<p>You and she may also want to consider whichever of the local schools are in commuting range to save $3,000 to $9,000 per year.</p>
<p>At some schools, there may be ways to cut costs significantly below the assumed cost of attendance. For example, living in the Berkeley Student Cooperative houses would be about $3,000 less per year than the off-campus housing and food budget assumed by Berkeley’s financial aid office. But doing stuff like that takes dedication to living frugally (now may be a good time for all of the kids to start practicing).</p>
<p>You may want to discuss with D1 about the employment prospects in law and the effect of law school debt on a new law graduate’s life. (Look up the cost of attendance at law schools.)</p>
<p>OP, has anyone mentioned the LACs – schools like Grinnell, Macalaster, Carleton, Kenyon, Earlham, Davidson, Kalamazoo? The key for you is that they’re “less selective”. This does NOT mean that they provide an inferior education. It means that most people have never heard of them, so hordes of HS seniors aren’t hurling applications at them. They provide a really fine undergrad education, and a great springboard to grad schools (which HAVE heard of them, and respect them). </p>
<p>Many of them offer generous merit money for students like your D, and at least several of them don’t require CSS PROFILE. There’s a poster here on CC who is getting $20K in merit at one of them, against a COA of $49K. She’s also getting need-based aid which you wouldn’t get, but if your D were to get that scholarship, and assuming Stafford loans and some Work Study, that would bring your out-of-pocket down to around $20K. I can’t find where you’ve said what you can pay, but at least that’s quite a bit cheaper than the UCs.</p>
<p>Huh? $49,000 minus the $20,000 scholarship leaves a net price of $29,000, which is in the ballpark of UC list prices. Student loans and student work can be applied to the cost (whether at the LAC you mention or at a UC), but do not reduce it (though they can reduce what the parents have to pay).</p>
<p>One more thing to consider is that if the daughters are used to an expensive lifestyle and are not enthusiastic about living frugally, it may be more difficult for them to avoid going over budget in college than most students. This may have to be considered when looking at the cost of attendance of colleges.</p>
<p>ucbalum, $49K COA, less $20K scholarship, less $5.5K Stafford, less $2K work study = $21.5K.</p>
<p>Of course, you’re right that the Staffords are loans which the student would have to pay back after graduation. The work study could be used for books and travel, or applied to the student’s account. But both loans and w/s would reduce the amount the parent has to pay to get the kid in the door, which seems to be the big concern here.</p>
<p>I mentioned it as an option because I wasn’t sure that LACs had floated onto the OP’s radar yet, and they’re one of the few places where the student has a decent shot at big merit bucks.</p>
<p>Yeah, D1 does have $16k in outside scholarships from winning service club competitions. Will be applied to first year unless she asks them to spread it over a longer period. Sounds like they will be flexible. Not sure if this would affect merit aid offers from other schools. Have to declare? If we go the UC route, this would cut the cost of 1st year in half. That might make year 2 doable and buys time. Half way through before younger siblings graduate high school. Year 3 is when we hit the wall, as StepD completes CC and transfers and D2 enters college.</p>
<p>UC = $28K-$33K, less 5.5K Stafford, less $2K work earnings = $20.5K-$25.5K. I.e. similar parent cost (i.e. not significantly lower as claimed) as your example. Or cheaper if commuting to a local one.</p>
<p>So is the progression like this, since you mentioned that D2 and D3 are two and three years behind D1?</p>
<p>Year 1: D1 at 4Y/CC?, SD at CC
Year 2: D1 at 4Y/CC?, SD at CC
Year 3: D1 at 4Y, SD at 4Y, D2 at 4Y/CC?
Year 4: D1 at 4Y, SD at 4Y, D2 at 4Y/CC?, D3 at 4Y/CC?
Year 5: D2 at 4Y, D3 at 4Y/CC?
Year 6: D2 at 4Y, D3 at 4Y
Year 7: D3 at 4Y</p>
<p>(4Y = four year school, CC = community college, 4Y/CC? = four year school or community college)</p>
<p>Of course, the above progression does not account for potential extra semesters (a risk that needs to be considered for the weaker students who may need remedial course work or may not be able to handle full course loads in college, though if the extra semesters are at CC, they won’t be as expensive as at a four year school). Nor does it include any parental contribution to graduate or professional school (PhD programs are often free, but law or medical school is expensive and usually involves gigantic student loan debt).</p>
<p>Year 3 and 4 look expensive, although there is potential for need-based financial aid even at your very high income (maybe even in year 5 and 6 if the kids are going to expensive schools).</p>
<p>It may be better for her to use that up early (if D1 has that much cost left over after scholarships awarded by the school she attends) before you have multiple kids in four year schools which may bring the possibility of need-based financial aid. Outside scholarships may cause some schools to offer less need-based financial aid.</p>
<p>ucb - yes, that’s the progression. Thanks for the chart! Originally was thinking the 16k should be spread out since it would offset need based aid and could only be used to sub for work study and student contribution, not EFC. But based on this thread, my thinking has changed a lot and it’s looking like need based aid is not going to be available in yr 1. So as you point out, better plan would be to use all scholarship funds yr 1, use that break to save for yr 2, and then hope for the best in yr 3 when maybe qualify for some aid with 3 kids in school at one time. Thanks. Good advice.</p>
<p>YES…you have to declare the scholarship your daughter has received.</p>
<p>But that softens the blow. If it is spread out over four years, and she takes the Direct loan…SHE will have $10,000 per year towards the cost of college, leaving YOU with $20k to pick up if she attends a UC. </p>
<p>If she gets a job (which she SHOULD do), then this would be money she could use for spending money. I’ll digress a bit. If it were me, I would insist that she earn her own discretionary spending money…and budget expenditures accordingly. She should not spend more,than she earns…and do NOT bail her out. It would be a good life’s lesson for her to learn to live within her means.</p>
<p>The scholarships,along with any future ones do have to be reported, and it would get applied to need based aid, but you aren’t really eligible for that much of financial aid anyways. It won’t affect merit awards.</p>
<p>Seriously, if you want your DD to go to Cal or UCLA, or any sleep away UC, it’s more than $30K a year with concurrent costs for whatever step D is doing. If you are practicing internal equity, and this is a situation that your wife and kids also feel is important, austerity regiments to pay for Princess1 to go away to school while the Step D commutes to CC can be an issue, as you brought up… </p>
<p>I really think you should offer both girls tuition and expenses to commute and anything else they have to get. I’d also step out of the GP picture and let your DD see what she can get them to pay. She’s going to be an adult real soon, and it’s her call as to how she deals with them. I would have been very angry if my parents interfered with any such offers from grandparents or relatives that impeded my college plans. And a young person with those growing hormones can get awfully unreasonable in a rage. I’d let her handle that end. You place what you and your wife can offer the girls, and stay out of it as to what they each can get from respective relatives including their non cust parents and gps.</p>
<p>Actually it is a baseline because if your child is eligible for federal/state aid, they are usually entitlements and are the first thing given in the financial aid package. However this will be a non issue for OP because OP will most likely not be eligible for any federal aid other than Direct (Stafford loans, which will most likely be unsubsidized).</p>
<p>For your family, when you fill out the FAFSA, you will have 2 in college (your D and your Step-D).</p>
<p>DGDz,</p>
<p>I know that it is kind of short notice, but has your daughter taken the ACT? If not, perhaps she should as she may do better on this exam than the SAT (make sure that she signs up for the ACT with writing. I would recommend, if you think that she can handle it to pay the late fee for her to take the june exam. Depending on how she does, she can prep over the summer and retake in Sept, still giving her enough time to apply early some place.</p>
<p>But, the main thing is that you have to have it set up so that YOU are not asking for the money. It’s not YOU they will be doing a favor, but your daughter. If she wants the money from them, then it is up to her to ask for it, to maintain the relationship and to “get” it to pay her bills.</p>
<p>This is why I would caution her, personally, to stay within what you could help her to do. At the same time, if she wants to please them, that is her life. You need not ever speak to them again if you don’t want to. They aren’t your parents. </p>
<p>I agree that your D1 needs a job. The sooner she understands that she needs a job, starts to earn money, and begins to see herself as a kid who earns her own spending money, the better off she will be in dealing with the reality of her life, which is that there’s not a lot of money. Kids with jobs “get” there’s not a lot of money better than kids without jobs.</p>
<p>Son’s friends currently in law school at Harvard, Yale and Columbia are up to their eyeballs in debt even with the 'rents helping out. $250,000+ for just law school. Granted they have great summer internships and solid offers for work when they graduate BUT that is still a whole lotta money!</p>
<p>Some did turn down some scholie money at UVA and Michigan for HYC law but they would still be in debt for $170,000. One at H law was an RA though so he was able to offset his costs while at law school, only covers board though no food.</p>
<p>And for those law schools they wanted HIGH stats. </p>
<p>I again would look to the local CSUs and UCs. Davis has a great history department and poli sci.</p>
<p>Davidson is in our neck of the woods and is VERY competitive. Great school, great academics. Duke has the Robertson but students turn down Harvard and Yale for that. Emory has the scholars and Georgia Tech the presidential. WPI offers something, as does BC, Villanova but again don’t think it would be lower that a Cal State, maybe a UC.</p>
<p>*Yeah, D1 does have $16k in outside scholarships from winning service club competitions. Will be applied to first year unless she asks them to spread it over a longer period. Sounds like they will be flexible. Not sure if this would affect merit aid offers from other schools. Have to declare? If we go the UC route, this would cut the cost of 1st year in half. That might make year 2 doable and buys time. Half way through before younger siblings graduate high school. Year 3 is when we hit the wall, as StepD completes CC and transfers and D2 enters college.
*</p>
<p>You do have to declare those outside scholarships, but they shouldn’t affect institutional merit awards unless the school has some kind of max awards allowed (a few schools have that rule).</p>
<p>Many schools will award merit based solely on stats, and if you have an outside scholarship it is just stacked on top. At my own kids’ undergrad, there are assured merit awards for stats. You get those no matter what. My kids both had outside scholarships and those were just added to the school’s awards. My younger son had two awards from the school (college award plus engineering award) and then had two outside awards (one NMF special scholarship, a community award and later a Tau Beta Pi award and Tylenol award). He got all of them.</p>
<p>Seriously, if you have strong students, you can get away with paying rather little if you target schools that give a lot of merit. My older son has cost us about $10k total for undergrad thru PhD (funded). Our younger son will end up costing the most because he’s going to med school, but his total undergrad was probably about $12k. lol Both dormed all 4 years and had awesome housing. (it’s almost embarrassing, but the med school hit will be substantial. )</p>
<p>But also make it clear to D1 that if she uses any money from the grandparents, it is her responsibility – i.e. you won’t be bound by any conditions set by the grandparents or bail her out if the grandparents cut off the money.</p>
<p>^^ Good advice. Also explain to her the old saying “He who pays the piper calls the tune.” If she accepts money from them, she can expect their interference in her life through college and beyond.</p>
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