diff --git a/NEWS.md b/NEWS.md
index 561b0c3..1f7849b 100644
--- a/NEWS.md
+++ b/NEWS.md
@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@
 
 * Remove "internal" installation (#16).
 * In the documentation, remove claims that `instantiate` is a good fit for centralized multi-user R environments (c.f. https://github.com/stan-dev/cmdstan/issues/1175).
+* Check subdirectories of the fixed CmdStan installation path.
 
 # instantiate 0.1.0
 
diff --git a/R/stan_cmdstan_path.R b/R/stan_cmdstan_path.R
index 7136974..f1e95c2 100644
--- a/R/stan_cmdstan_path.R
+++ b/R/stan_cmdstan_path.R
@@ -35,9 +35,14 @@ stan_cmdstan_path <- function(
     cmdstan_install
   )
   stan_assert_install(install)
-  if_any(
+  path <- if_any(
     identical(install, "fixed"),
     .Call(c_cmdstan_path_fixed, PACKAGE = "instantiate"),
     cmdstanr_path()
   )
+  if_any(
+    cmdstan_valid(path),
+    path,
+    cmdstanr("cmdstan_default_path")(dir = path)
+  ) %|||% NULL
 }