Are you on track for retirement?

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by lookout123

i'm on board with you cousin. if you make significant income - and i think $100K annually qualifies a personal decision needs to be made. The parents need to decide if paying for the kid's schooling is an obligation they want to take upon themselves or not. if they don't want to pay for the schooling then by all means - buy the bigger boat. if school is the priority - then fire up the savings or 529 plan.

but when it comes down to it, i've got problems with parents trying to take on debt to pay for their kid's college degree. unless the kid is going to medical or law school if they come out of college with $50K or more in student loans they are pretty fucked. if the loans are in the parents' names then they are both fucked. to go deep into hock just to get a B.A. makes NO sense. work part time or full time if necessary - graduate in 5 or 6 years instead of 3 or 4. decide what you want to be BEFORE you start school instead of changing majors 5 times.

The only point I would like to add is that who is to say how much money a person or family makes is enough to make the parents take on all the debt, where the child, who is about to go to school, has no chance in hell of getting loans in their own name. The ability of a child to get a loan, or any other need, is based on parents income. I have no problem contributing, but I want her to take on the debt in her own name. What I make should not be a factor in the personal decision that we make as a family or that the child makes on her own to take on the debt. The simple number of dollar amount in income is not a measure of one persons financial solvency.