<p>On the website, Auburn lists the OOS cost for room and board yearly to be $8972. Does anyone know which dorm and type of meal plan they are basing this on? I am trying to get the numbers to add up and am not coming anywhere near that figure. Want to be sure I’m not leaving anything out when we’re trying to figure out our hard costs and compare schools, apples to apples. The meal plans are also a little confusing and not well explained. Can anyone assist in these areas? thx</p>
<p>No one, including Auburn, expects you to eat on the forced on-campus meal plan. As I understand it, the room and board number is what you can use for food and housing for 529.</p>
<p>Room and board is an estimate and can vary per child. Next year’s dorm prices are published. The required meal plan for students living on campus is $955, but it states that this is not intended to cover all of their meals. Basically, if your child decides to live in a standard double room in the Quad next year’s cost would be $2275 per semester or $4550 per year. Tack on the required meal plan cost of $955 per semester and your room and board subtotals $6460. The rest of the difference of $2512 from the published $8972 cost is very dependent on the child (extra food, entertainment, toiletries).</p>
<p>When we visited the campus - I had the same questions. proud_mom summed it up very well. Until this last year - students were not required to have a meal plan if they lived on campus. Strange as that may sound. The price difference in dorms is about $1000/semester between The Hill and The Village - with The Quad splitting the difference. We’ve used the school’s published number to answer room & board questions on scholarship apps - but I’ve figured a much lower actual cost.</p>
<p>Son is a freshman living in the quad. The minimum food amount will not cover all meals so you need to budget some additional dollars. Our total for the year will be $7900. For the extra dollars we put money in his bank account so he could decide if he wanted to put on the AU card or use the money at off campus restaurants, ramen noodles, frozen pizza, etc. He has budgeted his money very well and I know we could have gotten by with a little less money.</p>
<p>If your son or daughter eats all of their meals on campus at the various restaurants you could spend a lot more. It would be very easy to spend $20 to $25 a day (or more) if your student is not careful.</p>