Helping DC’s financially at uni? What do you do?

[VoteForPedro]

Hi my DS is about to start uni this autumn. I’m wondering what people tend to do regarding helping with the financial side of things. He has applied for a loan and will be getting an £8k loan for the first year. He will also receive around £20k from his child trust fund when he turns 18 at the end of this year, that I’ve saved towards his whole life specifically for helping with uni or wherever he chose to do after school. This will hopefully mean he won’t need to get other loans in later years if he also supplements this with a part time job. His fees will be paid as he’s in Scotland.

He knows about the CTF and I’ve explained it is for uni and living costs. He will be living in halls and I think as part of learning to stand on his own feet, he pays for his halls etc via his loan and CTF. We will happy to help out a bit as I don’t want him to struggle £££ wise obviously, but I also want him to learn to grow some financial independence now he’s (nearly) an adult.

I know everyone’s circs are different but I really don’t know what is expected re finances once kids go to uni? Do parents pay for accommodation and then the student uses the loan for food / transport etc? Or do the students themselves pay for most things inc accommodation with a top up from parents etc? I realise my son is in a very fortunate position with getting some CTF money for uni but I just wondered what others have done and what’s worked?? Thanks in advance.

We have always paid for the accommodation. The loan pays for the course and living costs. She has got jobs over the holidays for top ups. She is studying in Germany at the moment for a year and we’ve had to help her out a bit more as she can’t work over there - thank you Brexit! The accommodation is much cheaper out there though - she’s in their equivalent of halls.

When you say ‘paying for the course’ is that the tuition fees? In which case we won’t pay that as uni fees are paid for in Scotland. How much is your accommodation approx a year if you don’t mind me asking? Thanks

We pay accommodation, DS only gets minimum maintenance, he lives off this and works in the holidays.

How much is minimum maintenance?

Yes the tuition fees. The halls will depend on whether you go for the basic or with bells and whistles or something in between. We went for the in between version and I think it was about £600 per month which included everything. The private rented flat she is going to be in next year is about the same (shared with 5 others though) plus bills on top. DD is living in a relatively inexpensive part of the country though. Other friends living in cities like Bristol and Manchester are paying a lot more.

Ds started on near maximum maintenance plus a bursary - IIRC it was somewhere around £8k for the loan plus another £1k bursary. His accommodation was an exceptional bargain because he only had to pay for term time. Most students wouldn't get the bursary and might have to pay year round costs. He'd worked the summer before uni and had his child trust fund. I didn't have to give him a penny for the first two years.

By the third year, I'd moved in with dp and ds went down to minimum maintenance loan, so just under 5k and no bursary. I gave him enough to replicate what he'd had the previous years. I did it as a lump sum, which I was lucky to be able to do following the move.