Had a savings plan for my kid's college, then visited the actual campus

Drove my daughter to State University last weekend for a tour. The admissions guy said tuition and fees are now $28,000 a year, up from $22,000 just three years ago. My 529 plan math is completely off and I'm looking at a $40k gap by the time she graduates. Anyone else run into this kind of sticker shock and have to totally redo their savings plan?

2 comments

2 Comments

holly_foster15d ago

That "gap" math is brutal. I feel for you.

ray_carr15d ago

My buddy Dave paid $18k a year for the same school back in 2015, and now we're looking at nearly thirty grand. I get the panic, @holly_foster nailed it with that "gap" comment. We had to dip into our emergency fund last year when my wife's hours got cut, and that set us back even more on the college savings. Now I'm telling my daughter she might need to do two years at community college first, because I refuse to take out a parent PLUS loan at those rates. The whole thing makes me wonder why colleges keep jacking up prices when most of us are just trying to get by. It's like they think we all have piles of cash lying around, and the reality is most families are scraping by on two incomes.