How much do you give your child on top of their loan?

[tinkywinkyshandbag]

Hi, DD hopefully starting uni in Sept. We are on a very tight budget as DH is currently not working and I'm self employed. Just budgeting for next year, very very grateful that she got nearly full loan which will cover most of Hall fees (catered if she gets her first choice). How much do people generally budget to cover additional expenses, clothes, lunches, pocket money etc? Thanks.

We are well on our way to saving £3,000 per year per child to afford topping up their loans, sadly I have just realised that our income has tipped into the next bracket up so they will get less loan and we will need to find 6 x £2000 more. Which we will pay out of income at the time I guess.

@CurseryKinkajoo it was actually meant for the OP @tinkywinkyshandbag but I hope it'll come in useful for anyone who has had a drop in income.

DD is quite lucky in that she's still going to be living at home for the first year and has managed to find herself a job (after 70+ applications).

@WhatHaveIFound I see that now - it’s obvious but exactly mirrors our current circumstances and probably many more!

Strange times we’re living in at the moment!!

@WhatHaveIFound thanks yes we did this hence her getting almost the max - thank goodness! Her loan will cover her hall fees but I am thinking of going out, stationery, travel, mobile phone, clothes...etc

Nothing. But we are lucky. Living in Wales the student loans are aimed to give the students £9250 to live on. Our wages just impact how much of that is her loan and how much is a grant that she doesnt need to pay back. She gets the minimum so doesnt have to pay back £1000 of it. It means she will have a much greater debt but has plenty to pay her rent and get by on.

Her room is more expensive this year. Shes staying on campus for y2. And we were going to consider giving her a small amount to help. But then covid hit and she was sent home and hasn't had to pay mast terms £3k accommodation fees. So she has that in the bank to help her out

tinkywinkyshandbag We will continue to pay for DD's phone and probably some travel though I don't know how much she'll commuting to campus. At the moment she's only scheduled for 10 contact hours per week.

Her job will cover going out but we'll help her out with clothes etc. We're used to paying her private school fees so it's considerably less than that!

We paid rent for them all, plus around £100-150 per week depending on food and course.

Mine get minimum loan, in halls we paid their rent and they lived off their loans.
We will do similar this year but may give them some money towards bills as their rent is cheaper than halls.

We pay our daughters rent, their loan (minimum received) covers their day to day costs. They've both worked during the holidays and put some of that money aside to help tide them over.

Not sure how we are going to do it yet.

We have decided that we are going to pay her rent, I am giving her minimum £100 a month, plus offered her to do her shopping on my Tesco account, she has got the minimum loan.

Her father is refusing to contribute, so I expect I will give her another £200 a month.

I can't imagine that she is going to be able to get a job.

We pay rent plus £100pw to live on if he isn’t working. Loan covers fees.

Marking spot, need to swot up on this

If she is getting almost the full loan, then there is no expectation for you to be giving her anything.
All the threads where people are replying £X or £Y per month, are because the dc are getting the minimum loan.

There is enough money in the loan to afford to go out sometimes. However, you and your dh are now in uncertain times and won't have cash to flash, so you funding extravagant going out, clothes, phone contracts etc can't happen.
tbh, even though we are in a position where we could give our dc more than we do, I actually think that they do need to try to learn to budget, and understand the importance of budgeting and understanding the value of money.
I do realise that there won't be the same number of student jobs vailable this Autumn, but equally, there won't be the same opportunities to go to clubs and things either, so spending will be down.

Considering how little the loan changes each year and how much rent varies, I think ‘topping up to max loan’ is an ok rule of thumb but downer always work. If they’re in cheap digs they may have more than they need to live on (so arguably you’d be funding some of that luxury), or if they are in expensive accommodation it may not be enough.

Good yardstick though but I would always recommend understanding the general cost of rent and also separately what you consider is enough for living costs for the 10 months at Uni (not including the summer)

We paid all the rent, phone, bus pass, foreign trips and other incidentals. I reckon it cost about £4k per year. DS used the minimum maintenance loan to live on.

There's no right and wrong here. You and your son/daughter need to prepare a budget to see how fair their maintenance loan will go and how much "top up" is needed. Then you can negotiate/adjust the budget to find a compromise that suits you and them.

Accommodation varies enormously, and that's the biggest cost (and also negotiable too - if the budget doesn't stretch to a superior ensuite then maybe they need to have a standard room and shared bathroom instead!).

For everything else, ensure that the budget provides for the basics, i.e. a £10 pm phone sim only contract rather than £75 for the latest iphone. Daily grocery allowance for basic "eat in meals" rather than buying all meals at cafes/restaurants, etc. Bus/train travel card but not taxis back from pubs at the weekend, etc etc. "Subsistence" level spending budget for laundry, replacement clothes etc.

Then add on a "luxuries/extras" weekly sum which they can spend at their discretion, i.e. spend it on a better phone OR meals out OR taxis OR new party clothes etc. Leave it up to them to make decisions as to what matters to them more!

DS's loan covers his rent/bills with £500 spare. We pay for his phone and will do a grocery shop every now and then but he will have to get a job to provide other money for expenses and spending. I'm a bit worried about it but he's quite confident he will get something sorted. He has quite a lot of experience having worked p/t since Y10.

Most parents should assume the maximum maintenance loan in England is what a student in England needs and make up the minimum loan to that. So eg paying the rent nad leaving hte student with minimum loan of about £4300 a year to live on is about £80 a week all year. My children are a bit better off as I pay the fees and rent and then £150 a week but they end up not that much more than many have even with the maximum student loan for those whose parents do not earn much.

There will be students on all kinds of income levels and mine found everyone gets along and are conscious some will have more money than others and some much less. It is a useful life lesson to see how others live - rich and poor and part of the university experience.
I paid £25k a year per twin which is £9250 fees, rent which was I think about £7000 in catered halls. I also provided a shared car and food when they were home and also sometimes had my arm twisted to pay other things like petrol or rail fares.

It has not ended now they have finished as both are now doing 2 years post grad which I am also funding. I just paid £20k fees for the two and will pay £6k rent for one for this academic year (other is at home) plus the usual £150 a week each and the provision of the car etc. However the end is in sight ..... given I started paying for full time childcare in 1984 when my first child was born. It has been a very long and very expensive haul but worth every penny. If I have saved the tax payer a lot by keeping them out of the student loan system then may be I have done some good there too.

We pay DD's rent and she lives on her maintenance loan.

I got nothing extra, got a credit card (that I finally paid off when started working!) and worked part time at the local subway- I was so skint as my loan didn’t even cover my rent, learned a lot though

It's a very unfair system as in lots of cases it relies on the parent subsiding the student - unfortunately as is evident here, not all parents are willing or able to do so. I feel so bad for those on the minimum loan and getting no extra financial support - it must make it a very tough few years.

The differences in the cost of halls across the country (in England) are enormous. In DD's case, first year in catered halls cost £7149. In second year a room in a five bed house cost £7800 plus food. Third year she is a returner to catered halls and its £8109. There is no way they can live on even the full loan if the costs are this high. There is an expectation that parents will support them. That's why the govt bases the maintenance loan (in England) on family income. The idea that a student in a town with a population of 60,000, 20,000 of whom are students, can "get a job" is fantasy.

Most of dds friends at uni work.

Student loan covered accommodation 6500ish and DS1 was topped up so he had a budget of 100pw.

DD received the minimum loan. We paid her rent the first year that she was in college but she has insisted on paying her own way since as she earns quite a lot working in the summer and tutoring during the academic year.