Originally Posted by
VariablePitchP
It’s not really been mentioned but are you also aware you may need 25/30K for a type rating when you finish training?
More and more places are bonding which is good but a Ryanair, for example, will expect you to write them a cheque for £25K to start the training with them.
Do please consider the advice of others, you really can be sat in the RHS of a jet by 25 latest if you go after it.
You said that you’d be taking home £40K in your plan and saving £20K of it. Afraid not, you’re going to be living at home and eating beans and rice for lunch, rice and beans for dinner. Spend more than £5K a year and you’re doing something wrong. Work 50 hours a week and you can save an absolute fortune if you absolutely insist on not having any debt.
Debt isn’t as cheap as it was with interest rates rising but if a £20K personal loan gets you working a year earlier then just take the loan and pay it back at the same rate you’d have been saving. Difference is you’re paying it back from an Airbus cockpit rather than selling insurance. Worst case you don’t get a job and just continue to pay it back, whilst living it home, spending nothing. You wouldn’t turn down a mortgage on principle and just rent for your entire life, this isn’t that different.
Hello again, read post above re the money (admittedly I was being a bit cheeky/optimistic thinking I could save £20k at that rate, although for the record I wouldn't mind eating rice and beans and living in a swamp for a couple of years if it gets me to flying
). Taking out a loan will probably be mandatory for me at this rate, and I do fully agree with you that it will probably be cheaper (in terms of % salary) to pay it off from a cockpit than save it while flipping burgers. About bonding, the blokes I've spoken to in the flightdeck have told me (or implied) that Easyjet for instance will take a fresh pilot and type rate them on the Bus (whether this is bonded or it is perhaps included in the cost of the training program is something I don't know), I'm not sure how it is for other airlines. In any case I could just find an airline that will bond me for a bizjet or an ejet or a Dash 8 for instance (probably far easier said than done) then lay low for a few years, pay off the 25k from before and take out a new loan for the type rating. We'll see how it goes honestly, anything could happen in the future and laying out a basic plan and getting involved in aviation is the most I can do at this point.