@katwkittens Thank you! It is helpful. My son is a confident extrovert, but also, like a lot of 18 year olds, innocent and a little naive. He is very laid back and not always forward planning. That said, he did a nice job with the college app process. He has traveled a bit, been to cities as a visitor. We’ve been to Texas several times. He is in Arizona right now for spring break with his girlfriend’s family, so getting a further taste of the southwest and is loving it. He would not be the first kid to make this kind of leap. It might be that I fear he would do just fine that far from home 
On the other hand, if he hates it, he is SO far from home. If UNM were in a smaller, less urban area, I’d probably feel better about it. I say this because when we looked at Northeastern his response was that it was way too urban. We kind of botched the college tour piece by not looking at UNM. He wasn’t super serious about it, made plans to go to AZ instead of NM, and now all of a sudden he is serious about UNM. Kind of hard to ignore such a great financial deal. On the other hand, it’s a big public university where you might be taking those first year classes with 200 of your best friends. He is admitted to the honors college though, so perhaps that will shrink the school for him?