Paying for flight training

floatflyingguy · Post by **floatflyingguy** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 12:59 pm

I have one more year of highschool left, and i am planning on going to Harvs next summer out of CYAV, how should i go about paying for it? should i get a loan for everything, or should i work on it as i have the money?

trancemania · Post by **trancemania** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 3:45 pm

Get a loan.

Then you only have to WORRY about paying it back.(you can fly anytime - weather permitting)

If you dont get a loan then you have to WORRY about when you will fly again.(depending on when you have the cash)

You going to end up paying the same amount anyways.
Get the loan and this gurantees the funds for your flying.

Redneck_pilot86 · Post by **Redneck_pilot86** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 6:18 pm

Definately get a loan or line of credit to cover it.

If you try to work your way through it, you will take longer and end up spending more money, as you will forget things between flights. Guaranteed funds means you can fly more often, and your retention of the lessons will save you money.

Also, I know of at least one flight school that will give you a free DC headset if you put a certain amount up front towards flight training. Not sure if Harvs has anything like that or not.

Cat Driver · Post by **Cat Driver** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 6:54 pm

Also, I know of at least one flight school that will give you a free DC headset if you put a certain amount up front towards flight training.

Never ever give a flight school money up front.

Ralliart · Post by **Ralliart** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 6:56 pm

Never ever give a flight school money up front

niwre · Post by **niwre** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 9:32 pm

Cat Driver wrote:
Also, I know of at least one flight school that will give you a free DC headset if you put a certain amount up front towards flight training.
Never ever give a flight school money up front.

Just wondering as to the reason. Is it ok after your happy with the school or never give money upfront as a rule? Honest question.

Adam44 · Post by **Adam44** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 6:29 am

niwre wrote:
Cat Driver wrote:
Also, I know of at least one flight school that will give you a free DC headset if you put a certain amount up front towards flight training.
Never ever give a flight school money up front.
Just wondering as to the reason. Is it ok after your happy with the school or never give money upfront as a rule? Honest question.

The main reason is should the flight school ever go out of business, you'll have a b!tch of a time getting your money back.

Night-Hawk · Post by **Night-Hawk** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 7:28 am

Redneck_pilot86 wrote:Definately get a loan or line of credit to cover it.

If you try to work your way through it, you will take longer and end up spending more money, as you will forget things between flights. Guaranteed funds means you can fly more often, and your retention of the lessons will save you money.

Also, I know of at least one flight school that will give you a free DC headset if you put a certain amount up front towards flight training. Not sure if Harvs has anything like that or not.

¸

Yeah a loan is great. But how do you get a 30k loan when you're 18 just out of highschool ?

I'm 19, I have a steady and shi**y job since i'm 16 and CIBC won't give me more than 5k.

Enlighten me !

Goose757 · Post by **Goose757** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 7:34 am

niwre wrote:
Cat Driver wrote:
Also, I know of at least one flight school that will give you a free DC headset if you put a certain amount up front towards flight training.
Never ever give a flight school money up front.
Just wondering as to the reason. Is it ok after your happy with the school or never give money upfront as a rule? Honest question.

Flight schools have a nasty habit of going TU from time to time. I can't think of any good reason why you would pay up front for training. What benefit is it to you?

Lommer · Post by **Lommer** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 9:59 am

If a flight school wants you to pay up front there are a few possible reasons you shouldn't do it:

1) The school wants the money now because they're having serious cash flow problems. I wouldn't give money up front to any business whose finances are in such disarray, especially if it's a flight school where my money is afforded ZERO protection if it goes bankrupt.
2) The flight school doesn't want to be responsible for ensuring you're encouraged and able to finish your training in a timely manner. If they have your money up front they may care a lot less about whether or not they can accommodate you when YOU want to fly, and whether they have the machines and instructors available too.
3) The flight school wants your money because they know they're crappy and they don't want you to realize this and leave for a different school half way through your training. Even if they are a decent school, it means that if it subsequently goes downhill or if you have to move for personal reasons, all you need to do to switch schools is pick up your PTR and go instead of worry about the thousands of unused $ they still have.

I'd say #1 is the most common, but don't discount the other reasons for not giving schools money up front.

good_idea · Post by **good_idea** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 10:37 am

Great idea going to Harv's Air. I am an instructor at the Steinbach Harv's Air. I would suggest geting a student loan and paying the government back. If you want to do you commercial too, you should look at joining a program at Harv's like Red River college and do some university at the same time and then you will have no problem with getting a government loan.

trancemania · Post by **trancemania** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 1:25 pm

Go to the air cadets man!!

You are young and not attached.(assuming here)
You could get your parents to sign for you as well.

Your situation might not look great from your eyes.....But you got a LOT of time on your side,which is something you cant buy.

To the other point:

Yeah when i started my school i gave them $6200 cash.

I got 7% off the plane rental each time.At the time is was a great idea.

Basically After 2 events happened (about 1-2 months) the situation totally changed.

The school was taking in only 10%(approx) of what they had been.

Then i decided to pull out.In the end i got all my money back but i was given 2 cheques that i could only cash at different times.(money abviously wasnt flowing)

Point is:

You never know what could happen.A lot of people are banking on that school going bankrupt.

saucer_driver · Post by **saucer_driver** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 4:12 pm

you're going to pay for training?

Scab 8)

Redneck_pilot86 · Post by **Redneck_pilot86** » Tue Jul 17, 2007 11:20 am

Night-Hawk wrote:
Redneck_pilot86 wrote:Definately get a loan or line of credit to cover it.

If you try to work your way through it, you will take longer and end up spending more money, as you will forget things between flights. Guaranteed funds means you can fly more often, and your retention of the lessons will save you money.

Also, I know of at least one flight school that will give you a free DC headset if you put a certain amount up front towards flight training. Not sure if Harvs has anything like that or not.
¸

Yeah a loan is great. But how do you get a 30k loan when you're 18 just out of highschool ?

I'm 19, I have a steady and shi**y job since i'm 16 and CIBC won't give me more than 5k.

Enlighten me !

I was 18 working full time at Tim Hortons, walked in and 30 minutes walked out with 10k to use. Just get your parents or someone else to cosign it. My folks dont have a great credit history, they have been farming too long for that, but it was enough to make the difference. The rest was OSAP.

As for that flight school, it is a good school that has been around and slowly expanding for as long as I have been interested in flying, I would have no problem giving them some money down. They dont ask for the full amount, I think it is about enough to get you to first solo or so, can't recall. And they dont require the money up front, its totally up to you. They give you the bonus of a headset because you have taken away the worry of a debt they cant collect on.

Thair81 · Post by **Thair81** » Sat Jul 21, 2007 12:21 pm

I got a student line of credit but tried not to tap into it too deeply. For what it's worth, the way I did it was that after I graduated from university, I moved back home with my folks and got a part-time job (25-30 hours a week). My folks allowed me to live at home for free so that all the money I earned I could spend on flight training. Working part-time (read evenings and weekends mostly) I was able to fly as much as I wanted (2-4 flights per week). Doing my training this way allowed me to get thru it without incurring very much debt, which is always nice. I had to dip into the line of credit during my instructor rating, but it was not very much in the bigger picture of things and I was able to pay it off quite quickly. Remember, most likely you will not earn a great deal of money initially when you actually start getting paid to fly, so having no debts will really help you out. Just my two cents. Good luck with your training.

costermonger · Post by **costermonger** » Sun Jul 22, 2007 1:16 am

Night-Hawk wrote:Yeah a loan is great. But how do you get a 30k loan when you're 18 just out of highschool ?

I'm 19, I have a steady and shi**y job since i'm 16 and CIBC won't give me more than 5k.

Enlighten me !

Got parents?

Sorry, but at your age and income, that's probably the only way you're getting anything approaching what you'll need for flight training. If you go through a college or university program, you'll get better options for financing because you can ask for a student loan - at CIBC specifically it was 15k max per year of school, principal repayment deferred until 12 months after graduation when I was looking for a loan. Basically, you can pay as much of it off as you can afford within the first year after you finish school - until a year after you've graduated, it's a line of credit that you can spend or pay off as you need. You only pay interest on what you owe on a given monthly basis while you're in school. A year after you graduate, it becomes a loan, you can't withdraw from it anymore and you've got to start paying back principal. You probably won't get it without cosigners.

If you're doing your flight training without an association with a post-secondary institution, you might have more difficulty getting the cash. You'll almost certainly have to start paying it off right away, so your payments while you're doing your training would probably be larger.

As for paying a flight school up front, I'd listen to other's advice and avoid it. However, if you plan on training in Ontario, the new provincial legislation requires that any school providing CPL training is registered as a Private Career College (after September of this year), and as a result, are required to contribute to a fund that's established to make sure you're not screwed out of your money if the school goes belly up while you've got money on account. So basically, if the school is in Ontario and offers CPL training, you should be safe paying up front, but that's money you're going to have to pay interest on if you've got a loan or line of credit. That's reason enough to not pay up front, in my opinion. Paying as you go offers peice of mind and can save you money.

Krashman · Post by **Krashman** » Wed Jul 25, 2007 8:02 am

So basically, if the school is in Ontario and offers CPL training, you should be safe paying up front,

I thought this has been discussed? DONT PUT MONEY UP FRONT... no matter what B.S. they tell you.

Every school would like you to do it... they might be well intentioned or not but save yourself any headache...

good_idea · Post by **good_idea** » Wed Jul 25, 2007 11:18 am

KRASHMAN is right!!

Don't put all your money up front. Most school have a pay as you go program. You will of course have to have a balance on account but not like $10,000 or any thing like that

costermonger · Post by **costermonger** » Wed Jul 25, 2007 12:42 pm

Jesus tapdancing Christ. You people must scan these threads looking for word combinations you don't like. What did I say at the start of that paragraph? What did I say at the end of that paragraph? Maybe I should try not to use so many words.

Let me try and explain this again so you guys can understand.. IF you learn to fly at a school in Ontario that offers CPL training, IF you put money on account, and IF that school goes tits-up in the middle of the night, there's a big-ass bond the government's got to use to reimburse you. You're not simply shit out of luck, like everybody has been in the past - which is why people apparently look for any sort of comment about putting money on account and respond with "no don't do it you idiot!" before they bother to read the rest.

Now, why shouldn't you put money on account even if you've got legal recourse should the school go under? Because it costs you money to have your dough sitting in the flight schools account. If you're using a loan, you'll be paying interest on money you haven't used, and if you've got enough cash in your account to pay for training straight up - well, you should be earning interest on that money! Invest it, do whatever you want. Even your chequing account will earn more interest than it will on account.

I feel like I should probably type something out in capitals, just to make my point.

KNOW THE INS AND OUTS OF THE FINANCING BEFORE YOU DROP 40k ON FLIGHT TRAINING.

There, that's better.