To be a bit worried about paying for DC university costs!

[rollonthesummer]

How do people manage it-how does it all work?!

In my day-I had siblings at university the same time as me-and we qualified for one grant between us! That paid for the accommodation and my parents gave me £125 a month to live on-I never needed a loan.

What happens now? Do they/you apply for one set of money (£9000 a year?) for the tuition fees and a separate loan for living? Is the amount you can borrow based on what your parents earn? If so-what is the current cut off??

Those with children at university now-what are you paying out on a monthly basis???

You can think what you like rollonthesummer but yes we have two still at uni and pay large sums to support them - same as we did for three of their siblings.
Luckily one went direct entry to Sandhurst. That is another way of funding through university with guaranteed employment post graduation- the armed forces. I think Navy pays some potential engineers through sixth form too. Certainly first son will have a fully paid degree and is doing ok for a 23 year old.

DD gets £3200ish maintenance loan per year split into three payments in October, January and April she uses this to live off. We pay her rent and 36 meals per term which is about £1700 per term.

As she doesn't work due to her workload we also pay £40 per month for her phone.

She did work before she went to Uni and saved over £1000 so this helped with initial outlay of books etc and her grandparents paid for a macbook and printer.

We will probably have to contribute in some way the year after she leaves uni as she has to do a course in London before she can start work. She will hopefully receive some funding but it wont cover her living expenses living in the capital even with a part time job.

I have 2 at university - one in 2nd year undergrad and one postgrad.

I pay £1350 out of my monthly salary - dd2 has her student grant but doesn't use it yet because we realised with dd1 how hard it was to get a loan for living expenses pg. If she chooses to continue,it will be there for her. If not, she can pay it back. I give the girls £250 a month each for living expenses and pay their rents - a city in the North and London. Dd1 has some money she uses to top up from a year at work before she went travelling and dd2 has money from temping. My dad also provides cheques for a couple of hundred pounds from time to time.

Will admit to a credit card for my treats - can pay it off before I start to have interest as we'll only have 1 to pay for next year. Ds works and dd3 has a good 5 years to go.

I don't begrudge it because I had 4 years of free education - 3 in London and one in Cambridge - all amazing.

We pay our Uni fees gets paid through fees loan (£9k per year). We pay her accommodation which is £600pcm - and don't pay anything on top of that.

Her maintenance loan is hers for everything else (£4320 pa). She works to top up.

So instead of her being in debt to the tune of £61,560 for a three year course, it will be £39,960.*

*figure might not be totally correct after a Friday night glass of prosecco 😬

I have already made decision not to move house or do any house improvements simply so I can have my mortgage paid in 5-6 years and be saving for DD uni expenses. She's only 8. I'm not sure if my parents would have done similar for me but as they had 3 kids and we went to uni in better times I'll never know. Incidentally I did pay for some of my university career and the determination to pass/qualify when I was paying for my education was dramatically different to when I had a free pass.

My DD is doing a vocational course so cant work. We are from wales so finance is slightly different. However, her maintenance loan is not enought somshe pays her hall, fees we give her £60.00 to live on, she is managing to save money which is good because she will need it over the summer.
Next year she is moving into a house share which looks lovely and will,cost her £450 per month.
The students who stuggle on £100 per week with phone and other expenses all paid are clearly moving in different circles from my DD.
We are struggling but just about managing to support her so dont worry, i am sure you will too OP.

Sorry that is £60.00 per week to live on, we also pay her mobile contract.

It depends on parental income, so if you have a high income, even though it's not as black & white as people think, be prepared to advocate you DC get a weekend job early on, so they have a work ethic and can provide for themselves as well as any support from parents.

Means testing for University grants for me is debatable, you can have a parent who earns a lot, but they have a big mortgage, or debts.

I feel it's a good idea to try and save for your children so there's a pot of cash there, even £5 a week over 18 years can build up with interest to be a considerable sum. Whether they use it for University or if they go down the vocational route, driving lessons and a car.

Things change all the time, so I can imagine the goal posts being moved again.

The shock is that the debt goes up quickly - the interest means that dd1's 27k tuition loan is already way above that . That's the bit that really annoys me.

There's now a pg tuition loan, started this year, of up to 10k. However, there isn't a student loan for living at pg level - career development loans are a minefield, expensive and count as proper debt.

I wonder how likely it is that the terms of the loans will change so that eg they aren't written off after 30 years or that the amount you need to earn before you start paying it back goes down or that the amount you pay back monthly will go up? Maybe the loans will be sold to private companies-could they change the terms??

My son has just graduated and my daughter will be going in September. We paid our son's rent for the 3 years and he used his maintenance loan (about £4500) per year to pay for everything else. Rent was about £600/month for 1st year in halls and £400/month for last 2 years.

There's also deposits to take in to consideration and when he was in private accommodation he had to pay half rent for June,July and August even though they weren't living there. Also factor in costs of utilities such as internet etc if it isn't included in rents. There's no denying it, it is very expensive.

Is it still different if you go when you are older? I went when I was 23, and as such was classed as a mature student.

OP - we pay the lot, so fees, rent, allowance and mobile phone contract. We do get help from dh's employer with education costs until ds is 24, but that is standard for the package where he works, and reflects the fact that it is common in Europe for the kids to go and do MAs etc for a longer time than Brit kids do.

Rent is about £366 per month, and we give him a generous allowance in term time. Holidays he comes home and tends to hibernate, and manages not to spend anything!

My daughter is the same, she has a loan for her tuition and gets just over 3k in maintenance, if your parents earn jointly over 30k they can't get more. The three k doesn't go far as her house needs to be rented for the full year and she still needs to be able to live, food, clothes, household items like loo roll or cleaner, toiletries, law books and socialising, we top her up by about another four grand or so a year.

Last year in halls it was a lot more . This year it's less as she's moved out of the halls into a shared home and rent is about 80 pounds a week.

op, I thought they loans were already being bought by private companies in England?

www.independent.co.uk/student/news/student-loans-sales-debt-private-companies-treasury-graduates-12bn-a7565716.html

not sure if this is a good or a bad thing, am veering towards bad?

Its terrifying! How is the maintenance loan paid back? I hadnt even considered deposits......

Even RG Unis have bursaries and scholarships available. Or at least mine has because I've just applied for all that I fit the categories for - mature student/single parent/deprived background/female Some of them are subject based (I'm studying Microbiology).

I'm hoping that we'll have a small mortgage only by the time DCs go to uni so can help. Also they are both EU citizens so hopefully will go to an EU uni for no/low fees! That is an opportunity that many have just been deprived of!

The loans that are related to income, do they take into account savings in the students names? Or parental savings? Or is it just parent's income?

Just thinking ahead (and worrying), DH will be retired by the time ours are university age.

My daughter started uni last sept, she receives £9000 for her tuition fees and £5500 in loans (the minimum for London). Her first year accommodation is £8500, so we have to top up £3000, plus we give her £90 a week for living, her halls are catered at the moment so no food costs. Plus we pay her phone, travel and other bits. She is quite good at managing her money and had a part time job pre Christmas. Next year she will move into private rented which we envisage will be about the same costs but she will need extra money for food and travel.

We were fortunate that ours got through just before the fees increased. So .....

£3,300 pa uni fees
£4,500 pa accommodation
£400 pm allowance
Plus mobile phones, train home etc

The above was on the basis that they didn't get a loan, run up credit cards debts

blog.moneysavingexpert.com/2016/09/02/how-much-are-parents-supposed-to-give-their-children-when-they-go-to-university/

Parents are expected to contribute anything up to £5K a year depending on the household income.

Pussycat they even take into account your other dependent DCs savings! But you also get an allowance for the them!

DS1 went to uni last October. He has about 3/4 of the loan and we top him up by £30 a week to make it up to maximum. He pays for his own phone (Giff gaff). We pay for the odd shop when we visit.

My salary went up last year, so we'll need to top him up more next year. Plus this year he had a couple of low income bursaries hell lose next year, but he had saved those anyway this year.

Bloody hell that's scary!