I hope you are having transparent conversations with your kids about some of this well before the application process. These situations can really blow up if they are senior year surprises.

If your kid is going to pursue a lucrative career in finance or tech, then paying up for prestige often makes sense. If not, then financially, it is hard to justify. Anyone pinching their own financial security (for example borrowing money you really don’t have) should think twice or three times about paying more than they have to for anything but elite degrees. Screwing up your retirement for Colby doesn’t make sense. That said, if you do have money, think of it as a luxury good, not just an investment. Like a vacation to Paris instead of Florida. In the scheme of luxury goods, I think a wonderful college experience is more valuable than a fancy car, for example. There are intangible benefits to the experience which could translate into financial benefits. For example, your English major daughter is more likely to find a future investment banker to marry at some schools versus others (for better or worse). But people who cannot afford luxury goods shouldn’t buy them.

My son has HFA and a narrow range of interests. I will spend large sums of money to get him in his preferred college, otherwise he won't do well because it's hard for him to adapt. His range of interest has a solid potential for future earnings, so it makes sense for his future. I am willing to bankroll that.

I think this is impossible to answer in general because it depends so much on intended major/career, need for grad school, how much will it put a dent in other family goals.

I have one friend with 3 kids -- oldest's goal was working in IB and he got into an Ivy. They paid full price for it and he is now in fact working in IB. #2 is doing CS and goes to an OOS flagship (they are in CA and he didn't get into Cal). #3 wants to be a doctor and is going to an inexpensive regional public U that has good pre-med support so they can save $$ for med school (the dad is a doctor so he understands the process). The "worth it" balance was different for each of them depending on their needs.

Another example... if you want to go to NYU just because you love New York and are undecided about what you want to do, no way is full price there worth it. But a friend's son is an amazing musical theater actor/singer and was already performing professionally in HS. He got into NYU Tisch and they are paying full price (and can do it without loans), which seems like a "worth it" for that field IMO.

Some of the possibly "worth it" schools mentioned in this discussion (Stanford, MIT, Harvard, etc.) are not schools my kids would ever get into. So then the comparison is VA in-state school below UVA/W&M vs. OOS publics of similar tier vs. private schools of widely varying price. One is at VT in a CS/statistics major and I don't think any other school he was competitive for was worth it vs. what he can get at VT for its cost (fortunately it was also his 1st choice)

My other wanted a smaller school (and we agree that would be best for her) and so was looking at mid-range LACs vs. public options CNU, UMW. With merit the in-state were cheaper but the LACs that gave merit offered some unique things and strong employment/grad school records for her area of interest. So, it was worth it to us to spend around $35k for that vs. $17K for UMW (the cheapest option). But would not have been worth it to spend $50K+ when there were excellent $35k options available and grad school is in her future.

Anonymous wrote:Assuming UMC, at what point does a school stop being worth the money (say sticker price) over cheaper options? Is it just Harvard and MIT?

We make 400-500k and have enough to pay for any college, but no so much as that it makes sense to pay for any college just because they like the school.

I’m not there yet but my thinking is we will pay for state U full cost, plus up to 10-15k more. I will only go higher then that if the private U is significantly better then the best state school they can get into. It’s fungible, but I’m not paying double the price if the schools/programs are of similar rank/quality.

I’ll give them my rationale, let them know what we save goes to them eventually. If it’s like 30k/yr , 120k total, how much is that if we invest and give it to you in the future? It’s a big number when you think about the compound growth. If we made 7 figures then I guess cost wouldn’t matter.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DC is a CS major. MIT would've been the only school we'd consider huge loans for, or impacting our retirement savings.

DC didn't get into MIT, so instead, they are going to UMD with honors and some merit.

But now DC has funds for a masters, if they so choose, or we can rollover to their retirement account. Not a bad way to start out of college for parents who came from very humble beginnings.

Only MIT just doesn't make any sense, especially for CS. Great that DC has $$ for an MS but

It does for us. MIT has a global reputation. Schools like CMU, U of Michigan and GA Tech, while really great, don't have the same global reputation. Stanford, IMO, isn't *that* worth it, IMO. COL out in CA is insane. And I used to live around there.

It depends on what you mean by global. CMU is very well known in China and India for example. It probably isn't going to wow anyone in Australia or South Africa though.
Remember that MIT isn't Harvard, Stanford, or Yale in terms of global name recognition and reputation. It is great but not up there with Oxbridge either.

Anonymous wrote:I don't know OP - I have 2 kids and I have a lot of 529 money saved, but in general, I think you are thinking about it the wrong way. I'm likely to spend more money for my DS class of 2023 than for my DS class of 2020. DS 2020, at a highly ranked school, is a strong motivated student. He did well in admissions but definitely had some rejections, picked a good school that gave him merit money so his overall cost is below the sticker price by a lot. But he is a motivated person - he will be fine at this school or at MIT or at a third tier state school - he will make the most of his opportunities. I'm glad he picked the school that gave him money because for a kid that will succeed no matter what, why over spend?

DS 23 is not as strong of a student - he needs a smaller environment and will likely attend a smaller private school, which may cost more. He is unlikely to get the same type of merit money (most decisions are in already but none of his admissions have come with the same offer as my older one). But it's worth it because he will need the help.

I can't imagine telling him he can't attend a good private school because he didn't try hard enough or it's not worth it since he can't get into MIT.

This is how we are looking at it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DC is a CS major. MIT would've been the only school we'd consider huge loans for, or impacting our retirement savings.

DC didn't get into MIT, so instead, they are going to UMD with honors and some merit.

But now DC has funds for a masters, if they so choose, or we can rollover to their retirement account. Not a bad way to start out of college for parents who came from very humble beginnings.

Only MIT just doesn't make any sense, especially for CS. Great that DC has $$ for an MS but

It does for us. MIT has a global reputation. Schools like CMU, U of Michigan and GA Tech, while really great, don't have the same global reputation. Stanford, IMO, isn't *that* worth it, IMO. COL out in CA is insane. And I used to live around there.

That is why being a Stanford student is so amazing! You live in a ridiculously rich area with a ton of opportunities compared to Cambridge in a hugely subsidized way . Cost of living as an adult is crazy but not at Stanford (I recently lived on campus and off in the Bay Area for about 7 years).

Financial aid, driven largely by endowment, is amazing at these wealthy private schools. It means most low-income kids won't have to work a lot on campus, which is awesome. However, when deciding about paying close to full price, endowment related concerns are pretty far down the list (almost like fringe benefits).

Anonymous wrote:My child was admitted to a school that costs 80k a year.
10k merit aid

We are actually UMC and make 300k HHI

Major is Psychology.

Other college choice is 40k a year with 20k merit aid. It's not a T50 and not a well known name.

It's hard to turn down bragging rights, but being saddled with a mortgage level amount of debt at 22 (or if we take it on, 62) seems like a terrible decision for a name on your resume.

Which school is that ?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DC is a CS major. MIT would've been the only school we'd consider huge loans for, or impacting our retirement savings.

DC didn't get into MIT, so instead, they are going to UMD with honors and some merit.

But now DC has funds for a masters, if they so choose, or we can rollover to their retirement account. Not a bad way to start out of college for parents who came from very humble beginnings.

Only MIT just doesn't make any sense, especially for CS. Great that DC has $$ for an MS but

It does for us. MIT has a global reputation. Schools like CMU, U of Michigan and GA Tech, while really great, don't have the same global reputation. Stanford, IMO, isn't *that* worth it, IMO. COL out in CA is insane. And I used to live around there.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP: look at the National Universities with the largest endowments:

1) Harvard
2) Yale
3) Stanford
4) Princeton
5) MIT

6) U Penn
7) U Michigan
8) Notre Dame
9) Northwestern
10) Columbia

11) WashUStL
12) Duke
13) Vanderbilt
14) Emory
15) Virginia

Why does a large endowment make a school worth the money?
It often allows them to provide better aid, which is most often need based at schools of this quality but the connection to being "worth the money" isn't clear at all.

Pretty sure Princeton gives every student living expense stipends for internships or commuting, and that there and at similar schools, on campus-job pay is quite high. The on-campus jobs at such schools also tend to be easy; the hard jobs like food service are unionized at Swarthmore (for example), to my knowledge. For high-endowment urban schools, kids get Lyft passes. And so on.

Lyft passes and ease of campus job are not two main considerations when deciding about whether a school is worth the money

Endowment allows certain things that poorer schools do not. Lots of first-years making over $15/hour in paid research opportunities at high-endowment schools.

University research work, outside of some limited work study, is very rarely funded by a school's endowment. I think you don't understand how university funding and finance work very well.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP: look at the National Universities with the largest endowments:

1) Harvard
2) Yale
3) Stanford
4) Princeton
5) MIT

6) U Penn
7) U Michigan
8) Notre Dame
9) Northwestern
10) Columbia

11) WashUStL
12) Duke
13) Vanderbilt
14) Emory
15) Virginia

Why does a large endowment make a school worth the money?
It often allows them to provide better aid, which is most often need based at schools of this quality but the connection to being "worth the money" isn't clear at all.

Pretty sure Princeton gives every student living expense stipends for internships or commuting, and that there and at similar schools, on campus-job pay is quite high. The on-campus jobs at such schools also tend to be easy; the hard jobs like food service are unionized at Swarthmore (for example), to my knowledge. For high-endowment urban schools, kids get Lyft passes. And so on.

Your connection to endowment size is tenuous at best...

Which schools with lower endowments do do all of that? Do any publics?

Aren't there 2 publics in your top 15 endowment list? The endowment connection is weak here.

The endowments per student of publics suck. You get into a top public and you’re still fighting for scraps.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My child was admitted to a school that costs 80k a year.
10k merit aid

We are actually UMC and make 300k HHI

Major is Psychology.

Other college choice is 40k a year with 20k merit aid. It's not a T50 and not a well known name.

It's hard to turn down bragging rights, but being saddled with a mortgage level amount of debt at 22 (or if we take it on, 62) seems like a terrible decision for a name on your resume.

It is a terrible decision. Really for any major, but especially for a major in psychology, where pay is often low and graduate school is really essential to actually using your degree in that major.

+1 psych majors will need a masters and license to practice and make decent money.

My niece went to a no name state univ for her psych undergrad and graduate degree. Got her license, and now working for herself and making six figures . Still, she had to take student loans for grad school, but she worked 3 jobs to pay her way through grad school, and now is making enough to pay off her loans.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP: look at the National Universities with the largest endowments:

1) Harvard
2) Yale
3) Stanford
4) Princeton
5) MIT

6) U Penn
7) U Michigan
8) Notre Dame
9) Northwestern
10) Columbia

11) WashUStL
12) Duke
13) Vanderbilt
14) Emory
15) Virginia

Why does a large endowment make a school worth the money?
It often allows them to provide better aid, which is most often need based at schools of this quality but the connection to being "worth the money" isn't clear at all.

Pretty sure Princeton gives every student living expense stipends for internships or commuting, and that there and at similar schools, on campus-job pay is quite high. The on-campus jobs at such schools also tend to be easy; the hard jobs like food service are unionized at Swarthmore (for example), to my knowledge. For high-endowment urban schools, kids get Lyft passes. And so on.

Your connection to endowment size is tenuous at best...

Which schools with lower endowments do do all of that? Do any publics?

Aren't there 2 publics in your top 15 endowment list? The endowment connection is weak here.