<p>I give my d 100.00 a week for groceries. I know she buys salads at fast food places a lot and sushi.</p>
<p>^^^love the screen name.</p>
<p>However, DH, dog and I don’t spend close to that. If that is well within your means, that is fine for you and yours.</p>
<p>Now that our son is on his own and working in a city (midwest, so you may want to apply a multiplier), I will ask what he spends on groceries for a reference.</p>
<p>I think I would give $100. Some areas in Boston are very expensive. In California, fresh fruits are cheap. It may not be so in Boston.</p>
<p>Just curious…does the amt. of money anyone sends their kid at college have any correlation to how much you are paying (tuition/fees/etc) for kid to attend said college? </p>
<p>If your child is attending a college where COA (your out of pocket expense) is very high, does that directly impact how much money you can/are willing to allot them for monthly expenses or is that a moot point?
Conversely, if your child attended a much less expensive college or had a large scholarship, would you feel more free to allow them more allowance for living expenses?</p>
<p>They eat the same no matter where they go to school.</p>
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<p>We were pretty much full pay for both of our kids. They still needed a roof over their heads and food which we also agreed to pay. They went to expensive private universities.</p>
<p>The cost of food would not at all be impacted by the total cost of attending the college.</p>
<p>We did not give either of our kids money for discretionary spending (entertainment, eating out, etc).</p>
<p>I helped my d unload the car upon returning from school and carried in several cans of alcohol infused whipped cream. Chocolate, cherry and cappachino, we had a talk about her food alowance and her gourmet desserts! She serves it with angel food cake, isn’t that nice. Not!</p>
<p>When I was a student a few years ago I lived off campus in Philly. For the most part I ate lunch on-campus (ate at the places on campus like subway, salad place, quiznos, etc., etc.). For the most part though I ate out for lunch every day (mon - fri). On average I spent ~$80 / week on food - $40-50 for on campus lunches and then another $30 in groceries which covered breakfast and dinners that I cooked myself since I enjoy cooking. Although I would have liked to brownbag for lunch I came to the realization that most of the time I just didnt have enough time to make my lunch in the AM before class or even the night before hence I would factor this in depending on your specific kids habits - especially if they dont like to cook you could envision that they could be eating out for lunch and dinner pushing their weekly spend to ~$100. :)</p>
<p>mafool, a university-owned theme house with two kitchens and she will have a single room for herself, cook for herself, etc. She turns 21 in Sept.</p>
<p>Does your S have a car? Because if not he may be limited to a pricey and not very good grocery store near his apartment. IIRC downtown Boston was just awful for grocery stores when we lived there as grad students (admittedly some years ago).</p>
<p>^But Boston has very good transportation, you don’t need to shop at a lousy store.</p>
<p>S2 walks ten minutes to Davis Square to get groceries. He even spent his own $$ to buy a reusable grocery bag. Has also found that those freebie string bags are good, too.</p>
<p>He does not have a car (and does not want one in Boston).</p>
<p>If you can afford to give your student 100/week, then by all means, feel free.</p>
<p>My husband has finally convinced me though, that just because we can afford to indulge our d, doesn’t always mean that we should. He had to earn everything the hard way and feels he is a harder worker & has more appreciation because of some of the struggles he faced when younger. Not than even 50 or 75 would necessaarily mean your student was struggling…depending on the circumstances. Just a different way to look at things.</p>
<p>If you’re Korean, you need extra money to buy the Kimchi. They are hard to find on campus :(</p>
<p>It seems that the devil is in the details. </p>
<p>Does a student start with a fully stocked kitchen? Does the budget include oils, spices, condiments, and other “basic” stuff? </p>
<p>What is the definition of eating well? Does eating well include eating heathful foods or … boxes of ramen noodles and baked beans? Do parents expect sugar and the blue/yellow/pink little bags to come from the local … Starbucks? Fwiw, have you priced that stuff lately? Bought coffee or tea that deserves to be called just that? </p>
<p>I believe that a fair comparison would start with the last meal plan PLUS everything that came from the house in September and Christmas PLUS the value of all those Amazing Amazon packages that showed up magically through the greatness of Parental Prime Accounts.</p>
<p>My bottom line is that one could get by with 75 or 100 dollars a week, but that it will require shopping for less than “great food” and load up on quite a bit of cheap stuff. If 400 dollars a month sounds high, how does 12 dollars a day sound. That is 3 bucks for breakfast, 4 for lunch, and 5 for dinner. A a few cents for a snack every two weeks! :)</p>
<p>We’re trying to decide how much money our son needs for food come this fall, as he is living off campus. His scholarship covers tuition and housing. I plan to send with him lots of non-perishable items (spaghetti, coffee, cereal, etc.), along with some household things (toilet paper, laundry soap, etc.) to start him out. But my feeling is that he and his two roommates need to sit down and figure out how to budget what they need in terms of food. Learn to shop like their parents do – check out the sales, go to the farmers market, etc. No need to go out to dinner every night. You own a crock pot – use it.</p>
<p>If he shops in Boston then he is going to pay a premium, but still I think $100 should cover it. Of course, if he also plans on using that money to go out to eat, even if it is just breakfast 7 days a week (that could easily eat up $35) then it might be tight. We live in the Boston area and I occasionally stop in a grocery store in town and I am shocked at how expensive groceries are there compared to my suburban store.</p>
<p>In our experience, there is not much coordinating with roommates. With four guys living under one roof, it is rare that they are all present for meals at the same time. Therefore it is hard to share food costs and plan meals. Inevitably someone ends up using up what someone else paid for and never got a bite of. In both my S’s cases, they shopped independently because they usually eat independently. S2 doesn’t mind cooking but his roommates aren’t very interested and eat out more. S2 often ends up cooking and eating with friends down the street.<br>
Basically, everyone gets a shelf in the frig. and you don’t eat off the other guys’ shelf. </p>
<p>We have never sent any “care packages” nor brought/sent loads of stuff from home to supplement needs, no big "stock up at the beginning of the semester. The $100 we send has to cover food,gas, razor blades,shaving cream, toilet paper, draino for the clogged shower, bug spray for the critters who share their home, laundry supplies, test sheets and blue books for exams …everything.</p>
<p>I think a lot of this has to do with how much the student is willing to “cook” vs. assembly or heating up. D1 loves to cook and has grown up in a house where Mom got all the fliers out of the paper on a Sunday and compared who had what on sale in any given week and made out her shopping lists that way, yes even including stops at multiple grocery stores. And plenty of times she’s seen me go to put something in the cart, take a look at the price and say no, way Jose. But there are certain things that I (and she) won’t skimp on, such as good parmigiana and feta cheese. </p>
<p>Her meal plan last year averaged about $100/week including $300 in portable dining dollars. She’ll have a significantly smaller meal plan this year but will still be required to have the $300 in dining dollars. I’m thinking that $50 will be enough per week to supplement that at Publix (which is luckily on the edge of campus & walkable.) She’s planning on making most of her lunches & dinners while having breakfast on campus.</p>
<p>If I can feed my family of 4 for about $500 a month, I think she’ll be fine with that.</p>
<p>I usually send my guys off with toiletries, cleaning supplies, pasta and sodas at the beginning of the school year. Replacements are on their dime. S2 gets flex dining dollars that he can use at local restaurants, but he will have to take a serious look at his habits if he moves off-campus. I could see him doing a lot of take-out/delivery (which happened during finals), even though he loves to cook.</p>
<p>Neither of my kids get up early enough to get breakfast at the dining hall – a box of cereal and milk at home will work just fine for them.</p>