<p>OP: the FAFSA people makes a reasonable EFC for your family, the rest in loans (made out to you) and grants. If you stick to your school’s formula any amt your parents pay will be moderate. If your family is super rich then the school may not give out any grants so your student loans pick up the slack, maybe your expected EFC goes up a little too but not that much. So stick to the financial aid package calculated by your school and you will not run up huge cost for your parents.</p>
<p>I must praise you for your sensitivity for thinking this out in advance. Your parents must have done a fine job raising you.</p>
<p>Pay forward is what my parents seemed to want. My mother died before I had any money to give and my father won’t use it if it’s given. Sigh. You can’t control your parents any more than they can control you. If you can get away with it I think it’s great to give parents money. Most parents would never want you to make your children suffer in the process, though. One regret I have is being too budget conscience in school, spend the money on the books and academic opportunites.</p>
<p>Almost 200K over 4 years is going to be hard to pay back, so I’m trying to get a headstart now by doing whatever they ask. </p>
<p>I also plan to pay it forward. Since my parents are paying my full tuition with any financial aid, I will most definitely try to do the same for my kids.</p>
<p>I’m the original poster. Let me clarify that my parents would be a few years from retirement by the time I would graduate from med school. They also have mortgages and expensive property taxes to pay for (a house is just sitting there and nobody is buying it from my parents).</p>
<p>If I do take the $320K path, I don’t think they could afford it. At the same time, I don’t want to be in that much debt.</p>
<p>I understand how you feel afruff. When I enter law school, my parents will have put 2 kids through a private education (about 300K) and would be starting on a third (who has aspirations of attending an ivy league school). If my parents pay for me to go to law school and my younger sister to go to college, that’ll be 500K+ (without financial aid) for all of their kids to go to school. I think that’s completely unreasonable, so I’ll probably do like other kids and just take out the loans…</p>
<p>afruff, many doctors start out with loans. I saw an episode of “Scrubs” when the main character (a medical intern) was lamenting that he had $100K in debt from med school loans and was making about as much money as a waiter. It’s a sad reality, but if you wanna go to med school, then maybe you should hope to get some really great scholarships, or be ready to take on that debt.</p>
<p>Have you posted over in the Graduate School/Medical School section? Or talked to some practicing doctors who are older than 35 for their longrange perspective?
To me, it seems that doctors are guaranteed work, status, do meaningful labor, help people. They have big loans to repay at a very slow rate. They never have to worry that there won’t be a job for them. Their medical schools connect them with available positions. They work very long hours, but by midlife are making a great deal of money while doing meaningful work. I know doctors making $400K at age 50 in a pediatric surgical specialty. Family practice doctors make less.
The repayment of the loans is at a slow rate of interest, I understood it that way anyway. As long as you are working, you are paid well. Repaying the loans happens over time; meanwhile you get married, rent a nice apartment, and work very hard. If that’s the life you want, it seems like a sure investment to borrow to achieve it.
But I think you should take my perception and try it out by talking to some real doctors.</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice. I have posted int hsoe forums. They are saying the same thing that you are saying: debt is a necessary part of becoming a doctor.</p>
<p>Just wondering: how can you afford to pay 3 tuitions ;)?</p>
<p>As a SWAG, your folks EFC would be 80,000 a year. No loans, no grants, all your folks money.</p>
<p>One strategy is to apply to top 100 schools like Pitt that have some awesome scholarships. I’ll bet you a nickel that if you apply today that by next month you will have a free tuition scholarship plus a ticket in the full ride scholarship lottery. Pitt is also affiliated with the hospitals that brought us many of the major transplant advancements.</p>
<p>A 4 point at Pitt is probably better than a 3.4 at Penn for getting into med school (I would again SWAG).</p>
<p>Financial aid because our combined income isn’t like your parents. We work very hard but our rather idealistic professions don’t pay well by their nature. We chose those paths. We had educations that meant a lot to us, and don’t want our kids to have less. </p>
<p>And the kids help: summer jobs, on-campus jobs. </p>
<p>Also, they weren’t triplets. </p>
<p>Two have graduated – one quite recently, this year – but we had to take a second mortgage out on the house, so in that way we’re still paying. </p>
<p>We had our kids late in life so if we don’t retire with travel, we had a lot of travel before we met, so we don’t mind.</p>
<p>No payback for undergrad although I did borrow some money from them for law school (which we otherwise paid for ourselves) which I did pay back.</p>
<p>Payback for undergrad would be like paying them back for food, etc. consumed while living at home in my parents’ book. But the expectation is that I would provide undergrad educations for my kids.</p>
<p>My parents got off a lot cheaper than I will! But then if they hadn’t provided the undergrad education, who is to say that I would be where I am today, willing to pay $$$ for a private education for 2?</p>
<p>I paid for everything, but my parents did help by paying my car insurance while I was in school (I co-op’d, so needed the car). I have thanked them many times over the years, but they have never wanted any repayment. If my parents ever needed anything, I would do whatever I could to help!</p>
<p>u asked ur parents to pay for grad schooL??</p>
<p>how it works for my family…u dont have to pay anything for UG(EVERYTHING is covered) but once ur done ur on ur own except for like cell fone when u need it if ur job for awhile doesnt give u med. insuarance my parents have given my sister emergency medical insurance(meaning hospital visits and sick doctor visits…)b/c she didnt have a full time job(my parents r relieved as of 3 weeks ago she was handed a very nice full time job in cali…that gives her 40k/yr + everything travel expenses hotels when needed insurance cell fone costs covered…)</p>
<p>My parents paid for about 1/3 of my UG–the rest was work-study and scholarships that I got through hard work (and being from a “poor” family.) Otherwise I couldn’t have gone where I did.</p>
<p>I was proud to pay for my own harpsichord lessons one summer–it was an “extra” that I didn’t want them to have to pay for. And for grad school I got everything paid for by the school–we were all pretty thrilled about that!</p>
<p>I remember having to ask my parents for $500 senior year and was terribly embarrassed. I don’t think I was embarrassed enough, or long enough, to pay them back!</p>
<p>I was married at 20, my husband at 19, and we both put each other through school. He suppported me by rigging sailboats until I graduated, then I supported him by teaching. University of California tuition was about 3K a year in the early 70’s, so it wasn’t that difficult. I don’t think we could have managed it with today’s tuition rates.
Our kid’s UG educations are a gift that we hope they pass on to their kids.</p>
<p>I came from a single parent very modest income family. My father passed away when I was in 6th grade. I went to school (instate public) on grants, scholarships, veterans benefits and social security. My Mom did pay the insurance on the ancient Pinto I drove and sent me a little spending money once a month. I got married after soph. year. From then on I went on loans and work study. H and I paid back the loans ourselves after I graduated.</p>
<p>H’s parents, a two income family paid his entire way through school (in-st. public). I don’t believe they expected repayment. </p>
<p>We have told our two kids that we can pay for a instate public school education. If they are not happy with that, they will have to figure out how to finance the alternative. We will not expect repayment.</p>