<p>Hi. I am trying to figure out a buget for my son for this summer and fall. In past lived in dorm with meal plan or university owned apt.
Starting June and summer school, his rent will be 650 plus he will have to split utilities. What would you suggest for monthly budget including rent? It is in LA. Does not belong to a frat?
thanks</p>
<p>When this occurred for our S in the LA area, we asked the housemates to ask the landlord for estimates on monthly utilities. Landlord estimated a few, and gave them the name of one previous year’s residents, to ask for more information on one of the bills. It might also be possible to have your student phone the utility company for records on that house by address, or describe it by square footage to get a very rough estimate on utility costs to heat or cool houses in that size range. I’m sure individual conservation practices, household size makes a difference but ask the utility company if they have any very general guidelines by square footage, age of house, and so on. </p>
<p>Based on those approaches, we began with a working budget of $50. per month for utilities. We learned that his rent already included hot water, so that made a difference (laundry usage). His rent didn’t include electricity which is significant for air conditioning costs, especially LA in the summer.</p>
<p>Remember to think of Internet service, if they will be splitting that. Most students don’t use telephone landlines anymore, so that’s one less bill. Instead, they use cellphones, each with their own contract plans, unshared among students. </p>
<p>For food, we emphasized he needed to cook in the house and now budget $75/week for all of his food needs, including candy bars or soda bought while on campus, sandwiches bought take-out, meals out with friends, whatever is Food. Anything he saved was his, so this gave him strong incentive to cook at his house and eat out less, since he pockets the leftover money from the $75. </p>
<p>As I recall, we began with $65/week for food but one look at his weight-loss in December caused me to realize he was scrimping on food, so we raised it by $l0 just so he would be sure to buy more groceries. After December, he went from cooking only cheese enchilladas to chicken enchilladas, and looks better for it. I shopped with him in December, too, to show him how to pick out some manageable meats (ground beef for hamburgers; chicken breasts for heartier meals). By then he was very price-conscious and it’s been a great thing to see him develop his cooking. I did buy him his first round of groceries (which came to around $200) as that’s expensive to start up from zero for pantry staples. Things like oil, a half-dozen spices, firsts of dishwashing/laundry detergents, we bought. That got him off on a good track for beginning to home-cook. Since then he knows what to replace. But that was outside the weekly food-budget; it was a send-off gift. I think if someone has eaten at home but never cooked for himself, that’s helpful to begin well. </p>
<p>TV is really sticky, since one kid thinks they have to have a great TV package with sports and movies, while another kid says “I hardly ever watch it…” so that takes a bit of negotation among roommates to establish what is fair.</p>
<p>If you think in terms of a “working budget” for food and utilities, just to try out and get started, and tell him you’ll both evaluate it after a few months’ time. That might be better than trying to calculate to the penny before it all happens. But, like you, we needed to start somewhere so that’s how we did it.</p>
<p>Personally, I found it hard to remember HIS due dates on utility bills, along with my own, when he lived so far away.</p>
<p>So I wrote a stack of future-dated checks for the first of each month. That way, he had the money in his posession, but couldn’t cash it too soon. </p>
<p>It is very important among roommates that everyone have this money on time, or it causes them plenty of friction. If one is late, the others have to pay bills on time and collect later from each other, which is very irritating. We wanted to be sure the flow of money kept our son able to pay on time each month. </p>
<p>Then we learned to date the checks 3 days BEFORE the first of each month, to allow bank time for those checks to clear before the students paid the utility company, which they often do online same-day from their bank accounts. Just a detail there that we didn’t know from the very beginning, but learned.</p>
<p>paying3tuitions gave some very good advice. My S was like p3t’s in that I didn’t think that he was eating very well first semester. We purchased a small commuter meal plan, I think it around 4 meals a week or 50 meals a semester. That way when he was on campus he could eat at the dining hall. It worked for him because without it, he was too cheap to eat on campus or he would have to remember to pack a lunch.</p>
<p>He did use the meal plan to eat with friends who remained on campus and it gave me some piece of mind. But my S is very cheap.</p>