<p>I'm posting this discussion here because I already have my finances in order, I just want to hear from those with experience about dealing with this sort of stuff.</p>
<p>So basically, I already decided where I want to go and what I want to do there. In the next fall I'll be going to UIUC to study Computer Science. Even though this is my state school, I still will need to take out a bit of loans. I imagine I'll have about 80k(ish) of student loans when I graduate. Personally, I'm not too worried because a CS graduate from UIUC typically makes around 90k (it's high because the school sends a lot of students to silicon valley, but thatss something I would be interested in). My parents, on the other hand, are straight from a lifestyle overseas where people usually do not have huge debts. This definitely scares them.</p>
<p>So, is this something I should be worried about? Thanks.</p>
<p>Um…YOU will not have $80,000 in STUDENT loans. You will have $27,000 in student loans, and then either private loans cosigned by your parents, or your parents will take the Parent Plus Loan. </p>
<p>Correct, sorry for that. I was just merely stating that they’re “mine” because I’ll be paying them off…but I should have stated that differently.</p>
<p>Yes, you should be worried. That’s a lot of debt. You should try to do everything you can to not borrow that much. Take a semester off and work, co-op, get some scholarships along the way, work work work in the summers.</p>
<p>Since the loans won’t all be in your name, you won’t be able to consolidate them into one payment, so each month you’ll be paying your payment and your parents’. That could be a big bill.</p>
<p>The chances of you making $90K a year right out of school are very small. You are making a lot of assumptions. It’s all right to be making plans and assumptions with your own money and credit, but you are doing this with your parents’. You do realize that you could be leaving them holding a big bag of debt if you cannot pay this back. Are your parents in position to be taking out this kind of debt? Frankly, I would never have done this to my parents, and my kids, for all of their issues, do not want to do this to us. </p>
<p>I know that Illinois is expensive, one of the most expensive states for even the in state schools. If you and your parents have not saved enough, can’t tighten the belt enough to pay about 2/3f of the costs from savings and current income, pushing every penny of the costs to the future is taking a huge risk. The past and the present heavily determine the future, and what it seems like is the case here is that you and your family haven’t saved, can’t pay anything out of current income, so you are borrowing half the cost, hoping that the future brings in more. Dangerous thinking. If your parents truly are on board about this, that’s one thing, but if they are scared and worried, you might want to spare them this risk. They are right to feel that way, as so many things can happen to derail your ambitious plans. </p>
<p>If you live at home, go to a local state school and make it to junior year successfully in such a program, you’ve increased your chances significantly for your idea to work, and the risk would be worth taking , borrowing the money for the last two years. To put down that kind of money, $80K, (and the interest on the parent and unsubsidized portions start accruing as soon as the funds for those loans are released) on what an 18 year old thinks s/he wants to do, is not something I would recommend to someone who cannot afford this kind of loan. Many computer majors switch out due to loss of interest, can’t bear the work, or the courses are not for them. Some of these majors, this one, the engineering, sciences have a very high attrition rate. Which is okay, if your family and you can afford this kind of risk, but if so much rides on it, …well, you are putting your parents in a bad place. </p>
<p>There is a reason that students can only borrow under $30K in Stafford loans. That is plenty of debt to have to repay when they start working. MANY, many, many students have lots of wonderful plans about how they are going to study x, y or z and make LOTS of money when they graduate but sadly, there are very few who do.</p>
<p>My S attending engineering school at USoCal. It has a wonderful reputation, but even so, there were many students who graduated with their engineering degree and couldn’t get a job. We talked with one who stayed an extra year to get a master’s because he couldn’t get a job the prior year with his bachelor’s in engineering and he complained he still couldn’t get a job but just had more debt.</p>
<p>Be VERY careful to minimize debt. NO ONE really knows what the economy will be like in the near future–there could be another tech bubble where hiring stops and there could even be layoffs in the year you are going to graduate and be looking for a job. Your folks could need their money or fail to qualify for loans and you WILL need a co-signer to get these BIG loans.</p>
<p>Not so long ago, nurses around here were getting huge signing bonuses (like 8k to 12k) in city hospitals. Our niece, who had her bachelors, decided to take one of those accelerated year long nursing programs. At the orientation, they promised the students that their loans weren’t going to be as big as they seemed (“They’re giving huge signing bonuses at hospitals all around the city!”) and that the affiliated hospital would offer all those students of a certain GPA a job when they graduated. Well, our niece finished at the top of her class with straight A’s. She passed the nursing boards in the minimum number of questions. But there were no job offers. Nursing in Philadelphia had dried up - in one short year it’d gone from 10k signing bonuses to you really need to know somebody to get in to a decently paying hospital. Fortunately for our niece, she did have connections and after 3 months was able to get a good job. But she never did get to make that big dent in her student loan bill. Now she has a husband and a baby and she’d love to work less hours, but it’s just not an option. </p>
<p>All this to say, minimize your debt. Computers may be great right now, but 4 years can be a long time in the tech market. Nobody foresaw that crash in nursing. </p>
<p>Be careful how you read the stats. Is $90,000 the AVERAGE salary or is it the 10th percentile, meaning 90% of the new grads earn $90,000 or more? If it is the median salary, that means half the new grads earn less and half earn more but it doesn’t tell you how much less or more. </p>
<p>Average can mean there are a few people getting jobs at $150,000 skewing the curve upward. In any case, it most certainly means a lot of new grads are earning less than $90,000.
At UNC-CH in 1984, there was a joke that the average salary of geography.majors was over $250,000. That was year MIchael Jordan joined the NBA.</p>
<p>Work very very hard and strive for summer jobs in Silicon Valley - they pay well and help with getting those high paying jobs.</p>
<p>This is one of the reasons UIUC is at the bottom of our list for D. With little or no chance for FA, stingy merit aid, and astronomical tuition even for instate students, it is not a good value for the money. </p>
<p>The short answer is that, if you have to borrow that much money, you really can’t afford it. If it were my child, there is no way I would co-sign for that amount of debt. It would be off to a cheaper school then transfer to UIUC.</p>
<p>I appreciate all the responses (criticism is appreciated too )</p>
<p>I feel that this really confirms all of my thoughts, and my parents’ of course too. It’s risky, it’s a ton of money, and yes I am making assumptions. So why do I keep with it? I really feel like I don’t have any other choices. </p>
<p>I could go to community college for free but then my shots at making it to Silicon Valley are just made 100X harder. (yes I could transfer to UIUC, but there’s more to explain than that). Just to explain it simply, I don’t think any east-coaster would be happy turning down Yale for community college…huge difference between the two. Without a doubt UIUC is hard to compare to Yale, but that’s how it feels for me because it is so great at CS. </p>
<p>Another choice is Iowa State, 40k cheaper (over 4 years of course) Though, I feel as if I’ll hate my time there, and my first job will (statistically speaking) pay less. So, chances are that the cost will even out if I go to UIUC within some time. Again assumptions, but I would rather make assumptions then be pessimistic. Otherwise, why would people go to college to begin with? Everybody assumes they are going to get a job. If we stopped making assumptions, we would stop going to college in general. Obviously, this assumption is a little more specific, but the job opportunity differences between these two schools are huge. </p>
<p>Also something my parents won’t understand so I don’t really speak of it, is the level of passion. At UIUC I have people who understand my great level of passion in coding and can even challenge my skills, whereas at other schools that just doesn’t exist. I don’t want to be a spoiled brat and put my parents in a bad place (which I know, is what I am doing), however, I really feel as if I have no other option that suits me. It’s a risk, and my parents and I recognize that.</p>
<p>$40K is not just that. Cost go up each year, and also there is that matter of interest that accumulates.</p>
<p>I understand perfectly. But your analogy still doesn’t hold. THis is not Yale vs CC. It’s UI vs IS. I know a lot of kids from Ill who went to Iowa, and really I see no harm done at all. Your field of study will determine your job chances and pay far more than which school you get the degree between those two schools. Yes, in academia and certain quarters, there UI is up there in the rankings. But not for you as an undergrad in your field. Really not worth it. You are too close to the trees to see the forest. </p>
<p>There is a kid who is not happy his parents won’t pay for CMU’s CS program which is probably #1 in the country, maybe the world and he’s going to OSU. Yes, some loss there, and certainly more than between UI and IS which some people have trouble even differentiating. The differences will even out, not the costs. The costs will increase because of the effect of interest and time. </p>
<p>It’s up to you and your parents, but you are 18 or so and I am 3X your age and have seen this time and again, whereas you are emotionally involved, still immature (as you should be at that age) and don’t know enough to make this sort of value judgment accurately, which is why no one, no institution will support your claim with loans at any interest rate in this capitalist country and system of ours. Believe me, if it’s such a great deal and you’re such a sure thing, someone woutd be there to capitalize it. The only ones you are fooling are your poor parents who love you and so they are giving you their money even though they can feel in their bones, this isn’t right. YOu are being a spoiled brat an puting your parents in a bad place, and you even know it, admit it , but still going to do it with other alternatives. My kids have their issues, and their immaturities, but they absolutely refuse to do this to me, and we, by formula can well afford it. I would have paid for that kid who had the CMU CS option if he were mine, but you, nope. Not a good deal. </p>
<p>You can go to UIUC, but just don’t go straight through. Go for a year, work for a year. Don’t borrow so much. Work during the year. Apply for scholarships. Don’t just accept that borrowing is the only way.</p>
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