How well do aircraft hold their value?

[epetes]

I am planning on buying my first plane this spring and I am wondering how well do aircraft hold their value? I am thinking of getting a Piper Cherokee 180 somewhere in the range of $20-$30k (late 60s model). I haven't seen any for less than that so I am guessing they will probably stay in that range but I haven't been watching prices for that long. So (as long as I take care of it), do they keep there value pretty well or they depreciate a lot? Also how long do they take to sell on average? I know that would depend on price and the market, but I am just looking for an average.

I have my A&P so I plan on doing some mods to increase the value of it but with today's economy you never know when you might lose your current job and I don't want to get a plane that I can't get rid of within a few months if I absolutely had to.

Also how much would it increase the value if I bought a VFR plane and upgraded it to IFR? Also along those lines, do mods really do anything for increasing the value of a plane? Keep in mind that I would be doing the maintenance on any STCs on my own so I would only pay for applicable parts or the STC itself.

[Mike Simmons]

Given the price range of $20K - $30K you are not really talking about large percentages or dollars when starting with the initial aircraft. If you are thinking about buying, now is the time as piston prices are still depressed and for the most part appear to have bottomed out although some fluctuations may continue for several months.

How you maintain and upgrade the aircraft (along with its pricing) will determine how quickly it sells. For example, there are many mid '70s piston aircraft on the market that have the same avionics they left the factory with, the same paint and the same interior. Some of these owners want a premium price but that just isn't going to happen when you have an aircraft of similar age that have upgraded avionics, more recent paint, etc.

For the most part mods and avionics add to the value - but this depends on the specific mod and what equipment you are adding and removing from the panel. In the case of avionics, I have seen the overall value of the aircraft decrease because of avionics upgrades. In other words, a single box was installed and multiple other boxes were removed. The capability of the aircraft was increased but each of those boxes have value and in some cases they exceed the value of the newer equipment.

There are too many variables to even give you a ballpark answer because each answer has to start with - "it depends". One key objective is to not overpay for the aircraft to begin with and this is probably the most common error I see from new owners.

Good luck