<p>Ok…so you say you can “help” with UC costs, but not much beyond that.</p>
<p>Does that mean that you can pay for all of the UC costs (about $28k per year), or that you can pay for some of that? If you can only pay for some of the cost, how will the rest be paid? You will have 2 in college when S is a senior, so you’ll have to also consider that.</p>
<p>I know first hand how hard it can be with financial safeties. When DS1 was in high school, he only had eyes for top (unaffordable) schools. My son also had top stats and therefore he felt he “earned” the right to go anywhere he wanted. He even made some comment like, “Why did I work so hard if I don’t get to go to a top school?” We had to talk him out of his threats to just take out a bunch of student loans for all the costs beyond what we could pay. We didn’t want him burdened with $140,000+ in student loans from undergrad costs. </p>
<p>Finally, I literally had to “lay down the law” and insist that we visit some financial safeties to add to his “list” of potential schools. Thankfully, after visiting some “good school” financial safeties, DS1 was able to find 2 that he liked. It was also good to know that if he went to a financial safety that the schools were strong enough that he could always go to a top school for grad school.</p>
<p>Have you had a “heart to heart” talk with your son about school costs and finances? My son had a hard time remembering not to just look at tuition costs; I had to keep reminding him to look at all the costs…tuition, room, board, books, fees, misc, etc. Seriously, there are some fine schools that would give your son some nice merit scholarships. Certainly, your son doesn’t want to later find out that he can’t afford to go any of the schools on his list. Right?</p>
<p>Which financial safeties have you discussed so far with your son? Maybe some people here could come up with some more suggestions. There are some very good financial safeties out there…</p>