<p>I've been crunching numbers to see how much I will spend at UCSD so I know wether or not to accept all of my loans. Here is the budget I came up with:</p>
<p>Tuition: $11330
Room & Board $9600 (took off the $650 pre-payment)
Books/Supplies $1500
Transportation $600
Personal $1600
Orientation $140
Insurance $930
Total $25800</p>
<p>Does this seem about right? Am I overestimating or underestimating anything?</p>
<p>books should not come out to $1500, though i’m not sure how much money you will be using on supplies, but i brought all my supplies from home so i didnt really use much besides bed sheets, desk lamp, and a few other things</p>
<p>and even if you buy books, you can sell them after you’ve used them so you can get a lot of your money back… heck, i sold my books for MORE than i bought them for and actually made a profit haha. so you’re probably overestimating there.</p>
<p>and im not sure about transportation. where are you from? norcal? socal? out of state? if you don’t go home often (maybe just during the long breaks, aka thanksgiving, winter, and spring), you might be overestimating.</p>
<p>$1500 is a gross overestimate for books and supplies. $1600 for personal stuff? I don’t know what you have planned but somebody sounds like a high roller. :)</p>
<p>@happyhappy: Well I got the $1500 estimate from UCSD, they had a breakdown of what I will probably spend on books/supplies, and it said $1500. Thats one of the ones I thought was a bit much but I didn’t know how much I would spend on it. Do you know how much you spent on books? As for transportation, I just threw in a number there. On the UCSD budget breakdown it said I would spend $1000 on transportation. I thought $600 would be a good number. I’m from SoCal, Inland Empire region specifically.</p>
<p>@$KingsElite$: So $1600 for personal stuff is too much? lol Stupid UCSD budget telling me that I’m going to spend a lot haha.</p>
<p>^Maybe 1600 is too much if you’re a guy but I’m pretty sure as a girl it’s easy to spend that much, if not more…</p>
<p>$30-$40/week on personal items is too much? $1600 is a good estimate for most people as long as you’re not splurging all the time. Eating out with friends will definitely play into that very fast.</p>
<p>i probably spent around $600 on books this year, but it totally depends on what classes you are taking and whatnot. also, i would suggest buying your books from the application on facebook called “marketplace” or using a site like amazon or half.com for used books. the reason how much you spend on books depends on your classes is cuz some classes are a series like math 20a-b-c which all require the same textbook, and you obviously wouldn’t be spending much on textbooks as compared to if you were taking 3 math classes that all required different text books. i’ve sold all but 2 of my textbooks (i still need them for classes next year), and i made around $500 from selling them.</p>
<p>After my first year, I’ve bought maybe 2 textbooks. Most classes (especially those with bigger lectures) generally have ample quantities of books on reserve that can be checked out from the library. Just use them in times OTHER than right before exams, and you’ll be fine.</p>
<p>@UCSD951</p>
<p>I feel like if you’re trying to save money, you can easily spend less than $1600.</p>
<p>@ucsandiego915, Oyama</p>
<p>Just curious, what did you guys spend your money on that required $1600?</p>
<p>Between:</p>
<p>Cell phone/Insurance/MacBook Pro/Gas/Parking Permit/Eating Out/Longboard/Snorkeling Equipment/etc., I easily went over whatever they estimated we allocated for personal expenses. $600 for transportation only covers a parking permit; my freshman year was when gas was at $4 (even around $5 in La Jolla) per gallon for gas, so weekly expenses then were $30-$40 for a fuel-efficient sedan.</p>
<p>This past year I’ve spent around $14,000 on personal expenses this year not including the above mentioned.</p>
<p>^Fair enough. You have some things there that I don’t have to worry about paying for and then I put a laptop under supplies. But yeah, the amount of money needed will be different for everyone. I guess I’m not much help.</p>
<p>And BOTTOM LINE</p>
<p>Take out all the subsidized loans they give you. If you didn’t end up using it, contact your creditor and just refund your excess amount. You don’t begin to accrue any interest on federal subsidized loans until 6 months AFTER you graduate and are out of school. Even unsubsidized loans only accrue a minimal amount of interest (since they compound monthly using a small variable APR%).</p>
<p>My $1600 (if not more… pretty sure it had to have been more) was mostly spent on gas/car expenses, eating out, and most importantly, shopping. hahaha. But I’m a girl, I buy a lot of clothes.</p>
<p>^I didn’t have a car, I never ate out, and I never bought clothes. Ha ha.</p>
<p>My world has just been turned upsidedown. I have stalked these forums for months and thought ucsandiego915 was a boy this whole time… Woah.</p>
<p>^ You’re not a very good stalker then… She’s said many things which tell you she’s a girl, such as the fact that she’s in a sorority.</p>
<p>hahahaha 10 char</p>
<p>lol I thought so too! but I found out before now that she’s a girl (maybe it was the sorority thing)</p>
<p>happyhappy,
hey, do you mind sharing how you sold those books? I was looking at sites like Chegg and it seems impossible to actually PROFIT from selling texts. the quoted buy-back prices are so low :(</p>
<p>Oyama,
I’m clueless as to how you can never have a copy and be fine. how long do they let you check it out for? do you personally just use them for homework and return them? </p>
<p>thanks guys for the help!</p>
<p>3-intervals in most cases, and overnight if you check it out within 3 hours of closing time (you return it the next day before 10am).</p>
<p>And yeah. I only use the book when needed, which isn’t very often given my majors.</p>