July and August are terrible months for me, financially speaking.  Not only are my annual property taxes and home/car insurance bills due, but it’s also time for me to man up and pay out the semi-annual tuition bills from my daughters’ institutes of higher learning.

For those of you with younger children who are thinking about their college futures, I have three words of advice.

Start saving now.

Seriously.  I had the good sense to open up 529 college funds (in Nebraska – it’s a long story) for my kids the minute they came home from the hospital (over twenty years ago).  I also diligently set aside money each month for their higher educations.  Even with all of that advanced work, it still wasn’t enough to foot the entire bill (even with scholarship help from good students).

For your edification, here’s a little breakdown of “in-state” expenses at our oldest’s university.  I won’t say which one it is, but it is typical of any of my in-state, public choices.  Keep in mind these are semester charges, so I get to do this twice every year.  If you haven’t done so yet, you should sit down and hold onto something.

Tuition

The charge here is $3,619.  So, taking a “full load” of classes (fifteen credit hours a semester), that breaks down to $241.27 per credit hour.  Yikes.  A credit hour translates to roughly an hour of class time, so that’s a pretty steep hourly rate for each class (not counting work done outside of class).  If you have the chance for your child to do “dual enrollment” while in high school (taking a class that counts for both high school and college credit), you should consider it, as tuition rates are a fraction of what they are when your kids get to ”the show”.

Housing

College housing has come a long way from the communal bathrooms, concrete block rooms, and heavy wood furniture that used to be labeled “dorm rooms”.  These days, ensuite bathrooms, cable and wireless internet access, and even in-room fridges and microwave ovens are common amenities.  It’s like living in a hotel room.  That will cost you $4,500 per semester, or the equivalent to $1,300 a month in rent.  Since there are generally two people to a room, that means the university is getting about $2,600 a month for each dorm room. For goodness sake, that’s the monthly mortgage on a $410,000 house – and at least she would get to live in that year-round instead of schlepping all of her stuff back and forth twice a year. Oy vey.

Meal Plan

For a fourteen meal plan (weekly), I’m getting soaked for $2,910.  That’s $13.86 per meal – of college food.  Granted, the menu options these days are much more elaborate and diverse than when I went to school back in the day (they have such choices now as sushi, barbeque, custom deli sandwiches, and much, much more), but come on. For a “normal” college menu, that’s some pricey pasta.  I’m sure there are some strapping lads that are getting their money’s worth every week, but a college girl?  Like the one I know?  The one happy with PB&J and half a bag of “Cheez-Its” for lunch?  They’re making money off of me every meal.

“Other” Fees

My semi-annual bill is also peppered with various “fees” for other “services” that are charged to my student.  There’s the “Athletic Fee”, which runs me $544 a semester.  I don’t think my oldest has entered a gym or other athletic facility on campus in the past year (unless she was lost), so I guess this pays for someone else to use that fancy rock climbing wall or the lap pool.  Then there’s a technology fee, Student Government Association fee, and an “Auxiliary Services” fee.  The total tab for these “other” fees?  $1,790 per semester.  I haven’t even talked about the cost of textbooks, which is a whole other racket in and of itself.

Mind you, all of this is for an “in-state” school.  I won’t even begin to tell you what it costs to go “out of state” (as my youngest partakes in).  Safe to say, it’s more than double the figures above.

Bottom line, you take all of these charges and multiply it by 8 (to cover four years of college), you have quite an expensive proposition to look at (not even factoring in rate increases every year).  For those of you wondering, that’s and easy six figures for four years of higher education – at an in-state public school.  Now, I’m not taking a stance one way or the other here to say that college is right or wrong for your little darlings; however, If a college degree is in your toddler’s future, all I’m saying is it will take more than loose change in a glass jar on your bedside table to get there, so the time to start planning is now.

No wonder Mom and Dad are clapping and teary-eyed when their kid walks across the stage to get that degree.  They just got a raise on their weekly paycheck.