Hangar price here is around €150 per month (large hangar several aircraft.) That’s if you don’t want to build one yourself. If you did build one the ground rent on the land is €400 per year for a plot suitable for a hangar for one normal sized aircraft.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
We all live on budgets of sorts. But often enough I have to say I wonder how people who howl like the horn of Gondor about how expensive everything is still deem fit to shop at the most expensive shops, go to expensive holidays, live in flats with rates which exceed my salary and drive late model leasomobiles don’t finally start asking themselves why they work paycheck to paycheck while people with half their salaries can afford stuff they deem out of this world.
That is the trap of consumerism. Life is better planned without it, not because the average guy can scrimp and save and do a few things others on the same or higher salary can’t do while they wonder why, but because he can scrimp and save, then invest the money. In a couple of decades you then live on a much larger budget, and larger budgets are better. At that point ‘they’ understand completely what you’ve done, but there’s not much they can do about the fact that you’re e.g. collecting rent from people like them to create that budget 
Silvaire wrote:
Life is better planned without it, not because the average guy can scrimp and save and do a few things others on the same or higher salary can’t do while they wonder why, but because he can scrimp and save, then invest the money. In a couple of decades you then live on a much larger budget, and larger budgets are better. At that point ‘they’ understand completely what you’ve done, but there’s not much they can do about the fact that you’re e.g. collecting rent from people like them to create that budget
That is another way to do it sure. I am aware that lots of Americans subscribe to this, save save save until retirement and then live the life you want. Also comes out of the necessity to pay for your kids education.
Makes a lot of sense in the US, maybe a bit less so here, even though lots of folks do the same.
My personal take is that I want to live a tad earlier than retirement, which is due with 65. Maybe it has to do with the fact that my dad died 4 months into his retirement, full of plans what he wanted to do. The other wake up call I got was the bancruptcy of Swissair and my loss of employment and with it staff travel, the reason I gave up flying GA in 1998 as I had access to very cheap travel. I had planned so much for the future which, well, never happened. The loss of that kind of travel was most profound and I told myself never to wait for something I really wanted anymore. I have a feeling that I won’t regret this stance.
As many had to find out for themselfs, the one thing no war, illness and economic crisis can take away from you is your memories of things you’ve done. Your money, your possessions and your life can evaporate like nothing. Your memories of your achievements and travels e.t.c. won’t. My favorite piece of poetry goes in this direction, read and accompanied by 2 of my very favorite people. The last one, Vangelis, has just passed after a very long journey indeed.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
My personal take is that I want to live a tad earlier than retirement
My working life so far has included e.g. roughly 50 vacation trips to Europe since 1998 when I could first reasonably afford it I also have nine collectable or useful motorcycles, three cars likewise used for various combinations of fun and utility, and a modest airplane. These were accumulated since I was in my 20s, with an eye to both their long term value and my enjoyment. Investment and reasonable financial planning did not ‘prevent me from living’ prior to my planned retirement (at age 62, several years from now). The main thing from the investment POV is (oddly enough!) not to waste money on things that invariably depreciate, and instead spend a fair proportion of it on things that tend to appreciate. Houses are generally good especially in times of inflation, and conservative bi-weekly stock purchases over decades haven’t been bad.
Financially, I started with zero but studied something productive. After that if you use your brain pay goes up over time – my income from all sources combined is now about 10 times what it was when I started work after university. Not ramping up your spending to absorb the entire increase in pay as it comes along is important. If you do something useful with pay increases nothing happens very fast, but it happens. As you age you can save a greater and greater proportion of your income, while still living well. I bought my first airplane before I had a license in 2002, for $23K. I learned to fly in it and had it until 2019. The second was $35K in 2010 and I’m still slowly improving it… at a rate that some here would find to be on a geologic time scale. I would no more spend $30K on a panel upgrade than shoot myself in the foot because its not a good investment, financially. But I have fun anyway, instead living by choice in good weather where reasonable utility and fun does not require avionics. When I’m done maybe 15 years after purchase the plane will be what I had in mind. I might have one more plane ahead of me, meaning three in a lifetime, with each one getting more expensive as assets grow and future lifespan shrinks. Each one takes years to sort out, each one ends up better than it was. The overall point is to build productively, not consume and throw away.
That’s really simple but its amazing how many people do the opposite, as you point out. On the other hand a lot of people do exactly what I describe, work with an eye to future growth in parallel with living their lives. As a result they create a good life from start to finish, even after they stop working. With factors such as government created inflation and other related widespread stupidity in mind, if anybody thinks following some government or corporate plan for their life is going to create that, outside of the bare necessities very much not including aircraft or flying, I think they are likely to be disappointed.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
I told myself never to wait for something I really wanted anymore. I have a feeling that I won’t regret this stance.
I absolutely agree. This has become even more acute for me as, at 60+, I recently got a (partially age-related) medical condition that left me grounded for three months. That’s been fixed now, but at my age you should not put off things you want to do. Even if the life expectancy for males of my age in Sweden is 84 years, that is a statistical average and there is certainly no guarantee that I’ll live that long – or even be in shape to do interesting things.
So I’d rather spend money on flying now than save for an uncertain future. I will in any case get enough pension for a comfortable retirement. If that will have to be with much less flying then I do now – so be it.
Airborne_Again wrote:
So I’d rather spend money on flying now than save for an uncertain future.
That is what my wife said at dawn of the Covid crisis. If not now when will we do such things? And what shall I say, she’s right, of course.
Certainly you should get on with stuff now. And eat plenty of veg – examples to make sure you stay in good shape
Unfortunately most people have done the opposite when CV19 came, and many packed flying in permanently.
CoVid and the passing of my folks in the same timespan refreshed my memory… things really do happen.
Lesson: Do the things you wanna do. And do them NOW
As far as the title of this thread goes, GA will not survive in EU, nor will it in the US, as nothing lasts forever. As the timeframe is not given, the question in itself is moot, though I love following this thread as some very interesting point of views are being exchanged. It also once more pinpoints to the size of the term GA, which encompasses the simplest UL to biz jets, with all in between, hence the sometimes vastly different opinions or financial barriers for each of us.
There is an argument that life in general will gradually become more and more bland and uniform.
To give just one example: 40 years ago you could jump into a car and drive at some great speed through the country lanes. Today it is about 1 minute before you get stuck behind traffic comprising of 5 cars with a “slow potter” in the front. Even on a motorbike it is very hard to get past that lot, and you will have another one to do a few mins later. The # of cars has gone up ~ 4 times, which has removed the fun from tearing around the country lanes
In GA, we have various new hassles as posted above, but it is a mixed bag because a newcomer will really appreciate the vastly easier navigation and communication.
Again, the (this particular; there have been many) energy crisis is nothing to do with this.
@Peter, lots of enjoyable rushing around on country roads still being done in the Alps, by motorcycle. I think it’ll be awhile before the fun police shut it down Europe wide. Not everywhere is as massively overpopulated as the Southeast UK. Car traffic in more remote and scenic areas may decrease as more range limited cars come into vogue, versus traffic increasing. People are slowly being trained by their masters to stay home, as in the Middle Ages, and the high alpine roads may become more open for those who don’t follow the program.
I recently decided to lose some weight, so far 20 lbs or 9 Kg and it involved a fair amount of vegetables. The goal is for sure to remain in good shape so that physical activities will continue to be possible for quite a while. My ‘energy crisis’ is thereby resolved.
In the interest of slow improvement in my plane, and safe flying in the years to come, new elevator fitting weldments and mounting pins are now on their way, €270 all included, not too bad and unlike a Piper (for example) the parts sit waiting for a order, as they have for 50 years. The parts are patient too, and they have been stored carefully, never thrown away…
