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.
Van Nuys Airport · KVNY
Private Pilot Training For Westlake Village
A complete FAA private pilot certificate flown from our base at Van Nuys Airport, twenty-four miles east on the 101 from Westlake Village, with published package prices and no meter running behind them.
5.0★100+ reviews on Google
$10,900standard private pilot
$15,900comprehensive program
7 typesof aircraft on one ramp
Local
What The Certificate Is, And What It Demands
A private pilot certificate is not a course you drift through. The FAA sets a floor of forty hours in the air, twenty of them with an instructor and ten alone, plus three hours at night, cross-country navigation to defined distances, instrument reference training, a written knowledge exam and a practical test flown with a designated examiner. Our standard program is $10,900 and contains all of it. The comprehensive version at $15,900 buys a larger block of hours up front for people whose diaries genuinely will not hold three lessons a week.
Westlake Village produces a recognizable kind of student. Conejo Valley professionals who already commute long distances for work, business owners who count their own hours carefully, physicians on rotations, and executives who fly commercially often enough to have opinions about it. The first question on the phone is almost always about the total figure, and that is the right question. We sell complete packages, with the aircraft, the instructor, ground school and simulator time inside one published price, and would rather be judged on that than on an attractive-looking number that grows.
There is nowhere in the Conejo Valley itself to learn. What that means in practice is that everyone from here drives, and the only real decision is which direction. East over the county line to Van Nuys puts you at an inland field 800 feet up that clears early and stays open, with a tower running all day and enough traffic to make radio work automatic. West puts you nearer the ocean, where the spring marine layer routinely takes the first half of the day away from you.
The pace of the certificate matters more than most people expect. Two flights a week and you are looking at six to nine months; one flight a fortnight and the same certificate can take two years and considerably more money, because a share of every lesson goes on recovering skills that had faded. Students from this side of the hill often book two slots on one day to make the drive count.
Courses & Pricing
Every Course We Teach
★★★★★
5.0 Rating
100+ Google Reviews
Course prices are packages, not hourly rates - the aircraft, your instructor, ground school and simulator time are all in the figure. Van Nuys Airport, KVNY. Financing Available Through Stratus & In-House Plans.
Start Here
Discovery Flight
The First Hour At The Controls. Credited Toward Your Training If You Enroll Within 24 Hours Of Landing.
From$229
Book A Discovery Flight
01
Discovery Flight
The first hour at the controls; credits toward training if you enroll within 24 hours of landing.
From$229
02
Teen Flight Training Ages 10–15
Starting before it is legal to solo.
$4,200
03
Multi-Engine Rating
For existing pilots adding a twin.
$5,100
04
Solo Certificate
Enough training to take an aircraft around the pattern alone.
$5,500
05
Sport Pilot
A real certificate, fewer hours, narrower privileges.
$8,400
06
Private Pilot Most Enrolled
The one most people mean by “learn to fly.”
$10,900
07
Instrument Rating
Turns a fair-weather pilot into a useful one.
$11,700
08
Comprehensive Private Pilot
Private with flight time, ground instruction and materials bundled.
$15,900
09
Premium Private Pilot
The most flight time before your checkride - 80 logged hours.
$22,500
10
Airline Pilot Program
Zero experience to airline-hireable qualifications.
$89,000
All Prices In USD. 7900 Balboa Blvd, Suite 108A, Van Nuys, CA 91406 · Open 9 AM–9 PM, Seven Days. Free In-Person Tour Of The School
Book It Or Gift It
Fly It Yourself, Or Give The Flight To Someone Else
Every discovery flight below can be booked for yourself in the next few minutes, or bought as a gift certificate that is emailed within minutes and never expires. Same flight, same price, either way.
Most Given
Two Seats
The Nice One
Twin Engine
Discovery Flight For One
One person, one instructor, and no audience. Hands on the controls from the left seat, briefed before you go and debriefed after you land.
Hands-On Stick TimePre-Flight BriefingLoggable Flight Time
Flight Length
$229Book It Or Gift It
Same Price Either Way
Discovery Flight For Two
The same flight with a passenger in the back seat, briefed and on the intercom. Couples book it; so do parents who would rather watch than hear about it.
One Passenger SeatPiper Warrior Or ArcherHeadsets For Both
Flight Length
$299Book It Or Gift It
Same Price Either Way
Luxury Discovery Flight
The nicest airplane we put a first-time flyer in. Glass cockpit, air conditioning, leather seats, and a parachute built into the airframe rather than strapped to the person.
Turbocharged Cirrus SR22Air ConditioningWhole-Airframe Parachute
Flight Length
Bring A PassengerInstructor + 2 is our maximum+$100
$499Book It Or Gift It
Same Price Either Way
Multi-Engine Seminole
Two engines, and the airplane instrument-rated pilots move into when they start thinking about a career. Flown from the left seat with a multi-engine instructor.
Piper Seminole TwinMulti-Engine DepartureCareer-Track Instructor
Flight Length
$499Book It Or Gift It
Same Price Either Way
Gift It issues a real gift certificate, emailed within minutes, which never expires and credits in full toward training. Flights are limited to 180 lb per person, 370 lb combined. Questions: (818) 290-8249, 9 AM–9 PM, seven days.
Getting Here
Twenty-Four Miles East On The 101
Get on the 101 eastbound wherever suits you, from Westlake Boulevard, Lindero Canyon or Kanan. The freeway carries you past Las Virgenes and Calabasas, over the open hills, and into Woodland Hills. Come off at Balboa Boulevard and turn north. The last five miles run up through Encino and Lake Balboa with the Sepulveda Basin on your left, and the airport fence appears on the right shortly after Sherman Way. Suite 108A is in the 7900 block.
Timing is the whole story. Between mid-morning and mid-afternoon the drive is close to thirty minutes. During the weekday eastbound rush it can stretch to fifty minutes, because you are traveling the same direction as everyone else. The nine o'clock slot beats the traffic in both directions and gets you the smoothest air of the day, which is why so many students out here quietly claim it and keep it.
The alternative when the 101 is genuinely stopped is to work east on Agoura Road, follow it into Calabasas Road and then Ventura Boulevard, and rejoin at Balboa. It is slower on paper and steadier in practice. Once you arrive, parking is in our own lot, free, with no ticket machine or barrier between the car and the airplane. Arrive fifteen minutes early; the pre-flight briefing counts as part of the lesson.
Why Van Nuys
Why Conejo Valley Students Drive East
1
The Weather Is On Your Side Inland
Van Nuys sits at 802 feet, well back from the ocean, and burns off early. Fields nearer the coast can lose entire mornings for weeks in late spring. Across a nine-month course that is the single largest factor in whether you finish on schedule, and it is the reason a lot of west-county students make the drive.
2
Traffic That Teaches You
Two parallel runways, a tower running all day and SoCal Approach directly overhead. You talk to a controller on lesson one and you are slotting in behind business jets long before the checkride. Pilots who learn somewhere quiet pick this up eventually, usually under pressure and in the wrong place.
3
Terrain Within Four Minutes
Depart west and the Santa Monica Mountains rise underneath you almost immediately. Ridge turbulence, canyon wind and choosing an altitude before you need one all become routine. It is exactly the flying you would be doing later on a run up to Santa Ynez or across to Big Bear with your family aboard.
4
Everything Under One Roof
Instrument at $11,700, multi-engine at $5,100, the full airline program at $89,000, all on the same ramp with the same instructors. Financing runs through Stratus Financial or an in-house plan, and the consultation before you commit costs nothing and involves no flying at all.
The Fleet
The Aircraft, From First Hour To Twin
Training starts in the Cessna 162 Skycatcher, the Piper Warrior or the Diamond DA20, and you can move between them without paying anything extra for the privilege, because the aircraft is inside your package. All three have modern radios and GPS so nothing you learn about navigation is wasted later. They were chosen for the way they behave rather than the badge on the tail: predictable, forgiving, and quick to tell you when you have done something wrong before it becomes anything more than a lesson.
The rest of the fleet is why people stay. The Piper Arrow II has retractable gear and a constant-speed propeller, which is where complex time comes from. The Cirrus SR22 Turbo offers a full glass panel, turbocharging, air conditioning and a parachute for the entire airframe, and it is the aircraft most owner-pilots out here end up flying; the Luxury Cirrus discovery flight from $499 is the quick way to see why. The Piper Seminole carries every multi-engine rating we teach, a $5,100 add-on. The Redbird MCX full-motion simulator is $189 for a one-hour session and is built into the private pilot packages.
From The Air
The Run Back West Toward The Conejo Valley
Four things you would pick out on a short flight home from Van Nuys.
🏙️
The Warner Center Towers
A tight cluster of high-rise offices standing alone above two-story Woodland Hills, visible from twenty miles out. It is the first thing that tells you the west end of the Valley has begun.
🌾
Ahmanson Ranch
Thousands of acres of open grassland and oak between Calabasas and Simi that were fought over for years and never built on. From the air it is a startling empty green gap between two suburbs.
🎬
Century Lake In Malibu Creek
A small dark lake in a fold of the Santa Monica Mountains with the old film-set clearing on the ridge beyond it. The gorge below the dam is one of the more dramatic pieces of terrain this close to a runway.
🪨
Mountclef Ridge
The pale rock spine standing over Wildwood and the western edge of Thousand Oaks, marking where the Conejo Valley ends. Lining up on it is how most local students find their own street from the air.
FAQ
Common Questions
About twenty-four miles east on the 101 to the Balboa Boulevard exit, then five miles north to 7900 Balboa. Thirty minutes between the peaks, up to fifty minutes in the weekday eastbound rush. Most students from the Conejo Valley take the nine o'clock slot, which avoids the worst of it in both directions and gives you the calmest air of the day.
Camarillo is another school's field, not ours; we fly only from Van Nuys Airport. It looks closer on a map, but it sits low and near the coast, and the marine layer over the Oxnard plain cancels a great many early lessons in late spring and early summer. Van Nuys is inland and 800 feet up, with two runways, a full-time tower, seven aircraft types and a full-motion simulator. For a whole certificate, the reliability is worth the extra miles.
The certificate is identical and so is the standard you fly to. The standard program at $10,900 assumes a fairly regular schedule. The comprehensive at $15,900 includes a substantially larger allocation of flight and simulator hours up front, which suits people whose weeks are unpredictable. The premium accelerated version is $22,500 for those who want to finish quickly.
Yes, if you can fly four or five times a week. That is what the premium program at $22,500 exists for, with priority scheduling and a large block of hours. Realistically it needs a genuinely clear diary, because the limiting factor is almost never the aircraft or the instructor. It is whether you can be here on a Wednesday morning in July.
No. You can fly the first lessons without one, but you will need a third-class medical certificate from an FAA-designated examiner before flying solo, so it is sensible to sort it out early. Raise anything you are unsure about at the free consultation and we will point you toward the right examiner.
Carry passengers, fly at night, and travel anywhere in the country in aircraft up to twelve thousand five hundred pounds. From here that means Santa Ynez for lunch, Monterey in a morning, Mammoth without the 395. Afterwards you keep booking from our ramp at Van Nuys, from the Cessna 162 and Piper Warrior up to the Cirrus SR22 Turbo, once an instructor has checked you out in the type.
The teen flight training package is $4,200. Lessons can start at any age, first solo is legal at sixteen and the private certificate at seventeen. It fits around a school timetable using weekday evenings and weekend mornings, and it is a structured course rather than an experience day. A discovery flight for two at $299 is the usual way families test the idea first.
Call (818) 290-8249. Book a $229 discovery flight, or come in for the free in-person consultation at 7900 Balboa Boulevard, Suite 108A. We are open nine to nine, seven days a week. If you already hold a certificate or have logged time elsewhere, bring the logbook and we will tell you exactly what remains rather than starting from scratch.
Talk To Us
Book A First Flight From Westlake Village
Take the 101 east one morning, park free outside the door, and fly back over Ahmanson Ranch and the Conejo hills with the controls in your own hands. Call (818) 290-8249 to pick a slot.
Discovery Flight For One
$229
60 minutes, hands on the controls, fully loggable
Book A Discovery Flight
Or Call (818) 290-8249
No Cost, No Obligation
Get The Full Training Plan And Price Sheet
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.
- Every package price, itemised
- Financing from $2,500 down
- A timeline based on your schedule
Loved On Google
Over 100 Reviews. 5.0 Stars.
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
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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
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.
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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
See Discovery Flight Details — $229
Reviews shown verbatim, exactly as each reviewer published them.
Aviation News
Latest From The Field
Notes from the flight line at Van Nuys — weather, regulation changes, checkride questions and the cost of training, written up as they come.
Van Nuys Airport · KVNY
(818) 290-8249
7900 Balboa Blvd. Suite 108A
Van Nuys, CA 91406 Get directions →
Open the full contact page
Open 7 days · 9:00 AM – 9:00 PM
Los Angeles Flight School7900 Balboa Blvd. Suite 108A
Van Nuys, CA 91406 Get directions →
★★★★★
5.0 · 100+ Google reviews