Student finance - high earners

[JaneExotic]

I’m finding student finance as clear as mud! If parents are higher earners (household income of £120K), student is entitled to the non-means tested tuition fees loan.

What about the maintenance loan? Would they be entitled to something? And how can I find out what?

They get the minimum loan - a bit over £4000/year I think.

Have you looked at the government website?
www.gov.uk/student-finance

Or this?
www.moneysavingexpert.com/students/student-loans-tuition-fees-changes/
Lots of information out there if you use Google.

Have you looked here?

www.moneysavingexpert.com/students/student-loans-tuition-fees-changes/

It’s the standard site for knowledgeable advice on this.

They get the maintenance loan of £4,200 you’ll need to add to that as it’s unlikely to even cover their rent. I have three dcs at Uni non of them is in particularly expensive accommodation and they all need around £1,500 extra rent annually plus money for food etc.

Thank you. I’d googled so much, I’d gone blind!

Unfortunately you’re likely ‘stuck in the middle’. Neither particularly high earners or low enough earners to get any extra help.

You will be burdened with paying extra support to your child from your wages. This is in essence just another tax on your income. If you had less well paying jobs then of course your child would be given a state subsidy. But because of how the system works, you will have to foot an expense that others don’t have to.

We earn around £70k with two at uni they get just above the minimum. As a parent you’re expected to make up the difference.

I’m happy resigned to making up the difference although it will be tight. I’m trying to work out what the difference actually is! If DD receives around £4500, what’s the shortfall?

Depends on the university and standard of living. My guess would be perhaps £10k

parental contribution

Our dd got the minimum loan and we topped up by about £5/6k a year, she was in expensive accommodation.

My daughter gets minimum maintenance loan. I pay her rent and she lives off the loan plus a bit of part time bar work.

Ds has just started uni, Dh earns over the maximum wage so Ds gets £4422.

The maximum maintenance loan a student could get is £9488 so we are topping Ds up by £5066 for this year.

However, we feel and Ds feels that this is a lot. His accommodation is £6335 (no real choice at Durham as it is standard for self catered but he pays a bit extra as the room has a 3/4 bed and an en-suite) so for the 30 weeks Ds is at uni this breaks down to £105 per week! When he is home we are feeding him etc so no doubt he will be saving money every week for socialising over holidays, he is a planner.

We saved up for this so have savings which cover both Ds1 and Ds2 who is 15 being at uni for 4 years each.

To be clearer £9488 minus accommodation of £6335 leaves £3153 over 30 weeks he will be away for term time.

The vast majority of students use their overdraft and lots have jobs to supplement their loan.

The current rates, plus a calculator of how much your DC would be entitled to, if starting university this year, are on the gov.uk website.
www.gov.uk/student-finance

The maximum loan available (and therefore the 'working to' amount when calculating how much the assumed top-up needs to be) for students resident in England depends on where the applicant will be studying - in London or outside - and whether or not they are living at home during term time. The other home nations' rules all differ in their detail.

We also do as @chocolatesaltyballs22 does and (at least for the first year) pay our DC's accommodation fees and leave them the whole of their (minimum) maintenance loan for day to day expenses, travel etc.

Thank you everyone, that’s all really helpful.

DS gets £6166 minimum maintenance for London. He is in halls this year and the cost is £5550. We also have to pay and education fund fee to his college of £1000 so we have used the surplus for that. We send him £80 per week to live.

@JaneExotic

I’m happy resigned to making up the difference although it will be tight. I’m trying to work out what the difference actually is! If DD receives around £4500, what’s the shortfall?

Max maintenance loan is around £9k (£12k within London area) so you could contribute £4-5k a year? Her maintenance loan might not even cover her rent. If you earn as much as you say you do, then why can’t you contribute? It’s always the wealthy people who are super tight with money.

My DC get the minimum maintenance loan of £4200. We pay their accommodation rent which comes to about £5000 per year each. I split this with my XH.

Wealthy?

Oh you have no idea

Our household income is well short of yours but we still count as high earners. DD gets the minimum maintenance loan and we are topping it up to the maximum. I can't remember exactly how much this is but approx £5-6k a year. We have split this into half-termly amounts for her. In the holidays she will continue with her job in our home town.

For years I have been cross with the state that you cannot on a google search be told exactly the amounts - eg they could easily say minimum loan £4200 and maximum for out of London £9200 and parents expected to pay the £5k difference but instead you have to hunt and hunt and hunt. (I in the end as had been paying school fees decided to pay the fees and maintenance and rent at university and not have them have any loans)

We’re expecting to be paying out for two from next September, about £500 a month each. We’re don’t earn as much as the OP but above the threshold. We have been planning for this. It’s less than childcare cost us in the early days!