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Originally Posted by Firebird2XC  Is the dream over? Nah, not really.
Is it highly unlikely that you'll be in a position to make it to the 'big leagues' and real money at this point? Yep. Doesn't really matter what your age is, the "easy in, easy up" moment has passed. If another comes around, it'll be years from now.
Most airlines have guys on the street on furlough status that will get called back before new hires get called to interview. Once you get in, you're behind all of them in line for upgrade to your first captain position.. and eventual interview at one of the 'majors'.
Ask yourself if you can sincerely live on $30,000 a year for the next 5 years combined with being away from home up to 16 days a month.
It's a tough nut to crack. If you really want it bad enough, go for it and more power to ya... but don't let the flight schools selling bulk packages con you into believing there's some sort of 'pilot shortage'. If there is a shortage, it's years in coming. |
Firebird said it much better than I did. If you want a career as a pilot, it absolutely isn't too late to start. But there is no shortage of professional pilots and its unlikely that there will ever be a shortage in our lifetime.
The 6-month zero to hero schools will tell you all about how all the babyboomers are going to hit mandatory retirement age 'in the next few years' and thus create a shortage of professional pilots of epic proportions. Those schools have been selling that babyboomer chestnut to students since the babyboomers were in diapers. It's bs and nothing more.
There's no shortage of pilots and there never will be, and the payscale reflects this. So like Firebird said, expect to make less than $30k for five years or so. Also, expect your trip up the career ladder to involve relocating a few times. That's not to say that you'll definitely have to relocate, but its something you'd be wise to expect.
As for your questions on training, An FBO will almost always be cheaper than a pilot mill. An FBO will probably take longer, but not always. The more you fly, the faster you'll finish. So if you can devote two hours a day to flying and 6 hours a day to studying, five days a weeks, you'd probably get through a private cert in a month. Most people can't devote that kind of time and most schools can't provide that kind of availability so figure on it taking about 6 months to get a private cert if you keep working and fly every chance possible.
FWIW, I did my private in just over 4 months, flying twice a week with a local FBO while I was working full time. I took longer to do the instrument rating but I didn't have the cash to fly every week at that time. I did the commercial cert after my instrument and it was exactly one month between my IR checkride and my commercial checkride. By the time I did my instrument and commercial, I was a non-equity partner in a Mooney so I used that and an independent CFI instead of the FBO.