Sales of pre-owned business jets took off in last year’s fourth quarter, blunting a weak second quarter and a “mixed bag of activity” in the third, according to business aviation information service provider Amstat. Business jet resale transactions were up 0.3 percentage points year-over-year, with 2.9 percent of the active fleet turning over in the fourth quarter. “This was the best performance since the fourth quarter of 2007 and squeaked ahead of the 20-year quarterly average of 2.8 percent,” noted Amstat general manager Andrew Young.
As of January 1, pre-owned business jet inventory stood at 11.7 percent, below the 20-year average of 12.7 percent and 1.2 points lower than a year earlier. Large-cabin jet inventory saw a significant decrease, to 9.7 percent from 11.8 percent, while the supply of available light jets contracted to 12.4 percent from 14.2 percent. Midsize jet inventory remained unchanged at 12.3 percent.
Improved transaction activity and shrinking inventories last year helped to boost the average asking price for large-cabin jets by 2.7 percent, to $13.96 million, as of January 1. However, this didn’t transfer to the other jet categories, with average asking prices for light and midsize jets falling by 12.1 percent (to $1.53 million) and 5.4 percent (to $3.68 million) year-over-year, respectively.
http://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/ainalerts/2014-01-28/pre-owned-bizjet-sales-4q-best-late-2007