To ask folk to share how much money do you give dc per week if you suppor them at uni ?????

[ginorwine]

Da goes to uni in sept
He will get no grant and £4110 maintanance loan
The accommodation costs alone will be 6,000
He has a £1,500 bursary linked to grades
This leaves him with zero cash for food , books , travel costs etc
This out first Dc at uni and we are really unsure how much he will need pw in support
Any advice much appriciated
( he can cook !)

[springwaters]

Mine get no grant or maintenance loan

I pay their fees and then they get a very generous £11,000 a year each to live on- so £200 a week. Rent is about half of that. They have large travel bills, car insurance, house insurance (£400 a year) etc

It is a very comfortable amount.

Most of their friends get £60 a week more than the cost of the rent once in a private house- less in halls as no bills

[minatiae]

£1000 a month, that's what I had and lived relatively comfortably on it. I worked though.My parents paid my rent and I earned this extra from having a job.

[MatildaTheCat]

We gave them £700/ month. One was in a cheaper area and paid rent and living out of this the other was in London and spent most of it on rent and had a pretty cushy part time job to fund other expenses. Neither took the maintenance loans but both had loans for tuition ( when it was much cheaper) in the hope it would encourage them to attend their lectures.

[IloveAiredales]

Our eldest has just finished her first year at uni. We pay £200 plus per month. She doesn't work in term time. It's a struggle for her but manageable just!
We pay her mobile Bill, quite a bit of food, clothes and hair cuts over and above plus any extras that come up too.
This summer we also paid flights, spending money and taxi for her for a holiday ( with her friends but to our house in Spain)
She has taken out tuition loan ( they are going up in Sept) and gets the very minimum maintenance loan.
Even if we could afford to pay these I'm not sure I would as I think knowing its her loan gives her an extra incentive to work hard. She is doing a tough course ( chemistry) at a Russell group Uni

[wheresthel1ght]

I went to uni in the late 90's so my feed were only about 1k/year. I got no grant and had to take out loans to pay my fees and some accommodation and worked to support the rest. My dad gave me £20-30/week if he could afford it that week. Mostly I got nothing.

[ThatGingerOne]

I'm still in uni at the minute and from a low class Northern family. I get almost £9000 just in maintenance loans and grants however my rent is just under £7000. I get nothing from my single mother who is earning under £12,000 a year and never expect anything from her because I know she couldn't afford it.

I also work and have done since I was 17. Honestly the best thing to do, even if you are giving money for uni is to encourage your child to get a job. Fast food is best because they're so flexible and in the summer you can move to a restaurant close to home to work during that time too.

I know a lot of Supermarkets are now doing Student/Parent cards. You can put money on your card and then it is spent using their card. Its a good way to make sure its not all spent on clothes etc [I know a lot of my friends blow through their money in a few weeks this way].

Either way, a job while studying is probably the best way to go. You can say on your CV you worked during your studies which is seen as really good and motivated and earn some money and experience too.

[Mouikey]

I went to uni prior to fees, parents gave me £200 plus paid my rent (about £45 a week back then!!). I worked only in the holidays. It was a substantial amount back then and I lived comfortably and could go out when I wanted. Other friends lived on £10 a week (how I will never know!)

[Feellikearightungreatfulcow]

I went to uni in 2000.
Got loan of 3500-4000 per year (max given as means tested based on mum's income)
Accommodation iirc was around 1500 per year.

No money off mum, though she tried to send me back each term with a decent food shop , and things from home, so not cash, but helped us out

Look back and wonder how I did manage.
Didn't work during term time (no time to)
Did have a (0%) student I redraft of £1500 ish which I used throughout the year

Worked 12 hour shifts in seasonal summer factory jobs all summer to repay overdraft and take some money back with me

Glad I had to manage (though think mum wishes she could have contributed cash) though as I had to keep a tight eye on money and am brilliant at budgeting now

[Pisssssedofff]

They will have to get jobs, in fact DD is looking for one the day after she turns 18 so that she has the required experience to snap something up as soon as she lands in uni town of her choice. I had two jobs and bought a house whilst at university and thank god I did given prices doubled the year after I left

[nonline]

My experience 15yrsago much like ungreatfulcow above although my parents continued to pay my £50/month 'allowance' and I worked third year as well as summers.

You could pay accommodation and leave rest to them (which would be pretty generous)? Living with little money and learning good management was one really useful part of being a student.

Is £6k what nice hall of residence costs now??

[ThatGingerOne]

Nonline - Right now mine is just under £7000 and I'm not even in London

[Leopard12]

Once rent and bills if any is paid for I'd say £60 per week is fine for food and nights out, travel will depend he may not really need any (I needed a bus so was £200 for a years bus pass so paid that first week), probably a few hundred extra for freshers week where they'll be lots of nights out and events on, my dps would also start me off with a big food shop each year to fill cupboards and stock up on faveourite food and essentials. A lot of courses you won't actually need to buy many expensive books, (a few still do) as they're in the library and amazon/ebay, probably worth waiting and then if lecturers do say they need the current version then you can send whatever the cost is to your DC

[newname99]

We pay accommodation and DD will get the maintenance loan of just under 4k.This could be spread over the 40 weeks so £100 per week for food/spending which is generous.

Oldest didn't take a loan but had money from a relative of approx 4k.Ws paid accommodation and £125 per month for food plus travel home and mobile bill. Our principle was she could eat, get home and communicate with us if needed.
She also worked so that covered her going out and clothes.All birthdays presents from relatives were cash gifts and this added up surprising well.

Working is good for students so don't worry if they have to work.

We did encourage them to go to Unis out of London
as accommodation so much more reasonable.We also saved ahead of Uni so accomdation was not such an upfront cost.

1st year in halls tends to be the most expensive and years 2&3 much cheaper.

[ginorwine]

Thanks
I'm shocked that some get 200 s week tho - what do they spend it on ? 😄

[nonline]

ThatGingerOne: wow. Piqued my curiosity to look up old first year halls - now cost £4.5k and they've ripped out en-suites. :-s

OP: leopard makes good point about books and what may or may not actually be needed. Very course dependent, but libs also very into ebooks nowadays.

[minatiae]

I spent my money at Uni on much the same as I do now. Phone, Internet, TV, food (for cooking), food (restaurant 1-2x a week), hobby (has varied, but always some kind of sport), car, clothes etc. It all adds up.

[YodellingForJesus]

Our DD gets around £250 pm from us, seeing as her loans and grants barely cover her accommodation (she picked an expensive city to study in). It's a struggle to find the money sometimes, but we are lucky in that at least we still have enough to get by. She has a part time job too, so she's doing her bit.

[ginorwine]

The hall is £150 per week
I need to check how many weeks they pay for! I have guessed at 6k but hope I'm wrong !

[ThatGingerOne]

Nonline, yeah its a bit ridiculous, even if you get an oncampus [usually cheaper] halls in which you share a bathroom and kitchen with 12 people its still over £5000 a year. Mine is a bit more as I am a second year and now off campus, thankfully with an en suite! After growing up with 4 brothers I've never been so happy not to share a bathroom haha!

Leopard: This is a really good point! Don't buy books if you can get them from the library for free. I have one they said was vital. Used it twice all year. Most books can be accessed on the university's online library where you can literally read the book on your laptop at home

OP: Alcohol! Of course haha! But seriously, spending money at the students union is where most of the money goes. Luckily I don't drink so its not too bad for me! I think a part time job is essential, like I said, fast food is the best place to go, if in a uni town try will mostly take on students and work around the student's timetable. Plus you get fed on your break for free!

Best thing I learned was that store brand stuff is just as good as the more expensive stuff. Once you've learned that its a god send. Plus you can use your student ID to get discounts. I also know this place called UniBulkBuy where you can get loads of stuff for cheap although they're not open again until September time. Make sure you go on StudentMoneySaver.com that website shows deals and TheStudentRoom.com has a forum like this just for students on a variety of things to get the best advice going

[Milliways]

We paid DS's rent and he lived of the basic loan. Actually he got a job and put the loan from first year in an ISA then didn't take the loans in years 2&3, (apart from tuition fees loans). He managed to work in term time and got full time jobs in every summer break, and knew the ISA money from 1st year was there if needed.
This meant that if we hadn't paid him anything his loan would have paid rent and his jobs everything else. It can be done!

[throwingpebbles]

I worked for a year before uni to save up for this (gap year, just not the glamourous kind). Gave me good work experience and a cushion of savings.
Then I worked every holiday and occasional weekends. (We had very short terms so weren't supposed to work term time. Many did but I was in a uni sports team so no time to!)

My dad helped a bit but mainly I paid my own way

[blueskywithclouds]

My parents paid my fees (back when they were cheaper). I got no pocket money as such, I got a part time job.

[Natsku]

I didn't get anything except for the odd bit of help for travelling home and rental deposits, and so I don't plan of giving DD an allowance for uni. It is different now though as back then a part time job was easy to get (that's how I paid for things, plus taking part in experiments) but where I live DD is entitled to a stipend during her studies so that makes up partly for that and the rest is up to her via loans and jobs.