Join now and 2.5 years to right seat of wide body, will it work? You decide if you can move on in 4 years.
InvitED; Not only everything that has been said so far is very, very, very, VERY true, but if you do think of the '4 years and I'm out' option, I wouldn't recommend that either.
First of all, the upgrade time is closer to 3.5 years than 2.5. By the time you have upgraded and flown enough hours on the right seat to 'validate' all those semi-worthless SO hours and make you somewhat marketable to another airline, you are looking at something closer to 6 or 7 years.
By which time you're close to 40 and had better be certain there has not been a downturn...
Airlines have expanded more than ever in the last few years. Cadet pilots, MPLs and others have seen themselves propelled to the bottom of seniority lists of major airlines like in a dream. These will also be the ones suffering the redundancy axe when things turn sour again, and they will.
Being at the height of an 'up' cycle, you'd better ensure you join a place you'd enjoy long term, lest you find yourself stuck in a groundhog day nightmare, or end up fighting with thousands of similarly experienced pilots for the same job...
And by the way, the seniority list isn't moving north that fast as it is, with one of the fastest fleet growth and hiring cycle CX has ever known. Expect 13 to 15 years to command, if that's your goal, and assuming things don't start going limp again.
Oh, and let me join the chorus: Do NOT expect a base. Not anytime foreseeable, no matter what the hiring team might tell you. The
only incentive for CX to open bases is to get rid of those on housing allowance, and that's proving barely worth the trouble to them as it is. You will
not be one of them, and CX will have
no incentive to post you out to where you want to be.
Compact rosters are in high demand by people a lot senior to you, if you even end up on the proper fleet.
Commuting across the Pacific is ill-advised at best, even if your roster allows it.
Heed everybody's warning on here. This is not necessarily the most impartial forum when it comes to CX, but if you have made an effort to reach out to the CX cadet / no-housing S/O community, you'll find their answers will sound familiar.
The recruitment team, on the other hand, is under pressure to find enough people to fill the seats on these terms and will happily distort the truth to try and polish that turd.
Transitioning to jets is not the easiest step in one's career. It doesn't mean you should bite the first shiny apple that's presented to you.