Updated . Educational only — not tax, legal, or lending advice. Confirm figures with your CPA, the state revenue department, and a lender before you close.
Do Not Compare a Loan Payment with a Lease Payment Alone
A loan payment buys equity in an aircraft you insure, maintain, and can sell. A lease payment buys the use of an aircraft someone else residual-values. The calculator only does the first one.
For the loan case, include down payment, tax, and the payment. Then add insurance, hangar, and maintenance, which remain yours. For the lease case, add the monthly payment, the hourly or overage rate, the maintenance reserve if it is not included, and the condition bill you will pay at return. Subtract nothing for “equity” unless the lease actually gives you a purchase option at a price you would pay.
Tax is not a tie-breaker you can guess. Bonus depreciation applies to property you own and place in service in a business, under the 2026 rules on this page. A lease may put that deduction on the lessor, who may or may not price it into the payment. Ask your CPA which contract you have before you let a salesperson claim the deduction for you.
Flight schools have a longer version at lease versus loan for schools. Fractional shares are a third structure: fractional decision guide.
Questions buyers actually ask
Should I put the lease payment into the calculator as if it were a loan?
No. That invents a principal and a rate the lease does not have.
What if the lease has a purchase option?
Price the option as a future loan, on the future date, at a value you believe. Do not add it to today’s payment and call the total a cost of leasing.