Careful. Buying a used plane can be a money pit. How much do used 150s go for nowadays? $20K? You could easily sink that much into a used plane just bringing it up to safe airworthiness.
Yup they can be, but so can a newer one. I would rather start my money pit on the low end and work my way up. I just sold a airworthy 150 with less than 750 hours on the engine for $14,000. It wasn't the prettiest plane out there, but not bad at all and mechanically sound. Good cheap planes are out there, you just have to sort through the pile a bit and be patient.
Pete
Mark's word of caution has merit and I learned that lesson the hard way.
As most of the old timers here remember, I threw away a corroded 152 (Queenie) because I didn't know what I was doing and had a less than honest A&P/IA doing the inspection.......okay, he was a crook.
Lessons learned the hard way and the corrosion Queen will never fly again.....bad, bad deal but I was lucky enough that I could take the hit and keep on flying.
Be careful out there when buying any plane......do your home work, too.
I don't want to scare anyone off of purchasing a C-150, but if the initial purchase has to be financed, that makes me nervous, because there may be more costs than just the initial purchase.
I am aware that new planes range in price from $200K to $million$, and I am not in that league. I have acquaintances at my local airport who ARE in that league. You should see the planes they own and fly. They are wealthy people.
Me -- I am financially in the minor league, but I was able to purchase my "airworthy" airplane -- N22507 -- for $14,250, without having to worry about where the money was coming from.
I got a couple of hundred hours flying out of it before the engine went bad. I can't complain about a couple of hundred hours for a $14K used airplane. But, I was in for major repair costs. See attached PDF. More than twice what I paid for the plane. Not to mention annuals/repairs/upgrades. Frankly, I'm still not done.
But -- I have had more than a decade of flying fun with it. Money well spent. But, it's a lot more than the initial purchase price. That's all I'm saying.
