SAFETY FIRST
Very safety and detail oriented. Pre-flight briefing explained everything there was. To my knowledge, this flight school is exceptional in their ability.

A certified flight instructor is a professional pilot authorised by the FAA to teach flying and to sign the endorsements a student legally needs. It is also the job most American professional pilots do on the way to 1,500 hours. This page covers the certificate, the privileges, the paperwork, and the parts of the career nobody puts in a brochure.
A certified flight instructor holds a flight instructor certificate issued under 14 CFR Part 61, Subpart H. The certificate is separate from a pilot certificate and carries its own ratings — airplane single-engine, airplane multi-engine, instrument, glider, rotorcraft and so on.
Two things make the certificate matter, and only one of them is teaching. The first is that under 14 CFR 61.193 a flight instructor may give the flight training required for a certificate or rating, and may give the ground and flight training required for a flight review under 14 CFR 61.56. The second is the signature. A student pilot cannot fly solo without a flight instructor’s endorsement under 14 CFR 61.87. A candidate cannot take a practical test without an instructor’s recommendation. A pilot cannot exercise the privileges of a high-performance or complex aeroplane without the endorsements in 14 CFR 61.31. The whole US pilot certification system runs on those signatures.
That is why the certificate carries real legal weight. Under 14 CFR 61.189 an instructor must sign the logbook of every person they train and must keep a record of every endorsement given for three years. Under 14 CFR 61.195 an instructor may not give more than eight hours of flight training in any period of 24 consecutive hours. These are not administrative details. They are the reason the job is a profession rather than a favour.

These are the eligibility requirements for an initial flight instructor certificate. Every one of them is in the regulation, and none of them is optional.
14 CFR 61.183(a). That is the floor, and it is lower than most people assume. The practical constraint is not age. It is the commercial certificate that has to come first.
14 CFR 61.183(b), the same language requirement that applies to every FAA pilot certificate.
14 CFR 61.183(c) requires a commercial pilot certificate or an ATP certificate with an aircraft category and class rating appropriate to the instructor rating sought. For an airplane instructor rating you also need an instrument rating in the airplane. The commercial certificate itself needs 250 hours under 14 CFR 61.129, so that is the real gate.
14 CFR 61.183(e). Paragraph (d) is the separate logbook endorsement on the fundamentals of instructing that an authorised instructor gives you before you sit it. The FOI test covers the learning process, elements of effective teaching, student evaluation and testing, course development, lesson planning and classroom instruction techniques. It is a test about teaching, not about flying, and it catches people out precisely because of that.
14 CFR 61.183(f). A separate written on the aeronautical knowledge areas for the instructor rating, covering the areas of operation you would be teaching.
14 CFR 61.183(j) requires at least 15 hours as pilot in command in the aircraft category and class appropriate to the rating sought. Paragraph (h) is the practical test itself, which comes later.
For an airplane single-engine instructor rating, 14 CFR 61.183(i) requires a logbook endorsement from an authorised instructor certifying satisfactory instructional proficiency in stall awareness, spin entry, spins and spin recovery. This is the requirement that puts most CFI candidates into a spin course, and it is a good thing.
The training required by 14 CFR 61.187 in the areas of operation for the rating, then the practical test, which is conducted from the right seat and includes teaching the examiner. The initial CFI practical test has a reputation as one of the harder rides in general aviation, and the reputation is earned.
They are one certificate with added ratings, not three separate certificates, and the initial one is by far the hardest.
| Rating | What it lets you teach | The practical reality |
|---|---|---|
| CFI — flight instructor, airplane single-engine | The initial certificate. Teach primary students up to private, commercial and the single-engine ratings. | The hardest one to get, because it is the initial ride and includes the fundamentals of instructing test. |
| CFII — instrument instructor rating | Teach instrument students and give instrument proficiency checks. | An added rating on an existing instructor certificate. No FOI test again. This is where a lot of instructing income lives. |
| MEI — multi-engine instructor rating | Teach in multi-engine aircraft, including the multi-engine add-on. | Added rating. Requires multi-engine time and is usually the last of the three, partly because twin time is expensive. |
A flight instructor certificate issued on or after 1 December 2024 carries no expiration date at all — 14 CFR 61.19(d). What lapses is the privilege, not the certificate. Under 14 CFR 61.197 you may exercise flight instructor privileges only if, within the preceding 24 calendar months, you have met one of that section’s recent-experience requirements: an approved flight instructor refresher course, a practical test for a rating already held or an additional one, the required number of successful applicant endorsements, or qualifying service as a check pilot or instructor under Part 121 or Part 135.
Very little of it is the part people picture, which is sitting in a small aeroplane on a nice morning.
Twenty to forty minutes at a table before every lesson: what the lesson is, what the completion standards are, what the weather is doing, what the aircraft will feel like. A lesson that starts at the aircraft is a lesson that gets half-learned.
You fly from the right seat, which reverses every sight picture you learned. You talk almost continuously. And you are simultaneously watching for traffic, monitoring the radio, and deciding how close to let an approach get to unsalvageable before you say anything, because the learning happens in the last few seconds before you intervene.
The part students remember. Twenty minutes afterwards on what happened, why, and what the next lesson fixes. Our own Google reviews mention the debrief more than they mention the flying.
14 CFR 61.189 requires the instructor to sign the logbook of each person trained and to keep a record of every endorsement issued for three years. An endorsement is a legal statement that a named person is ready to do a specific thing. Instructors take them seriously because the FAA does.
Explaining lift to somebody who has never thought about it is where most new instructors discover the gap between knowing something and being able to teach it. This is what the fundamentals of instructing material is for, and it is why the FOI test exists.
The instructor is legally pilot in command on training flights, which makes every go or no-go call theirs. Cancelling a lesson a student drove an hour for is part of the job and it does not get more comfortable with practice.
Here is the structural fact that explains the whole American pilot pipeline. A commercial certificate takes 250 hours under 14 CFR 61.129. An unrestricted airline transport pilot certificate takes 1,500 hours under 14 CFR 61.159. Somebody has to pay for the 1,250 hours in between, and almost nobody can pay for them out of pocket. Instructing is the job where the flying pays you instead of the other way around. That is why it exists at the scale it does.
The pay is modest. We are not going to put a number on this page, because instructor pay varies by region, by school, by rating and by how the school structures it, and a figure we cannot source is worse than no figure. What is fair to say is that new instructors do not earn what the training cost, that the income is usually tied to hours actually flown rather than hours available, and that most people instructing are doing it because of where it leads as much as what it pays right now.
And the hours do not come evenly. In a good month at a busy field an instructor flies a lot. In a bad weather month, or a month when three students are travelling and one has a medical to renew, the schedule empties out and there is nothing to be done about it. Van Nuys is better than most for this — the field averages 355 flyable days a year against a 3,000-foot ceiling and five statute miles — but no instructor anywhere has a flat income curve.
The compensating side is genuine and it is not a consolation prize. You fly most days. You get very good at the fundamentals, because teaching something is the only way to find out you did not understand it. You accumulate hours in an environment where somebody is watching your standards. And a lot of people who intended to instruct for eighteen months on the way to something else discover they would rather keep doing this.

If a school claims any of the three, ask them to put it in writing and watch what happens.
A flight instructor certificate is a qualification, not an offer of employment. Hiring depends on the school, the season, the local student demand and you. Any claim to the contrary is a claim about a labour market nobody controls.
Instructor pay varies too much by region and structure to publish a single number responsibly. If you want the real answer for Los Angeles, ask instructors in Los Angeles, plural, and ask them how many hours a month they actually fly rather than what the hourly figure is.
The gap between a commercial certificate at 250 hours and an ATP at 1,500 under 14 CFR 61.159 is 1,250 hours of flying. How long that takes depends on student demand, weather and aircraft availability. Anybody quoting you a fixed number of months is quoting you an average and presenting it as a promise.
Nobody starts here. The instructor certificate sits on top of a stack, and the stack is the expensive part.
In order: a private pilot certificate under 14 CFR 61.109, an instrument rating under 14 CFR 61.65, a commercial pilot certificate under 14 CFR 61.129 at 250 hours, and then the flight instructor certificate under 14 CFR 61.183. The instrument rating is not optional for an airplane instructor rating — 61.183(c) requires it — and it is also the rating that most changes how you fly.
At Van Nuys those steps are $10,900 for the Standard private pilot programme or $15,900 for the Comprehensive, then $11,700 for the Instrument Rating, then the commercial hours. The multi-engine add-on is $5,100 and is the prerequisite for an MEI later. The complete zero-to-airline path is $89,000, and financing is available from $2,500 down with terms up to 15 years.
If you are at the start of that stack rather than the end of it, the useful next step is not reading more about instructing. It is one hour in an aeroplane. A $229 discovery flight is a real lesson, you fly it, and it is logged as dual instruction that counts towards the 40 hours in 14 CFR 61.109.
If you are already commercial and instrument rated and looking at the CFI itself, the local page is the one you want: become a certified flight instructor in Los Angeles covers the training, the checkride and how it runs at Van Nuys.
Instructors here teach in aircraft the school owns and maintains, which matters more for an instructor than for anyone else: you are in them every day.






Single-engine training on the Standard and Comprehensive programmes is flown in the Cessna, Piper and Diamond aircraft. The Premium programme is flown in the Cirrus SR22 Turbo. The Piper Seminole is the twin for the $5,100 multi-engine add-on.
FAA-approved, full-motion, fully enclosed, and never cancelled for weather.
A Redbird MCX session is $189. Instrument scan, partial panel, holds and approaches all repeat here for a fraction of what they cost in the aeroplane, and simulator hours are built into every private pilot programme — 2 hours on Standard and Premium, 5 hours on Comprehensive.
Every instructor here holds a commercial or airline transport pilot certificate, a flight instructor certificate under 14 CFR 61.183, and a current medical. On every training flight the instructor is legally pilot in command, which is not a formality: it makes every weather call, every go-around and every decision to stop the lesson theirs.
They are here as a career rather than as a waiting room, and the difference shows up in the debrief. If you are a student, that is what you are buying. If you are a pilot thinking about instructing, it is worth knowing that the schools where instructors stay are the schools where students finish.

Seventy reviews on Google, and the most repeated subject in them is the instructor rather than the aeroplane.
The line that comes up most in our Google reviews is not the aircraft and not the price. It is the twenty minutes at the table afterwards, where the instructor explains what just happened and what to fix.
Eleven instructors and a fleet we own means the aeroplane is on the ramp and somebody is there to fly it. Reviewers mention scheduling more often than they mention anything else.
You enrol at $10,900 or $15,900 and you finish at $10,900 or $15,900. Nobody writes a five-star review about a surprise invoice.
All 70 reviews are on Google. We do not aggregate ratings from anywhere else, and we do not publish a figure we cannot point at.
A flight instructor certificate sits on top of a private certificate, an instrument rating and a commercial certificate. These are the published prices for the steps we sell as packages.
Sit down with an instructor at Van Nuys, bring the questions you think sound stupid, and book nothing. This is where the numbers get worked out against your actual schedule and your actual budget.
A real lesson. You fly the aircraft, your instructor is legally pilot in command, and the hour is logged as dual instruction. The full price is credited against any programme if you enrol within 24 hours.
Required before an airplane flight instructor rating under 14 CFR 61.183(c), and the rating that most changes how precisely you fly. Part 61 route needs 50 hours of cross-country pilot-in-command time under 14 CFR 61.65.
The 40-hour package that meets the 14 CFR 61.109 minimum. The cheapest honest way to a private pilot certificate here, and the one to pick if you can fly two or three times a week.
Sixty logged hours instead of forty, because the national average sits between 60 and 75. This is the package that most often ends at the price it started at.
Forty logged hours flown in the Cirrus SR22 Turbo, glass cockpit throughout, with the CAPS whole-airframe parachute. More aeroplane than a first certificate needs, and some people want it anyway.
Also published: Sport Pilot $8,400 · Instrument Rating $11,700 · Multi-Engine add-on $5,100 · Solo Certificate $5,500 · Teens aged 10 to 15 $4,200 · zero-to-airline $89,000 · Redbird session $189. Financing starts at $2,500 down through Stratus Financial or our in-house plans, with terms up to 15 years. Enrolled students fly single-engine aircraft at $179 an hour wet inside their package. Aircraft are available to qualified pilots who have checked out with us — call for availability.
Bring the logbook. Thirty minutes, free, at Van Nuys or on the phone, and we will tell you honestly what is between you and a flight instructor certificate — or between you and a first solo, if that is the real starting point.
Prefer to write it down first? Use the contact form, or read what a discovery flight actually involves before you decide anything.
A certified flight instructor is a pilot holding an FAA flight instructor certificate issued under 14 CFR Part 61, Subpart H. Under 14 CFR 61.193 a CFI may give the flight training required for a certificate or rating and the training for a flight review under 14 CFR 61.56, and may issue the logbook endorsements a student needs — including the solo endorsement under 14 CFR 61.87.
14 CFR 61.183 requires you to be at least 18, to read, speak, write and understand English, and to hold a commercial or airline transport pilot certificate with an appropriate category and class rating plus an instrument rating for an airplane instructor rating. You must pass the fundamentals of instructing knowledge test and the rating knowledge test, log 15 hours as pilot in command in that category and class, hold the spin training endorsement under 61.183(i), and pass the practical test.
Yes. 14 CFR 61.183(c) requires a commercial pilot certificate or an airline transport pilot certificate with an aircraft category and class rating appropriate to the flight instructor rating sought. A commercial certificate itself requires 250 hours of total time under 14 CFR 61.129, so that is the real gate rather than the age minimum of 18.
They are one certificate with different ratings. The initial CFI covers airplane single-engine instruction. The CFII adds instrument instruction. The MEI adds multi-engine instruction. Only the initial certificate requires the fundamentals of instructing knowledge test, which is why it is the hardest of the three to earn.
Brief the lesson, fly it from the right seat while talking almost continuously, debrief it, and sign the records. Under 14 CFR 61.189 an instructor must sign the logbook of every person trained and keep a record of each endorsement for three years, and under 14 CFR 61.195 may not give more than eight hours of flight training in any 24 consecutive hours.
It is how most American professional pilots build the hours between a commercial certificate at 250 hours and the 1,500 an unrestricted ATP requires under 14 CFR 61.159. The pay is modest and the hours are uneven — a bad-weather month or three travelling students empties a schedule fast. In exchange you fly most days and you get genuinely good at the fundamentals, because teaching something is how you find out you did not fully understand it.
We will not publish a figure we cannot source. Instructor pay varies by region, school, ratings held and how the school structures it, and the more useful question is how many hours a month an instructor actually flies rather than the hourly figure. Ask several instructors in the area you want to work, and ask about monthly hours.
No. Under 14 CFR 61.19(d) a flight instructor certificate issued on or after 1 December 2024 is issued without an expiration date; only certificates issued before that date expired, 24 calendar months from the month of issue, renewal or reinstatement. The 24-month clock now runs on the privileges instead. Under 14 CFR 61.197 you may exercise flight instructor privileges only if, within the preceding 24 calendar months, you have satisfied one of its recent-experience requirements — an approved flight instructor refresher course, a practical test, the required number of successful applicant endorsements, or qualifying service as a check pilot or instructor under Part 121 or Part 135.
For an airplane flight instructor rating, yes. 14 CFR 61.183(c) requires an instrument rating in the airplane in addition to the commercial or airline transport pilot certificate. The instrument rating also has to come before the CFII, which is the rating most instructors add first.
There is no honest fixed answer. The gap between a commercial certificate at 250 hours under 14 CFR 61.129 and an unrestricted ATP at 1,500 hours under 14 CFR 61.159 is 1,250 hours, and how quickly it fills depends on student demand, aircraft availability and weather. A field like Van Nuys with 355 flyable days a year helps; nothing makes it predictable.
The three private pilot packages, what each one includes, the financing options and a realistic timeline built around how often you can actually fly. Sent to you in one email. Nobody will pressure you.
Loved On Google
Every review below is real and shown verbatim, in the reviewer’s own words — written by the people who learned to fly here, not by us.
SAFETY FIRST
Very safety and detail oriented. Pre-flight briefing explained everything there was. To my knowledge, this flight school is exceptional in their ability.
INSTRUMENT RATING
I'm currently working on my instrument rating at essence, and it has been Fantastic so far, my instructor is Alex and he is very knowledgeable and patient...
DISCOVERY FLIGHT
I recently had the chance to take my first-ever discovery flight, and it was nothing short of amazing! From the moment I stepped into the cockpit, the...
KIDS FIRST FLIGHT
Had a great experience with this company. My son has been very into airplanes and his flight simulator on the computer so for his 11th birthday treated...
SUNSET CIRRUS
It was a great flight! I did a sunset flight and Alex let us fly an awesome. Website was easy to book, and the plane itself was really fun to fly...
HANDS-ON FLIGHT
One of the best flight experiences I've ever done! If you're looking for a fun flight, beautiful views, and even taking control of the plane, Essence...
FLYING LESSON
We had a great flying lesson with Ralph and came away with a much better understanding of both the aircraft and the principles of flight. Ralph is a...
SKY PROPOSAL
Unforgettable private flight with Essence—smooth journey and a magical moment as I proposed to my girl in the skies! Highly recommend!
KIDS LUXURY FLIGHT
I got 2 luxury discovery flights for my kids. I wanted them to have the experience of flying. Our instructor Alex was amazing he made sure they feel...
DISCOVERY FLIGHT
This was my first flight at Essence and it will be one I will never forget for several reasons. Joseph was an awesome instructor, demonstrating...
HONEYMOON SURPRISE
Last minute booking to surprise my wife on our honeymoon. She had no experience with flying and was scared of flying, but Alex was very easygoing and knew...
FULL-MOTION SIM
Amazing flight school in van nuys airport. I have been a student here for the past few months and i could not be happier. I started doing a lot of...
DISCOVERY FOR TWO
I booked a Discovery Flight for Two for my girlfriend's birthday and it was the perfect gift for her. She couldn't have been more excited to get to...
SIMULATORS
Very professional and great airplanes. I love the flight simulators. The pricing is very fair compared to any other flight school
TEEN FIRST LESSON
We gifted our teenage son his first flying lesson. He was so excited! Alex greeted us and gave a reassuring brief that made us all feel comfortable and at...
GIFT FLIGHT
Great experience with first ever discovery flight! Would highly recommend! Got it as a gift for my dad and he had a great time flying!
FIRST-TIME FLYER
Flying is my husband's hobby and I was incredibly anxious and apprehensive about the discovery flight. However, I felt completely safe and at ease once we...
SAFETY FIRST
Very safety and detail oriented. Pre-flight briefing explained everything there was. To my knowledge, this flight school is exceptional in their ability.
INSTRUMENT RATING
I'm currently working on my instrument rating at essence, and it has been Fantastic so far, my instructor is Alex and he is very knowledgeable and patient...
DISCOVERY FLIGHT
I recently had the chance to take my first-ever discovery flight, and it was nothing short of amazing! From the moment I stepped into the cockpit, the...
KIDS FIRST FLIGHT
Had a great experience with this company. My son has been very into airplanes and his flight simulator on the computer so for his 11th birthday treated...
SUNSET CIRRUS
It was a great flight! I did a sunset flight and Alex let us fly an awesome. Website was easy to book, and the plane itself was really fun to fly...
HANDS-ON FLIGHT
One of the best flight experiences I've ever done! If you're looking for a fun flight, beautiful views, and even taking control of the plane, Essence...
FLYING LESSON
We had a great flying lesson with Ralph and came away with a much better understanding of both the aircraft and the principles of flight. Ralph is a...
SKY PROPOSAL
Unforgettable private flight with Essence—smooth journey and a magical moment as I proposed to my girl in the skies! Highly recommend!
KIDS LUXURY FLIGHT
I got 2 luxury discovery flights for my kids. I wanted them to have the experience of flying. Our instructor Alex was amazing he made sure they feel...
DISCOVERY FLIGHT
This was my first flight at Essence and it will be one I will never forget for several reasons. Joseph was an awesome instructor, demonstrating...
HONEYMOON SURPRISE
Last minute booking to surprise my wife on our honeymoon. She had no experience with flying and was scared of flying, but Alex was very easygoing and knew...
FULL-MOTION SIM
Amazing flight school in van nuys airport. I have been a student here for the past few months and i could not be happier. I started doing a lot of...
DISCOVERY FOR TWO
I booked a Discovery Flight for Two for my girlfriend's birthday and it was the perfect gift for her. She couldn't have been more excited to get to...
SIMULATORS
Very professional and great airplanes. I love the flight simulators. The pricing is very fair compared to any other flight school
TEEN FIRST LESSON
We gifted our teenage son his first flying lesson. He was so excited! Alex greeted us and gave a reassuring brief that made us all feel comfortable and at...
GIFT FLIGHT
Great experience with first ever discovery flight! Would highly recommend! Got it as a gift for my dad and he had a great time flying!
FIRST-TIME FLYER
Flying is my husband's hobby and I was incredibly anxious and apprehensive about the discovery flight. However, I felt completely safe and at ease once we...
Reviews shown verbatim, exactly as each reviewer published them.