An aircraft lessor lease premium is a purchase-accounting asset recognized when an acquired lease has contractual rental payments above the market rate at acquisition. AerCap carried $341M of net lease premium at year-end 2025, down from $460M a year earlier.
Above-market rent creates an asset at acquisition
The lease premium represents value already embedded in the acquired contract. It isn't new rent negotiated after the acquisition and it isn't an aircraft appraisal.
AerCap amortizes the premium on a straight-line basis over the remaining lease term as a reduction of lease revenue. That treatment is easy to miss because an accounting asset is producing a negative adjustment to reported rent over time.
The 2025 rent reconciliation shows the effect
AerCap recorded $115M of lease-premium amortization expense in 2025. In its non-GAAP spread reconciliation, the company added back $104M of lease premium or deficiency amortization to reported basic lease rents, taking the spread numerator's rent base from $6.679B to $6.783B.
The two figures are related but come from different presentations, so investors shouldn't assume every lease-premium accounting amount maps one-for-one into a single non-GAAP adjustment line.
Lease premium runs off even if the aircraft stays leased
AerCap's remaining weighted-average amortization period was 4.1 years at the end of 2025. The asset therefore declines as the acquired above-market contract value is consumed.
That is different from maintenance rights, whose amortization is event-driven and tied to maintenance condition and claims rather than a straight-line rent premium.
Primary sources: AerCap 2025 Form 20-F and AerCap full-year 2025 reconciliation.
Part of the Aircraft Leasing Economics
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These companies are examples of how the concept is reported or discussed in public filings. Definitions can differ by issuer; these links open company research rather than a normalized metric comparison.
- AEROpen operating-model research →13 of 13 reviewed concepts in Aircraft Leasing EconomicsMaintenance condition and acquired-lease accounting4 of 4 bridge concepts supportedContinue through this bridge:Accrued Maintenance LiabilityEnd-of-Lease CompensationMaintenance Rights
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