What is the quality of life 5-10 years into regional flying? I know most people want to get into a major airline, but is it possible to attain semi regular schedules within the regionals with 60,000 - 80k in pay. I am thinking about going back to flying as a career. I'm 31 with a CPL need to redo my CFI, but have not flown in several years. My dream would be to be making 70k by my early 40's. Maybe 85k by 50's and have a schedule which affords me a decent amount of nights spent at home. Is that realistic in todays regional world?

 

What's realistic today probably won't be in 10 years.

 

Truthfully, there is absolutely no way to answer this. If NOTHING changed, then yes, that's reasonable. But something will change.

As we speak certain regionals are collapsing or have just went under. Often you have no way of predicting which will do this. You could just as easily find yourself as a line holding captain making $75k as you could find yourself furloughed with zero PIC starting at your third regional. Food for thought.

Good luck. That's 50% of it.

 

If you got hired ten years ago, then that's about where you would be today (assuming you avoided mesa, COMAIR, and a few other land-mines).

Predicting the regional business going forward is harder because of the likely elimination of most 50 seat RJ's and the ongoing scope battle at major airlines.

But the retirement numbers don't lie...majors will have to either hire a lot of pilots over the next 10-15 years, or downsize dramatically. This could be good for career progression but potentially bad if you want to be a regional lifer. If the majors get desperate enough you could end up with a bunch of regional lifer captains who are unemployed because they don't have anyone in the right seat of their RJ!

I would NOT plan on a regional career...far too many variables, plus one big gotcha that is not a variable at all: The regional system exists to keep labor costs low. It does this by forcibly removing jobs from senior ie more expensive) labor groups and transferring them to younger, more junior, cheaper labor groups. If you spend years at a regional working towards a certain top-end pay scale, you are the victim of fraud...few pilots will ever see the top of any regional's 18-year scale. If you plan to get your TPIC and then get out, well you might have some success at that.

 

At this point the smartest thing to do seems to be moving to a legacy as quickly as possible. There is going to be years of movement and the stagnation of the past 12 years is quickly coming to an end.

Of course 12 years from now things will look completely different...

 

Another thing to remember in 10 years 70k will be worth much less than it is today and 20 years from now 85k will seem like minimum wage. Regional salaries really have slow increases.

 

I dont think you are being too unreasonable, however... I have been at the regionals for 5 years and make just over $60K as a captain. Now my company is going through some hard times and I will be downgraded to First Officer and subsequently furloughed within the next 2 years. Nothing is certain in the airlines except uncertainty.

My two cents,

 

Forget the regionals. Find a quality 135 carrier with a mixed fleet and enjoy your life. I used to fly King Airs and was home most every night making the kind of money your interested in. It won't take 10 years either...

 

I would consider a QUALITY 135 operation to be better for QOL and possibly pay while building time.

But major airlines like glass turbojet time, and that's easier and (usually) quicker to come by at 121 regionals. They also like 121 experience, because it is different than most 135/91 ops. I show up for work, and 30 minutes later I'm taxing out with 30 pax after having preflighted and speed-read 19 pages of dispatch release info. Then I repeat that 3-7 more times. Part 135/91 often show up 3 hours early, personally service the airplane, do all their own flight planning, and fly one one leg with three pax. Thay have to adapt to the pace in 121, I would have to re-learn how to do all the flight-planning, and hands-on pax service. I don't have time to deal with pax beyond a quick question. If they get demanding or pushy, I let the gate agent sort them out...while they're waiting for the next flight because I just pushed without them.

Balance your near-term needs vs. long term career progression. There's no right answer that suits everybody.

 

Kind of disagree here, although I noticed you said "most 135/91" operations. I know of some 135s that are extremely fast paced, running like 121 operations, with well structured training departments and everything else. Not the "rule", more the exception, but hopefully that would be considered.