My son got into every college he applied to. Good for him! He was accepted at Northwestern and Wash University in St. Louis. So far Wash U has said no financial aid except loans. Waiting on NW package. Here’s the deal. He was offered amazing scholarships at some lower ranked school with great programs and had pretty much decided before the NW acceptance. He was so surprised to get in that now he really wants to go there. We are older parents with another sibling below him. We want to retire eventually and not be paying for college for the next 15 years. How do you decide if it is worth the debt to go to a place like NW or Wash U?
How much debt? If it involves parent loans or parent-cosigned student loans (i.e. more than the $5,500-$7,500 per year limit for federal direct loans), that is typically a bad idea, particularly since you (as the parent) indicate that college money for a younger kid and your retirement may be impacted.
you are sure to get bombarded with people asking you “didn’t you run the NPC?” “did you tell son that you’d pay for any school?”, etc. you really can’t worry about that now, so don’t let those comments get to you. But you can learn from this for your next kid coming up in a few years.
My advice would be to NOT raid your retirement. It’s that simple. Also, do not take out parent PLUS loans. If you decide to do that, read through all the threads here that give warnings.
Only you can determine the reasonable expense for an UG degree, so you need to think about that. Part of this would be to consider the ROI for the schools that are in scope. You can search starting salaries and mid-year salaries for certain majors at the specific schools. With these numbers you can ask yourself “is this difference worth the additional price of the degree?”
Also, if a professional degree is in son’s future (med school or law school or even grad school), then this makes the UG school even that much less important, especially for med school and law school. I would say “Save your money.”
I think you may have answered your question already. Price does matter and it should matter.
Is it worth the debt to go to a place like NW or Wash U?
No.
And if your son received zero financial aid from WashU, chances are that NW isn’t going to do much better. Congratulate your son on getting into these great schools - it’s an achievement he should be proud of. But it’s not worth ruining your lives for. And, the more money you save, the more options he’ll have - perhaps a summer program that costs a bit extra, or a semester abroad . . . or maybe you’ll even be able to set a small amount aside to help pay for grad school.
To answer your question. No, you need to consider finances and your child is able to be accepted to WUSL and NU they will have great opportunities at the other schools which are affordable. For parents and students who will be making this decision in the future I would recommend determining how much you the parent will be contributing before the applications go out and discussing it with your student. The student may be able to apply anywhere they choose, however, if the school is unaffordable they will not be surprised.
How much debt? If it’s the Direct Loan only…fine. But if you need to borrow $50,000 a year…don’t.
We are older parents with a freshman in college and a 12 year old, so we’ll be at retirement age (or older) when the younger child graduates high school. As selfish as it may seem, this means my retirement trumps the kid’s college cost.
With this in mind, we told D no parent loans for us, no co-signing loans and gave her a fairly firm dollar amount we could afford. I suppose if she wants to take out student loans later (junior or senior year?) she may but she’s debt-averse for now. So, in your situation, we would have viewed Northwestern and WUSTL as soft rejections. They’re not on the table.
Kudos to your son. It sounds like he has good options aside from these two schools. Wait until Northwestern’s package arrives and you have everything in front of you and your son. You may be pleasantly surprised by their package but also set parameters on the money situation now, so it’ll be slightly easier to say “No”.
Take this as a learning experience for your younger child. I think many parents learn this lesson with the first child. (This cost issue happened to my parents with my oldest sibling)
Did you tell your son you would be willing to pay for a private school full pay? If so, I think it would be unfair to say that, and then back out on that because he got less expensive offers.
How much money can you spend each year without resorting to parent plus loans? When will child 2 start college?
Is there anything in your finances that would help with an appeal for financial aid? Medical bills or a recent job loss (I suspect you simply make too much money to qualify for financial aid but aren’t wealthy enough for full pay.)
Do not raid your retirement accounts. That is IMO a line in the sand that should not be crossed.
FWIW, a lot of families with high but not high enough incomes are facing this same predicament. But it is terrific that your DS applied to schools where he received fantastic scholarships.
Ask your son to make up a spreadsheet that shows the COA of all of his schools. I wouldn’t make a decision until all information has been received.
If costs matter, tell him you’re waiting for all financial aid packages to come in before making a decision. We made a spreadsheet that gave us an estimate of total costs for all 4 years for our son. It was helpful to see the total out-of-pocket costs and loans (student and parent) for all 4 years. We also have a younger child, so we mentally multiplied the figures by 2 because we believe child 2 should have the same type of options as child 1. We chose a college we could pay for without loans so there will be money to travel, do a semester abroad, and to attend grad school if they want it. It wasn’t the cheapest college on the list, but we were fortunate that it was our son’s top choice.
I think you answered your own question. You don’t want to be paying for college for the next 15 years. That’s okay.
We have a bright snowflake who will be taking the money at a lesser ranked OOS public flagship and not going to a selective prestigious dream school.
LOTS of people in this boat.
You need to look at this from an 8 year standpoint…
If you borrow to let Child #1 go to his dream school, then to be fair, you’d need to be willing to borrow to let Child #2 go to his/her dream school.
Now, some here would say that you don’t have to be fair. Hmmm…well, when certain limiting fact are ALREADY known before Child #1 goes to college, then “being fair” should be the guideline.
It would be one thing if you believed retirement to be 20 years away, so you agreed to borrow for both kids, but then something happened later which required you to retire earlier. BUT…you already know your ages and your desire/need to retire at a certain point.
Please tell us more…what is your son’s major and career goal. There are very few (maybe 1 or 2) careers where attendance at a big name school is expected. 99% of careers can be attained thru “lesser” schools.
Thanks for the advice. Mathematical modeling and data analytics.
Math modeling. Got in and seriously considering Drake and U of MN
I agree with those who say cost matters. My kids both had to say no to schools that they really wanted to attend but cost too much … both survived, did fine, and are no worse for the initial disappointment. I work in financial aid, and I can tell you that there are far too many young people who don’t have a clue about money … parents who are honest about how finances work are actually doing their kids a big favor. If there are affordable options, those should be “the” options. He will get over it … and if he wants to go to grad school, I am willing to bet he can get into a funded program at a top school if he works hard in undergrad.