When to build a terminal?

[davecummings]

Hi all,
I am currently in the below world:

Airline Mogul - See my airline

I have at current 5 gates at LHR and three A/C on order so this time tomorrow I will have approx 6+ gates. My question is when is the best time to build a terminal in this world?


regards
dave

[1993matias]

The terminal feature was originally made to avoid gate shortages at big airports, back in the times when there was only one world for thousands of players. Today, in the half-empty worlds, there is no need for terminals, as there is always free gates at the big airports.

The terminal costs 75% less per gate compared to renting gates. E.g. you have five rented gates worth 350,000 each. That is 1,750,000. With terminals, you will pay 75% of that amount if you have five terminal gates; 1,312,000.

My recomendation would be not to build a terminal. With those high costs associated with building a terminal in your empty world, it wouldn't be worth using money on it. If you really want to build a terminal, do so when your airline has grown to be bigger, with a DOC of around 15-20 million.

To read more about terminals, go to the Game Manual here.

[davecummings]

cheers for that pal! If the world starts to get busy I wil build me a terminal!

[pseudoswede]

Keep renting until you reach 25 gates. Then build a terminal.

[mark4051997]

I build a terminal as soon as I get 5 gates so I can get my investment back faster and make profits higher

[cjp]

One thing to keep in mind about building terminals, since the minimum purchase is 5 gates, you should plan your build so you have enough planes/routes to be able to use at least 41 of the 50 slots created before the automatic gate return kicks in the month after next. Otherwise you will end up losing rented gates and have to extend the terminal earlier. After you build a terminal, you can no longer rent gates.

[jayceon]

Check out this calculation; no matter where you're building your hub (350k, 300k, 250k it's all the same), you will start making a profit within 9 years. So if your world lasts for at least 9 years, it's a good investment Only if you got the money laying around though, if not, buy planes instead.

Quick example, I want to build a terminal at CDG
Rental costs: 350.000/month = 1,75m/month for 5 gates = 21m/year.
Terminal building costs (5 gates): € 46,397,750
Rental costs w/ terminal: 1,31m/month = 15,75m/year
Profit: 5,25m/year

The more gates you build, the faster you make it back since building additional gates only cost ~2,5m at 350k airports. If you build 20 gates, you'll make the money back within 3 years If you see any faults in my calculation, feel free to comment