Hiring a private instructor offers the greatest amount of flexibility. All of your lessons will be one on one with the instructor, including any instruction that needs to be done on the ground. The instructor is your employee, and you therefore have control over the pace. Unless the instructor has own his own aircraft to use for instruction, you will generally have to rent a plane from a commercial rental facility at the airport from which you will flying. Private instructors are commonly used by students who primarily intend to fly as a hobby.
Private Instructors are also a good option for those who plan to combine their lessons with business travel. This is a slower and more expensive option. However, people who do do a lot of business travel within a localized region, and who also have very little free time, find that combining some of their lessons with business trips is a practical way to get in some training hours that otherwise would have to be postponed. The student and instructor will fly together on the trip, and the instructor will teach along the way. To learn more about this type of training, read the following article about television celebrity Alton Brown in AutoPILOT magazine.