the Price of Career Training

2 years ago I began working on my rotorcraft ratings. I knew the price was aweful and that it was going to take quite a bit of time. I started off working on my private rating, which required ground school, exams, physicals, and of course aircraft rental and flight instructor fees. They gave me a discount for "block" rentals, so instead of paying $350.00 per hour for the helicopter and instructor I got it for $300.00 It was a very nice discount when you have to have 30 hours of flight time with a instructor for just the private rating. The private program costed me around $18,000.00 then I started on my Instrument rating which cost just as much. My school that I went to went out of their way to help me save money. They did some researching and figured out how to roll different ratings together so I wouldn't be paying for extra flight time. I was able to do my IFR and commercial rating in one "program" then I got my CFI and CFII along with turbine transition and external load ratings in one shot. I was so impressed on how they went out of their way to save me money when they were the ones who would be losing the money. I asked the owner why he did it and he said "If we go out of our way to help you and save you money, you will go out of your way to fly with us and refer us to other pilots or people interested in learning to fly, and that makes us more than charging you the entire fee would ever come close to, also, it encourages our students to stay down here and work for us, build more flight time and better their odds of getting a "kickass" job out there. The school provided me with financial funding sources and helped me all the way along. There needs to be more businesses like this out there.

Was EXCELLENT!!! They went out of their way to help me with my wants and needs, was very professional, and offered a wide choice of programs. Yes it was very expensive, but here I am flying today making twice that much in one year. I never would have thought it would have been possible.

If it is your dream, your goal, your mission, then go after it, do it. It is hard to do it and survive on raman noodles and water, but boy is it ever worth being broke over!