The reality that others seem to be missing because they’ve conveniently forgotten the evil, addictive drug like pull that aviation has - is if you’ve got the bug you’re probably gonna give it a shot.
If you are going to give it a shot then understand the process. You don’t sound like you’re blind to the realities to me..
But…
The big Uni's , despite what some will say , aren’t all bad - it can come down to the luck of the draw as to your instructor - something you can choose if you pay as you go at a smaller operator.
I don’t think the degree is worth a thing for you as you’ve already studied - hours and experience are still the main currency in hires. Saying that , it will give you a structure (and a quiet place) to smash the subjects. Something that is hard with the fam - particularly the ATPLs - someone may correct me here, but Id say it works out to 20+ contact hours for the schooling and then the flying several days a week - both on different sites as you probably know
FYI I was also a late starter- I did a TIF at around 30, payed my own way over 5 years to a PPL , ran out of cash and sold my soul to the lords of fee help and a Uni - but a year later I had a CPL and an instructor rating something that would have taken five more years (auto spell made this instructor
ranting - not far from the truth)
By the time I’d finished training id payed about 80-100k to earn about 38k in my first single engine instructor job - yep - an insane addict.
I made a choice for my young family to instruct and to do so in big schools so I could stay local, earn a wage no matter how puny, smash hours quickly and leave the bin chickens up north to the young bucks - a part of me wishes I’d done some time up north, but the rest of me knows I’m way too soft.
I fought my way through the toxic rabid world of flight schools where 20 year old know it all instructors regularly took metaphoric sh1ts on one another (and me) to get ahead - but eventually I had all the tickets . Some time later I lost all patience with instructing and moved on so I wouldn't become one of
those instructors. (Note: for a few years I really enjoyed it!)
I then moved on to scaring the **** out of myself in crapped out old twins (about 65-70k) and then slightly bigger and better ones with turbines 110+k - that was my progression over about 5-6 years as a commercial pilot. I don’t see myself as a (big) jet jockey but never say never. Saying that, I like what I’m doing and that counts for a lot - to me.
I’ve managed to stay in one capital city for my entire career thus far . Staying put slowed me down but only by a year or so when I could have got on to turbines a bit earlier up north.
It is financially (and spiritually) hard at times along the way, and if you’ve
not got another income earner in the house it may be impossible at times.
You’ll feel like you’ve never got enough of any type of hours and you’ll think you’re ready for the next thing about 6-12 months before the powers that be do - then you won’t care anymore and you’ll get the jobs you want because you’re genuinely competitive (no matter what - all they wanna know on hiring is can they spend time with you and not wanna punch you in the face - Plenty seem to get through this policy though...)
There were a few seniors like you
in the uni courses but mostly they were kids.
I guess the overall gist of this weird late night rant is you’re not too old , but If you go hard it won’t be 7 years til you’re pulling a good wage (2 years training + 5 years getting the hours and working your way to reasonable coin )
If you take covid out of it, and I’m not sure we can yet I think the short to mid term outlook for the industry isn’t too bad. But the above will tell you optimism isn’t always a good thing.
good luck.
HA