Reply to Why do people think you have to spend so much on your kids?

Forum Index » Money and Finances

Reply to "Why do people think you have to spend so much on your kids?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We have 2 kids, we live in a 3 br townhouse in an exurb that has a 1400/mo mortgage, we send them to public school and we only save $2000 per year per kid for their college while having a 400k HHI. Rec soccer, cheap city summer camps. I don’t believe that you are morally obligated to financially strain yourself just to give your kids what society thinks is the ideal life. Our kids are very happy and don’t feel like they’re deprived from what I can tell. [/quote]
OP, I wouldn’t do the same but I fully understand what you are doing. You are doing the right thing. Good parenting doesn’t mean throwing money into expensive activities for your kids. Money doesn’t buy happiness. Your kids can be happy and have a wonderful life without all of this, and it seems like they are happy. 
Kids don’t need to go to elite colleges to succeed in life. Your plans don’t include paying for expensive colleges and this is totally fine. 
[/quote]

-1

Huge difference between "paying $80K/year for elite colleges vs fully funding $40-50K/year for good state school/private school with some merit vs go to CC and figure it out from there you are on your own"

Providing an education is very different than funding expensive sports/activities. 
Why have kids is you don't want to help with the basics?  In 2023, helping fund college is part of the basics when you make$400K [/quote]

Education is very important and helping fund college is definitely part of the basics. But that can be partly funding, that can be funding CC, etc.. 
Teaching your kids how to fish is more important than serving them the fish in a golden plate.[/quote]

CC path is not that viable if you want engineering/CS.  2 years at CC would be half wasted---you'd have your Gen Eds and maybe the first year of Calc.  Where I live the CC is not as rigorous as the first year of classes at StateU so you might get at most 1 year towards your Eng Degree.  Therefore, starting at a 4 year would be more useful. Have the kid go to State school/private with some merit so it's only 40-50K/year.  But if you make $400K+/year, you should at a minimum help your kid attend that without debt (or at most the $27Kmax over 4 years).  yes the kid can work a summer job and during breaks and earn $10K towards college and their spending in college.  But why would you saddle them with more debt or make them take 6-8 years to get their degree while working?

Not prudent
[/quote]

My kids went the CC path and then Virginia Tech. Graduated at the top of their class at VT. Maybe they were smart kids. 
I guess if your kids aren't that smart, maybe you should avoid that path. [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics