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Saving for College: Cost of College

This guide is meant to highlight resources parents, guardians, or other loved ones can use to better inform their choices in saving for and funding of a child's post-secondary education.

In preparing a savings and investment plan it is important to set goals. Saving for college can often mean creating a two decade plan. How can we determine a savings goal for something that far out?

Below are a few tools and tactics that can help in setting a dollar amount needed for post-secondary education. We can use these to find out what the current cost of college is and incorporate knowledge of the Higher Education Price Index (HEPI) to plan for the rising cost of college. We can also use freely available "Net Cost Calculators" to see what potential financial aid may be provided for certain schools.

Post-Seconday Schools

We can use certain tools to look up post-secondary educational institutions (Colleges, Universities, Trade Schools, etc.) and get information about them such as cost, cohort default rates, and programs.

Current College Costs

You can find this information on the College Navigator, but each school will have different factors to determine your child's out of pocket expenses for college. Most schools provide a net cost calculator/estimator that will aid in determining final costs of attending their college. You can often find these by doing a search for "net price calculator institution's name" in popular search engines. You can also use the Net Price Calculator Center to help direct you to an institution's page.

You can use the Federal Student Aid Estimator to gather an idea of how much federal student aid a student might receive.

Inflationary Pressure

Post-Secondary Educational Institutions are subject to inflationary pressure. This is often at a higher rate than general inflation measured most generally by the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The inflation of college costs is measured by the Higher Education Price Index (HEPI). This number is released yearly and can be found in a report from Commonfund.

This guide does not constitute any type of individual financial advice, tax advice, guidance, or endorsement. You are encouraged to consider your own financial situation and needs, continue your own research, and engage in your own ongoing financial education and when necessary contact and consult with appropriate financial professionals.

This guide is not individual savings, investment, tax, or financial advice.