Here’s a few tips when choosing colleges for application and enrollment, and simultaneously determining how your family will afford the costs:
- Calculate all 4 or 5 years of costs when determining the affordability of college, not just the first year.
College costs during a student’s senior year in college are likely to be at least one-fifth higher than during the freshman year in college.
– Mark Kantrowitz, FinAid.org (NY Times 4/23/2012)
- Colleges can raise tuition at any time during the school year. Both the CSU and UC have raised tuition mid-year in the past two school years.
- Pay attention to the proposals in Congress to eliminate subsidized interest on subsidized Stafford Loans and reduce tax deductions, like the American Opportunity Tax Credit, in years during college, to estimate possible cost increases.
