How does most of America pay for these elite schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"Most of America" hasn't heard of many of these elite schools and doesn't care. But I know to many UMC people those people don't count.

It’s very important for them to believe that they were in competition with every valedictorian from every high school across America, because that’s what makes their T20 admission so impressive. UMC people don’t want to accept that they were only competing with themselves. Oh, and also, the kids from my high school that had 99th percentile ACTs didn’t have any prep classes. Because there weren’t any. They were just that smart. But they still only applied to Flagship U.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As soon as our first son was born we started saving for college A small smoothly amount at first and increased when daycare was no longer needed. We do have 80k a year saved for him and his brothers. We do fine but have 10 year old cars. No fancy handbags, clothes, etc.

Now if we had 6 kids no way could we afford college for all six.

Good for you! It’s nice to read about responsible parents who planned ahead.

I guess you define "responsible parents" as those who can afford to save nearly a million dollars to send their three children to college!!

I guess us poors don't cout as "responsible" in your definition as there is absolutely no possible way we could accumulate a million dollars in our childrens' college fund, no matter how much we scrimp and save. What, exactly should we have cut back on? Doctor visits (those co-pays are costly)? Food (kids eat too much, even though mine are very thin)? Piano lessons (only the wealthy can learn to play the piano)?
We saved $300K for our three kids, and that's all we could afford, despite living in a small house, and not "doing fine" as the PPP self-described her HHI. Our not "fine" HHI does not allow us to be "responsible parents." Sad. We really suck because our kids are going to in-state schools, not the Ivies (even if they get in), not any private colleges because we can't afford them, even with merit aid.

You really live in a DC bubble. Most of America has a fraction of what DC parents have.

yeah, just don't buy that fancy purse ($2000) and you can fund college. so ridiculous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get that most people on DCUM have $80k saved per year of college and much of America (HHI under $125k) gets aid but do these two realities really cover these gigantic pools of applicants to all the top 50 schools? has the rest of America also saved $80k/year/kid? am I missing something? thinking about this tonight as friends of ours just had their daughter (one of 6 kids, first in college) commit to Carnegie Mellon. I know for a fact that they make more than $150k but I had no idea that $&0k/year was in their budget.

Responsible parents save for their kids' education.

this has nothing to do with education. you are buying prestige, a brand. it's really not that different from designer purse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

You sound bitter. Smile more,talk less....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

You sound bitter. Smile more,talk less....

no, not really. we moved to europe and kids will go to college here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

You sound bitter. Smile more,talk less....

no, not really. we moved to europe and kids will go to college here.

I'm the first PP, I'm very aware, as I went to an Ivy decades ago. I remember the sociology professor telling us that the average family at my college had an income of $250K, which is over $400K in today's money. It's changing tremendously now, as the tuition is zero for those making under $125K/year. So yes, if you have a brilliant child and you are not wealthy, an elite college is a better bargain than UVA or UMD.
I'm European by birth and we looked into that option too. However, for med school, is not great, as the medical students from foreign universities have a much harder time getting a residency here in the US.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

You sound bitter. Smile more,talk less....

no, not really. we moved to europe and kids will go to college here.

I'm the first PP, I'm very aware, as I went to an Ivy decades ago. I remember the sociology professor telling us that the average family at my college had an income of $250K, which is over $400K in today's money. It's changing tremendously now, as the tuition is zero for those making under $125K/year. So yes, if you have a brilliant child and you are not wealthy, an elite college is a better bargain than UVA or UMD.
I'm European by birth and we looked into that option too. However, for med school, is not great, as the medical students from foreign universities have a much harder time getting a residency here in the US.

It's changing in that they've replaced the middle and barely upper middle class kids whose parents used to be able to stretch to afford those schools out and replaced them with poorer kids. The rich kids are still there, it's just more of a barbell than ever

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

You sound bitter. Smile more,talk less....

no, not really. we moved to europe and kids will go to college here.

I'm the first PP, I'm very aware, as I went to an Ivy decades ago. I remember the sociology professor telling us that the average family at my college had an income of $250K, which is over $400K in today's money. It's changing tremendously now, as the tuition is zero for those making under $125K/year. So yes, if you have a brilliant child and you are not wealthy, an elite college is a better bargain than UVA or UMD.
I'm European by birth and we looked into that option too. However, for med school, is not great, as the medical students from foreign universities have a much harder time getting a residency here in the US.

It's changing in that they've replaced the middle and barely upper middle class kids whose parents used to be able to stretch to afford those schools out and replaced them with poorer kids. The rich kids are still there, it's just more of a barbell than ever

yes, exactly. the middle has been almost entirely hollowed out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

You sound bitter. Smile more,talk less....

no, not really. we moved to europe and kids will go to college here.

I'm the first PP, I'm very aware, as I went to an Ivy decades ago. I remember the sociology professor telling us that the average family at my college had an income of $250K, which is over $400K in today's money. It's changing tremendously now, as the tuition is zero for those making under $125K/year. So yes, if you have a brilliant child and you are not wealthy, an elite college is a better bargain than UVA or UMD.
I'm European by birth and we looked into that option too. However, for med school, is not great, as the medical students from foreign universities have a much harder time getting a residency here in the US.

and then it's 80k for those making over 125.
the chances of getting US residency from a foreign medical school are overall decent for an excellent student. but, really, who cares? US will be a total basked case in 20 years anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are parents with a good HHI who are either bad with money or who choose not to save for college. That money goes to living above their means. It drastically limits college options.

Bad with money?? You have never heard of uncovered, out-of-pocket medical expenses? You know nothing of special needs? Expensive prescriptions? Psychiatrists and psychologists who do not take insurance? Ever heard of disability? We have millions in our retirement accounts because it was made easy to save with pre-tax deductions and 401Ks, but our college funds are next to nothing because of medical expenses.

This is such a strange argument. You have saved millions in retirement accounts, but none for college. Just because you did not use a 529 plan, does not mean you didn't save for college. You just took advantage of the benefits of 401Ks to save, which is a completely valid way to do it...you saved tax-free with more flexibility on how you use the $$$s.

Not sure why a college should view your 401k millions differently from 529 millions. Millions of dollars are millions of dollars.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most high stats kids from donuts hole families give up on elite schools and go to the in state flagship

This is us. Our HHI is $145K. We didn't qualify for much FA, despite the fact that $80K per year is more than half our HHI!! Crazy.
State schools for our kids.
Meaning, the best and the brightest are NOT going to the Ivies or the SLACs like Amherst, Williams, Swarthmore, etc.
My kids should be at these schools, but we can't afford to send them there.

Do you have a kid in college? Have you actually applied for financial aid? Our HHi is a bit higher than yours (in the 180ish range), and we have definitely qualified for significant financial aid at "expensive" schools. I could see that you don't qualify if you have other significant non-retirement assets, but, if you are making less than $150,000 and don't own multiple properties or have 6 figures in stocks/brokerage accounts/or shares of a private corp., you will get financial aid at a lot of schools. It may not be enough, but, that is a different argument.

[Anonymous]

Some private colleges have so much money that they could go completely tuition-free, only charging for room/board, yet they charge $80k+ a year to people with $150k HHI and some 529 savings. (Net price calculators demonstrate this). It needs to be more reasonable.
I read in higher ed expert Jeff Selingo's newsletter that so-called "nonprofit" universities get average federal subsidies of about $41k/year per student.
Everyone agrees college costs too much. There's a lot of anger in this thread about the overcharging and it's sad to see qualified students denied opportunities. The main question is: What are we going to do about this? Is there any organization that's really trying to work with colleges and Congress to change this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our case - both sets of grandparents are also paying, we only have two kids, and we can live comfortably from the lowest salary, so we also pay as he goes for DC1's med school. We make almost 500K/year and we moved to a lower COL area, so our mortgage is low.

so basically you didn't need to save anything and you could still fund your kids' college and beyond. the vast majority of parents whose kids go to elite colleges have big homes AND fancy vacations AND nice purses AND fancy clothing. you can't save your way to 80k/year tuition, and even if you can, you shouldn't. it's like private k-12. if you need to eat $1 ramen noodles to pay tuition, it's not for you.

Those are your priorities. Don't tell others how to spend their money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some private colleges have so much money that they could go completely tuition-free, only charging for room/board, yet they charge $80k+ a year to people with $150k HHI and some 529 savings. (Net price calculators demonstrate this). It needs to be more reasonable.
I read in higher ed expert Jeff Selingo's newsletter that so-called "nonprofit" universities get average federal subsidies of about $41k/year per student.
Everyone agrees college costs too much. There's a lot of anger in this thread about the overcharging and it's sad to see qualified students denied opportunities. The main question is: What are we going to do about this? Is there any organization that's really trying to work with colleges and Congress to change this?

Honestly, the only way I see it changing is for a Bezos to give $10BN to Princeton, or Musk to Penn or Gates to Harvard, etc. with the money going towards the schools to become tuition free. Once that happens, their Ivy/Stanford/MIT/Duke...top 20 peers will follow or try to follow to keep up. They will have to figure out a mechanism for HNW parents to still have to pay. It will give the first mover massive positive PR and a relative drop in the bucket for their net worth.

This is already happening at certain grad schools...NYU Medical is now tuition-free from Langone gift and Yale Graduate Drama/Theatre School is tuition-free from Katzenberg gift.

Of course, those schools will then have even that many more applications, resulting in even lower acceptance rates. Not sure if anything moves for schools that don't already have massive endowments.