Teterboro aircraft broker opening cabin design center

Aug. 20----Teterboro aircraft broker opens design studio for on-the-spot cabin updates.

A Teterboro aircraft broker is opening a new cabin-interior design center even as the private jet industry continues to struggle amid an oversupply of used jets and banks remain wary of making private aviation loans.

Freestream Aircraft USA Ltd. opens the design center today to add revenue and, perhaps, give the company a leg up on rival brokers who do not offer the service, said Rebecca Posoli-Cilli, the company's founder, president and chief operating officer.

Buyers often want to customize their interiors, and sellers sometimes want to restore them to make their planes more appealing to potential buyers, said Posoli-Cilli, who started the company in 2007 and moved it in May from Hackensack to leased space above Signature Aviation's lobby on Fred Wehran Drive.

"We've been helping clients with design, but we would have to fly to Wichita or Little Rock to look at fabrics," she said. "What we have now is a place to sit down with a client."

The design center resembles a home interior decorator's shop, with racks stuffed with swatches of silky carpets, exotic leathers and grainy wood laminates, as well as samples of fine china and silverware.

An iMac desktop computer with computer-assisted-design software lets clients see what cabins will look like with different furnishings, upholsteries, side panels, carpets and headliners.

The brokerage, which employs seven, and which sells planes ranging in price from $1 million to more than $70 million, benefited through the industry's downturn by winning listings from large banks that were eager to unload repossessed aircraft.

Freestream has completed 16 aircraft transactions to individuals and corporations this year, totaling more than $600 million, Posoli-Cilli said. "We would like the number to be 22 to 24," she said.

Current listings include a 2005 Challenger 850 being sold by Credit Suisse AG at an asking price of $17.9 million, and a 1993 Gulfstream IV-SP, owned by the Nakash family, founders of Jordache Enterprises. The listing says "make an offer."

Prices of used aircraft are down by more than a third from 2007 and 2008 peaks, according to Connie C. Marrero, Freestream's executive vice president.

"If it's a [Gulfstream] G4, it's a 50 percent reduction," she said, although depreciation amounts vary with age and the amount of time a plane has been in the air.

"It's a great time to buy, but it's still a hard time to get financing," Marrero said.

"Banks are lending, but expect to put 40 percent down," said Posoli-Cilli.

Prior to 2008, Wachovia, now merged with Wells Fargo, "was doing less than 10 percent down and in some cases it was interest-only payments," Posoli-Cilli said. "They would even finance our commission and the pre-buy inspection, which costs $30,000 to $70,000," she said.

"That time is over."