First time buying a plane? Piper cherokee/archer tips on buying and what to look for?

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Bobby05

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Bobby05
I’m wanting to buy a plane but want to do my homework before I buy I one. First step was find a hanger and I have that taken care of and insurance quotes. I have it narrowed down to a cherokee 180/archer. What AD’s/maintenance items should I look for with a cherokee or archer. How bad is the backseat in an earlier cherokee? Could an adult fit in the backseat? Let’s say the plane is states away how would you get a pre buy inspection not knowing any mechanics in the area? How do you register an aircraft after buying it. How does sales tax work with aircraft? Any way of reducing sales tax? Any help of would be appreciated. Like I said this is my first time buying a plane and want to have my ducks in a row before I start seriously working.
 
Let’s say the plane is states away how would you get a pre buy inspection not knowing any mechanics in the area?
My A&P and I flew commercially, one way, to the seller's airport. He spent the whole day doing the prebuy, and we flew the new plane home. It was a very long day, and it would have been better to do it in 2 days.
 
Bobby05 said:
I’m wanting to buy a plane but want to do my homework before I buy I one. First step was find a hanger and I have that taken care of and insurance quotes. I have it narrowed down to a cherokee 180/archer. What AD’s/maintenance items should I look for with a cherokee or archer. How bad is the backseat in an earlier cherokee? Could an adult fit in the backseat? Let’s say the plane is states away how would you get a pre buy inspection not knowing any mechanics in the area? How do you register an aircraft after buying it. How does sales tax work with aircraft? Any way of reducing sales tax? Any help of would be appreciated. Like I said this is my first time buying a plane and want to have my ducks in a row before I start seriously working.
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I have a 1972 PA28R, so comparable to the models you're looking at -- just with retractable and constant speed prop.

You can comfortably fly 3 adults in my plane with 1 in backseat (and it has the 4" stretched fuselage which apparently makes a big difference for rear seats).
4 adults would be a bit of a stretch just in terms of making the weight work, unless they're all FAA regulation sized adults weighing like 150lbs. Once you throw in baggage it's going to be bad with 4 adults.

The climb during summer will suck if it's loaded down heavy, that's my biggest complaint. If you're flying somewhere with high DA you'll also want to consider performance, especially if you're going to be loading it routinely with 2+ adults (you asked specifically about adults in the back seat so I'm guessing you plan to fly with >1 adult pax often).

Piper ADs: wing spar is the biggest. Landing gear side brace stud (not relevant for your models I don't think). I had an AD for ignition that I had terminated by replacing it. Other than that no really costly or annoying ADs I can remember.

re: purchase process.

The first step you're going to want to do is find a local A&P who will take care of your plane. Tell him your target models and he can inform you about any critical items to consider (like expensive ADs or frequent issues for that series).

Second, you're going to want to find a plane. Sounds like you already know which models you want so that should help you narrow it down.

Once you've found a plane you'll get a prebuy. Start by getting the logs for the plane. Then, if the aircraft is far away you have a number of options:
1) Ask your local A&P who will care for your aircraft if they're willing to travel with you to see it (after they check the logs, of course)
2) Ask your local A&P to review the logs for the aircraft and coordinate a pointed, detailed list of items for a local A&P to look at and talk through. You'll be paying 2 A&Ps for their work, but still probably cheaper than flying your A&P out for 1-2 days of prebuy.
3) Disregard using a local A&P all together during prebuy, find a shop in the aircraft's area that you're comfortable with and have them do the prebuy. Risky IMHO.
4) Don't get a prebuy b/c its inconvenient and regret it later :)

Personally now that I have a local A&P who I know and trust, I'd likely do #2. When I was a new pilot and had no reason to trust one A&P over another I did #2, and then did #3 (and regretted it).

When you're buying, I recommend using some place like AerospaceReports as the escrow service. First off, it's a good way to keep your money safe rather than just sending a deposit to a rando. The side benefit is that they quarterbacked all of the paperwork for my purchase, the loan docs, and for a really small fee that I split 50/50 with the seller. They gave us each the necessary paperwork to fill out at every step and then they either filed everything with the FAA or gave us clear instructions about what we needed to submit and to who. Everything went off without a hitch.

For taxes, you'll want to google something like "aircraft use tax" or sales tax for your state. IIRC Illinois was 6.25%. So... purchasePrice*0.0625 = you write a check for that to state department of transportation. No idea if there are magical tax dodges available.
 
@Bobby05 welcome to PoA!

As to your question, take a look at the FAA's AD lookup tool. https://drs.faa.gov/browse/ADFRAWD/doctypeDetails

You can search all ADs by Make/Model/Year of aircraft. Note that some ADs are specific enough to be Serial Number relevant.
Note that some ADs are calendar time specific (eg every 12mo), others are flight time specific (eg every 100hrs), others are one time events.

Your A&P will go through these with a practiced eye, no doubt, but you should still be able get an idea of what's ahead of you, AD wise. This may be enough to steer you to specific models / years of your desired aircraft.

Be sure to come back and let us know what you end up with. We're suckers for aircraft pics.
 
There is no magical tax dodges that don’t cost more than the tax. For example you can register it in another country (big boats do this) but states request marinas/airports to send them list of boats/planes so they can tax them. State tax laws are based on where it’s located, not where it’s registered. The big boats are crewed and sailed away to avoid this, don’t know if they do this with big planes, seems like if you afford the plane you should be able to afford the tax.
You can and should use an LLC if you have partners, it protects against liability from your partners and you can add or remove partners without paying any tax because the LLC owns the plane. But you still have to pay the tax when you first buy it, and pay the LLC fees. And a LLC doesn’t protect you from yourself so it’s useless if you’re the sole owner.
Best way in Florida is to buy the cheapest plane possible and pay the tax and then upgrade it (aviation parts and labor are tax free), of course you are still paying big money to do the upgrade.
 
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