<p>There was a thread in the Parent's Forum asking about what sort of things that could happen requiring more money than expected during a school year.</p>
<p>Well, any and everything can happen. It always bothers me to see families drawing up plans and budgets right down to the dollar of the school cost, because, frankly, things don't always go the way it's planned. In fact, they rarely do. And it's not always at the student's end either.</p>
<p>Just in the past week, I've been hit with thousands of dollars of unexpected costs. Happens all of the time but not of this magnitude. That's why we won't go right up to our true maximum in terms of college expenses . We have trouble enough meeting the goals we set.</p>
<p>Thank you for saying that. I’ve thought this for years but never started a thread. I’ve had kids in college for 6 years and 6 more years of college tuition to go. During that 6 years I’ve had a year of unemployment, thousands and thousands in dental work for H and I, one operation and emergency room trip for S1 and one hospital stay for S2 and all the enusing medical bills, a car was that hit and of course insurance didn’t cover the entire cost of the replacement, we’ve had tenant leave and not filled rentals for months depleting cash flow and the list goes on. It’s fiscally dangerous to start counting the pennies in the sofa to get the money together for college.</p>
<p>This is such a great point to make. How many times do we hear people say things like, “well, it will be a stretch, but I think we can manage if we are very strict with the budget.”</p>
<p>That is a recipe for disaster. What family can go 48 months straight without some major big expense…major car repair (or worse, replacement!), major appliance replacement, pricey dental work (oops, broke a crown), pricey house repair (leaky roof or broken AC unit), etc…the possibilites for surprise expenses are endless. Even an emergency trip to see a very sick loved one (or attend the funeral) can break the budget. </p>
<p>These kinds of unexpected expenses don’t just come up once every few years; they tend to come up once every couple of months. A family can have 4-6 of these every year. These “surprises” can add up to $10k per year or more!</p>
<p>There was a student who posted one summer whose family suddenly didn’t have their “family contribution” for Emory because the of a major home repair that couldn’t be delayed and cost $6k. That $6k was most of the money they had for the “contribution.” They had no pad. Just one (pricey) unexpected expense devastated this carefully counted-to-the-penny budget. </p>
<p>There has to be some pad built into the budget. Some pad for unexpected school-related expense and some pad for unexpected family-related expenses.</p>
<p>Oh wow…emergency room visits. H had an emergency room visit about 18 months ago. We got the hospital bill, it was $1200. H said, “oh, our insurance will pay that.” I had to tell him that our insurance had already paid most of the charge, and that $1200 was our portion. The ambulance bill was $1100. Of course we hadn’t planned on any of this.</p>
<p>I’ve been thinking about this a lot recently. We had a bathroom flood situation in Feb. that left us with a gaping hole in the ceiling of the living room, bathroom and hallway floors that needed to be re-done, etc. I’ve managed to keep the repairs within the payment from our homeowner’s insurance, but boy oh boy that $1000 deductible I’m saving by serving as my own contractor is some of the hardest money I’ve ever “earned”. I can’t even imagine what it would be like to have to deal with this kind of repair work if it hadn’t been covered by the insurance. My fingers are crossed that there will be no major appliance or plumbing failures until Happykid finishes school. If there are, we do have a cushion, but not one that is as big as I’d like. Sigh.</p>
<p>Study abroad is popular with college kids nowadays, so you need to budget for airfare to far away places. Typical destinations are Europe, Asia, and Australia. It ain’t cheap.</p>
<p>The gremlins are hard at work here. We have been planning for months, really all year to fly out for DS’s graduation. Now that the air tickets were purchased, hotel room reserved and we are set, the car needs work, two trees need to come down (dangerous situation), high school son has some accelerated expenses plus his team is going to a camp that sells out early so gotta reserve a spot and pay asap, my mother has been switched to a med that is expensive out of pocket, I lost my contact lens and need an eye exam to get new ones, and DH broke a tooth. Our ride to the airport just had an emergency and is leaving town so we have to drive ourselves and leave our car there–3 days of parking, My credit card balance is dangerously high already from other things. I went rock bottom on air tickets–we are transferring and have odd time flights-- I really planned for this, and now it’s like our money’s being drained this month.</p>
<p>My freshman son got hit this second term with all kinds of unplanned things. Had trouble in a class so he had to quit his job which he had been so thrilled to secure. He got assigned a single for next year which means higher housing costs. He needs to pay to re certify for life guarding this summer right up front. ALso he has to transfer school within his university resulting in higher tuition, something we had hoped he could do after sophomore year, but nope, cant’ take critical courses unless he is in that school. High schooler wants to take a summer class which is a bargain in cost, but the books and the transportation bring the cost up. </p>
<p>I am reminding myself that these are all non essential things in that they are not life or health threatening, and so we are fortunate.</p>
<p>For study abroad trips, it is not only the expensive airfare, but the little side trips that add up. While on the one hand, you want your kid to take in the expense and perhaps, go to London/Paris/Spain for the weekend, because it is only $20 on Ryan Air, but those incidental charges add up quickly. And let us not forget the US $ is weak overseas, so even if you feel that you have given your child a “lot of $” for spending money, you will find out quickly enough that it does not buy much.</p>
<p>Let’s not forget for grad/professional school the process starts all over again; airfares, flying to interviews, admitted student days, exam prep and fees (3500 for bar review, 250 to sign up to take the bar, 160 for professional ethics exam, $$ move kiddo’s stuff back, $2500 to sublet an apartment close to school over the summer because lease is up at the end of the month) and the list goes on…</p>
<p>Right now, i’m trying to get through the summer. Want to refinance the house so we have to look good on paper and this is not a good start. DH is not at all happy about cancelling vacation this year. We had hoped to rent a house on the Shore for a week as we used to do but stopped some years ago, and thought we could manage it this year. </p>
<p>Again, I am well aware that these are all luxuries. But I did plan and budget, and that all crashed and is burning at the moment. Any leeway, I made is up in smoke.</p>
<p>We’ve found very real additional college expenses. ANd I’m not talking about “study abroad”. That’s a choice, and one the ds only get to make if they’re footing the bill. </p>
<p>You hear people say that COAs are inflated because personal expenses are never that high. True, they aren’t, but “standard fees” are never that low. The fin aid guide lists as standard fees those that are charged to everyone–health, technology, etc. BUT, all but a very few of d’s classes have had lab fees associated with them. We’re probably talking an extra $1200/year. These will get higher each year. She changed majors and has to take a summer class ($) or add a fifth year. Summer class is cheaper than a 5th year, but still an expense not budgeted for. She also has to take it at another institution (science building closed for construction this summer at her U). </p>
<p>Before fall classes start, she needs a physical, including specific tests (one to prove she’s had the chicken pox) that insurance won’t pay for. She needs scrubs, a stethoscope, shoes. She has to take an outside CPR certificaiton (the one she has for lifeguarding isn’t the right kind - Red Cross vs. AHA or something like that). A year from this summer, she’ll need to go to school for some kind of health certificaiton so she can start getting real work experience in a health care setting . . .</p>
<p>And that’s just the school stuff. Throw that in with all the other routine unexpected stuff (in the last month, dh needed a new crown, car was hit and run TWICE and we had to get a new one - can we just say a old high mileage vehicle more than 10 years old is worth damn little). </p>
<p>So, yeah, the thought of living so close to the edge for however many years there’ll be kids in college is just scary! Even scarier, families who have to do this kind of thing to afford any kind of school at all.</p>
<p>Regarding planning for unexpected, or failure to do so - this is no different from people overextending themselves with mortgages - one of the reason we are all in this housing bubble mess.</p>
<p>I just hope at some point people will wake up and realize that it is absurd to pay 50-60K per year for education if they can barely afford it and stop doing that. Then maybe an educational bubble will burst too and then college will become affordable to more people, and not just independently rich. </p>
<p>Great topic - and so totally true, and you don’t just need the cushion for the unexpected costs and emergencies but how about that little bit extra for the good stuff too. We could never afford the full cost of a summer program but when one of my kids was given a full tuition scholarship for a language program I wanted to be able to say yes even though room and board costs approached 2k. They did the work to get the scholarship, I wanted to be able to support and match their efforts. It would have broken my heart to say no. So yes, absolutely if you can do it at all - do have a cushion for both the unexpected bad and the unexpected good!</p>
<p>My cousin’s son got a great opportunity for a language program. He had applied for a scholarship for it and did not make the first round, but then was accepted. Oh, how happy they all were for the full scholarhship, until they realized that room and board were not covered and, yes expensive. Plus transportation there and back and supplies, and that he lost that time period from work that summer when he could have been making money. Yes, it all adds up.</p>
<p>The past is a good indicator for the future. If you had trouble saving for college, (and though we saved, not nearly enough), it’s not going to be any easier paying for it and paying off the loans. Things still keep on happening. Great opportunities that cost money keep popping up–a killer this year for my son who so want to do a trip, that has turned his financial upside down. Really, he can’t afford it. Really, we can’t afford a week at the beach. Really we can’t afford to go to DS’ graduation. All of this will go on credit cards with no new income to to pay the balance down.</p>
<p>And we are considered upper income, in that we don’t qualify for financial aid with 2 in college.</p>
<p>Don’t expect your college health center to be able to handle everything that happens. D’s freshman year we had an emergency room visit (after 2 trips to the health center and no help), and two medical specialists (multiple visits)…even with insurance, the costs were really high. You think you are safe with that health center right there, but don’t assume what they can do…</p>