Creflo Dollar’s Private Jet: He Asked for a $65 Million G650 and Got a Used G550 Instead

The Creflo Dollar private jet story is best known for a number: $65 million. In March 2015, the Atlanta megachurch pastor asked 200,000 followers to give $300 or more each so his ministry could buy a brand-new Gulfstream G650.

The G650 never arrived. The FAA register shows no G650 under his name, his church’s name, or his holding company’s. What it does show is a 1997 Gulfstream IV and a 2010 Gulfstream G550, the second one listed at $18.65 million when it was bought in 2024.

What follows is the full record, checked against the FAA register and the UK accident report: the Gulfstream III that ended up on the grass at Biggin Hill, the appeal that PolitiFact rated Pants on Fire, and the used jet flying today as N978SM.

Creflo Dollar’s Private Jet Fleet

Four jets can be traced to Dollar’s ministry through public records and reporting. The cards run from the newest arrival back to the Gulfstream III that started the 2015 campaign.

Gulfstream G550N978SM · serial 5286 · World Heir Inc

Current · active

Built2010

Registered to World HeirJun 17, 2024

Earlier marksN526GA, N235PV, N600JD

Range6,750 NM

Top speedMach 0.885

Passengers14 to 19

Engines2x Rolls-Royce BR710 C4-11

PriceListed at ~$18.65M (2024)

Gulfstream IVN878SM · serial 1319 · World Heir Inc

Registered · since 2020

Built1997

Registered to World HeirJul 23, 2020

Range4,220 to 4,350 NM (GIV to GIV-SP)

Top speedMach 0.88

PassengersUp to 19

Engines2x Rolls-Royce Tay

Purchase priceNot disclosed

Learjet 60N978SM (former) · World Heir Inc

Sold by 2024

With World HeirDates not disclosed

SoldBy July 2024, to Trigger Air LLC

Range2,405 NM

Max cruise466 knots

PassengersUp to 8

Engines2x Pratt & Whitney Canada PW305A

Purchase priceNot disclosed

Gulfstream IIIN103CD · serial 418 · the ministry's jet from 1999

Written off 2014

Built1984

Bought by the ministry1999

AccidentNov 24, 2014, Biggin Hill, UK

Registration cancelledJul 26, 2018

Range3,650 NM

Long-range cruise442 knots

Engines2x Rolls-Royce Spey Mk511-8

Purchase priceNot disclosed

Two of those jets are still on the register. As of the FAA’s September 2026 data, the G550 and the G-IV are both registered to World Heir Inc, at an address in College Park, Georgia, the city where the church is based.

The tail numbers follow a pattern. The G-IV is N878SM, the Learjet 60 was N978SM, and when the Learjet left, the G550 took over its mark. Our guide to airplane tail numbers explains how owners reserve and reuse custom marks like these.

The Origin Story: From a School Cafeteria to a G550

Creflo Augustus Dollar Jr. was born in College Park, Georgia, in 1962, and he built his ministry in the same town. His aircraft history runs through most of it.

Read in order, the record thins out after Biggin Hill. In March 2015 the ministry said Dollar was flying commercial, and when World Heir’s Learjet 60 joined the fleet has not been reported.

Inside N978SM: The G550 That Stood In for the G650

The Gulfstream G550 is the long-range successor to the Gulfstream V, first flown in August 2001 and in service from 2004. Gulfstream built more than 600 before production ended in 2021.

It flies 6,750 nautical miles on two Rolls-Royce BR710 engines, seats 14 to 19, and cruises as high as 51,000 feet. For a ministry that wanted a jet able to cross oceans, the range was the point.

Set the jet next to the one Dollar asked for, and the gap is smaller in the air than on the price tag.

The G550 gives up 250 nautical miles of range and a little top speed. It cost less than a third of the price in the 2015 appeal, at least on the listing, and the FAA register does not record what World Heir actually paid.

The purchase was not announced. Trinity Foundation reported in July 2024 that it had searched for, and not found, any example of Dollar disclosing the G550 to his congregation or his TV audience.

The Gulfstream III: 16 Years and a Foggy Night at Biggin Hill

Before any of this, the ministry flew a Gulfstream III, registered N103CD. It was built in 1984 and bought in 1999, and The Christian Post reported that it logged about 4 million miles in 16 years with the ministry.

The Gulfstream III first flew in December 1979, and 206 were built. It carries up to 19 passengers on two Rolls-Royce Spey engines and flies 3,650 nautical miles with eight passengers aboard, which makes a Pacific crossing a trip in stages.

Dollar’s 2015 video described two incidents with the jet. On one flight, the right engine failed en route to Australia, near Hawaii according to PolitiFact, and the crew landed safely.

The second came on November 24, 2014, at Biggin Hill Airport outside London. The jet was leaving on a private flight to Gander, Newfoundland, with 2 crew and 5 passengers aboard, and CNN reported that Taffi Dollar and three of the couple’s daughters were on the plane.

In CNN’s account of the video, a mechanical failure made the jet skid off the runway. The UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch described something else, and its report does not mention a mechanical fault.

According to the AAIB, there were thin patches of fog on the airfield that night. The crew expected the runway to have centerline lights, and they lined up on a row of edge lights set about 10 feet (3 m) outside the runway.

The takeoff roll carried the jet about 815 feet (248 m) across paved ground and then onto grass. The captain rejected the takeoff, and after about 395 feet (120 m) in the soft ground the nose landing gear and radome tore away.

No one was hurt. The separated nose gear tore a hole about 21 feet (6.5 m) long in the lower fuselage, and the AAIB listed the aircraft as damaged beyond economic repair.

The report led to one safety recommendation, asking ICAO to develop a standard that would let pilots identify runway edge lights specifically. The FAA cancelled N103CD’s registration in July 2018, with a sale reported.

The G-IV and the Learjet 60: The Quiet Replacements

The jets that did replace the Gulfstream III arrived without a campaign. The first on the register is a 1997 Gulfstream IV, serial 1319, registered to World Heir as N878SM on July 23, 2020.

The G-IV first flew in September 1985 and stayed in production in various versions until 2018. It seats up to 19 and flies 4,220 to 4,350 nautical miles depending on the version, a long step up from the Gulfstream III but short of the G650’s reach.

The Learjet 60 was the smallest jet in the fleet. It seats up to eight and flies about 2,405 nautical miles, a jet for trips across the country rather than across oceans.

World Heir’s Learjet carried the mark N978SM. Trinity Foundation reported in July 2024 that it had recently been sold, and The Roys Report named the buyer as Trigger Air LLC.

When the Learjet went, its tail number stayed behind. The FAA’s September 2026 file lists the G550, serial 5286, as N978SM, still registered to World Heir.

Project G650: The $65 Million Appeal

The campaign went live on March 13, 2015, in a video of nearly six minutes on the Creflo Dollar Ministries website. It asked for “200,000 people committed to sow $300 or more (to) help achieve our goal to purchase the G650 airplane.”

That works out to $60 million from the pledges alone, toward a jet CNN put at a reported $65 million. The page said the G650 would carry Creflo and Taffi Dollar and members of their church around the world to spread the gospel.

In the video, Dollar told the story of the Biggin Hill accident from the pulpit. He credited “a grace working on that airplane, that brought my girls back home to me,” and said he then “knew that it was time to begin to believe God for a new airplane.”

The backlash was immediate. The campaign page came down within days, and by March 16 a spokesperson told The Christian Post, “There is no campaign right now.”

The same spokesperson, Juda Engelmayer of 5W Public Relations, defended the need for the jet. “The plane is not so Creflo Dollar can get on by himself and fly,” he said. “They take a ministry team of 10 to 15 people with them.”

He added that the team took “thousands of pounds of food and provisions with them when they go around the world.” In the meantime, he said, Dollar was flying commercial.

Creflo Dollar’s Most Famous Private Jet Moments

The 2015 video is the best-known moment, but the scrutiny started years earlier and has not stopped since.

November 2007: A letter from the Senate

In November 2007, Senator Chuck Grassley wrote to six media-based ministries about their spending, and Creflo and Taffi Dollar’s World Changers was one of them. Religion News Service described the allegations he pursued as high salaries and the use of private jets and Rolls-Royces.

The final staff review came out on January 6, 2011. It called Dollar’s ministry the “least cooperative” of the six, and the probe ended without penalties or charges.

April 2015: “Discredit that man”

A month after the campaign came down, Dollar answered his critics in a sermon posted to YouTube. He told his congregation the devil was trying to discredit him over the jet.

“(The devil thinks) I got to discredit that man before he starts showing people Jesus!” he preached, according to CNN, to loud applause.

May 2015: “You cannot stop me”

The line that followed him longest came from another sermon, reported by CBS News on May 21, 2015.

If I want to believe God for a $65 million plane, you cannot stop me.

CBS also quoted Ole Anthony of Trinity Foundation, who pointed out that corporate executives may run fleets of jets, but they do not ask followers for tax-deductible donations to pay for them.

June 2015: “Because it is the best”

Then the church’s board made it official. In a statement reported on June 2, 2015, World Changers said a long-range intercontinental jet was necessary to its mission, and that the old jet had been declared a total loss.

“We plan to acquire a Gulfstream G650 because it is the best, and it is a reflection of the level of excellence at which this organization chooses to operate,” the statement said, as quoted by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

No G650 followed. More than a decade on, no G650 appears in the FAA files under World Heir, World Changers or Dollar’s name.

August 2024: The G550 goes to Aruba

Weeks after Trinity Foundation revealed the G550, flight tracking caught it heading for the Caribbean. On August 19, 2024, the jet flew to Aruba and back to the Atlanta area, The Roys Report found.

It is not known who was aboard. Roys reported that Dollar, who is not a licensed pilot, uses the jet for speaking engagements around the country and apparently for some vacations.

How Creflo Dollar’s Jets Compare to Other Pastors’

Dollar is one of several televangelists whose aircraft draw scrutiny. Our roundup of pastors with private jets covers the wider list, and the pattern of used, large-cabin jets repeats across it.

The closest parallel is Jesse Duplantis, who asked in 2018 for a new $54 million Falcon 7X and ended up with a 15-year-old one for $21 million. Dollar’s path looks almost the same, only with a Gulfstream.

Kenneth Copeland took the used route too, buying a Gulfstream V that Tyler Perry had owned. The G650 family Dollar wanted belongs to a different crowd, including Steven Spielberg, whose G650ER carries the tail number N900KS.

What sets Dollar apart is how public the ask was and how quiet the purchase was. The G650 was pitched on video to 200,000 donors, while the G550 that stood in for it came to light through a watchdog’s report.