VREF | The Truth About the Aviation Market

About VREF | The Truth About the Aviation Market

Up-to-date information on the state of the aviation marketplace and it's effect on aircraft valuation by the leader in aircraft valuation: VREF Aircraft Value Reference, Appraisal & Litigation Services

Publisher

Jason Zilberbrand

Category

leisure · news

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

3 Sept 2025

Latest episode

22 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

61 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   22 Oct 2026

   Who Watches The Middle Man? | EP 62

   To sell a house in Illinois, you need a license. To broker a used yacht in Florida, you need a license, fingerprints, a background check, and a bond. To sell a $35 million business jet in the United States? “You need a phone.” In the last 12 months, VREF tracked roughly 4,000 retail business jet and turboprop sales. More than 500 companies appeared as brokers or dealers. About half showed up on just one deal all year. The aircraft is regulated. The pilot is regulated. The mechanic and operator are regulated. But who watches the people negotiating the sale, holding the wire, selling the jet card, or arranging the lease? The closer you are to the airplane, the more you're regulated. The closer you are to the money, the less you're regulated. This episode, Jason Zilberbrand asks one of the most polarizing questions the industry faces: Is it time to regulate business aviation's middlemen? In this episode: Who is regulated today—and who isn't—from pilots and Part 135 operators to charter brokers, sales brokers, escrow agents, and jet-card providers Why prepaid private-aviation customers may have fewer protections than public-charter passengers Three possible rulemakers: federal agencies, state licensing boards, or an industry-funded organization under government oversight What cabotage means, why America restricts who can fly paying passengers domestically, and the uncomfortable question it raises about who can sell an airplane The case FOR regulation: unprotected deposits, opaque transactions, financial failures, illegal charter, and gaps in accountability The case AGAINST: the fraud was already illegal, sophisticated buyers have advisers, regulators are stretched thin, licensing favors incumbents, and business could move offshore What car dealers, yacht brokers, and real estate got right about licensing, bonds, escrow, and disclosures What Bernie Madoff, fragmented mortgage oversight, and the luxury tax teach us about rules that failed Five policy choices, from basic broker disclosures to full licensing and bonding Six actions you can take this week to protect yourself without waiting for Washington Jason lays out five options: Require written disclosures about who a broker represents, owns, and gets paid by. Require client deposits to go into independent escrow—not an operating account. Protect prepaid jet-card and membership balances with escrow or bonds. License and bond aircraft escrow and trust agents. Require formal licensing, checks, bonds, and discipline for aircraft brokers and dealers. The first four focus on transparency and the money. The fifth goes further: Who should be allowed to sell? The bottom line: We decided long ago that it matters who flies an airplane. But does it matter who sells it, who holds the money, and who arranges the deal? This time, you get the last word. Should there be more regulation? Which option would you choose—1 through 5, none, or something else? Tell us whether you're an owner, buyer, broker, dealer, operator, lender, or attorney. Comment or email info@vref.com (mailto:info@vref.com). Jason plans to count the responses and share compelling arguments from both sides in a future episode. Know the number before you make the deal. VREF.com Fly safe. Stay smart.

2. 

   14 Oct 2026

   Price It Right or Pay to Lose

   A listener went shopping for a mid-’90s Piper Archer. Low time. No damage history. Original paint. Original panel. Engine close to TBO. The seller was asking $189,000. VREF put the airplane at roughly $165,000. The buyer was prepared to offer $175,000 cash—and says he would have gone to $180,000. He never got the chance. According to the listener, the broker dismissed the VREF number and said the Archer would be the next one to sell. That was June. By the end of September, the airplane was still sitting. New asking price: $165,000. The seller turned away the possibility of $175,000, carried the airplane for another three months, and wound up asking $10,000 less than the buyer was prepared to pay. That story is the perfect introduction to today’s piston market. Because the market isn’t crashing. It’s splitting in two. In this episode: Why the current piston data does not support the “market crash” narrative How inventory can be down while individual airplanes sit for 200+ days Why listing pages can become a museum of overpriced airplanes How 2021–2022 values created a psychological anchor sellers still haven’t released Why free listing-site valuation widgets can become a self-reinforcing hall of mirrors The difference between values built from asking prices and values built from actual transactions Real asking-price spreads among Piper Archers, Cessna 172s, Cirruses, Mooneys, and Bonanzas Why two nearly identical airplanes can be priced $50,000, $80,000, even $200,000 apart How new-aircraft replacement cost supports parts of the used market—but does not validate every asking price Why flight-school fleet aircraft returning to market could become an important source of supply What 10,000–16,000-hour trainers really mean for private buyers Why school-aircraft pre-buys should focus on cycles, wear, landing history, and physical condition—not just total time How higher interest rates, down payments, insurance, and lender appraisals are shrinking the effective buyer pool Why an appraisal below the seller’s ask can suddenly require the buyer to bring tens of thousands more cash to closing Why a $60,000 avionics installation does not necessarily add $60,000 to resale value years later Whether appraisers are actually “too low”—or sellers are simply pricing above what the closing market supports A second Archer negotiation involving a large gap between ask and VREF—and a proposed direct wire to the seller’s operating account Why Jason says aircraft buyers should use escrow rather than eliminate the protections built into a transaction How that same listener ultimately found a privately listed SR20 priced near VREF and closed on it within weeks What happened when unexpected engine problems appeared after closing Why buyers should consider holdbacks or reserve escrow when meaningful engine uncertainty exists How to make a serious aircraft offer harder for a broker to dismiss And what sellers should ask their broker before letting an airplane sit for another 90 days If your airplane has been listed since spring, the question isn’t whether “the piston market” is good or bad. It’s: Which market are you actually in? Watch or listen to Episode 61 of The Truth About the Aviation Market. VREF.com Price to the market—not the memory of it. Fly safe. Stay smart. Pasted text

3. 

   7 Oct 2026

   The Single Pilot Citation is Dead | EP 60

   For more than four decades, one story helped define the legacy Citation market: This is the jet you can fly yourself. Your first jet. Your hands on the throttles. Your family in the back. Nobody required in the right seat. At the end of September 2026, that story changed. The FAA ended the single-pilot exemptions that allowed qualifying pilots to operate a group of Part 25-certified legacy Citations without the second pilot their type certificates otherwise required. VREF’s analysis puts the affected U.S. civil fleet at 1,212 aircraft. In this episode: Which Citation models are affected—and which are not Why affected aircraft are not grounded, but now require a qualified second in command Why former exemption-based single-pilot endorsements no longer authorize solo operation How the exemption system was supposed to work—and what the FAA says it found when it began reviewing it in 2024 Why 13 of 14 Part 61 exemption holders ultimately losing or being denied continued authority matters Allegations involving incomplete records, improper checks, unauthorized simulator training, and falsified records Why Jason says the FAA review began before the two high-profile 2025 crashes The difference between what Jason calls the “paper system failing” and a broader culture in which flying these aircraft alone had become normalized Why the Citation 501/551 SP models, Mustang, and CitationJet/CJ family through the CJ4 are outside this action Why the rule may shrink the buyer pool for older legacy Citations How adding a second pilot can materially change annual operating costs Why a representative 60-hour-per-year Citation II owner could see effective operating cost rise from roughly $1,800 per hour to more than $3,000 per hour once realistic crew costs are included What VREF found inside the affected fleet: 1,212 aircraft, existing inventory, aging airframes, dealer holdings, and parts-company acquisitions Why the older legacy Citation market was already weakening before this rule Why Jason says the FAA action didn’t create the whole problem—it “takes away the floor” The 57 affected aircraft VREF identified in dealer inventory, including 42 not publicly listed At least 22 affected aircraft purchased by parts companies since 2021 Why the Citation II versus Citation II SP may become one of the cleanest real-world valuation experiments in aviation What owners should do now: confirm crew requirements, call the insurance broker, price a qualified SIC, recalculate annual economics, and decide whether to crew up, sell, or move into an aircraft certified for single-pilot operation VREF.com Fly safe. Stay smart.

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.6 / 5

15 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

9 ratings

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Guest appearances

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