How much do you contribute to child at university?

[AnonymousBleep]

I've got a couple of years yet but I am planning ahead. I don't want my son really to start work with massive debts, but his dad and I (we are separated) are not completely minted so he'll have to get some loans to cover his costs. What is 'normal' for parents to contribute to children at university, and what's the most cost-effective way of going about things? I was thinking that my son would probably need at least £1K a month in living expenses (and that's if he doesn't go to a London uni) - is that reasonable? Is it better to pay for the tuition and my son get loans to help him out maintenance wise?

We are a couple of years away, but we are planning/budgeting on the basis that DS will pay for accommodation from his student loan and his own savings. It’s possible (probable?) the amount of loan he is entitled to won’t fully cover accommodation costs, but we have been paying a bit into savings for him since he was born.
Tuition fees will be completely covered by a tuition fee loan.

We pay for his food, clothes, toiletries, travel, phone etc already (mainly by giving him a monthly allowance), so we will just carry on with that when he is at uni.
We track how much we spend on food monthly, so will take an average of that, work out DS’s share (plus a bit extra because it is more expensive cooking for just one) and give him that for food, reducing our own family food budget accordingly. We might pay for food weekly, depends on what works best.
Or if he is in catered acommodation, we will pay the difference between that and self-catered.

DS is aware that choosing a uni with cheaper acommodation will mean he won’t eat into his savings. But we are not going to let him starve, we will always find the money for food.

If he wants extra money for going out, he will need a job, just like he would do at home.

We have a higher income tax rate so its not all as great as it sounds.

I think UK parents need to adopt US practices and start a college fund for their children almost at birth. Instead of buying cuddly toys and plastic tat for birthdays and Christmas, family and friends put the money in the college account and it grows. Once the children are able to work during the school holidays they can add to it. And there is always the time between finishing A levels or equivalent and going to University when most can work full time and not pay tax - so they can start with a substantial sum to supplement the loan. If they do not go to University they can use it for driving lessons or house deposit or similar.

My DS chose a local university as this was just not an option for us.
He was awarded a £6000 maintenance loan and I still pay his phone Xbox subscription etc and give him £20 a week. Obviously he has no accommodation or food costs.

Where can you calculate how much maintenance / tuition loan your child is entitled to please? On the gov site I can see what you could be entitled to, and an application form - but no calculator. Seems odd if you can't know in advance to help make life plans.

We couldn’t find one. We only found out how much maintenance loan he would get when he got the letter saying he had been approved.

Student finance calculator - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Dd has the tuition loan and minimum maintenance loan.
It covers tuition fees and her rent.

We give her £500 a month, pay for her car insurance and her phone. She also had a part time job which brings in about £400 a month.
Her out goings are
Food
£100 a month bills

She still moans about being skint!

Sorry should have said
I'm her first year there was a shortfall for halls of around £2k which we paid but she's in a house now which is cheaper.

This is what DD did. I'm taking her tomorrow. Her £6524 loan covers her rent on campus and leaves her about £100pm. I'm giving her £300pm. £400pm is more than enough to eat, study and socialise.

We'll look at living off campus budgets when she has a better idea of figures.

The way most people seem to do it is to use the total maintenance loan as a guide. It's based on your income, so if your son applies and your income means he only gets the minimum loan (this year that's £4,767 if living away from home and not in London), you'd then be expected to top up to the full loan amount (£10,227). i.e. you'd have to find £5,460 for the year. If you've already got £18,000 saved, on that basis you should have enough for a 3 year undergrad degree. Lots of people argue that it's not enough, but mine have coped. If they need more money they work!

Im fortunate my DD currently plans on going to Glasgow Uni which is close to us so no halls or flat to pay for. We dont want her having student loans to pay when starting out, so will give her money to “live” on.

This is quite a thorough explanation! www.savethestudent.org/student-finance/maintenance-loans.html

Just a comment about ‘ill give my child £1000 a month so they dont have student loans’

In some ways that’s what we are doing with our dcs.
But it still leaves the cost of university fees.
At £6500 a year, there is no way we can pay for that too.

Unfortunately , I think there are very few students who will have no student debts at all….