My husband and I have been where you are now. We’ve faced the college selection deadline — three times. We told our three children they could apply to any college they wanted. But, we stood fast to one rule — no debt, no matter what.for each of our children. Because our eldest received some scholarship money for undergraduate studies, we had enough to pay cash for her master’s degree. Our son took five years to complete his math degree. He was only offered federal loans, which we turned down.
The protests go something like this: “What can we do if that’s where he wants to go?” or “We can’t disappoint our child. She’s worked so hard.” You have a choice if they need you to take out loans. You can say, “No, we can’t afford that particular school.”all too often the desire of the student trumps the financial common sense of selecting a school that doesn’t require the accumulation of debt that will take several decades to pay off.. Lenders and the federal government make it too easy to overspend on a college education. Look at the cost of room and board this way.
This makes it hard for students to realize how painful the payments will be once they graduate — or drop out without a degree. Even with income-based repayment plans that can reduce the monthly cost, borrowers still bemoan having to manage student loans with all the other monthly obligations that come with living on their own.You may be planning to just take out loans for four years. But consider this: The national six-year completion rate for students who started college in the fall of 2015 was 62.