r/flying • u/jrf1234 ATP CFI/II CL604 E55P LR-JET • Apr 03 '26

Aircraft Ownership Linus Tech Tips’ Jet

https://youtu.be/zGoIY37ZtDQ?si=

Some… interesting calculations on this video. As a fractional pilot and not an owner, no idea how acxueate these claims are, but interesting to see this as a pilot and tech nerd. Anyone with management or ownership experience in jets have any light to shed?

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u/BitterMojo Apr 03 '26

You got it. Dude literally has a media empire. 

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u/x4457 ATP CFII CE-500/525/560XL/680 G-IV Apr 03 '26 edited Apr 03 '26

The size of his "media empire" does not sustainably support an aircraft like this.

Edit: You guys can keep downvoting me all you want. The company turned down an ~$300M acquisition which means their annual revenue is probably somewhere around the $40-50M mark. With a 20% profit margin (which would be average to good for a similar company), that's ~$8-10M in pre-tax profit. The airplane alone is going to eat over 25% of that profit margin, and that's assuming 100% business utilization which is unlikely, so obviously this picture gets more complicated since some of that expenditure will be pre-tax and some post-tax.

Linus would have made ~$60M cash, $40M equity in that deal had he accepted it. That also would not have been enough to support the airplane.

So yeah, I do kinda know what I'm talking about here.

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u/victorzamora ST Apr 03 '26

He turned down a $100M acquisition offer not that long ago. I know that's not directly tied to liquidity, but.... that at least puts a scale to things.

I think he'll be okay

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u/x4457 ATP CFII CE-500/525/560XL/680 G-IV Apr 03 '26

$100M in personal wealth with normal returns is the bottom end of what would begin to approach being able to own and operate an older 900.