How Flight Schools Expand Their Fleet Without Buying a Single Plane | Max Fuller, Wings Leasing

•Wings Leasing is one of the fastest-growing aircraft leasing companies in the country, and they are built exclusively for flight training. In this episode of The Aviation Business Podcast, host Dan Gill sits down with Max Fuller, who works in Sales and Marketing at Wings Leasing, to break down how aircraft leasing works for flight school operators and why more schools are turning to it to grow their fleets without depleting their capital. Max got his start in aviation watching FedEx departures at Indianapolis at age eight, worked FBO line service in high school, studied at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, and cold-emailed Wings Leasing founder Alan Goodnight from his dorm room. Less than two years later, he is closing fleet deals for some of the largest pilot training programs in the country. In this conversation, Dan and Max cover the real economics of fleet growth, what a sale-leaseback program looks like in practice, why a new Cessna 172 now costs over $700,000 with a two-year wait, and how Wings can close on lease terms in as little as 10 days with zero money down. If you run a flight school and you have ever felt like fleet expansion was a capital problem you could not solve, this episode is worth your time. What you will learn: • Why leasing preserves liquidity and keeps aircraft off your balance sheet as debt • How a sale-leaseback works and what a school gets out of it • How Wings Leasing closed 100+ aircraft in its portfolio since launching in 2023 • What it takes to expand a fleet from 5 aircraft to 8 or 10 without traditional debt • Why aircraft are best understood as portable real estate • How young professionals can build a career in aviation finance without being a pilot Connect with Wings Leasing: Website: www.WingsLeasing.com Connect with Right Rudder Marketing: Website: https://rightruddermarketing.com Podcast Library: https://rightruddermarketing.com/podc... Timestamps 0:00 Dan fills in for Tim and welcomes Max Fuller of Wings Leasing 3:15 Max's aviation origin story: watching FedEx departures in Indianapolis at age 8 5:40 Working FBO line service in high school and getting hands on aviation for real 7:35 Embry-Riddle, the business side of aviation, and discovering aircraft financing 8:10 Fighter jets flying over campus during Daytona 500 flyby practice 10:37 How Max found Wings Leasing and cold-emailed founder Alan Goodnight 12:32 Alan responded in 10 minutes and Max was late to class 16:42 Global aviation growing 4% per year and what that means for pilot demand 17:30 The buy vs. lease debate: why aircraft appreciation is not the full picture 18:16 The core case for leasing: preserve liquidity, allocate capital to better returns 18:58 Sale-leaseback programs: pulling equity out of aircraft you already own 20:19 Walking through fleet expansion from 5 to 10 aircraft using leasing 22:12 Wings Leasing portfolio: 100+ aircraft, double-digit growth, all major OEMs 23:18 How the lease process works: 10-day close, zero money down, insurance and maintenance on the school 24:32 New Cessna 172 pricing ($700K+), two-year delivery wait, and pre-delivery payments 30:14 Keeping aircraft off the balance sheet and what that means for school growth 31:29 Aircraft as portable real estate and non-pilot career paths in aviation finance 38:37 The future of aviation: always changing, always growing, maybe rockets 39:21 Wings Leasing closing pitch and Aero Summit booth