unequal money for unequal kids?

fieldsports
Wed, 02 Oct 2013 18:23:15 +0000

I have read plenty of unhappy threads on this board every spring, where parents and kids are trying to come to terms with the good news/bad news that Junior got into the school of his dreams but cannot afford to go. One of the great things this board can do for a proactive, early parent is help them get past the misleading message from so many other sources, that “money doesn’t matter; you can go to college wherever you want; all ya gotta do is believe”. Parents can then help the kid come to terms with reality while it’s still theoretical, and not yet too upsetting to face facts.

If you know you are a full payor family, and yet you are not in the financial bracket where each kid can go wherever they like for six years, with no concern about financial consequences, then you must manage expectation among your kids and guide them financially, even as they are looking at schools. The clearest way to do this, is to give them dollar amounts for their anticipated college budgets, per kid, while they are still well in HS. Would you expect them not to discuss this with each other, or in front of each other, if they are close in age? Would you expect a bunch of teenage employees to remain silent about bonuses at work? Would you expect them not to realize what it means, financially, if one is looking at pricey private LACs, and the other would like to look at those same schools, but has been told to look at state directionals?

I believe that part of the maturational process is for them to use their critical thinking skills, and participate, on the single biggest financial transaction that they will probably be involved in until they buy a house. (College is a bigger transaction, in a sense, because you don’t have a hard asset to resell.) I think kids from such families should know the budget, should know generally the sticker prices for different schools and types of schools, understand how the actual price might vary, and for whom, and why, think realistically about the potential benefits of different programs and schools, and know what it will cost them in life (or cost their parents in retirement) if other choices are made.