I don't think you're insane, but:I often say that I wrote large tuition checks with a sincere smile on my face, which some people took to mean that I must be insane. And, as it happens, the ROI has been more than we could have ever anticipated.
We were full pay for 4 kids at a range of schools. IMO, there’s not a better use of money.
1. This is one of those things with a "donut hole," right? Those who are poor enough are charged nothing, and those who are rich enough can pay with a tiny fraction of their wealth, but many of us in the middle are potentially getting charged a price that amounts to a stunning fraction of our wealth. I don't expect you to tell us what that fraction was for your family, but I don't think you're in the same ballpark as the OP. I will definitely be in that ballpark with four kids, $1-3M in savings, but also a pension that should cover most of our expenses and give us quite a bit of flexibility around how to use our savings.
2. I know you've spoken about the ROI for one of your kids being off-the-charts, but what about for the other three?
3. I have mixed feelings about the use of money here. If it brings joy to the whole family, and the financial ROI is positive, it's hard to argue with that. But would there be any less joy, or maybe even a better ROI, if one paid for a much lower cost school? (Getting more abstract, I also personally struggle the wealth hoarding that I see at top private schools. I've attended a couple - paid for by ROTC and a similar program for active duty officers, in my case - so I get the quarterly solicitations for donations, and my thought is that they might be the least deserving "non-profit charities" that I can think of given their multi-billion dollar endowments, land holdings in HCOL areas, opulent buildings, and administrators with multi-million dollar salaries. It makes it hard to feel good about sending those schools, say, 1/3 to 1/2 of our total savings if we paid full price for four kids to attend.)
This is a good point; thanks for sharing. I've noted before that in most scenarios, my spreadsheet has me and my wife dying in our 80s with a portfolio that might just keep growing in retirement, even if we pay six-figures per kid for college. I don't know where all that money will go yet. I have mixed feelings about giving it all to our kids who would already be in their 50s and 60s themselves, which makes giving sooner with a "warm hand" (as TomatoTomahto often talks about) appealing. So paying for college is clearly a way to do that....My wife calls it their "pre-inheritance".
Statistics: Posted by warner25 — Thu Dec 19, 2024 12:50 pm — Replies 42 — Views 2169