Financial support for kids at uni

[salmonandchips]

What's fair when you have two kids at uni but one has bursaries / grants / lower cost living accommodation than the other? Meaning that before parental support, one child is thousands of pounds per year better off?

Give them both the same amount and let them get on with it? The "disadvantaged" one will just have to work more hours in their part time job / and or get an overdraft.

Or try and even it up some how, meaning that one child might get more financial support from parents than the other?

Ensuring sufficient funding for them to be able to study effectively and still eat is about giving them a fair crack at getting qualified and starting a decent career. It's trying to give a fair starting line and a good jumping off point (or the best you can afford) so that they can support themselves throughout life.

Wills are different. They come at the end and are more about division of spoils.

We have had this with our three dses - and what we aimed to do was to give each of them enough money to pay for their fixed costs, and to have a similar amount left over for food, fun, books etc. We explained that this is what we were doing, and they have all been fine with it.

I just want a fair start for them both.

They currently both get pocket money - the same amount. Dsd has a part time job, I haven't decided that she should now get less pocket money because she has chosen to work. Likewise I don't give him any extra. He just goes without things.

Is that the same thing, I don't know?

If I've got this right, it's a big climbdown from paying accommodation plus £20 a week to giving your DS £1500 to even things out. What kind of fixed sum does your DH actually have in mind?

I think dp had an idea of about £2500 each per year.

Ds doesn't have much to do with his dad. He saw him once last year (Dads choice), so I can't see him and his partner helping out.

He knew the accommodation would need to be "topped up" and then £20 a week on top of that.

It's only now that he's realised that dsd won't need our help at all to put her in the position of having her accommodation paid for plus £20 cash per week.

We've been together for 7 years and living as a family for 5 years.

I think the only fair way is to work out what your DS will need on top of his loan to pay for accommodation and modest living expenses. DSD may need less money now, but that's not a good reason to penalise your DS if your household can afford the contributions. Depending on how easy/practicable it is for him to find a part time job, your DS could find himself priced out of university without the right support.

We've been together for 7 years and living as a family for 5 years.

If your son is down over 5 thousand a year purely because of your DP, and your DP is not willing to do anything to help him out or make it fairer, I personally would be moving out. I couldn't live with a man who would let that happen.

We've just had a long talk and he keeps saying he agrees with me and that we should ensure ds accommodation is funded and then give him a small allowance.

I then keep pointing out that dsd won't need any money from us if we do that as her loan cover those amounts.

He then keeps saying he wants to give them equal amounts whether that be £1500 or £5000 per year.

He has suggested that he asks dsd not to take her "London" loan meaning she will receive the same loan as ds and we could pay them both the same. He keeps saying she will have £1500 a year more debt, which is true. Whereas his £1500 would come from us as a gift.

Good idea in theory.

However, when I pointed out that dsd might not have to get a tuition fee loan if she wins her scholarship, she will have 27k less loan than ds overall and how on earth could we "even that up" for ds. He told me that I shouldn't consider that and just accept it.

It feels like there is one rule for one.

Have I understood this correctly that he is quite happy to fund your son what he needs but the sticking point is that he wants to give his daughter the same but you don't want her to have any money as you think she has enough from the loans and bursaries

He's saying he wants to give him enough to "survive" and then give her the same amount of money. I think we both initially thought it would even out and we would be giving them the same sort of amount to give them the level playing field. Now it seems we don't need to do this and I understand that's not sitting very well with dp.

It's not that I think she has "enough " rather that she has an advantageous starting point. She won't need to get a part time job, can enjoy visits home more often, nights out whereas he will need to work all weekend to be at the same point etc.

I see his point about the £1500 more debt per year but this is easily balanced out by the 27k.

So if he is given an extra £1500 then they have the same short term but she ends up with a long term debt of £4500 and he has £27k debt?

That sounds a fair compromise.

The key thing is that you must believe that he is treating your son as he would his own. If not, after 5 years living with your son, that's a serious issue.

I don't think there's any obligation to pay your son more money to take him up to his stepsister's income. If she has scholarships, bursaries, whatever - that's her good luck and her choices and possibly hard work.

If they both graduated at the same time and earned £10K difference, you wouldn't give him money to the even it up, surely?

If she could afford a house deposit in 10 years and he couldn't, you might loan him that. As others have said fair doesn't mean the same.

I think if you can afford accomm + pocket money for both, then do that. If she then doesn't have to work and he does - that's their choices, and their luck.

If you can't afford to do that for both, you need to involve them in the decisions. If you pay his accomm and her bursary pays hers, but they both have to work - that's fair. If he has to work loads of hours and she doesn't, you should give him more.

He wants one to get enough to survive while the other gets enough to flourish and enjoy. Thats not fairness.

The amount DSD borrows as a student loan is entirely her own business, and unless she gives express written permission the student finance people won't give you any information about how much loan she gets. Borrowing less sounds like a good idea but your DH has no right to suggest it to her in the cause of evening things up with your DS.

Personally I would not allow my son to be financially disadvantaged by my decision to live with a dp. I think your son should get the same financial advantages and standard of living (in terms of free time/necessity to have a pt job etc).
If it was your son getting the grants I bet he would want his dd not to have less than your ds.

If your son had the bursary and scholarship would he say his dd only needed enough to survive and a part time job?

If I were your dp, equally I think I'd feel your ex had some responsibility here. It all sounds very complicated.

Evening it up is the right thing to do. Perhaps it's not the 100% fair thing to do, but sometimes life isn't a straight equation.

I'd find it hard to love a man who expected my DS to suffer, whilst his DSD had enough for social outings and more frequent trips home.

We have two children (both now over 30yrs old). One went to uni, the other didn't. To the one going to uni we gave £200 per month by dd into their bank a/c and also posted a £20 note weekly with a letter with news from home. We also paid the contract on the mobile phone for this child which was never abused. This child took out loans via the uni to cover tuition and accommodation so have uni debt which we could do nothing about as we are not rich.

To the non-uni goer, we bought the guitar equipment for him to play in a band on the local circuit. We also bought his first car and insured it.

We kept records ourselves (privately) so we knew we were being pretty equal and fair to both and the spends worked out pretty equal. Each had different needs.

Our kids are both well rounded, happy and loving and trust us to do the right thing by them and always be fair.

You can't do more than that really. I would say horses for courses but keep it fair and equal.

I know it isn't the point of the thread, and I'm not having a go at the OP for this. Apologies in advance for the thread jacking. But does anyone else get fed up with the number of times on MN - where there are problems - the OP says "and he is the higher earner"?

It's so frustrating that so many more women than men are in that position.