“Paying back that much money may mean he lives at home rather than by himself…”
Having to live at home to pay off debt might seem annoying to the student because he doesn’t want to live with his parents into his 30’s. However there is another big problem with this: It very severely limits where he can get a job after graduation. It is hard enough to get a job after graduation if you have no constraints on location.
Far better to avoid the debt in the first place.
I definitely agree with the graduate with as little debt as possible folks. My girls were able to graduate with very little student debt. All took the $5500 per year and some years thanks to summer jobs they didn’t have to take even that. I know some of their friends NYU class of 2005 and Cornell class of 2007 that are still paying off loans unable to move out of Parents home, take a vacation or just enjoy their degrees. Yes daughters 1-4 went to some pretty amazing schools but not because of any prestige factor. They went because the school gave them a good financial AID package but they would have been just as happy going to their State school. Your son will do great a Binghamton. Its one of our top State schools and most of the kids I know would give their right eye to get in.
Many young people are so excited to attend X school that they insist that they won’t mind paying off the debt later. However, the reality is that often the newish grad can’t afford the payments and/or regrets the big payments after making a few of them.
Your child may think that he can live at home later and pay off the loan, but who knows where the job may be. Also the newish grad may be in romantic relationship at that point and not want to live at home.
There is especially a lot of resentment once in the work world and their colleagues aren’t burdened with such debt and they’re moving on with their adult lives buying homes, getting married, traveling, etc.
Ha, some kids think they’ll finish with a $120k job offer.
I’m mostly curious about which 4-year degree your son thinks will net him $120k