EMIRATE FO's & $$
 

I am giving Emirates some serious thought and the #1 reason would be for $$, but not the only. the wife is excited about it and we have a 7yr/old and just recently i read a thread about how money can be tight on an FO salary, just trying to get a better understanding of how much things cost. Being a USA regional FO,,8000USD+ a month sounds great, so how could someone post that money could be tight? What am i missing ? just how much do things cost in Dubai?

No doubts that I agree the poster right above me. It's how much one spends....

But Dubai is a city where one can be having a good decent life in $4,000 & on the other side $14,000 or even $20,000 is also less.....

You can eat in $5-$15 dollars or $150 dolars......

I have been to Dubai many times & it is a very secure & stable place to live, Virtually no crime. Almost everyone is a immigrant, so no one feels out of place & no discrimination.
Besides missing family, perhaps one of the few things one will miss is having a few beers in a Football game or barbecue with friends on a lake side & having few drinks.....
If you go with an open mind & you like new places, you will be able to adjust OK.

If you are a regional FO & you qualify with the 20 tonnes requirement, apply ASAP & if you to get Emirates, RUN, don't walk....... Coz the day you get a job with a major in USA, you can always come back...... if you want to.

Except for FedEx

Why, FEDEX won't hire someone who has flown in Emirates??

Pls elaborate...

The requirement to have lived in the US in the last 5 years:

OK that makes sense, I was not aware of that requirement.......

One big expense for pilots with children is school fees and transportation to and from school. The American School of Dubai costs over 70,000/year/child. Emirates' reimbursement falls short by over 30,000 on tuition alone for grades 1-5. It gets slightly better for grades 6-12, but still well short. So with one kid you'll be out of pocket close to $10,000/year just for tuition. Add in after school activities, transportion, etc and it is a lot of money. With two kids, which many F.O.s have, that expense doubles. So when those guys say that money can be tight, it is a factual statement.

The best thing that you can have is a wife who works at one of the American schools. There are three of them. That helps reduce the cost of tuition significantly. A number of pilot's wives work as teachers.



Typhoonpilot

Are FO's going right to the 380?

I can't argue with anything that's been posted above, so I'll just reiterate- it's not how much you earn, it's how much you save/spend.

I used an online compound interest calculator and ran two sets of numbers over ten years at 5% interest:

1) if you invest $48,000/year at 5% interest, you will have roughly $700,000 after ten years.

2) if you invest $36,000/year at 5% interest, you will have roughly $525,000 after ten years.

These numbers are $4,000 and $3,000/month respectively.

If you're an FO with two children in school, it is realistic to achieve either of those savings targets. It just depends on how you choose to live.