We paid a little more than 80K extra for our kids to go to schools they wanted to vs schools they could have gone to (2 of the 3 anyway, together, not each). No regrets at all TBH. We cut a lot of things out of our lives in order to travel more, but to us, the two schools chosen were worth it.
I guess I see it like any other purchase. Do you want the less expensive car or more expensive one, the less expensive vacation or the more expensive one, the less expensive house or the more expensive one. When two things are equal in value to the buyer, most will choose less expensive, but when there’s a difference, costs vs value get weighed.
Everyone has to make their own choices with it.
That said, check with Baylor and tell them he’d really like to go there but CU is so much less expensive, can they perhaps offer a little more to make it easier on you? I haven’t seen it done with Baylor because I don’t know anyone who’s gone there, but where I am, sometimes it can work out better for kids/parents - other times not. The worst that can happen is they say no.
I’m pondering the exact same question. If D has a dream school, she hasn’t shared it with us (probably to avoid disappointment if it doesn’t pan out); all the schools she’s applied to are ones she would be fine with attending. And if it ends up being the in-state one, it might be a little deflating because she really wants to go OOS but there are definitely positives to the in-state one too (not just financial positives). We’re still waiting to hear from a lot of schools though, so the question is still rhetorical for us.
Never bought the kids cars, never bought the kids houses. I have too many friends whose parents subsidized their “grown up lives” and it never turned out well. Kids ended up in neighborhoods where they couldn’t keep up with the Jones’, ended up overspending on stupid things because they never learned to save up for a down payment or other major purchase, etc.
So as mean as it sounds- we paid for education, “best fit” and not lowest price, and we told them early and often “We pay for 8 semesters. You can come home and live with us until you find a job and I will graciously kick in food and not charge you for utilities, etc. But while our love is forever, our financial support ends at college graduation”.
It worked. They took advantage of their educational opportunities, had interesting jobs while in college, internships, etc. and figured out how to launch. Yes, there were years of living in cruddy apartments with roommates and having friends over to share a pot of chili and beer instead of nice restaurant meals. But that’s what it means to be in your 20’s- learning to live within your means.
But now that they are “real” grownups, they are in satisfying and well paying careers, and whatever long range goals they have (cars, homes, vacations) that’s on them and their partners to figure out.
It helped that we started saving early- and were in good health, and had two incomes for the entire time they were growing up (one brief period of unemployment with two in college but we had planned for the possibility for a while).
YMMV. But I have friends who are still subsidizing their kids lifestyles even as the kids get close to 40 years old, and it’s really not a great dynamic. Parents gave us a down payment- does that mean they get to show up every Sunday morning expecting brunch and entertainment? Parents bought me the car- does that mean I’m never allowed to take off with friends and drive to the beach for the weekend because they’re expecting me at “Family lunch” on Sunday? It’s hard to untangle the “gifts” from the expectations sometimes.
That doesn’t seem quite the same as saying here’s a pot of money, decide what you think will be the best long term use of it (undergrad, grad school, downpayment). Do kids with a trust fund or inheritance never turn out well? There’s a difference between having money of your own and going back to your parents for a handout whenever you are short.
We are in this boat. I will say that if S2 decides to go to our State flagship(at a very modest tuition number, and expenses will be significantly less compared to other schools), then we might look at contributing to a down payment on a car or condo/house after he graduates. The savings on our part will not be small if he goes the local route.
Cornell, not so much.
We wouldn’t have allowed a 17 year old to make a decision like this. Which is NOT the same thing as saying “You decide where you want to go”. We were willing to pay more for rigor, academic opportunities, etc., not for proximity to great skiing or gorgeous dorms.
Trust fund kids? there’s a reason why many T&E lawyers advise making the age of majority 35 or thereabouts (which is crazy when you think about it). But that allows a wealthy young person to launch a career, build credit, make spending decisions without having access to their trust funds. Inheritance? That also depends. The trope of the kid crashing the porsche and then buying another has some basis in reality. Not all wealthy families churn out irresponsible kids (and poor families do as well, don’t get me wrong).
But letting a 17 year old decide how to spend 320K? Not in my house. Cars and condos and a lavish wedding sound like a lot more fun than some of other alternatives when you are a teenager…
I think a lot depends on what the intended major is and what his career aspirations are. If he’s planning on a field which will result in a good paying job right out of college, then using your resources now for the best fit. But if the intended major is likely to result in graduate school, then it might be wiser to save your money and project college costs over 5-8 years rather than 4.
We paid college rates for boarding school (no aid), then kiddo chose “free” college. No regrets on any money spent on education but, had his choices been civilian colleges, I’m pretty sure he would have chosen the least expensive as that’s how he rolls. Most likely, we would have gifted him any 529 money he didn’t spend.
If I have any regrets, they’re not about money. Had we known he was going to go the military route, I’m not sure we would have allowed him to leave home so early. We missed so much. Once he left for the academy, he never really came home again. We didn’t get the typical college breaks/summers with him. I wish I had those high school years back.
@CUBuffs1, it sounds like you can pay the extra $80K but would prefer not to even for a college you describe as better fit. If I were in your shoes, I would try to determine which is more important, cost or fit? If my son’s heart were set on a particular college and that college met all his requirements, AND I could pay that bill without seriously affecting other siblings or my retirement, there is no question I would let him go to his dream school. But, we also would have talked about this scenario before it occurred as it is a very common one. If finances were going to be a driving factor or even a major consideration, that should have been discussed and decided on beforehand to avoid any disappointments. It sounds like you can pay but, faced with these choices, you’d prefer to pay less. Everyone prefers to pay less, but is that the real issue here?
One other question for @CUBuffs1 to consider: did you make or imply any previous promises about college funding? If so, did they include the cost of the most expensive college?
I don’t know about OP, but for us, it is a hard thing to decide in advance out of context.
It is easier in theory: yes, many would be willing to spend more for Princeton or Yale than a state school.
But it gets harder on the margins — are they willing to spend nearly Ivy League tuition for a fine private school, but not a top-ranked school with international name recognition (that is, not one that many would list if asked to name top US colleges off the top of their heads)?
I don’t think it is a yes or no answer. It isn’t “are you willing to buy the more expensive car or not.” Because it depends on WHICH car/school and exactly how much more money are we talking about.
That’s harder to know in advance, especially when you haven’t seen financial aid/scholarship packages and are still learning about each college.
I might be willing to pay more for extra safety features on a car, but not for flashier wheels. Similarly, I might decide that smaller classes and less bureaucracy are worth it to ensure my student’s success, but a higher ranking isn’t worth paying for.
if it were me - and i just had one kid - i’d put all my eggs in one basket and chose Baylor.
college changes kids. if your son wants to be in a smaller school with a faith-based component, then why not? late teens are really the formative years. If this is where he wants to be now, feels like he would prosper and succeed, i’d go for it. You dont get these years back.
Not in my house (but these are kids who set up a Roth IRA at 16 and were taught to do their own tax return at 17). They learned a lot more about money and investing than their classmates who never thought about a college bill and had parents paying for all their needs. And every extra scholarship they’ve earned in college is money back in their pockets for a car etc.
Some kids might need protecting from rash decisions, but many are certainly capable of engaging rationally with the biggest financial decision of their lives (at least until they eventually buy a house).
It depends on the kid and if you can afford it. For D , she went to GW, which was her dream school. She got in, and got merit. If she had not gotten merit different convo. For her the DC environment and the “fit” socially was important, as well as other factors (she wanted a heavy Jewish environment). That being said, if she wants to do grad school, that is now on her. There are times that she looks back and thinks that going elsewhere that was cheaper would have been the prudent choice, but would that have made her who she is? Of course Covid skewed everything as well.
For S, we did give him an option, to go more local and then we would keep the difference for later use, or he could go to RIT which was a great fit for him . Academically it has been the best choice, and he is graduating early, so we dont have regrets there, but he also sometimes thinks about the alternative. Once again HIGHLY skewed by Covid. He has only had one normal semester his entire college life. But who could have predicted this.
So do we regret spending more to send them to the better fit/where they wanted to go, no we do not. It paves the way of whom they are today.
If what your son wants to study though, will require graduate school, I think then its a harder think.
As far as the faith-based aspect, DD did want a Christian college and I would have loved that too, except the cost was out of range, and then when she picked a major it was only offered at the public.
Anyway, at her public she is in 2 Bible Study groups, 2 discipleship groups, sometimes goes to Navigators etc., and attends church with her friends every Sunday. The college years can still be very Christian based if your kid is intentional about seeking it out.
But for her it was a matter of needing loans beyond the federal at Christian vs. no loans at public. Since you can actually afford Baylor, it’s up to you and your son what experience is best, but just wanted to let you know how it’s gone for my kid.
I need to add…we didn’t pay for a “dream school”. If the college had been just that, I’m not sure what we would have done.
BUT we, along with our kids, vetted colleges before applications were sent. Kids applied only to colleges that they liked and would have been happy to attend. Sure, both had choices they liked the best, but not in the “dream school” sort of category.
Our S had a dream school - we had a set amount we could spend per year. Yes, it seemed “perfect”, he loved it. It was over budget. We wavered, but in the end we told him no.
It was painful, he was very upset and said all his hard work was for nothing etc.
In the end he ended up at another school with a nice merit scholarship and will have a manageable loan when he graduates next year.
He recently thanked me for not caving.
D21 didn’t have a dream school. She applied to 9 schools - 3 that she was relatively excited about, 3 that she thought she could probably be happy at and 3 others that she was “meh” about (a safety and 2 others that she added after getting a surprising early deferral but had no emotional attachment to).
She’s a kid who benefits most from the best overall fit. It wouldn’t matter whether if the school was a T20, if she couldn’t see herself being comfortable and successful there then it wouldn’t appeal to her. It would have been great if “the dream” involved an in-state school, but it didn’t. That said, we did have a max cost in mind and wouldn’t have signed off on $200K++ even for an Ivy. We also have the benefit of a big age gap between our two kids (D21 is the younger of the two), so we’re not saddled with multiple tuition bills at one time and had some recovery time in between.
I guess if either kid had a “dream school” in mind that was outside of the realm of what we were willing to pay, I would have nipped that dream in the bud before the application went out - unless I could be more than confident that stats would result in a significant scholarship or if my kid had a hook that would result in admission with aid. I’m not a “Well, let’s see if you can get in and then will worry about paying for it” type of parent.
Anyway - no regrets so far about paying for the school that she’s at.
We sent both our sons to very expensive private schools and have zero regrets - they both had tremendous experiences and we would do it again in a heartbeat. But, it didn’t change our financial picture.
Would I do it again if it was a financial stretch? My answer to that question may be different - especially since our in-state school is an excellent one. In this case, I think we would have needed to be convinced the extra $$ (which over 4 years is a lot) was really the best option.
I don’t think you have to necessarily know it in advance. You just have to have parameters around making a determination. Your kid should not have a huge list of potential schools. And you can create the list of schools based on those you think are more likely to offer aid. Still will need to wait for actual determinations (and admissions) but if aid is needed, you wouldn’t want to waste time applying to schools with little/no chance at getting aid.
And you can have different amounts you are willing to pay. We are willing to pay $x dollars for a, b and c schools and $x minus some amount for d, e and f schools. But at least having discussions with respect to parameters will be more helpful than just winging it.