Wow, what a thoughtful process your family went through! I really appreciate the in-depth explanations of how the decision process happened and that you circled back to let us know how things went! Though I’d never have thought to do this, it certainly makes sense:
Congratulations to your D on so many wonderful options and on selecting a place that is interested in finding a way to make things work for your family! Wishing her a wonderful time in college!
Now if I really wanted to kill myself with analysis I would have gone back to each school for the last 3-4 years and averaged out the % increase for each rather than just using a flat 4% across all options. 
Great news !! Congrats.
Congratulations! 
Thanks for coming back and sharing. My S26 looked at a lot of the same schools and we are also from MA. After looking at schools in 6 states (some a plane ride away) he finally narrowed it down to Plymouth State and SUNY Plattsburgh. We had a lot of the same questions about the SUNY’s, why so few OOS kids when the cost is so low? He also got into UMaine but we never managed to visit which was a bummer as he may have really liked it. Ultimately he chose Plymouth State as he really wants to be as close as possible to skiing. I agree their admitted student day was really well run (we went twice as husband hadn’t seen it) but their dorms leave a lot to be desired. But it doesn’t seem to matter to him at all so I guess I won’t worry about it. I loved your comment about driving by a million times but never seeing the school, we had done the same and husband thought the school was just going to be all commuters with a couple of small buildings. Good luck to to your D!
Thank you!
I feel like dumpy dorms are sort of a rite of passage for incoming freshmen… and for the most part I feel like most students don’t really care (or even see) the same things/issues the parents see. From conversations with the students at Plymouth it seemed like a lot of the kids move off campus after 1-2 years and the off-campus housing is very school adjacent. And the students there generally seemed happy.
Lots of great hiking in that area too if your S is so inclined.
Yeah, both my older kids got spoiled by getting newly renovated freshman dorms at their private colleges, but youngest never even saw their dorm rooms so doesn’t know any better. And they probably would have had just as good of an experience if they had gotten the older non-renovated dorm. Apparently PSU now has a requirement to live on campus till they’re over 21 so I think it’s mostly just seniors moving off campus which is fine, he doesn’t really care either way.
He’ll be an Adventure Education major so lots of hikes in his future!
The one thing that struck me on the first of D19’s tours was how unappealing the dorms were. Then I realized they were mostly like that after a few more tours!