← The Rich Somers Report
Loading summary
Transcript260 lines
- [00:00]
A
Hey, guys. We are buying two more boutique hotels along the California coast here with summer's capital. 45 rooms off market in Catalina island and a second deal up in Bodega Bay, which will make a total of eight boutique hotels owned and operated. Our investors get passive income tax benefits. And the best part is, unlike investing on Wall street and a lot of these other asset classes like multifamily, our investors get to go and stay and experience these boutique hotels firsthand to see how their money's working for them. And so if you want to learn to see if we can help you before this opportunity fills up, you can go to summerscapital.com invest to book a call with my team. Again@summerscapital.com invest to book a free call with my team. Now let's jump into the show.
- [00:37]
B
The major airlines even now are starting, starting pays like 130,000. Just your base.
- [00:43]
A
Damn.
- [00:43]
B
So now you can start working the system. And as you, I mean, the major airlines are upgrading. You can upgrade in two and a half years, meaning, captain. So if you want to work the crappy shift and the weekends and you don't care, I mean, you're making 300 grand pretty quick with having a lot of days off. I know a bunch of 25 year olds that are making so much money right now and I tell them I hope you guys are invested in real estate because none of us made that kind of money at that age. They're just timed it right. So there's so many retirements. I think every major airline, Delta, United, American, they're retiring a thousand pilots a year. So they have to hire that or more just to keep up.
- [01:20]
A
All right, guys, welcome to another episode report. Today I got a good friend of mine in town, someone who's been on the podcast not just once, but for the second time now. And he specializes in the private jet game. He's a private jet captain himself, a private jet broker and an aviation specialist. I got my good friend Kurt Marker, also known as Captain Kurt. Welcome to the show, brother.
- [01:42]
B
Thanks for having me back, guys.
- [01:44]
A
Dude, it's been a little bit, man. And appreciate you hooking us up with the Tulum retreat. First time ever. First time ever I've ever been a part of the private jet game. But you hooked us up with a Goldstream 4 for some of our members, some of our guest speakers and round trip to Tulum. So thank you for that, dude.
- [02:02]
B
You're welcome. It was cool to cool to see your hard work and all your friends enjoying the jet. I mean it's that's a nice jet. A Gulf Stream 4. Yeah, it's not typically the first, first flight most people get. So it looked like the whole crew, all your people are super stoked.
- [02:16]
A
And we quoted it with like five different people. And so you know, you were like 30% below all the rest.
- [02:21]
B
That's what I like. You know, my, my biggest thing is like client retention. My clients keep coming back because if you just give good people, you know, give them good deals, they'll just keep coming back. You don't have to just nail a client to try and make a big payday one time. You just won't be around. That's why I've been doing it for 15 years, you know.
- [02:36]
A
So tell me about the jet market. Right now we know 100% bonus depreciation came back earlier this year. You mentioned before we started recording the jit market is heating up. Talk about that.
- [02:46]
B
Yeah, well, I knew even as a real estate investor like hey, the tax bill, if this comes back where the, the private jet market was a little bit slow, people weren't spending the money because the tax benefits weren't as high. They were 60% last year, this year was 40. So now everybody's either upgrading jets or if they're thinking about been buying in the last year or two now they're taking advantage of the tax trump, Trump's tax bill, which is 100% bonus depreciation. You can write the complete purchase price off of the jet as long as you put it into service by the end of the year. In service means one flight for business and so the market's hot. I get calls every single day from people that either don't have a jet or they're, hey, my boss wants to upgrade. But yeah, the jet market's on fire, especially quarter four.
- [03:32]
A
Is pricing going up for like pre owned jets?
- [03:35]
B
Yeah, I would say pricing's definitely going up because you have more competition. So if you don't want competition, buy a jet in January, people, they'll just let them go a little cheaper. Everyone's trying to close in quarter four to solve their tax problem. So yeah, it's really hot right now.
- [03:51]
A
Yeah, absolutely. Is it better to buy new or pre owned?
- [03:55]
B
You know, it really depends on what problem or how much money you have to spend, what tax problem you're trying to solve. If you go new a lot of times you can't just go buy a new one. Gulf Streams and Globals are two years out for delivery depending on the aircraft. So it's not often they Take orders. It's not often you can just go buy a brand new one. You could get a pre owned that's maybe a couple hundred hours on it that has only flown for one year and that's close enough to new where
- [04:20]
A
you still get, you get a pretty big discount on something that's barely broken in.
- [04:23]
B
You know what, they hold their value pretty well. So I wouldn't call it a big discount. It's not like driving a car off of a dealership. Yeah, they hold their value pretty well
- [04:32]
A
the market, you know, I would have never guessed that.
- [04:34]
B
Yeah. Yeah. And it's, it's kind of a funny market if, if you have a Honda Civic, there's just hundreds of thousands of them. But if you have say a brand new Gulfstream 500, there's not that many that are out there. So they don't have to discount and lower the, the, the amount, the value.
- [04:50]
A
And so which, which jets out there hold their value the best today?
- [04:54]
B
So it depends. There's light jets, mid jets and large cabin jets. Light jets are citations. They have a lot of maintenance support, a lot of mechanics all over the world. Those hold their value. In my opinion. The best midsize jet, you're looking at a Challenger or a Hawker. I would say the Challengers are the best mid size at holder value. Meaning they have a pretty good cabin. They'll do California to Hawaii, California to Miami. And then once you move into a large cabin, most of them you have kind of Falcon Global and Gulfstream. Gulfstream is probably the most everybody has heard of. Every here has heard of that probably holds their value the best.
- [05:32]
A
And all Gulf Streams are considered large, not all.
- [05:34]
B
They do have a couple small ones. G150, G200, 280. Those are like small to mid cabins. But most Gulf Streams are large cabin jets.
- [05:44]
A
So you hooked us up with a G4 to Tulum. And I don't know what these other jets look like inside, but I felt like that was a lot bigger than I anticipated. Is the G550, the G650 there a G7 today now?
- [05:57]
B
Yeah, there's a G700 which is a Y.
- [06:00]
A
And what, what is the size of those compared to the G4?
- [06:03]
B
So the G7 is probably, I don't know, the, the feet off top of my head, but it's got four different cabins where yours kind of had two different cabins.
- [06:13]
A
Okay.
- [06:14]
B
So a lot of these G7s, you can customize them, but in the back it would be a full bedroom, full shower with an office, desk, Like a small desk. I've got to tour some at some events. And they are very long and large down.
- [06:27]
A
What is it? What is a brand new G7?
- [06:29]
B
75 million, depending on what upgrades up to $80 million.
- [06:33]
A
Okay. And then if you wanted to go, let's just say a used G4 that's nice, retrofitted maybe isn't brand new. What would something like that cost? Maybe the one that we took to Tulum. That cost?
- [06:44]
B
Yep. The one that you took to Tulum. I got to fly that one right before it got remodeled.
- [06:48]
A
Okay.
- [06:49]
B
So that has a brand new interior. It's got new engines. You saw it was pretty darn nice. But you could actually buy something like that for three and a half to four and a half million dollars right now.
- [06:59]
A
Really?
- [06:59]
B
Yeah.
- [07:00]
A
Damn. That's a lot cheaper than I would have thought.
- [07:01]
B
It is. Just because they're older. I believe they started coming out in 84. A lot of them are in the 90s. They stopped making them early 2000.
- [07:09]
A
Okay.
- [07:09]
B
If you think about it, that, that one you flew is like a 30 year old jet, but it's been redone.
- [07:14]
A
Yeah. You know, so. So new paint job or do you guys. Do you guys wrap planes? Is the wrap a thing?
- [07:20]
B
They will wrap like a logo. But you know, know the speed we're doing, a lot of times they just.
- [07:24]
A
It will come off.
- [07:25]
B
They come off.
- [07:25]
A
But so you, you paint the outside, retrofit, new upholstery, all that in the interior. And then you send new engines.
- [07:31]
B
Yep.
- [07:32]
A
And then. And then does the thing go out, go up in value though?
- [07:34]
B
Yeah, it does. So paint, paint, engines, interior, all of those things we look at valuing an airplane. I would say the engines are the most important paint job. It definitely varies depending on the shop you go for, but you can paint it for anywhere. Two to $300,000 interior. I mean, you can spend a million dollars on interior. Just depends on where your budget is. But then also the engines, though there's no way to get a discount on those to redo G4 engines. We've done several of them. A minimum dollars for two new and rebuilt engines. On the ones that you have, that's the minimum number. If there aren't a lot of broken engines. A million dollars.
- [08:12]
A
Million. And that's not even brand new. That's for a rebuilt engine.
- [08:14]
B
For a rebuilt engine.
- [08:16]
A
How much for a brand new engine?
- [08:17]
B
That's a good question. I haven't done one of those yet. But typically you just give them your engines. They'll charge you to have loaner ones so your airplane's not down per hour. So I haven't actually ordered new engines because most people rebuild them. They're just so expensive.
- [08:32]
A
Yep. No, that's interesting, man. I know in the boat game it's the same thing. And I always wondered, like, what is it? What does that mean? Like, they're going to rebuild the engine because they'll tell you these, like some of these boats that are 20 years old, they need to have their engines replaced or they'll say, hey, like this is the cost for replacement or we'll rebuild it for half the cost. Like, I've always wondered, what does that mean? You got to rebuild it. But it would. It takes months.
- [08:54]
B
Yeah. And so when they rebuild it, they literally take apart the whole engine, inspect every single part. And the ones that have nowhere and they're good, they will reuse those parts. So that's why the minimum is 500 grand for one of those G4, G5 engines. And then it comes up to what other parts they got to replace. So I've seen it go up to 800 grand per engine.
- [09:13]
A
Yeah. That's crazy, man. So we know we're in a government shutdown right now. How is that affecting stuff in the air?
- [09:21]
B
I'll tell you what, talking like ATC slowdown, there's so many delays and especially the busier areas. I get pilots texting me. We just communicate a lot. And it's like five to ten hour delays in New York. So if you're flying a private jet and your boss has got to get to a meeting and you know they're wondering, hey, let's get going, let's get going. You can't leave because they really are saying short staff on ATC the other way. When you're transacting and buying and selling airplanes and trying to get paperwork, we have to get all these FAA documents to be able to go to Europe or be able to go long range over water, that is on a massive slowdown right now. So it's causing some operational issues as well.
- [10:00]
A
Yeah. We were flying back from Tulum and there was a lot of delay getting out of there. And the pilot, Brad, good dude, by the way, he was saying that they're in a shutdown. And so he was like, it might be a little bit longer than the normal. Did they handle the shutdown, by the way? I haven't been keeping up, you know?
- [10:15]
B
No, I think it's still going on. I think it's still going.
- [10:18]
A
How many days has it been?
- [10:19]
B
It's Been quite a Oscar.
- [10:20]
A
Look that up right now. See how many days has the government shutdown been going on? I'm curious. And then let us know. But I mean this, this was a thing when I was working in atc. We'd have the shutdowns and then, and then typically they would say essential employees come in non essential. Don't. ATC was essential. But I always wonder like, why do we have non essential employees anyways?
- [10:42]
B
That's a good question.
- [10:43]
A
I wonder if it doesn't make any sense.
- [10:44]
B
Is it a janitor in a building that you don't necessarily need them to operate, but it could be that safety, right? I mean.
- [10:51]
A
Yeah, yeah. 21 days. That, that's the longest I've ever heard of it going on. The 35 days in 2018 and 2019. Okay, that was. Yeah, that was actually I was, I was working in ATC until 2020, so. Damn, that's a long time. But they're not getting paid right now, right?
- [11:08]
B
That's the rumor I've heard.
- [11:09]
A
Yeah, that's crazy.
- [11:11]
B
And I think the rumor is if they show up like the ATC guys that are showing up now that they will get overtime later when the checkbook reopens. I think that's the incentive. Yeah, don't quote me.
- [11:21]
A
We would always get back paid on the back end when, when it would, it would happen. But I remember like during the shutdowns people would just bang out sick and just use sick leave.
- [11:31]
B
Take the time off when they could.
- [11:32]
A
Yeah, no, no, definitely take it off. And it's like, well, there's no guarantee you're getting paid, so why would you come? And then most likely you're probably going to get back paid. And then I believe the leave would also be backfilled as well. Like they would be taken care of pretty well after these, these shutdowns. But then again, I mean it was a unionized thing. But to the delays, you know, I know there's been some accidents as of recently. The, the D.C. midair collision that happened earlier this year, that was the first mid air collision in quite some time. I felt like that could have been avoided by atc. But I think a lot of these delays could also be avoided by atc. And you know, just kind of working behind the scenes, 11 years in the industry, I saw a lot of stuff in the air traffic world and when I saw delays, it's typically because of atc. But you know, the weather has a little bit of a play into it. But I would say the main reason for delays in The ATC world is, is because incompetent controllers work in position that are weak. We call them weak controllers. They can't keep up with the flow of traffic. And so when things get busy, they ask for relief and they'll go to tmu, which is traffic management. And traffic management will call out to all the other airports and say, hey, we need, we need intrail spacing. And then it gets to all the major airports, people trying to take off, and it's like, okay, if you're going to any of these spots, expect a delay to take off. And so that's really ultimately what creates these, these delays. And so the flip side, you get a strong controller in there, they'll jump into position, they'll tell traffic management, hey, take off all this in trail spacing. Let's just run it and let everyone go, just launch them.
- [13:02]
B
I've seen this happen a lot at San Francisco airport. It, the both runways are really close together that you land on. So if there's any bit of weather, they slow the flow down. But I would say, in my opinion, I've been flying out of s, in and out of San Francisco for 13 years. It's probably one of the worst airports that affects flow. So if you're flying privately in there, you're trying to leave and you're, you know, your boss or whatever, your client is like, hey, I got to get home to L. A right now. I've been hit with an hour to two hour delays and they're on a ground stop, meaning they will not let you start your engine, will not let you taxi until they deal with all of this traffic.
- [13:38]
A
Yeah, and a lot of it depends on the controller. Like I said, like when I would get in there, if I saw crazy delays, I would just, I would literally pick up the phone, call traffic management and I say, hey, let's, let's launch these guys. I don't, I don't need the intra spacing because at the end of the day, like these are taxpayers, these are our clients, the airlines, the private jets, these are the people paying our paychecks. And unless we really need to delay them and is a serious emergency going on, like let's, let's let them ride, you know, let's, let's, let's, let's launch them and let's let them go. And so for me, that was kind of always the sentiment for me, but it just depends on the controller. It really does. And I think because of the years and years and years of low staffing and shortages, they would sign people off and certify people that have no business work in air traffic. And unfortunately, I think. I think that's what leads to a lot of the delays and probably 90% of the accidents are because of the, you know, the people that shouldn't be working air traffic.
- [14:32]
B
Yeah, I've heard. I've been in busier airports before where you could kind of tell the controller is a little bit weak. And you're kind of questioning it, like, why did that person go? Or why. Why wouldn't you just move this? And then all of a sudden somebody else comes over the mic and just starts blasting like, move here, go here, taxi here, you're clear for takeoff. And you can see they go in and clean it up. Whether they're training or they just. In my opinion, as a pilot, maybe they shouldn't be working a really busy airport like LA or San.
- [14:58]
A
It can be, yeah. And I know exactly what you're talking about. That stuff happens a lot more than you, than you expect. And you can hear it, but, you know, it gets busy. And the controller that's not competent will let the pilots start taking over the frequency. People start stepping all over each other, and before you know it, you're 7, 8 control inputs behind, and you've completely lost control of the entire sector. And you got 30 airplanes stepping on each other. It's like, okay, someone has to step in and fix all that because it can get very dangerous quickly. But you have to learn to control the frequency. And that's. You need to key up after every single pilot reads back the instruction, and then boom, you keep right away give another instruction, read back, key up right away and give it an instruction. And then you fix it. But you should be two steps ahead and know exactly what the next move is. And then you control the frequency. And then boom, before you know, everything's back under control. And then the rush goes away, and then it might be slow for an hour, and then you're like, okay, we got nothing going on. Got three, four airplanes and everything's chill. And then it gets busy again. I personally like the rushes. I like going into there, like when there was a lot of weather and people are like, you know, busy. It makes the time go by faster, but, like, it gives you a certain adrenaline rush that is kind of fun. It's almost like playing a video game. And then you get into your. Like, you get in your groove and you just start, like, you know, just, just work in airplanes.
- [16:10]
B
And it's, it's, it's like attacking a Challenge. It gets challenging. Do you want to back down or do you want to just take it over and yeah, like you said, and just take charge.
- [16:18]
A
Like I, I, I don't miss the, the shift work, but I do miss like that like adrenaline rush, adrenaline rush that comes with working a busy session. I would love to go back there and just like, just plug me in for a couple of sessions, you know, but, but it is, it is a fun career. The other thing I'll say is this politically with the air traffic is, you know, very heavy unionized. And so almost, I would probably say 95%, maybe 97% of the air traffic controllers are unionized. If you didn't pay into the union, you would get shunned. And it did provide a lot of like job security and that sort of thing. But outside of the union, and this is something, I'll say, I think a lot of the air traffic controllers out there can't say this, but I can because I'm no longer working with them. Is there's something called a package pac. And what it is, is the controllers would donate a portion of their paycheck outside of the union, outside of the benefits, into the pack. And this pack would, you know, save up the money every single four years. And controllers would donate anywhere from 100 bucks a paycheck. Some people is as high as four or five hundred dollars a paycheck. And if you didn't donate to the pack, they would shun you. And this lump sum of money, it's a, it's a big chunk. I mean we're talking multi, multi millions of dollars would be donated to the Democratic runner up president every single four years. And so they donated to Obama. When Obama got elected back in, was it 2008? And when Obama got elected in 2008, the first thing he did was he turned around and gave all the controllers huge pay raises because this chunk of money went to the campaign and helped him win, you know, be elected president. Right. And rightfully so. And so there's an alignment of interest for them to donate to the Democratic runner up. And I never knew this was a thing. And so I got in the industry, I think a lot of people listen this, they don't know it's a thing. But this goes on in a lot of like unions and air traffic control is one of them.
- [18:08]
B
Wow. It's, yeah. I mean airline pilots are also unionized.
- [18:11]
A
Okay. And you guys have that, you flew there?
- [18:14]
B
Not in the private, but yeah. The airline, you know, is an airline pilot, Alaska for several years and, you know, so your union will go to bat against management for, like, your quality of life, your days off, your overtime. And a lot of times you hear, at least in the olden days, you hear like, well, the union was out golfing with management. Like, what do you guys need to be golfing for? Go in an office and hash it out. So there's always politics involved with unions and things like that. So you never know what's going on behind closed doors. But, you know, they're the ones that negotiate your raises and things like that.
- [18:44]
A
And some airlines I, I personally paid into the union because of the job security the union would basically run. Management would come up with the schedules, the seniority list, like literally all the vacation time, all that would go through the union. And then with the job security and all that, it. It made sense. Right. And so I always was a fan of it working atc, but obviously, like now kind of being in the business real estate world, you know, now you kind of see from a different perspective and it's like a little bit corrupt to see that that actually goes on, you know.
- [19:13]
B
Yeah, it's. It's kind of a shocking. And I agree. I think you need them. Like most pilots, it's their one job. Most guys don't do real estate like I do, and I'm encouraging that to have a secondary income. But yeah, the union represents your pay and what you're taking home at the end of the year. And they're kind of the battleground between the company and yourself. So anytime, if you ever had to get called to an office for some kind of incident or an accident, your union rep is going to be right next to you and you really want the legal team. I never had anything go on, but it's an insurance.
- [19:43]
A
Yeah, it is insurance. So I was always a fan of it and I was always, you know, active in the union and I helped out where, where I could. It's naca, National Air Traffic Controllers Association, I believe. But. But yeah, a lot of good people in that industry and a lot of, A lot of friends that I still have work in that industry today. And good people, hardworking. It's the. One of the, the highest suicide jobs in the world.
- [20:06]
B
Yeah, it seems stressful in the shift work. I, I've heard, maybe we've talked years ago where you're like, man, sometimes you're always nights and then you finally get mornings and to change your schedule is hard.
- [20:15]
A
Yeah, the shift work is tough. So anyway, so I want to switch gears here and get back to the Jet game. I'm curious, how do you get discounts when running private jets?
- [20:25]
B
Yeah, this is a question to get most common, right? Like, hey, how can I get a deal? I want to experience flying a private jet and if everybody doesn't know it's really expensive to operate, they cost a lot of money. To buy. The fuel is another large cost. So one way to get cheaper, discounted charter flights, they call them empty legs. What that also means is like a reposition leg. So let's say we're sitting here in San Diego, right, And you're in Phoenix and you want to ride back to San Diego. Well, sometimes I would say, well, there's an airplane in San Diego, we're just going to bring it to Phoenix and you're going to pay for it. They charge you round trip. That's just how it works, right? They're not going to give you a free leg. Well, now what we'll do is try and sell the empty leg that's going to pick you up at a discount so that there's some offset of cost. That's how you can get a deal. The one caveat is you cannot be late. They will say it's a 2 o' clock departure and if you're not there, the airplane leaves and there's no refunds.
- [21:22]
A
Yeah.
- [21:22]
B
So you know, that's one part where I've had that happen and clients get
- [21:26]
A
pissed and what kind of discounts can you get for an empty leg?
- [21:29]
B
So the cool part about that is it's negotiable. So as soon as you book a flight, they have a round trip booked. Sometimes it's weeks or a month out, they'll start advertising that empty leg. So maybe I'll keep it in my database and see if someone in my database needs a flight that day or if they request it really close within a day or two. Now all of a sudden I can negotiate say the airplane's going, it's not sold. How about like three grand? Or how about, I mean you can get up to like 80% off.
- [21:56]
A
Damn. Really?
- [21:57]
B
But it's as close to departure as you can. And that's the difference of working with someone like me. It's not. I operate an airplane. I have access to every airplane really in the world.
- [22:07]
A
Is there a website out there where you can find empty legs?
- [22:10]
B
There's not really one big website. I thought about creating it. There's a couple people that are kind of trying on an app. But what I've noticed is they're not really discounted legs. So they. They're putting some AI and database together, but there's really not a discount there. So it's something. I've been toying with the idea, but there's a lot of. A lot of work to that, you know.
- [22:31]
A
Yeah. Yeah. Speaking of, you know, cost of running a private jet, what is the most expensive part of owning a private jet?
- [22:38]
B
The most expensive part comes down, I think, to maintenance.
- [22:41]
A
Okay.
- [22:41]
B
I mean, aside from going to buy a G700, a G800. Grant Cardone just bought a Global 7500. I don't know what he spent, but I know those are in the 70s new.
- [22:51]
A
This is. This is his third one.
- [22:53]
B
Yeah, he had a G5 fifth. Actually, it's his fourth one. Fourth one, he had like a G200 first, which is a midsize. Then he went to a G550. Great airplane. I fly those. Then he went to a G650 sold. That went global 7500. But. So the most expensive part of owning an airplane is fuel and maintenance. But if you had to pick one, it's maintenance. You can't control when a part fails. And it's happened to me before, where you're about ready, you're starting your engines, and something fails. Now all of a sudden, you're stuck. I got stuck for seven days recently in a tiny little town. And the repair was almost $200,000 for a nose wheel steering. All it does is help me steer the nose wheel. You had to call in the Gulfstream mechanics in the middle of nowhere. They fly their tools up, they fix the part. It's just expensive maintenance.
- [23:41]
A
So what. What is. What does fuel cost for a plane like the. What was what Grant just buy.
- [23:46]
B
He got the Global 7500. I don't know what it burns, but that's a big jet. They're heavy, so they probably burn a lot of gas. I bet you that thing probably burns 6,000, 5,000 to 6,000 pounds per hour. So that thing's probably burning seven to 800 gallons an hour. Now. Fuel price varies. San Diego, LAX, San Francisco. Fuel's expensive. Aspen might be the most expensive gas in the country. But then if you go somewhere, Vegas is pretty good. There's certain airports that are really cheap in gas. Phoenix. So as a pilot or a charter operator, I'll be like, hey, fill up on gas there. Let's save some money. But fuel is a big.
- [24:26]
A
So what's the delta between fuel prices in the area, like Vegas versus, you know, Los Angeles or Aspen?
- [24:33]
B
Yeah. So, like, Aspen is north of $10 a gallon. Where? Vegas right now, I believe is about four to five dollars a gallon. We're talking double. So if you're flying from Vegas to go to Aspen, to go back to Vegas, you don't want to get any gas in Aspen at all.
- [24:48]
A
And if you go into like some satellite airport, middle of nowhere, Oklahoma to get jet A, we could be, what, as low as $3? As low as.
- [24:54]
B
Yeah, in the threes.
- [24:55]
A
Damn.
- [24:56]
B
Yeah.
- [24:56]
A
That's crazy.
- [24:57]
B
Yeah. I mean, you're not going to. When you're flying a big jet, you're not really going to go there just to save some fuel costs. But, you know, I've seen fuel bills, $30,000 to fill up a jet and it'll, you know, fly 12 hours on that. But that's a big cost.
- [25:10]
A
Yeah. So, you know, you talked about this on the first time you came on the podcast, and there's an alternative to the private jet game and you talked about the Piaggio. Break down the Piaggio. What. What is the Piaggio? And. And tell us a little bit about the Piaggio aircraft.
- [25:23]
B
Yeah, it's one of my favorite airplanes. I didn't know about it until I was invited to go fly on it. It's made in Italy and they call it the Ferrari of the skies. It is a turbo prop twin engine. The props are on the back, so it kind of looks funny when you first see it, but it's very, very aerodynamic and it's very fast. So the thing cruises almost at light jet speed, like a Citation jet. I believe it's 400 miles an hour. It flies at 41,000ft, which is over a lot of the weather compared to like a cirrus jet. You're in the lower altitude, 31,000, and you're in the weather as a pilot. But yeah, the Ferrari of the skies. It's got a big cabin, it's real bubbly.
- [26:02]
A
How many, how many people can it comfortably?
- [26:03]
B
I believe about eight.
- [26:04]
A
Okay.
- [26:05]
B
Yeah, about eight passengers with two pilot seats. So you could put a kid in the right. It's a single pilot airplane, so you only got to pay one pilot. Now, a lot of feedback I get from that or people complain about. It's like, oh, it's hard to get parts and they break a lot. Well, I think it depends on what you hear and what you see. I got a friend that operates four and he's like, we have no problems at all. We run them all the time, so. And you can pick them up used for 2 million bucks.
- [26:28]
A
That's it $2 million.
- [26:29]
B
Yeah, 2 million use and like I could get those all day long.
- [26:32]
A
And how fast is this plane cruise?
- [26:34]
B
Like 400.
- [26:35]
A
Damn. I mean it's fast and it can go up to 41,000ft as well.
- [26:38]
B
Yeah.
- [26:38]
A
And because it's a little bit lighter, can it get into shorter Runway airports?
- [26:42]
B
Yeah, shorter runways like Carlsbad or you know, even Santa Monica could go in there. And Santa Monica shorten their Runway because of noise. They don't really want jets in there.
- [26:53]
A
Yeah.
- [26:53]
B
Every once in a while you'll get a light jet. But Piaggios are just a great.
- [26:56]
A
Could you get the Piaggio into Catalina Island?
- [26:58]
B
Yeah, you probably could. Yeah.
- [27:00]
A
I'd have to check the weight Runway.
- [27:01]
B
Yeah. But you know it's, it's like 4,000ft. But it would probably do it, no problem. Yeah, I'd have to look it up. But there's king go in there and similar aircraft.
- [27:09]
A
So the Piaggio and they're made out of Italy.
- [27:11]
B
Yeah. Made out of Italy.
- [27:12]
A
Yeah. My, my boat is out of Italy and so I can resonate a little bit with the parts and all that sort of stuff. And now this is, it's not the Piaggio. There's only like so many of of my boat, it just came out. But the parts so far, and that's the one thing about the boat game, things are always breaking. I'm sure the airplane game is very similar. Things are always breaking. It's something you expect now but to get parts because it comes from Italy, it's like, dude, it takes forever.
- [27:36]
B
Yeah.
- [27:36]
A
For this boat.
- [27:37]
B
And it's probably similar to boats where airplanes, you don't necessarily wait for a part to break to replace it.
- [27:42]
A
You just have them on stock.
- [27:43]
B
That or you do it before it's ready. You're going, hey, there's a little bit of corrosion there. We're going to do it. And that's why airplanes have a lot more mandatory inspection periods, usually per hour on charters or per calendar month, like 12 month inspection.
- [27:57]
A
Every time you lose the engines on a boat, you're, you're probably going to be fine. But you lose the engines in the air. There's a lot of that can go wrong.
- [28:04]
B
Yeah, I definitely agree.
- [28:05]
A
Yeah, that makes sense. Talk about some of the benefits of owning a private jet. Tax benefits, all that stuff.
- [28:12]
B
Yeah, I mean there's. Most people use them for business, not just pleasure. One of the tax benefits is if you're using it 51% or more for business and you keep a log entry of that. You'll See, them use it 49% for personal use. So you can write that off. But it's got to primarily be for business. A couple other things are you don't have to deal with airport security. So a lot of the people that either charter or buy jets, you're just not dealing with the public paparazzi, delays in the airport, if you're trying to get to a meeting, things like that. So it's comfort, it's speed. You can get whatever food you want, whether the flight attendants there or you bring your own and have it delivered to the airplane. Some people do that because they want full privacy, but. And you also get a leave whenever you want. I mean, you want to leave Friday. I'm leaving at 4am out of LAX on Friday morning. It's not that fun. But guess what? They want to get to where they're going. So I don't think airlines leave at 4 in the morning. I think the early one's like 6am you know, so you just get custom
- [29:10]
A
flexibility and you just, you just walk right on.
- [29:13]
B
You walk right on. Yeah. So there's really no security at all with baggage. I mean, you could bring your gun as long as you follow the rules. Like there's no TSA with that stuff.
- [29:23]
A
Yeah, yeah. And it qualifies for code section 179. More than £6,000.
- [29:27]
B
Yeah, it does. And like for me, clients will start asking taxes. And there are aviation specific tax consultants because these aircraft go to different countries and different states, there is like a big game to it, which is very interesting. For example, when you buy an airplane, we'll close it. We will fly it to another state to close where there's no sales tax. But there are some caveats to that. So that's when if somebody, you know, I bring in a tax attorney for that for the extra benefit.
- [29:55]
A
How can someone get the private jet experience for less than $1,000?
- [29:59]
B
Yeah, one of my favorite things that came on the market that you've gotten to experience is JSX or another company called Arrow, which is based out of Van Nuys, which is in north la. JSX is really, it's been around a couple of years, but they're adding more and more routes. And they're known as semi private, meaning they bought these RJ aircraft with about 20 to 30 seats, but on the airline they'd have 60 seats. So all it has Starlink WI FI in all of them, which is very fast. And they board 10 minutes prior before departure. And most of these, they're not at the commercial airport side of thing, through the terminal, you will pull into a private jet fbo, just like where we fly the private jets out of. You'll have a lobby with coffee and soda. They kind of scan your boarding pass and go, hey, you don't have anything in your bag and you go through a metal detector and boom, you're on the flight. So speed, comfort. I mean, I absolutely love that.
- [30:50]
A
I flew JSX for the first time this past weekend, went out to Scottsdale and Carlsbad to Scottsdale. And like you said, you just literally walk through a quick security check and literally like 10 minutes later you're on the plane and then you land in Scottsdale. They drop you off at Atlantic Aviation, very quick and easy, because otherwise you're going into Phoenix sky harbor, which now you're talking, you know, thousands and thousands of people and traffic and all that. But Scottsdale, they got a little airport right there. And landing avian is so quick to get in and out of and in the way. On the way out, same thing. Just literally show up 10 minutes before the flight, walk right on. They don't check any of your bags. Like, super cool, super easy, relax. And it was comfortable, you know, like, I thought the service was good. And honestly, my ticket was 700. $700 to fly JSX. I'm like, dude, this is a bargain. Yeah.
- [31:35]
B
And I mean, if you're flying out of San Diego, say on Southwest of Phoenix, it's probably four or five hundred bucks anyway. There's not even a first class option. You got two people, you know, over kind of bearing your seat. I was stuck in a middle seat the other day. It was terrible.
- [31:49]
A
It's b. Yeah, that's. I mean, yeah, I, I actually, fun fact, on the way, on the way back from Scottsdale, I missed my flight.
- [31:55]
B
Okay.
- [31:56]
A
I showed up. I showed up like two minutes before. I get a little too comfortable close
- [32:01]
B
because you can show up pretty.
- [32:02]
A
I got a little too comfortable. And it was five minutes before. And they're like, dude, we already shut the door. So I ended up having a book Southwest back, Phoenix to San Diego. I sat in the middle behind a couple ladies or in between two ladies, but it wasn't too bad. But anyways, yeah, I missed the flight on the way back. But I'll say this for that experience, 700, and it's basically like a first class seat in a domestic airline. Semi private experience. You get a stewardess, you get to walk right on the plane. 10 minutes to board. It's so easy. It Makes sense for the everyday person. Now break down Arrow because I haven't flown Arrow, but I heard Arrow's even nicer.
- [32:35]
B
Yeah, Arrow is a little bit higher price point. So for your 700 tickets, probably a thousand dollars. I don't know all their routes. One of the ones that I personally want to do is Van Nuys to Cabo. It's like a twelve hundred dollar ticket. Right? Which is. And they have less seats than JSX. So instead of let's say 30 seats, I think on JSX there's only 20. And they're big, nice comfortable seats like this chair. And the service is a little bit better from what I've heard. So, you know, the flight attendant is bringing you champagne or whatever you want before takeoff. Kind of like first class on an airline. But the great thing is with Arrow as well, you're not sitting waiting for departure at lax. You're up at Van Nuys where you're moving and the plane's ready to take off. So it's quick, it's easy, similar to security. One big thing I like about Arrow is they just acquired a Gulfstream 4 like just like you flew on. Now they are selling seats and there's only 12 seats on the airplane. It might be 14 on the one they got. $5,000 is their trial period for a nice big chair on an actual private jet. All inclusive. To go to Hawaii.
- [33:39]
A
Damn, that's insane.
- [33:40]
B
Which you can't. You have to have a midsize to go to Hawaii.
- [33:44]
A
Yes.
- [33:44]
B
If you want to go to Hawaii, it's 40 grand minimum for a private jet. Or if you're by yourself or maybe your girlfriend or one friend wants to go. Now you're looking at ten grand instead of four. You're still on a gold stream. Four.
- [33:57]
A
Yeah, it's insane. And so where does that fly out of that?
- [34:00]
B
Van eyes.
- [34:00]
A
Van eyes.
- [34:01]
B
North la.
- [34:02]
A
That's not bad. Yeah, Yeah, I like that, man. That's, that's, that's a hell of an idea. So, and then, and then Arrow also goes to New York, I believe.
- [34:09]
B
Yeah, so they go to, they go to Cabo, out of la, I believe. It's like Dallas. And now JSX and Arrow, they're both kind of connecting in the middle of the country and then moving on to New York or Miami.
- [34:19]
A
Yeah, I saw JSX has some east
- [34:21]
B
coast stuff so you can't go direct, but they will stop in Dallas real quick and it's a nice little stopover. You might not even get off the jet. Yeah, in My opinion, I'd rather go for comfort and not deal with all the airport.
- [34:32]
A
Yeah.
- [34:32]
B
I mean, airport delays and everything else.
- [34:34]
A
You know, it's a nice touch and it's a, it's a nice experience. And, and at those prices, I'm like, oh, it, it kind of makes sense. Especially at 700 a leg and even 5,000 in Hawaii. It's like, okay, well, how much is first class to Hawaii? It's 5K. Is probably not gonna be that much more. But for that experience. You said how many seats in the G4?
- [34:51]
B
I. I would have to guess, like most of the G4s are 12 to 16 seats. They probably didn't do a 16 because then you're on a couch.
- [34:58]
A
Yeah.
- [34:58]
B
And I'm not.
- [34:59]
A
I might not probably put it like a good 12 in there.
- [35:01]
B
I bet you it's 12 or 13. Like nice chairs.
- [35:03]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [35:04]
B
And that's common and I think that's a great price point. I know a lot of people and
- [35:08]
A
it still makes sense for them, everything about it. So 12, let's say 12 seats at 5k looking at 60k.
- [35:14]
B
Yeah. And it's going to cost them one way, way less money to operate that.
- [35:17]
A
Yeah.
- [35:18]
B
So it's cool to see a company that they don't operate one they're going for and they're doing a trial period and I think it's going to do well.
- [35:24]
A
What are their other plans they have?
- [35:26]
B
I believe they're erj so kind of small airliners. They're long, they're black with a little bit of yellow and gold on it. I've seen them in Cabo.
- [35:34]
A
Yeah.
- [35:34]
B
So it's kind of a sexy, sexy airplane.
- [35:36]
A
I like that. They, they had the black. That's cool. That's cool. And so what about this aircraft? So there's an aircraft out there called the Cirrus jet. And the Cirrus jet comes with a parachute. What the heck is the Cirrus jet all about?
- [35:49]
B
Yeah, Cirrus is, man, they got the marketing down. I will tell you this. They are targeting. They have airplane with propellers and also jets. They've had jets for quite a while now. But they're targeting like a business owner like yourself that really wants to learn how to fly and fly themselves. So they make it very simple. They're very simple to operate. Their autopilots are the best autopilots out there. They have a top high end Garmin avionics. But one thing that I hear a lot of people talk about is they go, well, I feel more Comfortable with a parachute. So they literally have a parachute in their jet. If you have an engine failure and for whatever reason, you know, you're a lower time pilot, you just pull the parachute and it's, it is saving people really.
- [36:32]
A
Yeah, it does work pretty well.
- [36:33]
B
It's, it's weird as a pilot because I would never want to do that. I would rather kind of try and dead stick an airplane in with the engine out because we train it a lot.
- [36:41]
A
Sure.
- [36:42]
B
But there's a lot of people that don't have, I have almost 10,000 hours people, you know these pilots that are businessmen that have a couple hundred hours and they're buying a serious jet.
- [36:51]
A
Yeah.
- [36:51]
B
And they're like, well, I like this. But the other cool thing with the cirrus is now they are having an auto land button. And so if a passenger, let's say the pilot passes out, passenger doesn't know how to fly, they literally can click a button and that cirrus is going to start, it's going to tell ATC and it's going to start going towards the nearest safest suitable airport.
- [37:11]
A
Wow.
- [37:12]
B
That to me that is pretty cool. And they're starting to bring this out. Garmin is also starting to bring this out. They're going to go in CJ Fours King Airs now have them. Even though that's a turboprop, it'll automatically take over the throttles. And it's, I saw a demo last year and I was like, I'm really impressed. So the technology in aircraft is coming a long way now.
- [37:34]
A
You guys have had auto land in the commercial planes for quite some time.
- [37:37]
B
Yeah. On the Airbus and yeah, quite, I mean 20 years probably. It's been around a while.
- [37:42]
A
And I know Southwest, like when I was working atc, they do a lot of hand flying but I, I, I think a lot of the other airlines, they're doing a lot of autoland, right?
- [37:52]
B
Yeah. So auto land, we only use it like when there's low fog or low visibility. I know a couple guys that would just test it to kind of re get their skills. We do them in the simulator all the time. It's a requirement. But mainly like lax, Seattle, Portland, San Diego, where there's a lot of fog, what it allows you to do, you're actually not allowed to hand fly. You have to let the airplane fly. So you are monitoring to make sure that all the systems are working correctly and it will land itself and touchdown on the center line and it will also slow itself down. Damn, it's, it's really Impressive.
- [38:25]
A
So I know, like, on approaches Southwest, they'll always be down to take the visual. They're like, whatever shortcuts we can make. And so if I had five or six aircraft coming in and let's just say I had to sequence them, Southwest is always going number one. I'm making them number one because they're. Their pilots are gamers, and they. They want to get in quick. The other. The other pilots, a lot of the airlines, like American, United, Delta, a lot of times, they want to stay on course. I would say American, probably the worst. Those pilots want to go slow, and they want to stay on course. They want to stay on the RNAV arrival. They don't want to be. They don't want to peel off or do anything weird. So I'd always make American last because of it. But also when I'm like, you know, trying to get these guys visual and follow each other in Southwest always, hey, we got them in sight. We'll follow them in American always, like, they'll play like, oh, we don't see anyone. We're looking. And they don't. They don't want to accept responsibility with the visual step. So because of that, Americans always getting peeled out. I was always making them last. Southwest always number one. Same thing with departure. Departure. Southwest, check in right. Climbing out at, you know, 2,000ft. They're like, hey, we'll take any shortcuts you have. Boom. We'll shortcut them. And then, you know, these other airlines, especially American, you shortcut them, they're like, hey, we want to stay on course today. They want to go the long way. So, you know, because of that, I would always make American last.
- [39:35]
B
And part of that is actual standing operating procedure. One of the rumors I heard. Don't quote me on this, but I heard that Southwest incentivizes their pilots to not be late. I think airlines have like a. A 14 arrival within 14 minutes of your time. So if you watch. You, as an ATC guy, know Southwest taxis fast?
- [39:57]
A
Yeah, they do. They teach. Sometimes they're taxing like, two 50 miles an hour.
- [40:01]
B
I'm like, are they taking off? You know, and so they. I. I understand where they're coming from. They have ceramic brakes. So if you just taxi fast and get on them once harder, it's better. It's better, and it saves the company money. So I had heard that they train pilots to taxi faster and also take any shortcut. I mean, I watch for the last years and years, watch Southwest go in front of me. Even though we were ready first, and it comes down to controlling the controllers. Know those guys are game, and boom, they're out of there. So I heard it was an operational thing where at American and Alaska, places I've flown, it's all about safety and liability. And I also understand that as a pilot, too. So it's kind of. There's a mix of both, because if you take a shortcut on the ground or whatever, and all of a sudden something happens, pilot is always the first person to blame.
- [40:46]
A
So is it true that Southwest gets paid by the leg versus these other airlines where they get paid, like, by the time they push out the gate and then they arrive at the next gate?
- [40:54]
B
Yeah, that's correct. Southwest pilots get paid by the mile.
- [40:57]
A
Okay.
- [40:58]
B
Not even the leg, but the leg is the mile. Right. So since they're doing that, they're like, how fast can we get there? Where American is like, hey, we want to start your engines, you know, right after departure time, we want to push up the gate. And then there's not. There's no incentive. I actually will say there's actually only incentive to slow down because you get paid more money if you came in later or longer than your scheduled time. And its pilots aren't really going to do that on purpose. But at the same time, if you're talking about shortcut, like, why would you take a shortcut if you can make an extra 10 minutes of pay? Which is.
- [41:31]
A
And. And I'm speculating here, but I believe it's like a true stat if you look it up online, like, which airlines have the least amount of delays in Southwest. Right.
- [41:38]
B
That's probably true.
- [41:40]
A
Yeah.
- [41:40]
B
And you know what I find at Southwest, I ride them a lot as a passenger. When they come in late, man, they can quick turn a plane so fast, and they're just like, hey, it's dirty. Just get the trash. We're good. If the floor is a little dirty.
- [41:51]
A
Yes.
- [41:51]
B
And boom, they catch up on time real quick.
- [41:53]
A
Yeah.
- [41:53]
B
So I think there's incentives there.
- [41:55]
A
Yeah, but they're over all, man. From ATC perspective, I'm like, they're. They're pilots are the best. And because we know they're trying to get in quick, we would. We would always hook them up also with, like, climbing out, you know, if we're trying to jump another plane that's coming opposite direction or a bunch of traffic that might delay, I know I can give them an expedited climb and. And they'll do whatever I tell them. Where these other airlines, they don't. They don't want to do that stuff.
- [42:16]
B
Some of that is the aircraft that 73 is all Southwest have, the Boeing 73, they climb really well and they're typically not super heavy. A lot of American, United, the bigger aircraft, we're limited by weight. We're, they're really heavy already. American has 321s that are kind of on the verge. So you can't really. It's not a little sports car like the 73.
- [42:36]
A
Yeah, yeah, but, but they overall, like their pilots are just more gamers than some of these other airlines.
- [42:41]
B
I would agree with that.
- [42:41]
A
They're, they're, we, we call them cowboys.
- [42:43]
B
Yeah, I would agree they are, yeah, they're more cowboys.
- [42:46]
A
So out of all the airlines, which airlines pay the best? If you're a pilot right now, in
- [42:51]
B
the last couple years, it's, it's Delta's kind of been the number one and meaning they have high pay scale and they also have high profit sharing.
- [42:58]
A
Really.
- [42:59]
B
I know guys over there at the
- [43:00]
A
end of the year get a slice of revenue.
- [43:01]
B
Oh yeah. Every airline is starting to do that to compete to attract pilots. But the airline's got to make a bunch of money where American is just not making that much money right now. Delta and United are crushing it. And I just text a couple buddies the other day and I go, hey, I see those profits. They all said profit share coming up. So yeah, you get a piece of that profit.
- [43:22]
A
So how much can you make as a captain for an airline like Delta?
- [43:26]
B
I mean, Delta is the highest paid. It's wild. So if you work the union contract and you don't just work a schedule, you get and you kind of play the game and you go in there and you go, hey, on my days off, I'm going to look for some double pay trips and trade this. I mean, I know guys making close to a million dollars a year as a captain. A million a year working the system. Damn.
- [43:45]
A
Damn. A million a year as a Delta pilot?
- [43:48]
B
Yeah.
- [43:48]
A
That's insane. And how many days off are you holding a month making a million a year?
- [43:51]
B
I mean, so I know my dad wasn't doing quite a million. He, he was crushing it playing the game and he had a couple months that were like triple his nor a normal salary pay. And he said, I still got half the month off. It's because he was so fine tuned into the system of trips, kind of always watching it. No, ooh, this one's going to double pay. And so I mean if you can get paid the same to go fly for 30 minutes or 10 hours, which one would you want? So he would look, he'd be like, oh, if I fly to Phoenix, I would stay the night, but then I could wave it and come back to San diego and get four days of pay for one 30 minute flight or an hour of flight. So there's a way to game. And that's one advantage to the airlines where Delta, United, America, southwest does it. FedEx is a really high paying, another high paying airline as well.
- [44:38]
A
So how much could you make flying, let's say right seat for Delta or one of these majors?
- [44:42]
B
Right seat. I've heard a couple guys making like 600 to 700,000 as a co pilot. As a co pilot, if they're very senior. So what happens is if they don't want to be the captain because if you're a new captain, you're working the weekends, you're working the crappy trips, not the high paying stuff. But if you stay as a co pilot and you move your seniority way up, you would be able to pick every trip you want. So most people, every is different. But most people, I want to make as much money as I can in the least amount of work. So that's what allows you to do that as a, as a first officer is a very senior person.
- [45:15]
A
So someone listening to this podcast right now, if they want to get into the aviation space, they want to become a pilot, how long would it take them to become a pilot and get hired for a company like Delta?
- [45:25]
B
Pretty much a couple years. Right now if you quit your job and you dedicated six days a week to, to train and to be a pilot and never stopped, you could get through all your licenses within a year. And then after that you got to build hours. You could do that in another, about another year to build your hours and then you would get on with the regional like Skywest or Compass or one of the smaller regional airlines, you could potentially go there. I went there for about 18 months and then moved on. So if you're very, if you're a go getter and you don't have a family at home and you're just ready to go for it, I mean you could get in there and start making about three years.
- [46:02]
A
Three years. Wow. Yeah, that's pretty quick.
- [46:04]
B
The major airlines even now are starting starting pays like 130,000. Just your base.
- [46:09]
A
Damn.
- [46:10]
B
So now you can start working the system and as you, I mean the major airlines are upgrading, you can upgrade in two and a half years, meaning captain. So if you want to work the crappy shift and the weekends and you don't care. I mean, you're making 300 grand pretty quick with having a lot of days
- [46:24]
A
off and, and I heard that right now is actually a pretty good time to get in the industry. A lot of pilots are retiring and there's, there's a high demand for pilots right now currently. Is that right?
- [46:31]
B
Yeah, that's correct. I mean I know a bunch of 25 year olds that are making so much money right now and I tell them I hope you guys are invested in real estate because none of us made that kind of money at that age. They're just timed it right. So there's so many retirements. I think every major airline, Delta, United, American, they're retiring a thousand pilots a year. So they have to hire that or more just to keep up. So what it's doing is there's 16,000 pilots at American. So imagine just we've already been losing them for the last couple years. I mean, American's been hiring, I think somewhere around 2,000 pilots for the last, you know, three and a half, four years that I know of. So they're replacing them.
- [47:07]
A
But yeah, so good times. If you're listening, it's good time to become a pilot. Good time to get in the industry, but also good time to move up quickly.
- [47:14]
B
Yeah, correct.
- [47:14]
A
Get that 600k right seat or potentially million dollars left seat with 50 of your month off. Get in the game now.
- [47:22]
B
Yeah, if you're a hustler and you put some time in knowing the contract like all the holidays are double pay. So people that don't want, like I have kids, I don't want to work on Christmas, it's not worth the double pay to me. But hey, if you're new, I was double paying all the time before kids, you know, so work the system. You can make a lot of money and have a really good life.
- [47:39]
A
How much do these pilots make working for like Spirit and Allegiant, some of these budget airlines.
- [47:44]
B
So Spirit had a really good pilot contract. Even though I don't like writing on them, I think their seats are cheap and they're every, you know, they charge you for water and anything. But the pilots actually made really good money. But if you look, they file what, bankruptcy two or three times in the last couple years. I've had a lot of people leave. So I would say those guys were still making, you know, two to $400,000 a year or more. But again, I had friends at Spirit 12 years left to go to United because they saw the writing on the wall.
- [48:10]
A
Yeah. Personally, I don't think I would ever get on an Allegiant flight. I used to work air traffic for 11 years, and when I worked at LA Center, I did six years at LA Center. I worked the Vegas area. And so Vegas was a hub for Allegiant. And so we would work a lot of these aircraft climbing out of Vegas. And out of all the airlines I worked coming out of Vegas Airport, Allegiant was number one with in flight emergencies. And it was. It seemed like every single week there would be one or two Allegiant flights that would climb out and they would call us and say, hey, Senator, we got to go back down and land. Because we got. We got some sort of in flight emergency and we don't know exactly what it is. And I remember there was one Allegiant flight they had. They had a flight, the 757. They were buying used airplanes, I believe, that were being retired by other major airlines. And I think there was a time when they were buying some Boeing 757 that, that American was retiring from their fleet. And they had a flight from Vegas to Hawaii. And you know, they take off a lot of fuel, a lot of passengers, but there's a couple times where they would take off and say, hey, we gotta go back down. We can't go to Hawaii, but we have so much fuel we need to burn off. So they would request to go into a holding pattern for like three hours and burn enough fuel so they go back and land. And I'm just thinking, man, like, if I was a passenger on this flight right now, and I had my family thinking, I'm going on vacation to Hawaii and then I'm going to be in a holding pattern for three hours just to go back and land in Vegas, like, I'd be pretty pissed.
- [49:27]
B
Yeah, I agree. I've heard some things about Allegiant. I've had a couple friends that work there very short time to just to go on to American or somewhere. But I had heard some rumors about some maintenance issues, and I think there's been some articles in the news of them just kind of trying to patch the airplane and put it on. Where other major airlines are like, hey, let's fix the problem so it doesn't happen. I mean, things happen. But Chris Salerno, a mutual friend of ours, was going to Italy in July on American first class. He's texting me, he's like, oh, this is a pretty cool first class. Well, three hours in the flight, they're over the Atlantic. They turned around to go back to Charlotte, and he's texting me from the. He's like, dude, we're turning around. I go, well, that's a safety call. The pilots are saying, you know, they're talking to the maintenance, they're talking to dispatch. They're going, hey, so that's a bummer of a flight. Well, they landed, they had another airplane, they got on another aircraft and took off. And I go, well, it's a bummer that you had to deal with it, but I go, that's for your safety. And things do happen, right?
- [50:19]
A
They do happen. But I do tell people all the time now, after seeing Allegiant and seeing Spirit on the ATC side, I tell people, I'm like, hey, like, if you're considering flying Allegiant, like, it's more than just delays and that sort of thing. Like, it's actually a safety thing. So if you. If you value safety. I don't know that I would fly a Legion, especially knowing that they're. They're using old aircraft that these other airlines retired.
- [50:40]
B
Yeah. And I'll tell you what, it's not just the airlines. This plays. Plays into the private jet game and the charter game. There's plenty of operators out there that buy these crappy airplanes, and really hardly. They fix them to maybe code or maybe they just pencil up the book. So that's a big advantage of, like, working with me as a broker and a pilot. I know the companies that have lawsuits against pilots for pilots, saying, this airplane's unsafe. I'm not going to take it. And then they fire the pilot because of me, and they're like, well, we're going to lose a couple grand. And the pie is like, dude, I don't want to die. He's trying to protect clients. So there's airplanes, you know, they're. They're pretty safe, but you really want to. You hope for the best, you know?
- [51:15]
A
Yeah. Kurt, I appreciate you coming on, my man. Dropping so much game, so much value. Where can the folks get in touch if they want to learn more about what you're doing?
- [51:22]
B
Yeah, pretty much Instagram. I'm on there every day. The Captain Kurt. And send me a message if you want to book a charter or something like that.
- [51:28]
A
Oh, there we go. He's Captain Kurt. Kurt Marco in the building. I'm Rich. Numbers, listeners. Thanks for tuning. We'll see you guys on the next one.
- [51:33]
B
Peace.