All Articles Tagged "commuting to school"
With College Costs Up, Even Wealthy Families Are Cutting Housing Costs
benchprep.com
College costs have gotten so high, that even wealthy families are forced to find ways to pinch and save money. MSNBC reports that a new report from student loan organization Sallie Mae shows that families earning over $100,000 a year are realizing that keeping their young adult children at home through college saves tons of money. The report states that 47 percent of students whose families earn over $100,000 are living at home this year compared with 37 percent in 2011. Meanwhile, 53 percent of students with family income of $35,000 to $100,000 are living at home.
This of course means many students must sacrifice school choices for location. Almost 70 percent of families were forced to make tough decisions regarding school choice because of cost, up from 64 percent last year.
“I lived close enough to school that it didn’t really make sense to blow so much money away to live in less-than-ideal living situations,” said Chrissy Callahan, a 23-year-old 2010 graduate from Brandeis University in Massachusetts who works in Web journalism. “My sister had also commuted to college and enjoyed it, so it was a pretty easy decision.”
Callahan estimates that her family saved about $45,000 during her four years in college. She was able to graduate debt free and in much better financial standing than many of her classmates.
“I definitely appreciate the discipline that commuting gave me,” she said to MSNBC. “It forced me to plan out my days in advance and prepped me for the real world.”
While families may be saving on housing, they’re also borrowing more. The typical family borrows 18 percent of the total cost with student loans and nine percent in parent loans. This is up from the 15 percent of student loans and seven percent parent loans of last year.
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