You May Also Like
Is USA actually multicultural?
- September 30, 2023
- 36 comments
Sure, you guys get a lot of migrants from different countries every year but from what I understand,…
What jobs pay $4,000 per month?
- April 30, 2023
- 27 comments
What type of jobs in the US will pay you $4,000.00 per month? Is it a big amount…
Laurence Brown AMA – Lost In the Pond – Vagaries of British vs. American Culture
- August 19, 2022
- 45 comments
This is the AMA with Laurence Brown. He is a Brit that has come to the US and…
48 comments
Yes. If they can.
A reminder parents, small contributions to your child’s 529 plans can go a long way. New regulations have made it even more tax advantaged. There is absolutely no financial reason not use one.
It’s common to *help* pay for it. Few can afford full tuition.
Yes, it’s common to help.
The government allows people to put money away for their children, called a 529 plan, that can be used to pay for tuition. When the money is sent to pay for college, it’s tax free. If the parent has the funds, they usually try to add to the plan on a yearly basis until the child reaches college age.
My parents paid for a lot of mine.
Yes, to some extent at least. When financial aid packages are calculated, they take the parents’ income into account.
It’s common to help out and pay some, but attending is so expensive these days (over 100k on average if you’re paying full sticker price at an in-state university) it’s nearly impossible to completely pay for everything. Most non-rich people have to take out loans to cover the rest.
My parents (and some scholarships) paid for my undergrad tuition. Loans paid for my law school tuition.
There’s lots of ways to pay for college, one of them is definitely parents paying. But students can also earn scholarships, get financial aid in the form of grants or loans, or earn money themselves (though the likelihood of a student getting enough $$ to pay for even a semester of college is unlikely due to the total costs, but totally feasible to scrap money together for rent or books or something like that).
Many states are also starting to do completely free rides to some extent. There are usually requirements to meet, either residency such as having to be a student in a state from K-12 and/or a GPA minimum to meet. Some states specify this for community college, where you can often take intro level education classes or work to an associates degree or some type of skilled trade. Others will just flat out offer free rides to their entire public university system.
Currently, I think it is very common for parents to want to pay for college if at all possible. Whether or not they can is another matter. In previous generations, it seemed you would often find parents who would choose not to pay for it even if they could afford to because they believed making your children pay for it themselves made them a better person in some way.
Most often yes. If they can afford to pay for college they usually will.
When I was paying for child care somebody told me “it’s expensive, but get used to spending that much until they are out of college”
I was confused, then I realized that, at the time, day care was actually more than tuition at the state college.
In my area, 2 years of community college and the first year at the state college are free. This makes a BA much more affordable.
If they can afford it, I think most parents would. My parents paid for both me and my brother, and my wife and her sister’s were also paid too.
I have never met anyone who could afford it, so… _maybe_?
Yes, it’s fairly common for parents who can afford it. I was lucky that my parents signed up for Florida’s pre-paid college program, which allows you to pay for your child’s in-state tuition over time and locks in the price when you start paying.
For sure. But it definitely depends on the parents.
My parents do quite well and are paying mine and my sister’s tuition. I picked a Canadian school, so my tuition is about half of hers and I’ll have some left over in the 529 for her grad school.
My parents have always been about “do well in school and don’t worry about money for now,” which has been a nice blessing to have as a young guy.
I do, however, have a lot of friends who are ostensibly also pretty well off but had to pay for their own school anyway. A lot of them drove fancier cars, etc. than my parents, so maybe it’s a difference of spending priorities.
I plan too.
We started contributing to a college fund as soon as our son was born. We ask the grandparents for contributions for his birthday and Christmas.
If he doesn’t go to school, well then I’ll pay the penalty and buy a truck lol
Yes, many parents pay for college if they can afford to.
Initially yea, but if the kid isn’t taking it seriously you’ll see parents stop paying for it all.
Yes, if they can afford it, it’s common to help.
My parents set up a savings account when I was a child. When I was picking a college, I was told that they would pay my tuition using this money until it ran out. When it ran out, I would have to get loans. That money covered just over a year of tuition.
My parents paid for a large chunk of my living expenses while I was in college (rent, cell phone, car insurance). Except for 1 semester where I was actively seeking work, I worked at least part-time to pay the rest (groceries, textbooks, gas, utilities, clothes, etc).
​
Edit: I will also add that I started taking college classes while still in high school (my school didn’t have AP classes). The local colleges provided a discount to high school students, it was $100 per class plus books. My parents covered this cost entirely, and I got a full year of college credits for $1000 + books.
It is common for parents to help pay a portion of college costs. It is also common for parents and students to take out loans. It is common for students to try to get scholarships or work to help pay their college costs. A single family might do all of these things to help pay for college.
My dad paid for my community college and helped out with my bachelor’s.
parents usually help out if they can. Personally, I discovered ONE WEIRD TRICK to graduate college debt-free, which is having rich parents who were able to pay for the whole thing.
If they can afford it, yes.
In my experience this only happens for a lucky few, many parents help by co-signing student loans
It’s common for parents to help pay towards the cost of college. College educations are expensive enough that few parents can completely pay the cost themselves.
The calculations for financial aid are built on the idea that parents will contribute some towards college costs (unless the person going to school is over a certain age).
Yes although only a very small percentage can pay for it out of pocket without some assistance.
Yes, in fact it’s not uncommon for parents to begin saving for their children’s college from early childhood or even birth. There are tax-advantaged savings accounts for that very purpose.
My parents split the cost of my college education with me 50/50 (undergrad). They said that scholarships I earned counted towards my half, as did the money my grandparents had given for birthdays and Christmases along the way. My dad did want me to be financially responsible for some of my education costs to make sure I “had skin in the game.” I was very very fortunate that with this arrangement and going to a state school, I was able to graduate debt free.
If they can sure, but it’s not common they can.
It’s common even if they can’t afford it. The federal government will loan parents as much as they need to put their kid through college, they will only loan 5-10K to students directly due to our credit system. I plan to pay my parents back but 3/4 of my student loans are in their name.
Yes. Why have kids if you can’t afford to educate them?
In certain income brackets, you are almost forced to unless your kid gets scholarships.
Due to my wife and my income, my daughter only qualified to receive $5K in student loans per year because the FAFSA algorithm decided that she should be receiving a certain level of financial support from us.
We’re too rich too get any aid and too poor to just write checks.
It is so common that most people can’t afford to go to college unless their parents pay for the entirety of it.
Maybe not wholly, but certainly helping a bit for sure depending on what they can afford.
It’s common for people (who can afford to) when they have a child to start setting aside money for a college fund. My parents did this for me, and in the end I was left with student loans totaling ~$2000, which I was able to pay off very easily.
I plan to do this for my kids.
For more well off families (so you’ll get more yeses on Reddit than real life). My parents could never afford to for me or my brothers we borrowed them money growing up and sometimes still today. I told my kids if they wanna go here they have to pay for it if they choose to go to the EU we’ll get their plane ticket.
I think a lot of people’s parents at least partially help pay for college.
My parents paid for my first semester of community college when I was a concurrent student. After that, it was on me. Unfortunately, until I was 25, they took my parents’ income to determine if I’m eligible for financial aid. My dad makes good money, but couldn’t pay for my college because I have 5 siblings. So I paid for college when I could and worked when I wasn’t. It took a while, but I graduated from a 4 year college while only owing $3,000.
A common goal is to have one third of the expected cost of college saved by the time your child is ready to enter college, with the remaining 2/3 to be covered by the child themselves including work, scholarships, loans, grants, etc. There are tax-advantaged investment accounts specifically for this purpose. There are other ways to conserve money too – e.g. attending an in-state college, taking transferable credits at community college, etc.
But yes, in general, parents often want to help their kids through college (of whatever flavor) however they can. Also, the parents who are most likely to be in a position to help in this way are also more likely to themselves be college-educated, and therefore particularly understanding of the value of a college education for their kids. That last part is arguably not really fair. But that’s a whole other discussion.
TL;DR: yes for those parents who can afford to help, but not necessarily all or even most of it, and not necessarily unconditionally (e.g. any school you want anywhere for any degree).
Yes. College tuition at many schools is high, and financial aid is usually based on your parents’ ability to pay, so if they don’t pay when they can afford to pay, it makes it much harder for the student to be able to afford college.
If parents can afford it they help and if the student wants to minimize debt there are things they do to help out as well. My kid went to community college and lived at home for 2 years before transferring to a state school. That was about 40k savings. We live under our means in a modest home, don’t take expensive vacations and maintain our cars. It doesn’t look great, but my 17 year old Honda still gets me around and it helps keep my son out of debt while he is building his adult life. That’s not the way it was for us and we see the difference a good head start can make.
My parents paid for my complete college education. I took out loans for law school.
Somewhat.
I wanted my A+ to work in IT but my parents said go to college or were kicking you out. So 4 and a half years of my life wasted and $60,000 later I have a degree I’ll never use. I then got my A+ soon after and have worked in IT since.
Yep. It’s not a great system because shitty parents can and do fuck of their children by forcing them to adhere to their beliefs during that time or they can deny them both money and student loans. This happened to a couple of my friends.
Yes. My parents did. But I went on to grad school. So my mom paid half of undergrad. My dad paid half of everything, and I paid half of my gradschool. My only other highschool friend who’s parents could have afforded it had his college money spent on rehab, shout out the opioid epidemic. He’s better now.
Yes my parents did but in return my twin and had to graduate with a good(3.0 minimum) gpa in a profitable field of study.
Yeah, most kids who go to college get it paid for by the parents. For those who don’t, there’s definitely income-based govt help both during and after college, but if you have the means it’s the norm
Yes. It is rare that they won’t if they can.
If you can, yes. College degrees tend to be seen as tickets to better jobs, and the student debt system is atrocious so people try to avoid it for their kids if they can help it.
There are the usual limits about the family’s means, of course, and there are always exceptions for other reasons.
I don’t know how common it is but it’s certain not uncommon. My parents paid for my college. I have friends that are in the same boat and some that aren’t. But that was almost 20 years ago.
A financial advisor once told me to save for retirement and not my kids’ college because, in this day and age, you can’t do both.
My oldest is now in HS and as I’m looking at college tuition, I think I could swing it if she went to one of the few close state schools. If I’m lucky, her other 3 siblings won’t go to college.
Yes. It’s called being a good parent.