Good twin for beginner.

[HectorD]

Hello, I am currently a student pilot with close to 100 hours (started training at the age of 13) and will get my PPL hopefully in the next few weeks. My father has owned a number of twins including a Cessna 336, Piper Navajo, 2 commander 500s and a commander 560. He is currently looking for a plane that would be comfortable for atleast 3 adults and 2 children (that discards most singles), be able to carry this amount of people with a good amount of fuel, travel from Puerto Rico to US with hopefully 1 stop and also be a good training vessel for me when I start my multi engine once I get the private. He is currently looking at the Baron 58s, Baron 55 colemills (not very comfortable but feels our needs preety well and is a good trainer), Twin commanders, and piper navajos. He doesn't like cessna 310s cause he says he doesn't trust the gear of those planes, but he would consider a 310R cause the gear do look a bit stronger. I recommended a piper aztec, but that would not be suitable for our mission.

what would you recommend?
Another important thing is price, he does not want to spend too much on maintenance more than necesary, and a plane that is prone to problems is not what we want.

[sternone]

A lot will depend on your pre-buy inspection, get a technician of YOUR choice in there. An annual is not sufficent to see if the plane is good or not.

I would go for a Baron 58 if you need to haul that much. you can get a good one for around 150k$, you can get easely 30 to 40% off asking price these days, nobody buys piston twins these days with avgas rocketing skyhigh, and this is just the beginning, every day prices drop on piston planes and nobody buys them

[HectorD]

Originally Posted by sternone

A lot will depend on your pre-buy inspection, get a technician of YOUR choice in there. An annual is not sufficent to see if the plane is good or not.

I would go for a Baron 58 if you need to haul that much. you can get a good one for around 150k$, you can get easely 30 to 40% off asking price these days, nobody buys piston twins these days with avgas rocketing skyhigh, and this is just the beginning, every day prices drop on piston planes and nobody buys them

Indeed avgas is a big issue, a Baron 58 burns around 22gph and with prices currently around $5 per gallon, that would be around $110 per hour for fuel alone, but there really isn't anywhere you can rent a Twin much less a baron 58 down here so its a necesary expense. We are looking at the cheap barons because we don't really need those GNS 530s and stuff, down here in the caribbean you can't get lost... period. Unless if you are flying at night but with a handheld GPS it will work just fine.

Ofcourse we will do a pre buy inspection, who wouldn't? My father says he first wants to lok for a good Aero commander 500, but if he can't find one he likes, he will look for a Baron and go from there. I am impressed by the number of baron 58s in the market, about 70 according to controller.com and they are good planes.