In my very weak defense I showed college counselor my list and she said it was fine. Albeit, college counselor handles class of 600+ students, and already have what I said considered special attention to my sister and I
College counselors know nothing of family finances, and don’t usually ask. Unfortunately.
And just read your last thread linked to above. You ignored some good advice in that thread.
A couple things:
- The University of Hawaii has an honors program. You might take a minute to read about it to see if it would elevate the academic experience adequately.
- This site should help you find some schools that offer merit scholarships:
https://scholarships360.org/resources/great-schools-great-scholarships
If your dad is still paying current mortgage, makes net $11,000 and has $7,000 of bills.
If he pays $30,000 a year for you and sister, then that’s an additional $3,000 a month in bills.
And add to that the loans, because $15,000 each doesn’t pay for any of the schools you got accepted to.
A gap year would enable you and your sister to work, and apply to other schools that would give you merit.
Your mom thinks Berkeley is the “be all” of colleges. But paying so much for two is not feasible.
Your dad was worried about application fees, he is already close to retirement age, and still has a huge mortgage to pay.
College counselors at schools do NOT look at how younare going to fund college. Your family finances are out of their realm of responsibility.
It sounds like you had a well balanced list innterms if acceptances… but NOT in terms of affordability.
Time to go to Plan B.
@Gumbymom Thanks- and I notice, back then she thought dad earned 120k. Big difference. Huge.
Your college counselor endorsed the college choices- not your family’s ability to pay.
OP, I think you’e trying to grasp this as best you can. Good for you, for trying. But on CC, we have no sympathy for big loans or a severely crippled lifestyle (and retirement,) to fund a college inside the top 50, just for the sake of it being more prestigious than others. Not at all.
I’ll stick my neck out…how did the family qualify to finance a $750,000 house on $120,000 income. My opinion…no bank is going to give more private loans to this family IF these are the finances.
It could roughly work out. Depending on how much is financed of $750K at about 4% interest on a 30-year loan. Lenders will usually lend about 33-40% of gross monthly income depending on credit worthiness. $11,000 net would maybe be $15,000-16,000 ish gross. But who knows.
Work out so the parents aren’t carrying a lot of debt into retirement? I don’t think so.
MBA programs tend to be quite expensive & unfunded - that is, MBA candidates are expected to pay their own tuition, and there is not the range of financial aid options that their might be for professional programs like law or medicine.
So if you are planning on an MBA or other business-oriented masters, then it is even more important to avoid saddling yourself with too much debt - or alternatively you could plan to work several years post college, and hopefully find a position with a company that will help fund a part-time MBA down the line.
I’d add that I sometimes shake my head when I see students who want majors in econ or careers in business or finance contemplating taking on unsustainable amounts of debt for undergraduate education. That is an emotional decision, but not a practical financial decision-- and not the sort of decision I would expect to see from someone I would trust to handle finances for a business. Business management is a constant process of budgeting, balancing, preparing financial statements, making projections, doing risk/benefit analysis. Money spent on X is money that is not available for Y. A short-term expensive purchase can carry a heavy opportunity cost in the future. On the other hand, some things are worth investing in.
A college degree is certainly one of those things – but if a college degree at reputable institution is attainable at a low cost, buying the same degree at an extraordinary high cost simply for the experience of attending school away from home or perceived desirability of the name of the school on the diploma.
I can see paying a small premium for a degree from a handful of super-elite, prestigious colleges – which would include Stanford and the Ivies. By small, I mean I certainly could see the logic of your father paying +$15K a year over another choice - and I have chosen that number ($15K) because the dinnertime conversation made it clear that is the amount he saved for college. But neither Rochester nor UW fit that description.
No future employer or grad school will ever fault you for attending a state public U. I think this will become even more true in the future than it has been in the past, as the cost of a private education has become so extraordinarily expensive.
The OP said the family purchased their home for $750,000 and owe MORE on it than that now.
I don’t think the family will qualify for loans if that’s the situation.
Yes the mother should try and work, saving the money strictly for college. It’d help offset the cost-of-living situation in Hawai’i.
Really, right now the options are:
- UH (least good option considering the OP’s stats)
- NACAC list = uncertain but worth trying
- UAH = good option, definitely send app and see
- gap year if the above doesn’t work out
Even URochester doesn’t seem feasible. If the mortgage isn’t paid off and the eldest parent is the working parent and is 62, then odds are that loans won’t be possible for all 4 years and/or won’t be able to borrow.
(In my experience, parents start tiring/getting more fragile health-wise between 62-65, and at 65-70 working becomes a gamble if not a sudden impossibility because your health can just fail you at any point even if you felt healthy previously. You may be able to keep going till age 70… but you may not, and odds are evenly split. The more physical/more stressful the job, the less likely the odds.)
Some “prestigious” universities will offer merit aid. The name may not be familiar to a family in Hawai’i but they exist too; there are excellent honors colleges also.
That’s the problem. Your choices would probably have been much better if you had escaped that “top 30” mindset and applied to colleges that accept a higher proportion of applicants.
Talk to your sister about Rochester and if she is willing to attend with you, do call their financial aid department and try to negotiate a better package, based on the premise that you both will attend They offered merit aid and merit money is always potentially negotiable, since it is not tied to finances. However, it is also possible to ask for reconsideration and exercise of professional judgment for the need-based aid as well. Tell the financial aid department that your parents could afford to send one child to Rochester with the current package, but not both, and that your parents are not willing to finance one child to attend a private college while the other must attend the home state U-- so it either both of you attending or none
I don’t know if that will work or not, but there is nothing to lose.
And since you want to go into business as a career - this is the time to be firm in your negotiations. The college has accepted you and your sister and they have made an offer – now it’s your turn to thank them for their offer but let them know it is not enough, and find out whether they will improve upon it.
It’s a waste of time to try the same with UW or Cal because they are public institutions, neither of which has funds to offer for out-of-state students.
Without knowing the exact figures it’s possible to purchase a $750,000 home with a 15,000-16,000 gross income. Also, I have no idea what deductions are being taken out of the check. Some could be pre-tax like a 125 medical or retirement plans. Someone asked how the OP’s parents could have purchased the home and I answered it.
I don’t know the original purchase price and I don’t know the original loan amount and I don’t know about refinancings, HELOCs, 2nd mortgages, etc. Maybe the original loan was a negative amortizing loan. I’m just saying, in lending anything is possible, especially before the mortgage meltdown of 2008.
I don’t have a sense that the better schools on the NACAC list have a lot of aid to offer by that time (even if they are schools that give good aid, which most aren’t). I don’t really see that as a solution for the OP.
There won’t be any loans if the story is as written, a 62 yr old lone earner with a large mortgage is a massive financial risk. I would say the student here doesn’t have the mortgage story right (because they wouldn’t have qualified for such a mortgage 6 yrs ago without a real down payment)) , but ANY mortgage left is a problem, let alone 4K a month. SO we are moving into questionable information territory.
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in lending anything is possible, especially before the mortgage meltdown of 2008.>>
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The story as written is that this was 6 yrs ago, not pre GFC, and probably the worst time in that mortgages were tough to get.
OP, if you do take a gap year and launch College Search 2.0, keep us posted and we’ll do our best to make sure all the colleges you apply to – which can be a mix of reach, match and safety (all of which offer strong merit awards or are organically affordable) – are schools that fit you well and which you can afford.
^surprisingly, the better schools typically DO have financial and merit aid available, because they miscalculated yield and often “lose” some of the top students to other schools that offered more merit. However it’s limited so time is of the essence. That’s why, if OP is interested in trying for the NACAC list (as well as her sister), she should start working on her essays - improving the commonapp essay, working on “why college z” template (think of what she has to bring to the table, have various things, pick and choose depending on what matches the college once the list is published, and polish it in three days.)
Then it is highly unlikely that your dad will be able to draw any money out of a refinance in a few years. If your parents currently owe more than the cost of the house due to interest, that mean that their mortgage is negatively amortized and they have been losing money — this is the setting that so many people were in during the housing crisis of 2008.
Your dad will not be able to borrow against the house to pay your college, and given his age and the fact that your mom doesn’t work, there is a good chance that even without paying for your college, your parents may lose the house down the line, or at least have to sell and move into smaller, more affordable accommodations.