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Higher education

Talk to other parents whose children are preparing for university on our Higher Education forum.

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Original poster

Just how much are you paying for your DC to go to uni this year?

41 replies

LaineyW · 14/10/2010 08:43

My DD (18) has just attended her first open day at Southampton Solent. She loved it and is very fired up to go now but obviously we're looking closely at tuition fees/accommodation fees/food bills/new laptop etc.

Can anyone tell me what they are actually paying on a monthly basis to keep their DC at university?

OP posts:

sarah293 · 14/10/2010 08:44

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OnlyWantsOne · 14/10/2010 08:45

Im at uni, and a lot of my friends manage to be completely self sufficient whilst they study, infact, I have had no financial help from my parents and I am fine

sandripples · 14/10/2010 09:49

We pay DD's rent and she pays for everything else from her loan. She's at a uni where students are not allowed to work. Rent has varied over the 4 years from about £290 a month to £350 a month. In lots of places rents would be cheaper I think.

sandripples · 14/10/2010 09:51

Sorry - should have said that the rent is not always every single month as we had to pay it termly in the first 2 years and it was about 1000 per term. But now she's in a house outside uni so it is every month. She had a year in Germany last year and rent was a lot cheaper but I haven't included that.

pinkbraces · 14/10/2010 09:52

Sandrippels why isnt she allowed to work, Im counting on the fact my DD will get a part time job, she has done so for 6th form

sandripples · 14/10/2010 09:55

She's at Cambridge and that's the policy as there are so many academic demands on them. Its a lot of pressure and I'm actually glad that she is not allowed to work!

sarah293 · 14/10/2010 10:05

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senua · 14/10/2010 10:14

"Can anyone tell me what they are actually paying on a monthly basis to keep their DC at university?"

Nothing. It's her degree, she pays for it. I could give her a monthly allowance but I stopped doing that when she turned 16 and could start to stand on her own two feet, financially speaking. She is living off what she saved from work when in sixthform.
I have given her bits and bobs (eg some money to enjoy Freshers) but nothing on a regular basis that she can rely on.

mrsscoob · 14/10/2010 12:52

Hi, her grant/loan she cover the basics, but if she isn't working then you might like to buy her laptop, plus she may need kitchen equipment and things like that although she should beable to share the cost of that with her housemates.

Also its worth remembering that the grant/loan payments are not authorised until they sign on to the course so usually don't arrive until about 5 days after they have actually joined so she will need a bit of money to tide her over for those few days.

My son started a few weeks ago, I sent him down with £300 for food, kitchen equipment and going out money for freshers week until his loan arrived. He told me he only spent about £30 of it before his loan came and he has been doing alright and since then he hasn't even started on his loan and he's bought everything he needs including books and clothes.

Lilymaid · 14/10/2010 14:27

I think the OP should first look at some of the typical budgets that student unions produce. Her DD will get a student loan and unless she is doing a science subject or something else that is very heavily timetabled she would have time to do some sort of part time work to cover at the very least the social costs.
After that, the OP can consider whether she can or wants to give her daughter regular sums of money or just pay for certain items such as books.
When DS started university 5 years ago I gave him £30-£40 per week plus cost of books and he paid for his full board accommodation from his loan. A work colleague was giving her daughter £100 in the same situation - and others would give nothing and expect their DC to get part time work to pay for their upkeep.

figroll · 14/10/2010 19:11

I paid £4,500 for the accommodation in halls, £350 for books, £650 for a computer. However, she is living off her student loan of approx £3400 now, if that helps. So in terms of actual money that we spent, £5,500. At the moment we aren't giving her anything but we will see . . .

She isn't supposed to work because she is doing medicine and has a very full timetable.

Original poster

LaineyW · 14/10/2010 20:49

Thanks so much for all your replies (sorry for lack of response, have been at work and have only just come back online now).

I think DD1 will get a part-time job as she's had one here in our nearest town for a couple of years now and is used to the extra cash (plus she's a clubber so will need the money if she wants to carry on with that...)

Luckily DD2 is thinking of midwifery and I'm told there is usually a bursary to pay for tuition fees, which is a relief.

OP posts:

mumeeee · 15/10/2010 22:03

Well last year we paid £5000 for the year for DD2's halls. She is in Kinston which is counted as London so her Halls were expensive. She had a tution and maintenance student Loan. So her tution was paid and all liiving and other uni costs came out of her maintence loan.
This year we are contributing towards her rent well paying most but not all of it and she pays for everything else.
I did buy her some books she needed before she went and I also send her small bits and pieces but that is all.

Milliways · 15/10/2010 23:02

My DD is also at Cambridge, and her rent was about £1200 this term.

She could not imaging fitting a job in. Last year she had no free days at all, and 6 lectures/meetings etc on just one day! She was working late every night and so was glad for the short term & long holiday to recover.

She gets work in the holidays.

We also pay her rent, she gets the loan for fees & maintenance loan to cover living fees - although she has managed to save a load of that from last year.

mumeeee · 16/10/2010 13:38

Milliways. How did your DD manage to save any of her loan from last year. DD2 had just about enough to cover her living costs. She did finish the year without going into her overdraft but didn't have any loan left. I expect she spent to much on going out at first but that slowed down as the year went on. She also had to buy a video camera for her course, She had a job for a dfew weks in the summer which helped with the rent of her new house. She moved into it on June 1st and she stayed in Kingston for most of the summer as that's where her job was.

mirry2 · 16/10/2010 14:04

Our DD was at a London university and used her loan to pay for halls in the first year and rent for her flat share of £350 a month in year 2 and 3). She only had a few hundred pounds left over from that so we gave her £300 a month for food and other expenses (£10 a day).

I've always been surprised that there isn't more media coverage about the inadequacy of the student loan for living costs.

Also what is annoying is that private flat/house leases are always 12 months so my DD had to sign a lease from September to August even though the student year was only Sept-to June

RustyBear · 16/10/2010 14:33

It's easy to say glibly that they can get a job - it's not always that easy. Where DD is at uni a lot of the traditional 'student' jobs are actually still being done by last years's students who haven't found a full-time job yet, and other jobs have disappeared because lots of shops have cut the hours of their normal staff & aren't recruiting extra weekend staff.

Best bet is if your teen has a job in a store with lots of branches- they can often transfer, though a friend's Ds found the branch in his student town wasn't offering as much money as in his home town

Milliways · 16/10/2010 15:03

Mumeeee: DD has always been frugal, and a total bargain hunter.

She eats in halls when there is a "chef special" at £2 etc, and gets fed at church for £2 each Sunday and once in the week :)

AT the end of her first term, she went away for a weekend with some friends as had only spent

BlackandGold · 16/10/2010 17:32

I agree with Mirry2.

DS was at a London Uni and his loan didn't even cover his rent, let alone anything left to live on.

We had to support him quite substantially. He didn't have time to work during term time (and we wouldn't have wanted him to) but he earned money during the summer holidays to help out.

His flat lease finally finished mid Sept so he also had to pay Council Tax from June onwards as he was no longer considered a student.

sayithowitis · 16/10/2010 19:14

DC1 ia away at university and gets the loans and a grant. However, the loans and grant only cover the cost of accommodation and books. I therefore end up having to give about £100 pcm to cover food and any other expenses like clothes etc.As DC1 is studying a pure science, with at least two lectures/labs per day during the week, there is very little time left in which to do a pt job ( even if there were any around) and do private study. DC1 has become very adept at searching out bargains, but I know it is still hard to make ends meet. And, DC1 is a teetotaller, so I dread to think what it would cost if we were helping to fund an 'active' social life as well!

frazzled74 · 16/10/2010 22:13

My DS is also looking at universities for next year, we have open day booked for southampton solent but it clashes with oxford brookes one so he has to choose which one to visit. I am hoping that he will be self sufficient with his loan and part time work. I am going to put away £100 a month to help him out with books and emergencies.

duchesse · 16/10/2010 22:26

Riven, 5 hours of lectures maybe, +3-4 supervisions a week for which she will have top put in at least 8 hours week for each. I would be very surprised honestly if your DD had any time to fit a job in during term time. If her tutor finds out (and they have a way) she will be in trouble and the quality of her work will suffer. Terms are not long as you know and it's pretty full-on while you're up.

figroll · 19/10/2010 22:02

My dds loan doesn't cover her rent either. I expect we are just expected to pay it as parents.

saggarmakersbottomknocker · 19/10/2010 22:07

We paid very little to ds during his 1st year bar the odd supermarket shop when we went to visit. He managed on his loan and didn't use his overdraft. We are helping him out more this year as he has a year abroad though.

I agree with RustyBear though on the job front. Part-time jobs are pretty difficult to come by at the moment. ds didn't manage to find work last year.

sockapoodle · 19/10/2010 22:08

£250 a month for DD, she only gets smallest loan due to our income and that just covers her rent. Only gets the money when she's there, she works during the holidays. Paid nothing during her industrial year, some of her friends still got money from their parents when they were earning £15k!

Rules changed when DS started so he got larger loan of around £5000 so we don't give him any extra.

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