Student finance and high household income

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Honestly its so much pressure I can’t pull £8000 out of nowhere. We earn loads on paper but live in the southeast, disabled adult im caring for and financing, one gone through uni, one at uni, one due sept 2026 and I have had time out for caring, racked up some debt, why isn’t it just one standard maximum maintenance loan and you choose what amount to apply for? I’m sick of explaining to the kids what we earn, how much the mortgage is, how much the bills are, why we can’t buy them a car, why we can’t pay for ensuite halls etc etc.

massive mortgage for a shoebox, council tax £380 a month, I know we are lucky but this just is so stressful. No savings, they’ve gone on supporting the other kids.

please don’t all pile on about how I’m just venting , if anyone gets it please just let me know.

I worked throighout my medical degree though this was the '90s. Plenty did, care work or bar work.

My DC are in Manchester and Nottingham. So big Uni cities.

Both of them have had part time jobs in London (where we live) since they were 15 - they are grafters. They cannot find p/t jobs for love nor money at the moment. Bar work/supermarkets/cleaning/anything - are like gold dust at the moment and they are really struggling.

why not base it on how much someone wants/needs to borrow?

Because loads of students won't pay it back. You'd get wealthy young people taking the absolute maximum at taxpayers expense, then going off to work abroad or becoming a stay home parent & never paying it.

Students dont get the maximum loan if the household earns £25k.

1 full time minimum wage worker could earn that

I hear you!

I think that the system needs an overhaul.

My DD I s just finishing and son is about to start.

Husband and myself work full time , DC1 works every holiday and we pay contribution (£300 p/m) She only qualifies for a minimum loan

We still have a mortgage and have to pay our bills.

DC2 cannot find temp job. We are frantically searching as this is needed to supplement what we will pay come October. Accommodation has gone up (£2000) since halls first time around.

Anyone says ‘they are adults, let them pay’ does not share the same worldview as me!

I want to support them to come out with the smallest debt possible, otherwise they will never be able to afford a home and a life once their studies finish.

The nearest uni’s to us are rubbish therefore they cannot stay home and save money that way.

No family support (or inherited wealth here). 😊

No you didn’t , sorry, I just meant it’s not that we have any unnecessary expense we can drop - if we had leisure stuff maybe (like expensive gym membership somewhere etc)

Remember their repayments are the same regardless of the size of the loan so whether you get the min or max kind of doesn't affect how much they're able to save or afford on a mortgage.
(I agree the system needs an overhaul though!)

It's difficult.
Dd1 went to uni 2021-2024.
Luckily, a fairly local uni did her preferred course, so she stayed living at home (not that we saw her much! 😀)
Dd2 will be going on uni open days this autumn...and its clear its a more expensive even than 3/4 years ago.
She'll get minimum maintainence loan, like dd1.
She may stay local, too - Dd1s friends who lived away didn't have a great experience 😕
We'll have to do the same as we did for dd1 for dd2 - so driving lessons, help to buy a car, small monthly allowance...it adds up.
Retirement seems a loooong way away...

Because they are not like schools broadly offering the same subjects to all students. Different unis offer different degrees and then different variations within those degrees. And then on top of that the different unis have different min grades to apply.

I’m on UC and when my DD turned 18 I stopped getting the additional payment for supporting her - completely fair. Then when she applied for Student Finance she gets less because of my earnings?! The whole system is fucked, and totally geared against families like ours - low earners but not low enough?!!

We are lucky that the uni she is at is only 40 mins away on public transport so she can live at home - there is no way I could have paid rent for student accommodation for her.

And before anyone asks, her dad lives in Europe & doesn’t work due to his health so we get no support from him.

Living out - there’s also this whole selling point of uni life and you’ll miss out if you live at home etc.

Then that whole idea needs to be scrapped. In Australia - a small percentage live in colleges or in halls - mainly country kids. The rest commute from home. The idea that you need "the experience" is frankly BS. Its just creating massive debt. My DD lives at home, works three jobs and studies medicine. She is plenty independent. She doesn't to be getting extra by living in halls.

If your DC is happy at home that’s great for them
I don’t think it entitles you to dis the whole living away from home experience
Our DC wanted to go away,we were happy to support them, they had a fab experience
In my view staying at home for Uni is just not the same experience,it might suit some people, but it’s nonsense to pretend it’s the same

For a start our public transport isn't good enough for everyone to be able to commute from home.

If you can pull a reasonable amount of support together, ensuite isn't essential. Luckily student finance covered DD's rent, £6,700 but she had to accept all she could have was a shared room (ended up with a lovely girl who DD still in touch with), as we'd made it clear we could only give her so much a month.

Admittedly DD found it hard to get a job in the first year, but then she found a term-time job at home (and that job actually made her a lot more attractive for a uni job - she was given a higher role than the uni had advertised for).

I do acknowledge that staying at home for uni isn't for everyone, especially is there isn't the right course at their local.

But if people can't afford it - then what? And people are feeling under pressure from kids who feel they are missing out. Maybe you can afford it but I bet many more families put themselves under massive pressure and debt which has a long term impact on the economy.

My daughter is going to York. Accommodation is random. There is a couple
of sets of halls at 6k, others are 10k. You can put a choice but it’s completely random what you get!

I feel for you OP. We had twins 2nd time when eldest was a toddler so potentially three at uni at once as middling earners with massive COL in London. Saved what we could for years and funded eldest according to calculators.
All three v academic and top A levels. We encouraged apprenticeships and it worked well for one of the twins. The other deferred uni for three years in a row and has now decided it’s not worth it. She works alongside people who have a degree and eldest now works alongside people who don’t!
We talked to them about finances and said we would always support them if they chose uni but I am SO relieved they didn’t all go. I also feel for friends who paid for theirs to go only for them to drop out after 1-2 years as that seems pretty common.
The twins sometimes joke that eldest got more spent on her and siblings do notice this stuff so you can’t say no. I think it would be fair to say your youngest will have to defer if you literally can’t afford it though.
Oh. And uni jobs seem very very hard to get. That’s not a solution you can rely on.

You can say that about anything though,there are some things some people can’t afford ,doesn’t mean others should not have it
We have delayed our retirement,no regrets