How to Save Money at Alabama

aeromom
Thu, 21 Jul 2016 18:39:23 +0000

Since there has been some discussion on other threads about the high cost of attending UA, I thought I would resurrect this old one because there are some great ideas here. Further to my own post #7 above, I feel the best way to save money for the future is to do what I will call “not-spend” money in the first place. Here are some ideas of how to “not-spend”.

• Live in a traditional dorm instead of suite-style. http://housing.ua.edu/new_students/rates.cfm You can “not-spend” about $3150/year right there.
• Don’t spend your $325/semester Bama Dining Dollars (can be reimbursed to you). http://actcard.ua.edu/creditrequestform/ . You’ve just “not-spent” another $650/year.
• Don’t bring a car to school.

• Ask your car insurance company to reduce your premiums based on student being far from home (i.e., not driving/not driving as much). Or, take your student off your policy completely.
• Check with your homeowners insurance to see if your policy covers your student’s belongings (thus not-spending on renter’s insurance).
• Shop hard online for bargains on used/rental textbooks. Much has been written about this on CC forums.
• Buy plane tix well in advance (if applicable to your family situation). Clear your cookies before you search online for tix, because most sites can see that you have repeatedly looked at a certain destination so they know that you’re keen to get there and their prices can reflect that, usually not in your favor.

Those are the obvious things. But here is something that might astound you:

Determine how much money you will/can save by not having your student at home: food, gas, ‘mad’ money/allowances, high school registration fees, music lessons, private tutoring, test prep fees, school sports fees, school events fees, school club/EC fees, travel/club sports fees & tournament fees, parking permits, gym memberships, sports training fees, coaching fees, museum memberships, school pictures, dance tickets, etc. You will be surprised at how much you spent on your kids in high school! (Do I really need that 3rd TV in the basement that the now-gone kid will not be using? Nope, and that’s another $10/mo “not-spent” on my Direct TV bill.)…

…And then (this is the uber important part!), put that money aside and “not-spend” it. Set up a direct debit each month into a separate savings account for the amount you are able to not spend on your now-gone student. I calculated that our daughter will not-spend us $3927/year once she leaves for college. Yes, I will turn around and spend that $3927 on her college…but it is not additional spending I have to make, is the point. Plus, I just realised that the phone contract is up in November and we’ll no longer have to pay for that interest-free financing of 2 new smartphones we got 20 months ago, so cha-ching, another $687.24/year not-spent coming soon.

Talk with your students in advance of them attending college about these finances. Just because many of your students have tuition scholarships which have ‘saved’ you money, doesn’t mean that they can/should then turn around and un-spend all of that savings! Agreeing on allowances and a spending budget (or, rather, a “not-spending” budget) ahead of time will save you (no additional pun intended) a lot of headache.