I have 3 children. I diligently saved to help pay for their college educations. When my oldest started college 4 years ago, I had saved enough for each child to use about $30K/yr for college. Anything more than that would need to come from scholarships and loans. My oldest decided to go to a more expensive college with this understanding. For various reasons, she transferred after her freshman year and her average total cost was almost exactly $30K. My second child started college two years ago. He got multiple merit scholarships ($13K/yr) and benefited from being in school for two years at the same time as my oldest (probably saved at least $15K a year in need based aid for those 2 years). His average cost per year looks like it will end up around $32K/yr. Given the rise in the stock market, it should be covered no problem. Now comes child #3. Given the good stock market, I have enough saved for $36K/yr. So sounds like child #3 is in the best situation (although if you factor in inflation, maybe not really). Here’s the problem. If she wants to go to the same school as child #2, it will be more than that because she would not be getting the scholarships and the benefit of 2 kids being in school at the same time. It would be easy to justify that child #3 cannot go to the same school as child #2 based on not getting the scholarships. But it’s much harder for me to say sorry you were not born a few years earlier.
Trying to figure out the fair thing to do here. Assuming I can afford it (it would be tight and I haven’t figured out how yet), should I pay for child #3 to go to the same college if she gets in and wants to go? Should I make her pay a little to account for the scholarships that child #2 received? What if she wants to go to a different college that costs more than $36K/yr - should I pay more because child #2 in essence got more due to being born at a better time?
Thoughts?
I am at the planning stage for child #3. She’s a sophomore in high school.
I see it as you saved ~30K for each child and said “Your net cost has to be 30K or you pay the rest”.
Each of your children did that. They took advantage of what was available at the time…scholarships, two kids in school.
So to your 3rd child: “I have 36K for you per year for college. You get a little more than your siblings because of inflation. You need to find a net cost of 36K or less or you will have to get loans. If you need help, let me know.”
If she says “I want to go to Whatssamatta U, Pat did…” then you say “If you can make it work with scholarships, then go ahead.”
There is literally no way for us to be fair amongst our three kids in terms of dollars, so I have changed my thinking to giving them what they need individually to launch successfully.
As the parent of 3 children similar to your situation, have child #3 a high school sophomore, and child 2 and 1 were 15 months apart so they were in college at same time for 3 of 4 years. Child 1 Played college baseball for 4 years at a state school, no athletic money, but in state tuition. Child 2 went to Fordham, received 25k merit per year. Helpful, but leaving a big nut on the table every month to pay. Child #3 has Fordham on their list (currently $70k) per year, as well some “cheaper” 50k per year schools. My wife and I are blue-collar, first in our families to obtain college degrees. We will sacrifice and do whatever it takes to find the right fit college for child 3. An extra few years of work to help my kids have a better future is well worth it. We’d rather them flourish at a school they are happy at, then struggle or be miserable at a cheaper school. The right fit for each is the key.
By the way, we did tell all 3 that they have to pay for their own marriages and houses. Whatever they get in inheritance, keep in mind we gave to you while we were alive.
Interesting how this was moved to the parents forum, but it’s nice to see other people in here. Thanks for the replies.
BmacNJ - Thanks for your perspective. Ultimately, I imagine I will agree with you. However, I do believe that kids really don’t have a good understanding that they can succeed in many schools. The whole concept of a “dream” school is ridiculous. For any school my child wants to go to, I believe there are many others where they could flourish at equally. Having said that, I agree that I don’t want them entering a school with a negative feeling (although there’s probably a lesson in that too).
bopper - That is the other side of the coin and what I had initially planned.
Ditto post # 1. Repeat that mantra often in years to come. Fair- yes, equal- not necessarily.
My poor older sister had to take the SAT, not just the ACT, I believe and some other stuff to prepare my parents for my turn a year later- she remembers this many decades later. I got several scholarships and went to the flagship instead of Podunk U, a good fit for her. A wealthy physician I knew (I’m one too) paid for one D to go to Stanford while another went to a good instate public. You can imagine the huge cost differences. There was no real benefit for the less academic D to spend money just to go to a private college. The first D did benefit from the top tier U.
There are things your kids can control, such as college choice/scholarships/athletic recruitment. There are things outside of their control such as how many kids are in college at the same time. I would find it hard to penalize a kid for something out of their control. Any savings during the years of multiple kids in college I would spread over the three and factor in inflation.
That said, equal is not always equitable. My kids all need different things, and I try to provide to the best of my ability. Giving my third exactly what my first got may be equal, but it would meet the needs of my third.
I understand that fair is not always equal. In fact, I have told this to my kids at a times.
In my case, putting aside the scholarship money my child #2 got, is it fair to say to my youngest that she can’t go to a school because she had the unfortunate luck of being born a few years later where her need based aid will not be as much? Let’s assume that the benefit of the school would be the same.
My second kid’s college cost about $8000 a year more than kid one…because kid two started three years later. Both private colleges.
You are comparing apples and oranges if your kids start college years apart…due to increased costs.
We parents offered our kids an undergraduate education on us. We were fortunate that we didn’t have to put price restrictions on this. But frankly, if one kid had chosen our local public university, that kid would have still had the same benefit of a free undergrad education…paid for by parents.
My daughter’s school listed tuition at $32k when we were searching. By the time she started, it was $34k. By the time she graduated, it was $42k. By the time a much younger sibling would go, it will be $$$$.
My other daughter’s tuition was about $16k (they started at the same time). I think when she ended it was about $17k.
Each got to go to the school she wanted to. The one at the cheaper school has more in student loans because she had less in scholarship money. My OOP wasn’t the same for both, but it was fair.
Seems like you are talking about very little difference here-yeah over the 30 but not radically so. Would you experience hardship to pay a bit more for the 3rd? What is the actual issue?
It IS challenging trying to be “fair” while still keeping your finances intact for your financial future. Our S went to school X with hefty merit aid that paid >50% of his tuition. D liked school X so much that she wanted to apply there and do so with our blessing. Do our and her surprise, she was accepted. We were facing her transferring to school X while were on the hook for 100% of all costs. We couldn’t figure out a way to say no, so we scrimped and make it work and are happy she got to matriculate at the U she wanted to attend and was accepted at. We paid much more for her to attend X than we paid for our son, but she was there slightly shorter, since she entered with 3 terms of CCollege.
OP, will it be a significant hardship for you and your spouse to pay for the 3rd child to attend the school s/he wants to attend? What options have you and your child explored? Have you considered asking your children who graduated to help pitch in and pay for child 3’s education? Is that something you want to do?
Sometimes that’s just how it works out. Same thing happens if first-born wants to go to the school child #2 eventually goes to but at the time of application will be the only sibling in college.
Is this the only school that she is interested in? Are there other schools that would be a good fit AND more affordable? If so, why is this more expensive school the only one of interest. Is there something significantly better about tht school that is worth the extra money?
If it turns out the best fit schools require more than $36K AND IF I could afford it (with better financial circumstances perhaps you can afford a bit more), I would require her to take the federal loans and get a part-time job at schol to substitute for merit scholarships, but try to make up the financial aid amount. If you can’t., however, that is just the way things are. Circumstance change. Life is not fair.
I have to admit that part of this question is me just wondering out loud. My daughter has no idea that I am even thinking about this. She really is in the beginning stages of even looking. My guess is I’d find the money, but my head is always thinking about stuff like this.
Chill. College costs go up every year, about 3 to 5% compounded. $30K after 4 years at 4% compounded increases turns out to be $35.1K - that’s the present value of the cost you spent on #1’s average year. So you can either focus on the nature of the gift (paying for schooling) or on the net present value of the gift (that $30K you spent before would be $35K now) to see that the two are really close to being equal. You’ve done very well by them to cover this while the costs have risen beyond the inflation rate.
Oh, and if you wait until a 5th year, that compounded $30K is now $36.5 and it turns out that the earlier child got $500 more in value than the younger child. For which you can buy 1 or 2 textbooks.
Do you think your kids will care? I have no idea how much my sisters’ colleges cost and I don’t care one bit. My parents even paid for one of them to go to law school. (And she never practiced law a day in her life ?)
Although we, too, have three children, our financial situation is certain to differ from yours as well as from others.
We assured each child that we would fully pay the equivalent of their attending our in-state flagship public university – currently about $29,000 – without their having to take out any loans. We also agreed to cover additional costs for any foreign study and some various expenses. Beyond that, they were/are expected to take out a Stafford federal student loan to help pay for part of any additional costs to attend a private LAC – which we otherwise fully cover (minus any merit/need-based grants/work-study provided by that college).
BTW, blessed are college 529 plans – we started those as soon as birth-order allowed.
It is completely fair to offer all children a roughly equal amount for college. And you even adjusted for inflation.You aren’t saying that #3 cannot attend the same school as #2, only that your contribution will be the worth about the same amount. The child is free to choose to assume some debt or not, as were his or her siblings. Yes, the fact that there is but one child in college isn’t #3’s fault. But, any school’s fin aid policies are also out of their control. A local school used to automatically offer a full tuition scholarship for a certain ACT score. Then they stopped. Not “fair.” And if you pay much more for #3, how do you know #1 won’t feel hurt because he or she didn’t have those same choices? Honestly, the “fairest” thing to do is stick by the original offer. We can pay X.