Hour Building / USA, Nam, SA or elsewhere..

[Carbo 9]

Hi All,

I am new to the forum, had a look at previous posts and would really appreciate your help.

I am a few hours away from obtaining my fixed wing South African CAA PPL and am looking at the best “value for money options” to obtain a commercial license, be it in South Africa or elsewhere.

I have approximately US$25 000.00 saved up.

The options are:

1) Continue flying in South Africa;

2) Enroll in a Namibian flight school in Swakopmund;

3) Build hours through flight schools in the USA, possibly Arizona, California or any other state/school that can be recommended. I do not mind going rural and would in fact welcome the opportunity, especially to save costs, as long as the school is affordable and trustworthy.

I really like the USA idea because of the savings on hourly rates (I believe one pays around US$100 per hour for a Cessna 172, with fuel, whereas we pay in the region of US$200 where I am from), but I am having difficulty to identify suitable USA schools.

Could anyone please recommend a good value for money USA school or a contact person who can refer me to such a school? Like I said, I won't mind flying in the middle of nowhere if it will allow a cost-saving.

I do not foresee that I will be able to complete the full FAA CPL for the paltry sum of US$25,000.00, but please correct me if I am wrong (this sum must also cover accomodation costs etc.)

Therefore I am thinking of only doing +- 100 solo cross country hours in the US and to then return to SA to complete our local CAA CPL curriculum and flight tests (plus the 40hour instrument rating requirement) and thereafter to fly commercially in Southern Africa.

If there are other options that would get me flying commercially sooner, I would really like to hear from you to be pointed in the right direction.

Thanks!