Hello All, I’m new to this forum. I have twin girls who will graduate high school in 2 years and we are woefully underprepared the cost of putting them through school. My wife hasn’t worked full-time in 16 years (hoping that changes soon, as it will be a big help!), so as a result, we’ve not saved nearly enough for college. While I want my girls to have some “skin in the game”, I do not want them to 1) despise me for not planning better or 2) be saddled with huge student loans upon graduating from college. Reality says we certainly won’t be able to cover all of their college bills, but for financial aid purposes, having 2 in college at once should help, correct, even if they go to different schools (which is likely). Looking for others who’ve been in similar circumstances, and for advice on what you’ve encountered and/or things we should be aware of. Thanks!
You should be aware of your in state options.
You should be aware that what your children, alone without cosigners, can borrow is very limited. $5500 each in their first year.
You should hit the net price calculators (NPC’s) on several schools right off the bat so you have some framework.
You should know that the EFC estimated family contribution is the LEAST you will pay.
You should know that the schools define your need…not you. And they don’t care about your bills, the coast of living where you are, etc.
Edited to add that the NPC may not be accurate if you are divorced or have your own business.
You should know that you are not alone in this…lots of well intentioned parents with great kids are in the same boat. And you should definitely TELL your kids what you can and will pay each year. They need to know. Don’t be coy.
You should sit down- this weekend- with all your recurring bills, your cancelled checks, your tax returns from the last few years, your retirement account statements if you have.
Figure out based on this what you can realistically free up every month. The folks I’ve seen who are in the biggest hole are the ones who say, “We’d come up with 50K somehow for XYZ college” without a clue as to where that 50K (times four years times two kids) would come from.
Make a plan- now. If every year you’ve intended to sock away 12K in college savings but somehow disaster always strikes- the roof, the fridge, first the muffler and then the radiator on your car, guess what- you’re not going to stop driving or eating ice cream just because your kids are in college. If your day to day living and emergency needs have somehow made that 1k per month vanish into your household expenses, then you can’t plan to pull 1K per month out of your lifestyle by magic without specifying exactly where the money is coming from.
Own a vacation property with a sibling which you never use? The time to discuss selling your half is this week. You haven’t evaluated your insurance policies in 10 years and you think you might be over-insured? Pull out the policy now. You get a tax refund every year which you intend to put into savings but instead goes into your summer vacation? March down to payroll on Monday and get your forms adjusted so you aren’t giving the federal government an interest free loan every year, and then fill out the form to have that amount automatically deducted from your paycheck into a savings account (or retirement account if your company has a match). You can vacation at the local zoo this year and treat yourselves to a nice corn on the cob/burger BBQ in the backyard knowing that your “vacation” dollars are working hard for you every day.
However you want to start- don’t wait. And don’t be afraid to show your kids (to the extent that you are comfortable sharing) where the household money goes so they don’t think, "Oh Dad makes 80K per year. Surely he can swing 40K in tuition- it’s only four years…) like some of the kids who post here do…
What is your EFC? How will that change if your wife gets a job?
Start letting them know that hard work pays off no matter where they end up in college. Our kids were aware that there were financial limitations to their choices. One asked me" why would I work hard to get good grades to end up at the same college as kids who don’t study?
Well, for one, you don’t know where they will end up going to school- and the better they do, the more choices they will have. Also, even if they end up in the same school as a student who they don’t think worked as hard in school as they did, their efforts could pay off in attending the honors college, perhaps a merit scholarship, being better prepared and doing well in that college.
Readjust your own attitudes and be prepared to counteract some of the “college talk” that students hear. Well meaning relatives may have ideas about where the twins should go to college- based on the tuition and admission statistics when they attended- back in 1960. However, tuition and admissions have vastly changed - even in the last few years. I heard a parent say that her child “only” got into college X, not the parent’s first choice for her. Although College X is a decent and respectable college, how could that child get excited about attending knowing that her parents were disappointed? When you hear of a peer attending a college, speak highly of it. Many colleges have strong aspects such as supportive instructors, a good program for certain subjects, find out what they are.
When it is time to apply, you will be in a better position to consider your options.
You’re where I was two years ago but I only have one daughter. What did I do? I ran a lot of NPCs on a lot of colleges and eliminated a lot of schools. It didn’t matter if D liked them. They were gone. I had D take the SAT/ACT June of her sophomore year. In hindsight, it was a tad early but it gave us a baseline of where she might go in terms of academics (she had never done any standardized testing before this). Just so you know, she was not a high stat child so all those no-loan, need blind, generous schools were out of the picture. We have a prepaid trust for her to all the instate public universities and colleges, that was the ultimate fallback. She ended up applying to small LACs where her last ACT score was above the 75th percentile or very close to it. She had picked those schools based on a lower initial score and stuck with the same schools. That strategy worked out quite well, not only in acceptances but in merit aid awards.
We had to look at our finances. We had assets from inheritances and we had to figure out what to, well, free up and what to keep. As @blossom put it, if you have a vacation home and even if you do use it once or twice a year, you may have to make that painful decision to sell it. If you take a vacation every year, you may need to pull back. If you eat out four times a week, make it once a week.
What I found most helpful was sending my income straight to savings so that we could live on just my husband’s income. That took some adjusting for us. So, if your wife does get a job, just send her paycheck to a savings account away from your paycheck.
Last, tell your children about the financial situation now. I don’t think it has to be a big announcement but make sure they understand that they do not have free rein when it comes to choosing their colleges. They will need to consider costs and name a specific dollar amount. Say you cannot pay more than X amount of dollars.
I don’t think your children will despise you if you put constraints on their college search. In fact, they may actually appreciate the parameters. Looking for schools is exhausting and it’s easy to get overwhelmed by the sheer number of schools out there. Saying something like “you need to look within 3 hours and this is what we can afford” may make things more manageable, not less so.
Following this thread because a good friend of mine is in a similar position: limited finances and twins (high school freshmen). In his case, he’s already told his kids that if they want to go anywhere but their local public schools, they will need scholarships. The kids are good students in an IB program, but there are tens of thousands of others like them, so…
Good advice above. Add to that that now is a good time to do what you can to help them qualify for merit scholarships! There is plenty of non-need based scholarship money available for top students, so if you can do anything to help them in that regard, go for it! If they can ace the PSAT, they may have a shot at National Merit, which means lots of full-ride opportunities. Also, the better the SAT and ACT scores, the more money they may get at certain universities. Lots of universities give automatic scholarships based on GPA and SAT/ACT scores. This summer would be a good time for them to take an SAT or ACT prep class (in person or online) so they are ready for junior year PSAT, SAT and ACT tests.
If you’ve raised them right, they’ll be very understanding. Everyone makes choices and having a parent stay part-time so she/he has more time with them in childhood is nothing to be ashamed of. My own kids and husband have always appreciated that I work part-time around their school/work hours and they’ve always know that choice had a financial impact. When we sat down with D about the college budget, there was no anger or resentment. She was grateful to have ANY help to be honest. Yes, she did feel a bit pressured because she didn’t want one of the huge state schools we could afford but it also gave her some time to accept that she needed either large merit or into a competitive full-needs school. She did the latter. S (high school freshman) watched big sister go through it so well prepared.
Your girls are sophomores. Like others have said, figure out what you can offer each of them. Do some research as to what that means in terms of options. Give them some names of specific colleges and how those particular schools would be possible… “this is a school you could attend, live at home and have no debt… this is a school we can afford with modest student loans and your summer earnings… this is a school where your chances at enough merit are very high… this is a school that promises to meet full need and we are in the position to pay our EFC.” They don’t have to GO to those schools but they’ll have a more concrete idea of the TYPES of schools to look at. Believe me, they WILL appreciate knowing. We know too many kids who applied to schools they could never afford, attended schools they had to leave after the first year because of the expense, or even undervalued what they could have (like only applying to local state schools they hated because they didn’t realize their stats opened doors to other options.)
In the end, you aren’t required to give your twins a college education. They should understand that it’s a kindness to help them even if it’s community college and local state transfer.
Good input here. Also would add that in addition to strong grades and test scores, many colleges may make merit scholarship decisions based in part on the nature of ECs. Some seemed particularly prone to offer merit for high levels of civic engagement or meaningful, ongoing community service. Others may favor different activities. Not suggesting resume padding here, just noting that pursuits done sincerely, with depth, that relate to who the student is, may play into the decisions. For our non-ED kid, some schools were very responsive to 4 years of increasing levels of responsibility and visibility in community service. These colleges rewarded that consistency (in spite of a bit of unevenness elsewhere in the transcript) and also had no application required merit aid. Scoping out what schools consider as part of these decisions may help with matches for your twins.
Best with this. I have seen far more problems when people aren’t realistic about costs, than when they are direct with their kids.
TwinsDad, I will PM you later tonight.
Before they make their application lists, be sure to tell them exactly what the cost constraints will be, so that they can build their application lists accordingly. These forums are full of disappointed students and parents who failed to have the money talk before the application list was made, so that they find that most or all of their admissions are to schools which are too expensive.
Look at the links on this thread.
Lots of good info there. As you can see, some were written a few or more years ago, so do check each school to see if the info still applies.
Lots of options out there.
@TwinsDad73, welcome – you’re in the right place. Lots of great info from this group.
Run some NPC. If you are likely to get need-based Fainancial AId, then there is an advantage (over the long haul) to having twins so more years of “two in college”.
So understand where you are! In our case, we could afford two years at the local CC, then two years at an in-state public. Period. And yes it was saddening and painful to come to that conclusion, but we were able to, and we were able to hold the line. Kid graduated last May with less than the equivalent of junior and senior year Stafford loan debt. She’s off to a great start in her professional field, and has no regrets.
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Work out what you can afford to pay for given your current income and expenses. Don’t count on your wife getting a job that will make $X. That might not materialize. Get on the same page about the money with your wife. You will need to be able to maintain a united front about the money issue.
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Tell your kids what the bottom line option is. If they can get a scholarship to some place else, well OK, but your costs can’t be more than $Y.
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When your kids’ teachers and relatives and whoever else is around them/you start to talk about how College A or University B would be perfect for your kids, look those people in the eye and tell them that you know what you can afford, and that A, B, and C are out of your price range but you would be delighted if they would help your kids get scholarships for A, B, or C. Maybe they do know something you don’t and can get the money your kids need. If they don’t know anything special, being told bluntly what is and isn’t in your price range will probably be sufficient to shut them up.
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As necessary, remind your kids what their options are, and make sure that they know what those places have to offer them. Your budget will allow a choice between the local CC and two or three in-state publics? Well then make certain to visit all of them and check them out. Your budget is a bit bigger than that? Visit some places that you and your kids have identified as being in the affordable range and reasonable academic options. There’s no need to waste anyone’s time on places that can’t be brought into your price range, or where your kids aren’t likely academic matches.
How are the girls at standardized testing? Did they take the PSAT this year? At any rate is is changing, but practice materials should be out soon. Have you heard of he National Merit Scholarship Corporation?
@TwinsDad73, Don’t beat yourself up. Being prepared to shell out $500,000+ for two simultaneous educations isn’t likely at most of our households.
I think it’s important to get to educate yourself on the different types of aids and which are offered by schools your daughters may be interested in.
First, on need-based aid: As noted, generally speaking you can get an idea of how much need-based aid you may be eligible for by running your information through a few net price calculators that you’ll find on the colleges’ web pages. (I really don’t know if NPCs are calibrated to deal with twins at the same school, though.)
Be aware that some colleges only offer need-based aid, period. So if their estimated family contribution works for you, then good, add that school to the list. If it doesn’t, then move on. Don’t expect to get more.
Second, on merit aid: Some colleges offer both need-based aid (income based) and merit aid (achievement based). For a comprehensive list of colleges that offer merit aid look at the thread at the top of this board. You should also check each college’s website for information on the requirements and restrictions of their merit awards or scholarships.
Fortunately you are starting with enough time for your twins to prepare as well as possible for their PSAT/NMSQT in Oct 2015 when they will be juniors. You should visit the Financial Aid & Scholarships forum on CC and learn as much as you can about the many opportunities open to students who score highly enough to qualify for NMSF in their state and take steps to help them start preparing. An optimal time for PSAT prep is the upcoming summer and, because the upcoming PSAT will be under the new regime, you should definitely get a head start.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/national-merit-scholarships/
https://www.collegeboard.org/delivering-opportunity/redesigned-psat-nmsqt
That said, even if your girls don’t quite make NMSF in your state, the time they spend prepping for the PSAT will pay off when they have to eventually take the SAT, which should help with other merit scholarships.
They’ve not taken any standardized tests yet. Their school will offer the SAT next year to all juniors. As I’m reading the threads, I think we’ll look into having them take the PSAT sooner. They are both A-B students with GPAs in the 3.6-3.7 range on a 4.0 scale…