent range for Asia and Europe. It is cheap and they shovel money in. I think it has the exact amount of seats needed for 90% of shorthaul routes.