<p>It turns out our son may be going to school in a state where his cousin lives minutes away from the school. The cousin has invited him to move in with him - likely he'll still stay in the dorms freshman year and spend the summer at his cousins. This brings up the question of establishing instate residency.</p>
<p>What do you need to do -
Drivers license
Register car
Pay rent
No longer be claimed as a dependent on parents taxes
What about health insurance - can parents still provide this?</p>
<p>Anything else we need to consider?
Thanks for any information you can share.</p>
<p>Depends on the state and the public university system. The info will be on the college's'web site. Normally one has to have established residency by living in a state at least a year before going to college. One can't establish residency by going to college in a state.</p>
<p>We're looking at the info on the website -
What we're really asking is if there are general guidelines that apply - that was the list posted, health insurance, dependency, etc.</p>
<p>It is always going to depend on the state so there wouldn't be any general guidelines. The only general guideline is that getting residency for college tuition the way that you are hoping is not easy and probably is close to impossible in most states.</p>
<p>Also to be considered independent, students have to be married or age 24 in most states.</p>
<p>For most states, for tuition purposes, residency follows the parents, regardless of anything else on the laundry list the OP provided. It doesn't matter where the kid resides, where the car is registered, where the kid has a driver's license, where the kid votes, whether the kid is "independent" for tax purposes, etc. Just as it doesn't matter whether a kid is truly "independent" to establish independence for financial aid purposes. Residency for tuition purposes is a very different situation than residency for virtually any other purpose. States are allowed to set those rules even if they differ from the rules for other state benefits.</p>
<p>Otherwise, OOS tuition would apply only for freshman year since everyone would just rent an apartment and become a resident of the state.</p>
<p>Chedva is right for the most part it does nto matter who your son lives with, or where he registers his car as long as he is a dependent student (under 24, not married, not in the miliary, no kids for whom he provides more than one half of their support) for tuition purposes, your residence is his residence. Unless you are also moving to the state, he will be considered out of state.</p>