Frugal Living & Planning for College

One of the biggest bill a family will face, besides buying a home, is college education. The average price of college education in the U.S. has risen well above the average rate of inflation. For the longest time, families cope with the ever rising cost of college by drawing equity from their homes or borrowing ever larger amounts of student loans, especially from private lenders. But with the collapse of the housing and financial sectors, many families are being forced to rethink their college planning strategies.

What if you are the frugal sort with no intention of going into massive debt to finance your offspring's education? What if you are heading to college and not wanting to graduate with a heavy debt load?

It comes as no surprise that many families and their kids are looking more and more toward the public university as an affordable choice that offers value-for-money college education. But as a recent Money Magazine article warns us, with soaring applications and diminishing state budgets, public universities may not be the panacea to college tuition sticker shock.

So what can you do about the ever rising college tuition bill? An earlier Money Magazine article, Ease the Tuition Squeeze offers six tips for dealing with this dilemma:

1. use your savings strategically
2. apply higher - and lower
3. play it safer
4. borrow smart
5. make tuition less taxing
6. stop worrying (at least for now)
   

Links:

• The Trouble With Public Colleges
• Ease the Tuition Squeeze