I'm Graduating From A College I Can’t Afford - NYU

Parents Forum
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<p>Of course she does not yet regret it. She is not paying the consequences of her decision yet. In the next ten years when she is paying off the loans, she will have a much better idea of how it feels to pay off that kind of debt. When she can’t rent an apartment she wants, can’t buy anything, can’t get a car, maybe can’t afford to take a great job because of her financial predicament. My friend’s daughter is working as a waitress instead of in her field because she could not afford to take a starter job with the loans she has and staying her in NYC. So she has a NYU degree and has been waitressing for two years. Just hope the recession doesn’t cut into her pay from that. She has really be spinning wheels these two years and no one is happy about it. Not like she is living high on the hog either. Barely making it really, but can live in Manhattan if she does this. </p>

<p>I know a woman who turned down some top schools for a 4 year full ride and a masters on top of it at a local college. She has some regrets and hopes her kids can go out and experience college farther away than she did. She feels she was cheated out of the traditional college experience and her life has been rather plodding, something that would have had an excitement blip and some other possibilities had she gone away to some of those schools as her sister did. In the end, both have similar lives, actually, but the one who did go away and accrued the debts and had her parent scrimp, pay and borrow, got the experience out of the deal which she feels to this day was worth the price.</p>

<p>In my case, I have to say that the loans H and I took out really defined the directions of our lives as that is how we met, at an expensive private college neither of us could afford. The loans for prof school made it possible to get jobs that paid the student loans and are responsible for our current lifestyle. Worth it? I don’t know. THere were some really lean years there paying back those loans, and those numbers are nothing compared to what this young lady at NYU is facing for an undergrad degree alone.</p>

<p>I really don’t know if it would be worth it. You see, the amounts borrowed back then were often equivalent to a year or two salary, which was doable. Now tuition costs are higher than many families make in a year, and to borrow the money means borrowing more than you can even gross in a year when you are out. I know families who are looking askance at medical school these days, because the cost/benefit is not coming out so well, and you are going to be employed and make a decent salary as a doctor. No such guarantee for the vast majority of undergraduates. </p>

<p>Yet there is a part of me that says if the kid enjoyed the experience, did well, it is worth it for me as a parent to stretch and pay it. I am torn on the subject.</p>

<p>But I would not go on what the student is saying right now. She is not yet paying back the loan and going through the difficulties that entails. Until you live it, you cannot say what is worth it.</p>

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<p>FireandRain: It is not clear if the calculated need matched the parents willingness to pay. For my son, the calculated expected contribution is way above what we are willing or able to pay also living in a high cost area with other kids to educate and retirement to think about. My son had to pick a school that offered him merit aid or go to a state school. I think tuition is ridiculously high, but not sure it is NYU’s fault as they clearly have plenty of students willing to pay.</p>

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<p>You know, there are a lot of people who are “house poor”. I don’t mean right now with the state of the mortgage business and the real estate market-- I mean chronically. They spend their lives trading up every time their income goes up; they often cannot afford to enjoy the nice neighborhoods they live in because the costs of staying there are so high. My cousin is a real estate agent in Larchmont/Mamaroneck NY and often reports on these gorgeous tudor estate homes which look like they were furnished from IKEA. House is worth over a million dollars and they’ve got folding chairs around a laminate table in the dining room waiting for when they can afford the good stuff.</p>

<p>Why is this deemed socially acceptable but paying for private college not? I don’t think I would ever take out a mortgage for what the banks say I could afford- house is just not that important to me and there are so many other things that are (including donating to charity, helping family members when they get into trouble financially… things that don’t show up on a mortgage application.) On the other hand, if someone wants to forgo discretionary spending in every other area to pay their mortgage, who am I to criticize???</p>

<p>Similarly… if young people have to live without cable TV, a car, cellphones, vacations, etc. in order to pay off tuition loans- I say it’s their right to do so. Don’t expect the waitress down the street working the night shift at the diner to pay higher taxes to bail you out when you decide you’d rather not pay off your obligations… but as long as you’re not asking the rest of us to subsidize your decision, who cares???</p>

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<p>I can’t believe people are blaming NYU. Come on! Schools are businesses! They all want to encourage folks to apply in order to boost their admission stats and to fill up their classes. In addition, only a few schools have endowments equivalent to Harvard or Yale. Others can’t afford to give all of the aid that would be necessary.</p>

<p>Yes, the parents should have put their foot down more. However, they too are blindsighted by a system that says “go to the best college with the best cache at any cost.” High school information sessions certainly encourage this type of thinking.</p>

<p>I really do feel sad for this girl. She will have her dream become a reality nightmare in a short time.</p>

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<p>Buying a big, expensive house is a family thing. More than one person benefits from it and if you truly live in your house as I do, they benefit all of the time. We are one of those folks that bought a big, expensive house, and filled it with IKEA furniture and curbside discards. Made no sense to get anything else with 5 active boys. The house was a boon to our entire family as we are a large boisterous group. We had the grandmoms living here through a crisis. My brothers took refuge here. My oldest came back home for a while. My husband ran a business from the house. Having the big house made it easier on everyone 24/7 as there was plenty of space for everyone. It was a good use of our money at the time.</p>

<p>Now I wish I could sell it as things have changed. But in it’s time it was a good choice to have made as it did contribute greatly to the quality of a lot of people’s lives. Sending a kid of to a private college is not going to have as much impact on as many people.</p>

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<p>I agree with Blossom here. We’re not talking about the family taking out the loan; it’s the student. If she chooses to do so, why should it be bad that she is the one who benefits by acquiring the education? She feels, right now, that it was worth it. I assume she means, then, that she got an education she is happy with. If she later has to live frugally because of this, that’s a choice she has made. </p>

<p>Cpt, for you the big house makes sense, but you’re not the example Blossom is talking about. Her point i think is that it is seems to many that it is okay to be house-poor, but not education-poor. However, of the two, one is not intrinsically worse than the other. just a different set of choices.</p>

<p>We did not “put off” family, kids, and our future because of my H’s decision to go to med school. We lived in a tiny apt. over a pizzeria, took out hefty loans (probably more than equivalent to what this young woman took out), and somehow bumbled along. the kids survived it. And when he finished, H did not choose his career based on what would pay the loans back the fastest; he chose the lowest paid primary area, in community medicine. The loans were close to half our income. We still bumbled along. The kids thrived despite it all.</p>

<p>The woman in the article is not asking for anyone to pay her loans. I’m surprised by the animosity her choices have stirred up in this thread.</p>

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<p>Garland, it’s one thing to have $88,000 in graduate (MD, JD, MBA, etc.) school debt that can be easily paid off in a lucrative field in less than 10 years. It’s another thing to have undergraduate debt that huge and she hasn’t decided what kind of career she wants to pursue. If she has to go back to graduate school, then she is in real deep trouble if she has to take out more loans.</p>

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<p>I think she’ll find that NYU liberal arts degree not nearly as highly regarded as she thinks. Not $90,000 worth.</p>

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<p>Garland, you and I both went the ramen noodle route to pay for college and grad… and we seem happy with where we ended up as a result. It surprises me that folks who didn’t go that route assume that the big house, nice car and vacation is a better use of funds.</p>

<p>I have neighbors who took out home equity loans no questions asked to put in a nice kitchen or a pool. Their kids go to the local (non-flagship) state U and they seem happy with their choices- and I’m happy for them. A couple of them are somewhat judgemental about our decision not to add onto or rehab our house… as if having the original bathrooms is an offense to the neighborhood. I don’t expect to pay for their granite countertops and didn’t expect them to pay for my kids college tuition… and yet, forgoing consumer goods to pay for education is somehow un-American.</p>

<p>I remain so grateful to the banks and institutions which deemed H and me credit worthy… even when we had no assets to speak of other than our own human capital.</p>

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<p>Someone is asking," Why the animosity?" I don’t think there is animosity towards the girl or the parents. Many of us just think that incurring 90K in undergraduate debt is plainly stupid,which is certainly controversial on a site like this. I guess we will find out how “happy” she is with her decision in about ten years.</p>

<p>For the record, I don’t think that any college , anywhere is worth 90K in debt for undergraduate study. Graduate and professional school might be a different story, however.</p>

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<p>I certainly don’t have any animosity towards here. I think she is and has been naive. I could be wrong she could be the exception. Perhaps she will land a really good job and a weekend job, live in a 4th floor walk up with several roommates, eat ramen and Kraft macaroni and cheese, forgo a car, forgo cable TV, high speed cable, not take any vacations etc etc and get these loans paid off in 10 years.
Most kids however, are shocked and stunned at the sacrifices they will have to make and don’t think it’s fair they should have to suffer such a low standard of living. They forget to make paying off their loans a priority or worse run up credit cards to satisfy a cash flow crunch.</p>

<p>During college, I ate plenty of ramen as well - most of the kids I went to college with who took out loans - lived crammed into off campus houses or apts, didn’t spend money on electronics (save a stereo), worked while in school and didn’t spring break in Cancun.</p>

<p>I get that I am stereotyping here and throwing in a little bit of “back in my day we had it rough” but honestly with the private loans there for the taking a lot of kids think they can spend it today and pay it off tomorrow. Tomorrow eventually comes.</p>

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<p>Tenisgh, justamom–we paid off those loans, as i said, when they were almost half our monthly take-home income–nothing “lucrative” about it, Tenis, and equally not nearly as penurious as described above.</p>

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<p>taxguy - you are spot on. There’s no way one can justify going 90k in debt for NYU over, let’s say, a SUNY Binghamton, with perhaps no or negligible debt. The quality of the education is the same - great experiences can be had at either place. This does not reflect animosity but merely is a statement of fact, right? </p>

<p>What people are also missing the cost of lost opportunity. Given that we all tend to accumulate responsibilities in life as we move on, there is no time in most of our lives like our 20’s to take a job for the experience as opposed to just money. Bust out of NYU with 90k in debt and those opportunities in many cases become untenable. </p>

<p>And needless to say major in a field like drama or performing arts (and let’s face it, that happens at an NYU a lot) where the relationship between risk and economic return is nothing short of outrageous and the debt is a two decade economic ball and chain. </p>

<p>Education has vastly outpaced the cost of inflation over the years. We all need to encourage young people to quit being ill advised consumers. And this story fits that bill well.</p>

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<p>Less than $90,000 in debt to live in Manhattan NYC for four years is not bad, especially when considering the degree & friendships & sowing of wild oats that came with the experience. I know lots of folks who borrowed much more for overpriced homes & land that is now reduced to about 50% of the purchase price. The NYU degree plus the Manhattan living & learning experience seems like a very good deal to me. The student followed her dream & now has to pay the price–which fortunately can be paid in monthly installments over a period of ten to twenty years. Pretty reasonable for a “dream come true”.</p>

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<p>Just a mom, it occurs to me that kids who have been living the good life (car, vacations, ski weekends, etc.) would most likely be shocked to find their standard of living cut drastically once they’re out on their own and paying their own. </p>

<p>Perhaps we’d do all our kids a favor by cutting back a bit. It will make adulthood a lot less stressful.</p>

<p>I remember my honeymoon quite fondly- it was the first “trip” H and I took. It felt luxurious and wonderful to us then. By today’s standards, the hotel was a dump, there was nothing much to do for entertainment, and the food was mediocre. I wonder if our kids will need 5 star hotels for anything to feel special for them… </p>

<p>And time will indeed tell if this NYU grad makes the most of the debt and the educational experience. The highest public servant in my town last year was a mid-career police officer (no college) who took advantage of every overtime opportunity available. He earned more than the mayor (a law degree) the superintendent of schools (a PhD) and of course, his boss, the chief of police who gets no overtime. He outearned many of the professionals in town as well- including virtually every pediatrician or family practice physician. Lots of tongue clucking about that-- but it just goes to show that the correlation between education and earnings is a pretty weak one for a lot of people, despite what they may tell themselves.</p>

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<p>That’s what we do here. We try to help our kids keep perspective on how the majority lives.</p>

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<p>I think the fact that we had to live frugally most of their childhoods has had a good effect on my kids. Neither (at 25 and 22) has owned a car. Both dress extremely economically–second hand and wear it till it falls apart. My D lives in a cheap apartment with secondhand and/or IKEA furniture. My S lives at home and pays his way. Both work hard at work they believe in. Both will save to travel–we put a premium on experiences, not things. I think growing up in stringent circumstances has given them a perspective that some young people do not have. Especially because, through my work, my S’s work, and the town they live in, they are so cognizant of all they have that many don’t–a warm home, a good education, healthcare, healthy food, close family and friends. </p>

<p>And yes, they both like ramen!</p>

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I agree. Many continue this high standard of living in college while they are borrowing money and are in for a rude awakening…
It is amazing how little you really need when you have to do without.</p>

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<p>We spent a good ten years of marriage paying off student loans. Since neither H nor I have family with money or who have been able to help us with much, it meant watching many of our peers at work and from school living much better than we were able to manage. I was not gracious enough that I was not jealous at times. When we had our first couple of kids, things were not the way I had envisioned them with all the time and money we had spent on education. Those student loans really hurt in those early years. I don’t mean the clothes, shopping, furniture. We are not big on these things even now when we have the money, the house, the time. I mean things like not being able to visit my mother as often as I wanted. Trying to scrape up the money to go to family events. Helping out family members who had problems. Getting a good careperson for my kids while I worked. Wanting an apartment in a safe area that had enough room for little boys, a good nursery school, good neighbors, etc. Our school loan payment was tantamount to a mortgage those days. It was a good ten years before we were free of those payments, and then we had bills from using credit to get things like travel, car, etc as those needs, wants arose. It took a good 20 years before we were where we wanted to be, free of loans other than for the mortgage. I really don’t see how you can get a young person to understand this. We did not understand it when we undertook the loans. Was it worth it? I don’t know. I guess it was because we were able to get through those times without a true disaster. But if we had had some real problems due to lack of money because of those loans, and it could have happened, it would not have been worth it. Both H and I could have gone to state schools for virtually free, and then part time to professional school, freeing up a lot of money and enabling us to get on our feet sooner. </p>

<p>I like ramen, by the way. Making it tonight in form of lo main because some friend gave several heads of cabbage this past weekend. A nice cabbage soup will be made too. I don’t mind cutting back on the food, clothes, furniture, car. Where it hurts is other things that cost money that have to be given up when you don’t have much.</p>

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<p>A student I taught at a CUNY school showed me a question she posted on Yahoo answers and many others posted on that site. Young people are posting in droves that they can’t pay back their student loans and that they had no idea what they were signing or committing to. Naive is putting it mildly.</p>