We are poor compared to most of our friends, but DC1 goes to a Top 20 school for less than $20k a year because of generous FA and scholarships and DC2 has received a full ride for great academic achievements and sport. We spent zero on college consulting for DC1 and $5k for DC2 because we were not at all familiar with sport recruiting.

How mediocre does your kid have to be and tell me you didn't go to a good school without ...

Anonymous wrote:Bro, what's on your info? For $10k, I can can be your consultant. Anyways I'll give you a free tip. Use Chatgpt.

It's not complicated. Have perfect SAT scores, max scores on AP calculus and physics, and an extracurricular activity that you really enjoy (I did fencing and was A-rated). International Math Olympics is also a great experience. I went to Stanford.

The expertise of a good college counselor will help your kid find the best list of schools to apply to. And I'm not talking just T25 schools. They know who has the best BME or best Civil Engineering or whatever major and that will meet the other criteria that's important to your kid (size/location/big sports environment/etc). That to me is the best part of the counselor. Helping you find the best targets and great Safeties. My kid's top safety was still considered in the final 4 choices it was that good (and my kid knew the other 3 were "much better" but kid liked the school so continued to evaluate it). That is what you want---a great safety, that gives you merit (35% of tuition) and your kid would love to attend if needed.

The next best part is the CC manages the schedule and nags your kid for you, so you can still have a somewhat happy fall of senior year. Ours required all applications be done by early/mid Nov, except the few that kid would apply RD if ED didn't work. So by Nov 15, my kid had only 2 applications left, and by Dec 24 had 3 Acceptances with great merit. Made the holidays much less stressful.

Anonymous wrote:DH and I make $900K combined, I am looking for a counselor in the $40K range. I interviewed a couple of the companies that charge $100K but could not pull the trigger. My kids are in public school so $40K seems relatively affordable compared to what my colleagues all spend each year on tuition.

But you don't need to spend that much. $4-8K gets you a great counselor and is really all you need. And that is typically for the full 4 years of HS.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just saw it today, 300K for a college campus visit tour.
https://www.luxurytraveladvisor.com/private-jets/300k-luxury-college-admissions-tour-includes-private-jet-ivy-league-visits

Honestly, I don't think you will be getting any useful "guidance" from these counseling service if you are on a 40k budget. Whatever advices you got from them will be generic. Just self-study the application process.

So stupid. I’m wealthy and this is ridiculous…things like:

“During the tour, students are prepped with custom questions to ask during info sessions and campus tours: a practice that often makes a memorable impression with admissions staff.”

Only someone who has never been on a college tour would think this is an accurate statement. The AOs don’t know any individual person - even with a check in - who asks a stupid or insightful question.

What a good consultant does help with (and can be had for the $5-7K range) is things like "this school really likes you to do an interview, so once you visit if you like the school at all, schedule an interview ASAP so everything is fresh in your memory". And then they help you know what the school looks for in a candidate so you can ask the right questions in the interview, but mostly it's just knowing "hey you need to do an interview or do X for this school"

Anonymous wrote:We have a seven figure HHI and I would not consider paying anything like that.

+1

We paid $5K for a college consultant. This covered the entire 4 years of HS, but we only used them from Jan Junior year until the end. Worth every penny, but I woudlnt' pay more than $5-8K, because it's not needed. If your kid is that good, a consultant at this level will help them get into the schools they are targeting, and most importantly have a great list of Target schools as you need to realize no matter what (unless your parents are famous or family has name on a building at the school) it's still a lottery. All the counselor can do is help your kid have the best application and write targeted essays well. But none can guarantee admission at T25 schools.

How stupid would you have to be to be comfortable spending $40,000 on a college consultant?


There. Fixed the question.