How much living allowance do you send them?

[IheartNiles]

DD will get minimum loan.

We’ll need to top up her accommodation (looking like another £3k as she medically needs an ensuite).

How much do you then give them to live on / how much do they need?

She has a Saturday job at home now and my expectation is she should find a part time job while she’s there. I strongly believe in getting lots of work experience and valuing money.

£75 per week for living expenses.

My ds get the minimum maintenance loan.
I pay him £500 pm which covers his and bills.
Although he refuses to have the heating on and has built up a float for his bills.
I also pay for his phone.

Yes a private rental will usually be 52 weeks. Also, be aware that the cost of private accommodation can often be more expensive than first year halls accommodation. It very much depends on where you are. Dd is in a city where there are more students than private accommodation, so landlords can charge a premium unfortunately. This means we are paying considerably more than we did for her first year uni accommodation.

@kimlek no, I’m saying if parents are paying the accommodation cost in many instances for the first year the maintenance loan therefore needs to meet their other cost over term time only assuming they may be at home during the Xmas and New Year breaks. Roughly 4.5k maintenance loan gives £140 / wk for 32 wks. Which hopefully should be more than adequate.

as I posted hall contracts, Uni owned at least, are most often between 39 and 42 wks, private rental for second year onwards 52 wks. And DCs may choose / need to be there for part of those vacations in which case, again assuming parents covering rent, the maintenance loan would spread over more weeks.

JSA for an under 25 is £67.20

I think that is a good starting point for food with some extra for books / consumables.

We pay accommodation, phone and train tickets home.

DD lives off minimum maintenance loan and has a part time job. (If she ran into trouble, we would help, but the idea is for her to take small steps towards independence.

@boys3 ahhh I understand! Thank you for explaining. Makes total sense.

My dds get a minimum loan. Dh and I pay for their accommodation.
Both dds have jobs ( eight hours a week).
During the Summer both dds will work full time. Dd(2) has a paid internship for the Summer

We give Dd our parental contribution - ie top up their min loan to the max student loan amount for outside London. We divide by 3 to give her a termly amount . She pays her accommodation (bills included ) out of that. It leaves her with £50 per week for food / anything else. Accommodation and food is calculated over 52 weeks.
She works over the summers to build up a buffer. She seems to have a little left most weeks which is good for those weeks when she has something bigger to pay for ( ie trains / ball tickets/ stash etc)
We pay phone bill and insurance

You’d think as it’s a loan all students would be awarded the same. Really odd to expect adults to be funded by their parents…

DS has a meal plan with his accommodation and manages just fine on £150 a month.

Christ. I am realising my kids wont be able to go to University.

Depending on your household income, they may be able to get the full loan which should cover everything quite comfortably.

In reality though it isn’t a loan in the conventional sense, more a graduate tax given it’s link to earnings. But I get the general gist of your point.

I think it maybe quite hard to live of just maintenance loan (even if full loan) in a number of areas in the UK so I think it may limit people to where they feel they can go. I think unis with shorter terms and those that only charge accommodation term times will potentially be more affordable. It is ashamethat some students will be limited with where they can attend.

The Welsh system works like that - same overall amount for everyone, but with a grant / loan split that depends on household income.

Mine is in London, so pricier. He doesn't take the maintenance loan. I pay his accommodation (which includes breakfast and dinner), phone, Oyster card. Then I give him £250 a month to cover lunches, socialising and everything else. If he has a major expense (like needing to replace his trainers when they fell apart) he can ask for more. He does have a casual job, but he plays a sport at high level so doesn't get much time for paid work on top of everything else.

Not just that but for students from Wales the loan/grant for 2023-24 has been increased pretty much in line with inflation as opposed to just under 3% in England.

the income thresholds in Wales are a bit different too. Upper threshold £59,200, so slightly lower than in England, but, and a fairly massive but, maintenance entitlement for living away from home and outside London is max loan £9950 plus a further £1,000 grant element.

We pay his accommodation

He gets min maintenance loan about £4.5k. He gets this in three lump sums that he pays immediately to us. We divide this annually by 9 months (he’s not at uni June July or August) and pay this to him so he receives a monthly payment that’s easier for him to control.

He will work in the holidays.

My twins finished last year.
I paid rent and fees and £150 each paid per week which is quite generous and I also fund their car which they share and took to Bristol in year 2 although most students don't take cars. I started it in the July before they went so they could save from it over the summer as the start of term 1 of year 1 tends to be quite expensive.

Loads of people they know had an awful lot less, one boy £20 a week e.g. people just muck in and don't need a lot.

For us paying what I did was not too different from £17k to £18k a year school fees so I just continued the pain a few more years.

When my sons went in 2017/2018 we paid one weekly and one monthly - they chose. They started on £75 per week and ended on £85 in 2021 as prices were rising. Was planning on £90-95 for dsughter but have gone to £100 as inflation especially food is crazy.

Pay for trains home and phone on top. So she can always be in contact snd get home when she wants.

Give her the difference in loan. Ideally over 3 terms like she'd get if she was eligible for maximum loan.

We paid for catered hall and later accommodation and food. The minimum loan is for everything else. They both were fine with that and managed occasional holidays too.

I pay for accommodation and phone and dd gets minimum loan to live off. She also has a part time online job she kept from
when she was home which is well
paid and does that still one evening.

with the prices of halls anyone else thing the 9k that the government state isn’t really enough t it’s more like 10-11k needs to me found from somewhere