Find the Right Flight Instructor for Your New Airplane

Here are some tips to vetting CFIs, understanding insurance, and securing safe training.

Meg Godlewski

Tuesday, May 12, 2026 at 08:00 AM ET

Verified

Edited By:

Travis Tingle

Flight instructor and student inside small Piper aircraft [Credit: FLYING Archive]

Key Takeaways:

When searching for a flight instructor for a newly purchased aircraft, consider aircraft-specific type clubs, professional CFI organizations like NAFI and SAFE, and local flight schools, noting that the current market may offer more experienced instructors.
Crucial considerations include verifying the instructor meets your insurance company's specific experience and recency requirements, ensuring fair compensation for their expertise, and insisting on thorough ground instruction.
Students should commit to the learning process, including ground sessions, and adhere to aviation rules, as instructors have limited leverage with aircraft owners who disregard regulations.

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Congratulations! You just bought an airplane—or a share of one—and now you need to find a flight instructor who can teach you how to fly it.

Luckily for you, pilot hiring at the airlines appears to have slowed down a bit, which means commercial pilots who became flight instructors to build their hours for jobs at airlines are staying flight instructors for a bit longer than they were even a year ago. This means they have more time to develop as teachers.