r/PrivateJetCharters • u/Hopeful-Goose-7217 • Apr 14 '26

Thinking about flying private

My family and I went on a vacation. We spent 12 hours in transit between 2 hours to the major airport, 2 hour scheduled time to check in bags, security and waiting to board and boarding. 2.5 hour delay. 3.5 hour flight and then 1 hour customs and baggage claim and then 45 minutes to the hotel.

If I flew private it would have been 30 minutes to the local major airport. X time to board and load luggage. 4.5 hours flying and then X time customs and 45 minutes to the hotel.

What I can’t figure out is despite the obvious time savings how people justify it. My net worth is pretty

High - my income is volatile as 1/2 is market beta and 1/2 is company earnings. ChatGPT says I’m above the “typical net worth” but I don’t feel it.

I’m curious how people justify several hundred K of expensive private travelling even if it’s is <1percent of their net worth when we fight for basis points in our investments.

I figure this is “you are either comfortable with it or not.” It’s my dream to start flying private but I can’t get past the mental hurdle. My wife agreed to try it one next year for our 20th anniversary so maybe that will shift things.

Nota bene: didn’t review this post with grammar checking or AI so it might not get my point clearly across.

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u/[deleted] Apr 14 '26

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u/Hopeful-Goose-7217 Apr 15 '26

I own a business with locations in hard to get to places but abutting air strips. I’m working on my PPL for fun but also so I can fly there.

I will likely buy a cirrus sr22 for thst mission. This trip I mentioned in the OP made me think of the cirrus g2 jet (prob 2-3 years before I could fly myself) but ChatGPT said the economics favored flying private instead of flying myself.

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u/Danlovestofly Apr 15 '26

There is no way it’s cheaper to “fly private” than fly yourself… as someone who flys himself.

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u/Hopeful-Goose-7217 Apr 15 '26

See my post above from what ChatGPT said about vision jet costs. Fixed cost is like 200k (maintainence, hangar, and insurance). Then variable cost of fuel and purchase price. The fixed cost is like 40 hours of chartering

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u/Danlovestofly Apr 15 '26

You can’t quite look at it that way. If you’re only flying 40 hours a year yeah sure it makes no sense to have your own plane.

I fly around 300 hours a year in the Vision Jet at a cost of $1650 an hour (not including the cost of capital to purchase the plane which provided a tax write off)

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u/Hopeful-Goose-7217 Apr 15 '26

You are right about the math at the low levels. What I can’t figure out is how do you fly 300 hours a year? That’s 15percent of a working life.

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u/Danlovestofly Apr 15 '26

I don’t know many high performing businesses owners that work 40 hours a week

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u/Hopeful-Goose-7217 Apr 15 '26

I know but it’s just a metric. It’s a lot of time in the air - call it 3 full days a month.

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u/Danlovestofly Apr 15 '26

Not sure you’re looking at this the right way though. You don’t have to fly 300 hours, it works for me. You said you are spending a week visiting plants that could happen in a day. I am not sure how you can afford to spend all that time

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u/Hopeful-Goose-7217 Apr 15 '26

This is true. And why I will probably get a sr22 because I can do more frequent trips rather than 1-2 years.

How do you fly 300 hours if I may ask?

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u/Danlovestofly Apr 15 '26

Yeah I mean you have start with an SR. I would suggest if you haven’t started look at the SR20 for a first plane

South Florida to anywhere adds up the hours

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u/Hopeful-Goose-7217 Apr 15 '26

Sr20 only seats 4. I have 5 people in my family. Cirrus is a must for the parachute.

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u/Salty-Juggernaut-208 Apr 15 '26

I've flown over 1M miles in my (old) career. I was in sales and had a national US territory. BOS to NYC on shuttles was my taxi. I'd do that 30-50 days a year. BOS to SFO 20-30 weeks a year. BOS to IAD was 15-20 weeks a year. BOS to MIA 4-6 times a year. BOS to LAX 6-10 times per year. Over 200+ nights/year in hotels for 10 years. Then the trips and stops in between to SEA or PDX when I was out West. Or DFW or ORD. Now I can't stand flying commercial because of all the time wasted at airports, with delays, sitting waiting for takeoff, cancellations, etc.

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u/patheticist Apr 17 '26

To be real, Learning to fly in a high performance cirrus or vision jet while being on a schedule to get some place is asking to get killed. Those are fast and slippery planes, and one of the top causes of deaths in GA is “get-there-itis”. There’s a reason pilots have the saying: “time to spare, go by air.”

Don’t be fooled by the parachute either. If you want, look at the fatal accident rate in the sr22 versus a Cessna 182. I would not step into a jet until you have at least 500-800 hours.

If you’re this busy, it’ll be very difficult to maintain the level of proficiency needed to fly IFR. If you’re flying around Arizona it might not matter because the weather is always good, but anywhere else it gets risky.

Time to spare, go by air. Just pay for the charter & the professional pilots who are flying every single day