Parents of the HS Class of 2026 (Part 2)

Parents of HS Class of 20xx
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This was a topic on the class of 2025 thread awhile back – how much “allowance” do you give your college kids, if anything?

The answers ranged from zero to several hundred dollars a month, I think, depending on lots of factors, of course.

My D22 has only worked as a TA during school, although she has done that every semester since sophomore year. It doesn’t pay a ton, but it certainly puts enough money in her pocket for gas and eating out. We also give her a bit of money per month (not sure how much – $150? – because my DH sends it to her via Zelle). She has a credit card in her name, and she has a credit card on our account, too, for emergencies (and we also fund flights home, toiletries, etc).

She is as frugal as her father, however, and saves every penny – and then she spends it for something big. Six weeks ago she informed me that she was going to Hawaii over spring break with her suite mates (she’s there right now). And she texted to ask/inform me of this while I was in the thick of dealing with my aging parents and their impending move. I said, great, please text Dad if you need some logistical help. She did not text Dad – she just booked tickets and hotel rooms. :joy:

Anyhow. She’ll be fine. My S25 and D26 on the other hand, hoo boy. I’ve posted this before, but S25’s Chipotle and Regal Cinema habit and D26’s spending on craft supplies and boba are going to do us in. :zany_face:

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That is REALLY impressive for your D19 to do while in New York! I remember calling my own parents in a panic when I moved there fresh out of college and was looking for an apartment (lived in the dorms at NYU for awhile while interning) – I couldn’t even fathom having to come up with first month rent, last month rent and one month of security deposit all up front, lol.

It’s just so crazy expensive to live there.

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My sister graduated from Barnard many moons ago and was determined to stay in NYC. She found a 1BR apt in Harlem and shared with two other girls- they were all crammed into one bedroom with three twin sized beds! But she somehow made it work. I guess not much different than those forced triples in the dorms!!

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This is maybe a silly question, but we haven’t looked at merit scholarships at all outside of what schools give because I’ve read repeatedly that there isn’t much private merit money to be had?

Where/how do we even start looking for this?

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My husband and I are planning to downsize and maybe move to a state that would be better for our retirement. I’ll admit, if it was up to me and my husband, our kids could live with us forever. But we will instead encourage them to go off to build their own futures. It just seems so much harder for kids nowadays than it was for us when we were fresh out of college. It looks like it will only get harder in the years ahead.

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To be fair, it’s the same apartment she moved into during senior year so we put down the deposit on that back then - and we do sign the annual guarantee- but she’s paid all rent and utilities since graduating.

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It may be more common here, I’m not sure. But I have 3 coworkers whose adult kids are living at home after college while working full time entry level career jobs (paralegal, some kind of admin job in government, independent school teacher). Two of whom went to UC Berkeley. For us, we will expect D26 to have a job if living with us. But the options will likely be have a bunch of roommates in a more cramped less ideal place, or come live at home until you can afford better. We’re fine either way. And, we are not downsizing or going anywhere. We never really upsized. We’ve had this same sub 1400 square foot house since before she was born. Converted garage into a home office and second bathroom at some point. But, it is not too much space for 2. Works well for 2 or 3, and will be totally paid off not long after D26 is done college.

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This may or may not give you the chuckle I intend…
S26 is now a Sophomore at UNC-CH.
We have three kids, and we’ve committed to spending a Time-Value-Money Amount equivalence to each of them. So how they ‘spend’ it will obviously depend on their choices of In/OOS and school etc.

Anyway, last summer the two of us got into a bit of a disagreement which devolved into a pretty solid verbal ‘fight’ as older teenage boys and their fathers are often apt to do. However, he couldn’t stop himself from making some ridiculously short sighted statements about his ‘living conditions’, independence and self-sufficiency.

I dialed things back and calmly asked him if he felt he would be better off if we changed the nature of living and funding arrangements to support his view of his self-sufficiency and independence from us… and that I would be more than willing to help him pack his bags that morning and drop him off at his off campus apartment (which we had already begun to pay for mid summer) - and to further support his views, we would allow him to start fresh by paying his own way from that point on. Then I gave him the math, with $ 4k in his personal account, he could pay two and a half months rent and utilities, but would have no food, no car, no gas (but wouldnt need it), no health insurance, no phone, no tuition etc so unless he got himself a job making more than $50k a year starting within a month, he would be broke.

I told him I was willing to teach him the concept of “F* Y* Money” before it was taught to him by his employers when it would really cost him a lot to find out… He stormed off, but two hours later was having quiet conversations with his mother.

That evening he asked if we could have another discussion - and asked me to explain what I really meant about it. So we talked about “F* Y* money, employers and being asked to do things we didn’t want to or put up with conditions we didn’t like… and where we draw the line between things we don’t like and things we find morally and ethically wrong. And how while I hoped it never came to this for him, there may come a time when he has all sorts of responsibilities besides himself (wife, kids etc) where he will be forced to swallow hard and do things that might not sit with his personal compass very well. etc etc”.

So once we got past that series of moments… he goes off to school as planned.

Through a friend of his, he lands a “cush” job as a personal aide working around 20 hours per week (on the schedule he sets), doing house chores, driving her around, grocery shopping, errands, doctors appointments etc. She is paying his $35/hour… not reporting it. (We’ve had the discussion on FICA/withholdings etc… which I’m paying my accountant to figure out our real risk/reward). He’s done the math on what a $70k / year after taxes job would be in “the real world” while he mumbles some ‘complaints’ about her as an employer - she texts him at all hours (basically between about 8 am and 6pm) and asks him to continuosly move some items from room to room to room (by accounts, it sounds like she is an ‘organized’ hoarder - and so its a constant shuffling of all of her things in bins and crates etc from room to room to room, only to end up in the same room it started to initially) but mostly, this job sounds like doing part time care of a grandparent who needs some physical help with chores but mostly needs someone to just talk to / listen to throughout the week. It frustrates him, because he is “Lazy Efficicent” just like his father - I want to do this one time the right way in as simple and efficient as possible" and everything about this particular job is like polar opposite.

Here’s when I realized he got the message I put out to him earlier this past summer. He is not the only person that serves as her personal aide - she has two other college age boys who help her out at around 10-20 hours each per week. Both of them are his friends, one of whom is in tech school paying his own way and trying to transfer into UNC-CH all on his own money, the other is a full time college student, whos parents are helping him to pay for part of his schooling.

The one whos parents are subsidizing him (but not paying for everything) has gotten into a couple of disagreements with the lady about the way she wants them to do things around her home… and has basically crossed her to the point that she canceled a few days of work for him each week over the month of February… and asked my son and the other kid (the one paying his entire way on his own) to pick up the hours if they can. My son has told her, I can do it for a little while, but not for more than the month (of February), the other kid (who is paying his way) was like “absolutely I can take whatever more you want to give me” even though the third kid is both of their friends…

So February ends and the three of them are talking while out, and the subsidized kid is complaining that he is down almost $2000 in his account in on month and may not be able to do spring break with them because of that “ridiculous old lady”, while the kid who was paying his own way said something along the lines of “hey thanks for the extra income”, my son chose to say nothing - and the other two started to get into it with each other about who should be supporting who as friends in that situation. Where at one point the pay his own way friend said "You just haven’t learned how to keep you damn mouth shut when talking to people who are paying for your entire life - you aren’t independent, you only think you are, you are totally dependent on your parents and “" for all of your needs and you basically told her to F O*… and you don’t have F* O* money.” My son told he he almost choked on that - and later told his friend when they were alone, “well my father calls it F* Y* money… but now I totally understand the concept”.

We were out to dinner for his 20th birthday last week when he relayed that story to his mother, his younger sister and I. It was very funny when his sister, without missing a beat said “Don’t worry dad, I already know I don’t have any money…”

So sometimes, they actually do hear you, even when they seem like nothing is getting thru.

Edit: His current checking account is over $ 18k now…

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I’m not the OP on this, but my two cents:

  • Talk to your HS counselor about community orgs that tend to give scholarships to students at your specific HS. In our area, there are two neighborhood groups that give out 20+ awards of $1000 each to strong students primarily at our HS - one is a Chamber of Commerce-type business group, and the other is a neighborhood women’s club. There is also a local family that sponsors 5 awards of $1000 for students who participated in HS fine arts programs. The school has one “college counselor” (as opposed to guidance counselors) who keeps a list of these with details and deadlines, and given that our college counseling is generally very poor, I’d bet most schools have at least this level of organization and likely much more.
  • You should also Google “communities foundation [city/county/state].” These seem to exist primarily for the purpose of college scholarships, and they have random assortments of scholarships ranging from very broad (“female HS seniors”) to incredibly specific (“seniors at XYZ High School with a 3.7+ GPA who want to study business at a private college in Iowa”). Most won’t be relevant, but you can occasionally find a gem in there.
  • You might try “The Scholarship Algorithm” by Carlynn Greene, available at minimal cost on Amazon. It’s not so much a narrative book as an 80-page brain dump of tips, ideas, and sources - many of them will be familiar to CC regulars, but some are potentially of interest.
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Thank you for this! I appreciate your taking time to list the details.

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Her high school has a scholarship tab on the counseling/guidance site- definitely check the high school website. They have a list of all the local town scholarships and they are separated by needs-based and merit-based.

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And if her school doesn’t have a website, look at the website of the closest large and decently-funded public school. Those websites tend to be public, too!

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That’s a hilarious story.It reminded me of this clip. It’s still true to this day.

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We would sell ours but our interest rate is so low that a smaller house would likely be more expensive than our mortgage!

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Chiming in late that D26 was accepted to Holy Cross (my alma mater) on Friday! It was a moment of pure joy, but we are still awaiting decisions from four UCs over the next two weeks that will thrust everything into even more chaos.

Nothing is at all certain with us; the current contenders are Gonzaga, Holy Cross, and to a lesser degree Connecticut College. A UCLA or UCB (both highly unlikely) would trump any of these, and UCSD (50-50 likely) might too. UCSB for whatever reason has dropped in favor, but they release decisions tomorrow, so we’ll see. All very different schools with very different prices!

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We are lucky in that our high school scholarships have one general application and then each individual scholarship may or may not have a supplement. All scholarships available are laid out on one form with the requirements for each. Each one has a folder in the guidance office; once the kids decide which ones to apply for, they go to guidance, sign their name in the scholarship folder, and take a supplement (if required).

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Congrats and hope the rest of the week and next week bring more awesome news!

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My eldest lives at home and likely will for a while. She’s on the spectrum and holds a full time job - but I’m not sure she wants to live solo yet.

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We didnt give her an allowance. I think she’s spending about $1,000/month in outside activities, restaurants etc.

I remember in college debating a $5 Sunday night dinner and vowed I never wanted that for my kids so I tell them to spend whatever they want within reason. As long as she keeps her grades up, I want her to live her best life.

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This is something we’re going to have to figure out. D19 was a vague “within reason”, but as noted above she’s naturally pretty frugal so that was never an issue. C26 on the other hand, is going to need a budget¡ amount tbd.

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