Form a Flying Club and Fly for Less

January 2020 - Jack Neima’s excellent article in September covered some of the most important concepts in the idea of forming a flying club.

These are the high points:

1. A group of pilots, probably in a Canadian EAA chapter, decide they want to share in owning an aircraft.
2. They identify an orphan aircraft that possibly needs some work.
3. They convince the owner to donate it for a charitable receipt for fair market value.
4. EAA Canada takes ownership and helps the chapter form a flying club.
5. The new flying club refurbishes the aircraft and shares among its members the expenses of the purchase from EAA Canada and the refurbishment.
6. Once the aircraft is ready, the flying club takes ownership from EAA Canada.
7. The flying club forms and documents its organization and establishes its method of handling financing, booking aircraft, and making rules.

Benefits of this process are huge, from social to financial to convenience. There are some excellent resources available through EAA to help make this happen, and a great example is www.bookourplane.com, which is software written by a flying club but freely available to anyone.

An additional benefit is that EAA Canada receives the funding to donate for scholarships or whatever educational purposes may be achieved with the funds generated by the sale of the donated aircraft. Check out the manual on how to start a flying club for more info. It’s a U.S.-based document but you’ll find tons of useful information there.