Show me somewhere you get a plane and instructor for $80.
You're a gold seal, what is the average actual logged time at each checkride? It ain't the book minimum. To get to CFI, CFII, AND MEI, which is what the puppy mills give you for the cost, 350 hours is a good estimate. The thing about such a strong market for pro pilots is that there is a corresponding uptick in demand for advanced instruction. A plain-jane CFI simply doesn't get the hiring looks you might think, even in this market. The other routes like survey or pipeline still have minimums in the 500-2000 hour range (Surdex and Woolpert, before you ask). Banner tow is 350-400 with 100 tailwheel. Every DZ add I've seen in the last two years has specifically said "no low timers".
You're discounting the time and opportunity cost of rolling your own. Right now every DPE I work with has a month wait, my part 61 students have trouble scheduling more than one or two flights per week, my schedule is pretty solid for 2-3 weeks. Tell me you've purchased any of your planes in less than two months and how much above the sale price did it cost to get in your hangar/dock?
This guy doesn't sound airline bound, there are real advantages to having all the extra multi time baked in to an average $200/hr cost for someone with 135 aspirations.
You're selling a best case scenario that may have been true 8-10 years ago, but it simply isn't the case anymore.
I don't like the puppy mills, but the product they're putting out is specifically tailored to the current market. They have teams of analysts who's only job is to ensure that is the case.
Absolutely it can be done much cheaper, but this is a "strike while the iron is hot situation", the additional six months it will take him to do it the old fashioned way could easily mean the difference between getting furloughed/laid-off or not when the bottom drops out of this boom.
Where exactly did I say plane and CFI?
I didn't, I'm not sure how your road to your CPL went, but most of my hours were NOT dual.
And $200 AVERAGE per hour is still straight nuts.
When it comes to "plane Jane" that's exactly what ATP Inc and many of the other mills turn out, I mean look who they use for CFIs, want to stick out and save money, log time in a little (and likely cheap to rent) tailwheel, or join a glider club, learn from pilots who actually have been there and done that, not just the self licking ice cream come of puppy mill CFIs.
250hrs is PLENTY of time to knock out all the needed first job stuff, instrument, high performance/complex, ME, tailwheel, etc. and if you want your CFI that's not a flight hour intensive thing at all, and getting anything more than just your straight CFI initially is silly before you start working and making money, in fact many flight schools will pay for your add ons, seems like many places are hurting for CFIs too.
I've also not had a issue with DPEs or rentals, if you're having a one month wait for anything other than weather, and even then, you're training in the wrong place.
With people being desperate for pilots, what they ask for and what they get are often two different things, this isn't 2003, getting a job as a greenhorn non CFI isn't as hard as it used to be if you get in your car, drive and shake hands, getting a job as a greenhorn with a CFI is super easy.
Haven't bought a plane in the last few months, but I don't pay asking price on things, I've also not had too much trouble getting a hangar, again, if you're having these problems you need to broaden your search.
All that expensive multi time, no one really cares much anymore, and even if you have 80 hours multi, you're still a 250hr pilot, chances are you ain't going to be PICing a ME out of the gate, and as your experience builds you'll end up getting multi time if you want it, and you'll get paid to build it vs paying to build it!
Again if anyone is 8-10 years behind in their thinking it you bud, thinking airlines and whatnot have room to be choosy, nope, and thinking anyone cares where you went flight school, please, don't tell me, did you list by name your flight school on your resume?
You can get your stuff done outside of a puppy mill just as fast, I got guys done 0-CPL and into a job in under 6mo before, it really only comes down to how full time of a student you can be, if you're needing to work and don't have the money to do it all at once, that's going to be one, if not THE biggest factor.
Strike while the irons hot, yeah, but the difference in your options, if we falsely presume there actually was a time difference between somewhere like ATP Inc and doing it at a club or something, that's nothing compared to the albatross of extra debt / capital.
This is what James doesn't comprehend. Many of the so called "puppy mills" have agreements with regional airlines and train to a syllabus designed for a particular airline's flying. Even some major airlines are studying setting up programs. Someday the airlines could even help with financial assistance as the shortage gets worse. It is being discussed. And gasfiltered is correct, it is a good time to get on with the airlines with thousands of retirements in the next 10+ years.
Oh yeah, I've read that marketing, and it's just that, which you should get as you're in the industry, is you don't need a foot in the door to get into a regional, meet the mins, have a pulse, don't show up high and you're in.
They don't care if a puppy mill trained you or if frickin' jeffrey dahmer was your CFI, beggars can't be choosers and all that.
