Walking the floor of a hustling maintenance shop the other day, it was easy to spot planes—old Rockwells, twin Cessnas, Bonanzas—you would want to buy because these days, the better shops only work on well-maintained machines. If you buy a rat with pages of major squawks, don’t be surprised when a shop manager unapologetically tells you to bring it back after someone else wrenched it to the shop’s standards—especially if you are coming in as a new customer. “I have barely enough technicians to maintain the planes—to high standards—of my existing good customers and can’t get bogged down with a new customer’s plane that’s going to be a hangar queen,” one told me. A reader with an early 2000s Skylane told me his otherwise good shop won’t work on it anymore because it isn’t a turbine.
The point is to buy the best used airplane you can find, and that means digging deep into the logbooks and even deeper when inspecting the airframe. Stand your ground if the seller/broker won’t address major issues, or deduct the price of a high-quality repair. It’s nearly impossible to find a turnkey used plane, but with a refurb you can come close and your shop will want to work on it.