Collectibles markets are driven by passion, not rational thought. But the aircraft-collecting market has seen a split in recent years between those who purchase and restore for love and history and those who are new collectors with an interest in return on investment.
The owners of Redondo Beach, Calif.-based Platinum Fighter Sales claim to have brokered more than $300 million in classic aircraft and warbirds (aka military planes) to both types of buyers over the past three decades.
In the last few years, Simon Brown, co-owner of Platinum, has noticed an influx of investors. These clients may not even know what kind of plane they’re buying, but they know a good return on investment when they see it.
“Over the last 40 years these airplanes have doubled in value every 10 years,” Brown says. Adjusted for inflation, this is in line with the historical average annual return on the S&P 500, which since its inception in 1923, is only about 7 percent.
The fear among collectors and those who love the planes for their history over a return on investment is that these rare birds will be kept under lock and key instead of shared with enthusiasts. Many are transported abroad from their country of origin and privately hangared, effectively taking them out of circulation at air shows and similar historical events.
“From a financial or commercial standpoint it’s good, but you don’t see the airplanes fly as much, which kind of defeats the purpose of telling the history of the airplanes,” Brown says.
The Collector
Greg Herrick, owner of the Golden Wings Flying Museum outside Minneapolis, owns 38 vintage aircraft. Most date from the golden age of aviation, the period between the two world wars.
“It’s not just the airplane, it’s the history that it represents,” Herrick says of what drives him to collect. He has history in spades in his hangar. Among his collection are five Ford Tri-Motor aircraft, manufactured in the 1920s and known as the first luxury airliner. “One of them is the oldest flying metal aircraft in the world,” he says. “One of them is American Airlines oldest flying aircraft. I also have a flying car and the world’s first diesel-powered airplane.”
Herrick isn’t opposed to buying aircraft for investment purposes, but he prefers the historical adulation shown by many collectors and the public access they allow.
“The preservation of this is so important, but if someone [has invested] and created value, then maybe they incentivize other people to collect and restore them,” Herrick says. “These planes should be appreciated.”
The Seller
Sixty percent of business at Platinum Fighter Sales is domestic, with the remaining sales tracking a flight path abroad.
“We have people that buy an airplane in U.S. dollars and hold on to it and then sell it just because the exchange rate is favorable,” Brown says. “They make more money off the exchange rate than they do off the value of the airplane sometimes.”
A large portion of Brown’s international sales are from Europe. There are also buyers in Australia and New Zealand, with sales in Eastern Europe and Russia growing.
Buying or selling a vintage aircraft can be an emotional exercise for a collector. Investors, however, just want the best deal, Brown says. “If someone wants a particular airplane, we take the emotion out of it for them,” he says. “We don’t want them to pay too much. We want them to be treated fairly.”
Parts and Restoration
The purchase price is often only the first in a long line of expenses for both collectors and investors. Returning a vintage aircraft to its former glory (or even just a flyable state) can be an expensive task.
For Brown, it comes down to the individual choice of love vs. money. “Some airplanes you can do a restoration and be financially still in a good situation,” he says. “Other airplanes you are going to restore can be that much more labor-intensive, and you may end up upside-down on it and never get your money out. Perhaps in 10 years you may, but not straight away.”
Herrick admits to investing more than $10 million into purchasing and restoring aircraft, but he thinks certain planes should be left as is. Of the first diesel-powered plane, the 1928 Stinson SM-IDX Detroiter, he says, “That’s an artifact and is in its original condition, and any restorer, no matter how good they are, is not going to rebuild the airplane exactly like it was.” The Stinson is, and will remain, earth-bound.
Buying History: Glacier Gal
On rare occasions, an aircraft’s history can be more important than its condition.
In 1942 a Lockheed P-38 fighter crashed in Greenland during a delivery flight from the U.S. to England. Encased in a glacier for the next half century, the warbird was recovered from beneath 260 feet of ice in 1992 and then restored by Kentucky businessman Roy Shoffner. Known as Glacier Girl, “it’s one of the most famous planes in the world because of the history of it being under the ice,” Brown says.
Glacier Girl was purchased by Rodney Lewis, president and chief executive officer of Lewis Energy Group, for an undisclosed amount and now forms part of his extensive warbird collection.
The Holy Grail
Warbirds with infamous pasts aside, many vintage aircraft can be obtained for prices of about $50,000 or less. Trade-a-Plane.com has an exhaustive list of available craft from all eras.
But there are certain airplanes that remain out of reach for even the most affluent collector.
Herrick’s obsession is a Curtiss Condor from the 1930s. “There are none flying, but I know where one is in Antarctica. It was abandoned there,” he says. “I know that there is one on the side of a mountain in El Salvador, and I know there is one in a storage shed in Utah. That to me is the holy grail.”
On the sales side, Brown says anything British is super-hot right now, especially Spitfires and Hurricanes. “This year is the hundredth anniversary of the Royal Air Force,” he says. “It’s made them the flavor of the year. Anything that is British, in fact.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.
