“(In full transparency we are anxiously awaiting our 19/20 aid package.)”
- Yeah, we are too! Any word on when that's out?
Us too! Someone on the UChicago parent Facebook page said that financial aid was posted on Wednesday so maybe some people have gotten it, but we haven’t seen ours. I called yesterday and they said that we should hear something in the next two weeks. Back in May they told me late July or early August. We submitted our financial aid documents in February! @JBStillFlying @RelocatedYankee Let me know if you hear!
@JBStillFlying @RelocatedYankee My D’s 19/20 FA is posted. Our net cost will be about the same as 18/19, so I can’t complain. (But it still costs a boatload of ? ?)
My D’s still not up yet. Maybe tomorrow . . .
^ Update: D got her award yesterday. Reduced due to moving off campus but that was expected so no surprises.
@JBStillFlying So if the student moves off campus, how do they calculate FA? Do they still consider some reduced version of housing costs in COA and then compare to EFC?
@browniesundae Yes that is pretty much how they do it.
@browniesundae the budget for 2019-20 deducts about $5K for living off campus:
https://financialaid.uchicago.edu/undergraduate/costs
The FAQ’s from the College Aid Handbook include some additional information:
"OFF-CAMPUS LIVING
What happens if I decide to move off campus? How will this affect my financial aid award?
The Office of Financial Aid uses different room and board costs for the different housing arrangements. The total cost estimate for an off-campus resident is approximately $4,000 less than that for a University housing resident because the costs for off campus housing are typically lower than those for the College Houses. Therefore, because the University of Chicago Grant is the last type of aid awarded, students who reside off campus will receive approximately $4,000 less than those in the College Houses or International House. The Office of the Bursar will bill an off-campus resident only for tuition and the student life fee. If the credits to your account (e.g., University of Chicago Grant funds, outside grants and scholarships, student loans, family contribution) exceed charges, you will receive a refund to help pay for rent, food, and other living costs.
IMPORTANT NOTE: You must notify us if your housing plans change."
https://financialaid.uchicago.edu/files/documents/2019-2020-uchicago-college-aid-handbook-students-families.pdf
Not sure why there is a $1k discrepancy. Based on what we received, it looks like they deducted between $4k - $5 for moving off campus. D didn’t have to provide any specifics; they calculate this based on whether or not you’ve done the room lottery.
@JBStillFlying Thanks! I’m really glad this issue came up. It will be good to have in the back of my mind next year, if DD considers moving off campus. I probably wouldn’t have thought of it on my own until the decision was already made.
@browniesundae - agree that many can be taken by surprise if they don’t read the FA handbook first. My D is still going to realize some savings, but her primary motivation for moving had more to do with her friend group and others in her house who were leaving. Many of them stayed through year 2, but opted for off-campus in years 3 and 4.
The off-campus housing in Hyde Park is much nicer than the dorms. But it’s not $4,000 cheaper than the dorms unless you live in dorm-like space (i.e., two people in a studio) a mile or more from campus, and unless you don’t eat.
When my kids moved off campus – and this was a decade ago – we figured that we saved about $1,000-$1,500/kid/year, without counting the benefits of having summer housing in Chicago. (They spent 5 of 6 possible college summers in Chicago.) About $500-$1,000 of the savings was the cost of the room itself, taking into account the need to pay for things like internet access that got bundled into the dorm price, and assuming that you could cover half the summer rent with a sublet (which you generally could). The rest was savings from not being on the meal plan. (My kids both loved to cook, however, and ate really well, and healthily. They could have saved a lot more if they tried.)
It is also highly dependent on whether they live there during the summer, it makes a lot more sense and a lot more savings if they do.
Yes, our analysis of the savings initially assumed that the student would be spending the summer elsewhere and subletting his or her Chicago space at a substantial discount. That in fact is what happened when our first kid moved off campus. To do an apples-to-apples comparison, you had to spread the net out of pocket summer rent (full rent less sublet rent received) over the school-year months. Obviously with a dorm you are only paying for (and only getting) ~36 weeks of housing per year. You pay a lot per month when you are there, but you don’t pay anything when you are not there.
Even if your kid plans to stay in Chicago for the summer, it still makes sense to analyze things that way. If they live in a dorm during the school year, they can easily sublet great space off campus during the summer at a substantial discount to the monthly rent on a full-year lease. So, if instead they live off campus during the school year, staying in the same apartment during the summer is a nice perk, but it’s still expensive because they will be paying a lot more rent for that than they would pay if they sublet equivalent space from someone else.
Does anyone actually know whether summer sublets are still “at a substantial discount”? With the increase in internships and other professional opportunities for UChicago students, summer rents in HP (furnished place, etc.) might be significantly higher than they used to be. Short-term/furnished downtown is pretty darn expensive compared to unfurnished and fully-year, per some friends of ours who are in Chicago for the summer . . . but that might be a different situation than a college neighborhood that empties out a good number of its residents in the summertime.
Our analysis is a lot more “back of the envelope” but we calculate that the $17,000 for the 9-month academic year plus summer expenses in Chicago (where my kid wants to remain) is still more expensive, even if sublet rents are cheaper, than a full year of rent and commensurate expenses including furnishings and not scrimping w/r/t groceries, utilities and the occasional restaurant visit. In fact, we calculate that UChicago has kind of nailed it w/r/t the $4k differential (although we are basing that on comparable rents for my daughter’s specific living situation* and YMMV). A couple of things to consider is the forced travel expenses when the dorm closes for winter and spring break, and the OPTION, with the off-campus situation, to budget more strictly on rent, food, utilities and so forth. No such option to reduce that $17k to something a tad less expensive. If you are on significant financial aid, then different story - a bit of savings each year, perhaps, but not all that much.
$4k a year for a full-pay kid is equivalent to a small scholarship and can eliminate the need for a part-time job throughout the academic year.
- In HP within a mile of campus, but outside the university's Golden Rectangle. In addition, Woodlawn is becoming a more doable option, especially with the new dorm opening up next year and the newly-opened JO (groceries plus pharmacy).
For a bachelors degree, NOPE! The reason why prestigious school publish higher than average starting salaries is because they’re on on the east/west coast or other expensive places like Chicago. Employers never pay more than an entry level salary for a college graduate, otherwise they could attract an experienced professional to do the job. The best thing to do is choose an affordable school and stick with it.
@coolguy40: If UChicago meets full demonstrated need, then isn’t their net cost of attendance by definition “affordable?” Do you mean “the best financial deal?” And in that case, do you have any thoughts about potential differences in educational experiences or quality between, say, a Harvard or UChicago or Columbia vs. a UMass or UIUC/UIC or SUNY? Or do they all offer the same thing?
You are only looking at this from a monetary ROI and IMO going to a college like UoC is much, much more than your paycheck upon graduation. Jobs come and go, what stays with you the rest of your life is the actual education you received…
Not the case at all, for example, as I said in another post my DD boyfriend was just hired by Amazon at a salary well north of $100K for CS (beating out an MIT and Stanford grad in the final round). UChicago is not even known for CS. If you think Chicago is an expensive city you clearly have not lived on the West Coast. One of my other DD lives in Streeterville (which is probably the most expensive area in downtown Chicago) overlooking Navy Pier on the 29th floor, she is a year out of college and is able to afford it on her salary (which granted is higher then average) but not north of $100K. Something like that in San Francisco would be out of reach at double her current salary.
Lots of variables there. In my DD case, I’d say no. And the reason being, while Chicago is a fantastic school, she’s got her heart set on med school, so another 8-12 years of at least $50,000 tuition after undergrad work is done. So a key goal for us/her is to minimize debt in undergrad in anticipation of much larger bills and probably loans, later.