Buying a $660,000 airplane from someone you have never met should not require you to guess what happens next. It doesn't here. Every step below has a name on it, and the money moves through a neutral escrow agent — never through me.
Your money goes to escrow, never to me.A neutral escrow agent of your choosing holds the funds and the documents until we both authorize the close.
Your inspection, your inspector, your shop.Pick any Cirrus Authorized Service Center in California, Nevada or Oregon and I'll fly it there at my expense.
It's already at a Cirrus service center.Sierra Aero is on the field at Truckee. An inspection can start this week with no ferry at all.
Two to four weeks, signature to flying it home.Most of it runs in parallel — financing and insurance don't wait for the inspection.
Step 00 · Before we talk
Read the records first.
Scanned airframe, engine and propeller logs, oil analysis, and a digital logbook summary with per-cylinder compression history — all public, all linked below. Including the corrections log from this year's logbook reconciliation: 105 transcription corrections, each with its source page and the reason it changed.
You · before contact
Step 01 · One day
A call, and an honest one.
What you fly now, what you want this airplane to do, how you're funding it, and when you want to be flying it. If the airplane is wrong for you, I would rather say so on that call than three weeks in.
Both
Step 02 · One to two days
Purchase agreement, signed.
Price, deposit, what conveys, the inspection window, how squawks get split, and the closing date. Electronic signature — no printer, no scanner.
Both
Step 03 · One to three days
Escrow opens. The airplane comes off the market.
A $25,000 deposit is wired to a neutral escrow agent — not to me. You pick the agent; nearly all of them sit in Oklahoma City, because that is where every aircraft title record in the country physically lives. That is what the deposit buys: the airplane is off the market for your entire inspection window. It's refundable under the agreement's contingencies. Escrow and title fees are split 50/50 between us.
Your choice of agent
Step 04 · Two to five days
Title and lien search.
The escrow agent pulls the FAA record on N21JZ from the first owner forward, looking for breaks in the chain of title and any recorded lien. Anything it finds is mine to clear before closing. Title insurance is available if you want it.
Escrow agent
Step 05 · Parallel · Three to ten days
Financing, if you're borrowing.
Start it now, not after the inspection. Aircraft lenders require title and escrow anyway, so nothing here is wasted. My note is a short bridge; the lenders listed above write twenty-year paper.
You
Step 06 · Parallel · One to three days
Insurance, quoted early.
A turbocharged Cirrus with a parachute has real underwriting requirements, often including transition training and dual time before solo. Get the quote at Step 2 — the worst place to discover you can't be bound is the day of closing.
You
Step 07 · Three to seven days
Your prebuy, at the shop you choose.
Your expense, your inspector, and I don't supervise it — that independence is the whole point. Sierra Aero is an Authorized Cirrus Service Center on the field at Truckee and can start immediately; they are also my shop, so if you would rather have eyes that have never seen this airplane, pick any Cirrus center in California, Nevada or Oregon and I will fly it there at my expense. One flight, no radius limit. Mather and Woodland near Sacramento, All In Aviation at Henderson, Hillsboro Aviation or Jet Center Medford in Oregon — your call.
You choose · I ferry
Step 08 · One to five days
Squawks, split the standard way.
Airworthiness items are mine to correct. Cosmetic and elective upgrades are yours. If the inspection turns up something serious enough that neither of us wants to proceed, you walk and the deposit comes back.
Mine to fix · yours to elect
Step 09 · One day
Close through escrow.
Funds release, the bill of sale and registration are filed with the FAA, any lien is paid directly out of proceeds, and title passes. The $5 FAA registration fee is yours.
Escrow agent
Step 10 · One to two days
Delivery — and the tax question worth asking.
California generally taxes a sale delivered in California, and at this price that is a five-figure question. If your advisor tells you an out-of-state delivery helps your position, I'll fly N21JZ out of California — Nevada is twenty minutes, Oregon is one leg — and you cover fuel, my ticket home, and lodging if it needs an overnight.
I fly it · you cover the trip
