You should be proud of yourself and your son for coming to a workable and affordable option. I wish the both of you much success.
I think we sometimes get blinded by what we want for our children even when we know what the needs are.
The article in the Atlantic http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/05/my-secret-shame/476415/ by Neil Gabbler, who says he was pretty good at living frugally except when it came to his children is a good example of the slippery slope to financial instability resulting from trying to give your children everything they want.
It sounds like a good plan. Possibly, your son could get a job as well as attending community college, to save up some $$ for the transfer time when you will have two in school.
Things that my eldest son said last that made me tear-up: “I won’t sacrifice our family’s finances and future just because I wanted to go to a nice university” and then, he said “Community college is cheaper, right?”. I said “yes” and that if he keeps his GPA at >3.7 and then transfer, he can still graduate from a UC.
My second son seems like to get a degree from a local state university (CSU) and take Environmental Resource Management, focusing on Health and Safety. I told him that environment, safety and health (EHS) professionals also make a good and satisfying career.
I can sleep better and breathe easy now!
If your second son changes his mind and wants to major in something not available at CSUB, then at least he now knows beforehand how the financial constraints will have to be considered when he makes the application list. (Didn’t you mention previously that he had an interest in computer science or engineering, which is available at CSUB? Seems like you may have to be prepared for him changing his intended major.)
My second son isn’t sure yet what he wanted to do. He wants to be an engineer and then he looked at CSUBs major and chose ERM. His Math and Science grades are all “As”. As much as he can ace Math, he said he didn’t like doing it. He’s like jack of all trades but master of none. I think he’ll be a good EHS guy. State of California needs environmental and safety professionals and also pay them good plus state pension, etc.
@dad3sons Good job going with the team approach. I think it will work well for you.
We are doing that now with my son who is a junior. We helped find his interests in studies, then we selected some schools that featured some things that he wanted in a school, and now we are just refining the list. We hope to visit a few schools that we have not seen on his list. Fortunately we have saved some money for schooling so budget issues are not a concern. He just needs to find the right educational and personal fit. We had him read an article on best ROI on colleges and majors and that opened his eyes.
My son thinks he knows exactly what area he wants to study, business, so that helped eliminate a bunch of liberal arts schools. He still likes us to present him new ideas on schools and asks what we think about them. He doesn’t feel a huge need to research himself. He’s more like " give some options and I’ll pick the one I like best". So we are just going with that and hopefully it works out in the end.
Good luck!