<p>That is only possible if you co-sign. There is no way I would burden my child with 100K worth of debt for undergrad. That would never happen. And because of that, there were some schools my son simply could not apply too/attend once we saw how little merit aid they were offering. He’s now set to graduate debt free in two years and is very happy about that. </p>
<p>It’s nice that your daughter wants to put money second but you are the grown up here. You need to get real about finances asap and share a new financial reality with your daughter.</p>
<p>At most colleges, you can’t “stack” merit awards and need-based Financial Aid. </p>
<p>With your D’s great stats, she should be able to find some great merit awards. just not at the tippy top schools. Jumbo loans (if you can even get them) for undergrad are a bad idea. On rule of thumb is to keep the total below projected first year salary. Personally I think that any undergrad loan total beyond $20K total seems like too much.</p>
This now is getting too personal … but I had this conversation the week she took her PSAT and she claimed the stress it put her through was one of the reasons for her low score. ;(
She also had a teacher taking her side and told me I was too harsh and suggested that we just take out loans.</p>
<p>it wont be the teacher paying them back, so she can say whatever she wants…, when your daughter wants to buy a house, or a new car, or begin her own retirement savings… what if her spouse also has school loans? will she still think 100K in loans is worth it for undergrad? what if in her 2nd year of college your financial situation changes and she cant finish school? </p>
<p>we went the path of lowest possible cost to undergrad and son will graduate with no debt at all, thanks to merit aid. He (just like your D) worked very hard in high school, had good grades and test scores and looks at merit aid as his reward for that… the name of a school wasnt/isnt a reward… especially as he wants grad school</p>
<p>the name of the school matters very little in most cases after she graduates except for a few majors. engineering, biomedical engineering etc, not so much. it will be the name of the grad school which will be what employers look at…</p>
<p>I think every single parent on CC would back me up and say that your daughter needs to understand the financial reality here and that the teacher who suggested you “just take loans” is completely out of order and should not be a factor in the decision your family will be making.</p>
<p>Determine the number, the amount of money you have saved or can contribute, that you can afford. Ideally this leaves you with your retirement, your emergency cushion, whatever. Give your D that number. The number is not “half” of some unknown tuition, it’s an actual number.</p>
<p>Show her what her loans will cost her to pay back (and as you may know she is only eligible for $5500 first year then gradually up to about $7500 in later years). Anything beyond that is YOUR loan, you will be responsible for it. You don’t have to do it (and possibly you won’t qualify to do it!)</p>
<p>Then let her see where she wants to apply that amount…at a school where she can graduate debt free? At a more expensive school where she’ll take max loans? At a reach that may or may not provide lots of merit (and if it doesn’t, it’s not doable).</p>
<p>D can get a fantastic education at many places. She doesn’t have to choose the cheapest one but she does have to choose one that works within the means of her family.</p>
<p>Monthly Loan Payment: $1,150.80
Number of Payments: 120</p>
<p>Cumulative Payments: $138,096.57
Total Interest Paid: $38,096.57
Note: The monthly loan payment was calculated at 119 payments of $1,150.80 plus a final payment of $1,151.37.</p>
<p>It is estimated that you will need an annual salary of at least $138,096.00 to be able to afford to repay this loan. This estimate assumes that 10% of your gross monthly income will be devoted to repaying your student loans. This corresponds to a debt-to-income ratio of 0.7. If you use 15% of your gross monthly income to repay the loan, you will need an annual salary of only $92,064.00, but you may experience some financial difficulty.This corresponds to a debt-to-income ratio of 1.1.</p>
<p>The limit on subsidized Stafford loans (which she can get without a creditworthy cosigner) is something like $23,000 for all four years. Many here would say that taking on significantly more debt than that is risky.</p>
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<p>Just ask the teacher to cosign the loans that are in excess of the Stafford loans.</p>
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<p>Unfortunately, this can be a rather delicate matter, in that you appear to have overpromised before, while what you can deliver is substantially less. But you need to have the conversation soon, before the application list is finalized. One or more safeties which are affordable for certain as well as certain for admissions must be included in the application list.</p>
<p>Agree that having her run potential loan numbers through a loan calculator would be helpful. Also, checking universities’ career surveys (MIT, CMU, Berkeley, Virginia Tech, and Cal Poly SLO have detailed ones by major) to get an idea of realistic starting pay levels at graduation may help her understand reality.</p>
<p>I’ll back you up. We, too, told our boys we’d pay half of their college education and we had every intention of doing so. Then the economy hit wiping out a good portion of both our income and savings. Fortunately, my two older boys scored well on standardized tests and were quite willing to look at schools which were affordable. They will have some debt upon graduation (that we might be able to help them with should the economy improve), but they won’t have high debt - certainly not close to 100K - not even half that - not even close to half that.</p>
<p>There’s no way I, in good faith, could sign my boys (or ourselves) up to paying high loans for college - esp when there are good, affordable options.</p>
<p>ANY teacher who told ANY student that doesn’t deserve to be in their position IMO. I often caution students against debt and against having one or two “dream” schools that “their life” depends upon. It’s fine to apply to them just to see what would happen, but don’t expect to go to them (unless the finances come through).</p>
<p>There are many, many good schools out there.</p>
<p>Again, consider Pitt and/or Case Western. Her stats could gain high merit awards at either - possibly also at U Rochester.</p>
<p>She might consider the University of Arizona – if she graduates before using up the 8 semester scholarship eligibility, they specifically allow the remaining semesters to be applied to their pharmacy program. (This is their program for national scholars.)</p>
<p>Earlier in the day, I had my D read the posts about some school choices. I will tell her to read the rest about $.
I hope she won’t have a melt down.</p>
<p>Better to have the meltdown now than after the acceptances come in and you have no affordable options. Pharmacy schools are expensive and like medical school the grad part is generally covered only by loans. Most would advise you to save all the money possible in undergrad in order to help out with grad school. Even though pharmacists have a good salary the guaranteed jobs of 5 years ago are not there, and it would be sad to be saddles with enormous debt. What is important is high grades. </p>
<p>Now some schools offer 2+4 programs so that her schooling could be less overall.</p>
<p>have some ice cream and chocolate ready for her fire123… reality bites sometimes, but she needs to know what the reality is. Be ready with your bottom line number…not much time left if you still dont have that number firmly in your head. you will also feel bad but dont beat yourself up, she may thank you once she realizes what that kind of debt would mean to the rest of her life ( as others have posted…it would actually be primarily your debt as she cant borrow that much… but high loan packages from schools in financial aid would be part of it too)</p>
<p>I work in a public high school. Each year I see hundreds of students go off to various colleges. I have yet to see one return unhappy with their selection as long as it fit their stats and location/size preference (and they weren’t super big into party as their major causing them to flunk out). There are many who expected to go to school A, but found it simply unaffordable compared to school B. Every single one ended up happy at school B and glad they chose it. This even happened to me way back in the dark ages (accepted to Duke, but it was unaffordable and I went to a state school - loved it!).</p>
<p>It is very difficult to see financial realities sometimes when one isn’t used to dealing with payments and income, but honestly, neither you nor your parents want to be saddled with high debt upon graduation. At that time, you would much rather be able to spend your money on other things - clothes - apartment/house - travel - family - car - oodles of choices. Just think about what 50 - 100K could buy… and twice that if your folks are also borrowing.</p>
<p>The school name on your degree is not worth years of high debt. MANY employers/grad schools have several colleges they hire from and they treat all newcomers the same.</p>
<p>Yes, look for a nice school, but make it one that is affordable too. You’ve earned that merit money. Congratulations!</p>
<p>fire - It’s pretty common to see improvement from PSAT to SATs. (One of my kids went up 190 points from PSATx10, w/o studying.) Test familiarity and extra coursework helps. So stress from parents may have been a non-factor at PSAT. </p>
<p>I hope you find a good solution, preferably w/o much loan.</p>
<p>Exactly. Get it out of the way in October then craft a list of colleges to apply to that includes academic and financial safeties that she is willing to attend. </p>
<p>If you do that now, by April there WILL be good options.</p>
<p>The point about pharmacy school is a good one too…that’s not likely to come with any merit or FA grant money at all…if this is the plan it’s even more important to save as much college money as possible during undergrad so enough money is there to pay for grad school.</p>
<p>Imagine stretching so far now that there’s nothing left for that…she certainly doesn’t want to be in that situation!</p>
<p>Pitt has a guaranteed pharmacy program for its top applicants. It also offers some full tuition scholarships.</p>
<p>Maryland’s medical programs are mostly in Baltimore. I do not know about pharmacy. However, Maryland is not known for giving out much money. BTW, Michigan does not throw a lot of money around either. My daughter was offered full tuition and Pitt ( she is a senior) and Maryland, but not a dime a Michigan.</p>
<p>fire123, out of curiosity, how is your daughter planning to pay for her half?</p>
<p>Also, her list as noted above is heavy with out of state schools–which sometimes give out of state, high stats students like your daughter enough to bring finances down to the in state level, but not much more.</p>
<p>Northeastern has a good pharmacy program and gives great merit aid to honors students.</p>
<p>I think your daughter needs to look more at that tier of privates. “Holding you to” an agreement to pay half if you don’t think it’s feasible with your income is unrealistic, and expecting to pay her half with loans is also unrealistic – it would make sense for you to find a firm dollar figure you can pay, and let her know that she can do Stafford loans and the rest should be made up with scholarships or with the school being a cheaper state school that you can afford.</p>
We have not worked out the exact figures but I think she hopes to get some scholarships, some loans, some work study to pay for her half. If she gets more of the former, she will need less of the later.</p>