<p>Anyone who has been a victim of identity theft is entitled to free credit freezes with all 3 agencies.</p>
<p>OP - I don’t mean to scare you, nor imply this has happened in your situation, but I strongly urge you to check your credit score (easy to do, and you’re ‘owed’ one free check a year, online – I suggest one of the “big three” - Experian, Equifax, or Transunion) and if need be, put a block on any new credit being issued under your name.</p>
<p>Credit reports are free (one a year from each reporting agency), but credit scores are not- yet.</p>
<p>In any event, OP can get more useful information from a credit report than a credit score.</p>
<p>Well can someone recommend what a student can do to get alerts if her parents TRY to open an acct in her name?</p>
<p>Anyone can freeze their credit. It will just cost a small amount each time they want to thaw it out (ie temporarily unfreeze it)</p>
<p>OP, are all of your scholarships reported to UChicago? I am having a difficult time understanding how it is that you have so much money to lend your parents. When you first were accepted to UChicago, you appealed the tiny $3K family contribution and couldn’t even pay your acceptance deposit. </p>
<p>Are these summer earnings? Are you “making money” by simply attending UChicago because you are not reporting renewing outside scholarships? Since you are a junior, you must know how the taxable non-education parts of your scholarship affect you.</p>
<p>Didn’t the student say she makes a good bit of money in the summer from summer internships? If so, that’s not scholarship money, so no need to report to the school. However, it may affect her EFC since it sounds like her parents don’t have an Auto 0.</p>
<p>That said, the student gets a good amount of grant money from UChi. Her FA pkgs likely exceeds her “direct costs” …so she has money for “personal expenses and travel” sitting in her acct…along with her summer earnings.</p>
<p>That said, she did put $650 on her credit card, so maybe she doesn’t still have a lot in savings?</p>
<p>Ok…my opinion. The OP and others are concerned that the relationship with the parents won’t be so good if the OP stops giving them money and cuts off access to her accounts. Consider this…the relationship with the parents also isn’t going to be so good if the OP continues to give her family money.</p>
<p>That being said, the OP needs to change all of her bank accounts to ones with HER name on them only. Since she is over 18, this should not be a problem. All refunds from college and other earnings should be deposited into these new accounts. If the money in the other accounts is hers, she can withdraw it, and leave those accounts with $0 in them. She should ask the bakelite how to get her name removed from the accounts.</p>
<p>If, and I mean IF the OP feels compelled to continue to loan money to her parents, she needs to find someone (a lawyer perhaps, or accountant) to help her draw up,a,loan agreement with the terms of the loan, including term of repayment and interest. Both she and parents should sign in the presence of a notary. No signature…no loan.</p>
<p>And lastly…if it were me, I wouldn’t loan them ONE additional dime until all past debts are repaid. Just be clear…tell them they have an outstanding debt and you will NOT extend any more loans because that is an outstanding debt. That way…if they repay you, if you choose, you can turn around and give them the same amount in the future…but no additional money.</p>
<p>The OP needs to just say no. This trend is not going to end until she does.</p>
<p>I asked earlier in this thread how this over extended college student has the funds to loan $5000 to her parents. That is a lot of money for someone who is receiving significant need based aid…even if it IS internship money.</p>
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<p>They are contributing their financial information for your FAFSA, so I wouldn’t do anything too drastic until they file the final one for your senior year early next year. I wouldn’t do anymore cosigning any more though.</p>
<p>Once your senior year financial aid is awarded, you are totally financially independent. Move out this summer and stay on campus if you have a summer job that pays enough. Register to vote there and make it your primary residence. Get a cheap storage bin. Move all of your accounts, your credit cards, etc and make sure the address is a place where they won’t have access to the information. They no longer have a right to know your financial situation. </p>
<p>I don’t what to do with the lease that you’ve already co-signed. That’s a tough one, but worst case you have to go through bankruptcy and it costs you a lot of money. That’s bad, but life is long.</p>
<p>^^
I agree. If this student still needs their info to apply for aid next year, they’ll likely withhold on the grounds of: you didn’t help us, so we’re not helping you (by giving financial info)</p>
<p>* I wouldn’t loan them ONE additional dime until all past debts are repaid. Just be clear…tell them they have an outstanding debt and you will NOT extend any more loans because that is an outstanding debt. That way…if they repay you, if you choose, you can turn around and give them the same amount in the future…but no additional money.*</p>
<p>Of course this makes perfect sense…but not when you’re dealing with serious dysfunction. </p>
<p>These parents are the type to call and say, “the utitilies are being cut off in 2 days and we don’t have the money. You HAVE to help us. At least consider your younger siblings. They need water and electricity to shower and eat before going to school. You’re being selfish. You have a nice place to live at school and you have the money to help us.” They’ll present situations that are so desperate that a nice person will often fold. </p>
<p>My own MIL would fall for these antics from her grand-daughter. “Grandma, I have two outstanding speeding tickets that I can’t pay. I’ll be arrested if they aren’t paid. I need $600 to pay them”. And, MIL wouldn’t want her grandD to get arrested, so she’d pay…and pay…and pay. Ugh! Believe me, if GrandD didnt’ know that MIL had the money, GrandD wouldn’t have been bothering her.</p>
<p>Hi everyone. Thanks for all the suggestions. Like most of you have said,I just have to learn how to say no and distance should help as well. I’ll definitely endeavor to live away from home once I graduate. Easier said than done I suppose. To clarify a few concerns, around 10% of my money comes from scholarship refunds. Around 90% comes from summer/school time earnings, and I was very lucky this summer in terms of compensation. And yes, my school is aware of the scholarships and my summer/school time earnings seeing as the school issued the paychecks. The scholarships are sent directly to the school, not to me. And they show up on my financial aid letter. I’ve taken care of my tax situation as well.
About the credit report/scores. I was able to obtain my score this summer, and it was pretty decent for a college student, so I don’t think my parents have opened accounts in my name. I don’t think they would stoop so low…
And I did go ahead and change my account numbers for the cards per your suggestions- I did leave copies of the cards at home since I’m abroad.<br>
Also, in terms of the money I gave recently, I paid the bills on my card because my mother had said that she would give me the money on Friday. Fat chance I suppose. So I’ll probably just pay the bill in full within the next few days.</p>
<p>so I don’t think they have opened accounts in my name. I don’t think they would stoop so low…</p>
<p>Well, they haven’t had to…yet. Your giving them money hasn’t made them feel the need to. But…once you stop the gravy train, they may be tempted…and claim that they “had no choice”.</p>
<p>Do keep us updated.
I too am worried they’d open a credit account in your name - all because the situaiton was “desperate” and you weren’t helping and they do mean to pay you back, etc, I’m sure they’re good at making excuses even to themselves. Too many parents have done it in the same way many people use their credit card - thinking it’s not a big deal since it doesn’t feel like real money.
Good for you though, with the credit scores and changing the account numbers. It mustn’t have been easy to do from abroad. Good luck in any case.</p>
<p>You said you are home 8 months out of the year. Does that mean you live there? If that is the case then I don’t see why you shouldn’t contribute some monthly amount to the household. But if you aren’t living there at all, then I don’t see it. Maybe a little if you visit, but nothing to the tune of $5k.</p>
<p>It is a good point that you have to be careful until your final FAFSA and aid papers are filed.</p>
<p>You really don’t have the money to give. You may need relocation money when you graduate and perhaps a car, deposit for an apartment and furnishings in a new place. You will need any savings you can put aside for these kind of future expenses.</p>
<p>Hopefully you can just say that the expenses overseas took up your excess funds. Hope you are enjoying your time. And do see the counseling center when you come back, because you deserve some support and suggestions for dealing with this situation.</p>
<p>Also, when the lease comes up, you can make the case that they shouldn’t need a cosigner because they have established residency and payment. And that you can’t sign again because you don’t have a job yet and you will need to be signing your own lease in the future. Don’t get manipulated into signing something again. Bad precedent and it does make you responsible for the rent if they don’t pay or it will be on your credit report too.</p>
<p>Hang tight. You should feel really good at how well you are doing.</p>
<p>Brownparents: The living home 8 months out of the year thing was a major typo. I wasn’t using a computer, and by the time I realized my mistake it was too late to edit the post. I am not home for around 8 months out of the year. More like home for 4 months, and for the 2012-2013 school year I was only home for about 2 months.
At this point, I won’t give them any money for rent. And I really don’t have any obligation to give them rent money if I never go home-I still haven’t decided whether I’ll return home during breaks. The frustrating thing is that my parents’ situation wasn’t always like this. My dad would have a relatively well paying job which would help us live comfortably if he had expanded the career path he was on 6 or 7 years ago. Instead, he got lazy, downsized, and tried to pursue something else which ultimately failed. And all of you are right. I do have to tread carefully or my parents might withhold their financial information.</p>
<p>Blue215,
You are to be commended for how you have handled this difficult situation. While your have been put in a very unpleasant situation, they are still your parents and this is clearly a sensitive issue for you. Hopefully some of the more harsh comments by some posters here are not hurtful to you.</p>
<p>blue,</p>
<p>if you have cosigned the lease, you are legally responsible for the rent, even if you don’t live there. That doesn’t mean you have to expect to pay it, just that the landlord can come after you if your parents don’t pay it. I am a leasing agent in an apartment complex and deal with this all of the time.</p>
<p>I would strongly suggest that you call the landlord and discuss how you can be taken off of the lease according to the state laws that the apartment is in.</p>
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<p>Certainly not until after the FAFSA is in early next year. Stay cool until then.</p>
<p>waiting until the FAFSA is filled out is the best of all worlds. She will still ultimately be responsible for the rent until then if her parents don’t pay it. That is 3-5 rent payments away. Can she afford that?</p>
<p>Blue, do you have a copy of the lease? If not, then get one. You are entitled if you are a cosignor. I’d suggest taking it to a student legal aid place and asking them for direction.</p>
<p>She can’t afford it, but getting through school is paramount and it will likely take a long enough time for the collections process to proceed that she can still graduate college and get gainful employment. </p>
<p>Like I said earlier, bankruptcy is the worst case option, and some negotiated settlement is more likely. Losing senior year of college because you drove your parents away and can’t get them to submit their meager financials is a much much worse scenario. What do you do then?</p>
<p>only Blue can decide what the right answer for her is. There are several possible right answers here. </p>
<p>She likely won’t be able to get off of the lease until it is time for renewal anyway. It doesn’t hurt for her to go ahead and have a copy of the lease and find out when it is up for renewal. I am sure she can find a way to do that much without making her parents angry enough to not give her FAFSA info. She can start doing background work, getting her ducks in a row, while maintaining civility and not telling everything she is doing and thinking.</p>