Moolanomy weekly roundup #8: “College Savings” edition

By Pinyo • Sep 16th, 2007 • Category: Weekly Roundups

I wrote about saving money for college in my posts: “My kid’s college costs will be $467,000! Are you kidding me?” and later in “Saving $250,000 for my son’s college education” with dollar amount adjusted down to a more realistic level. This weekly roundup, I searched my Google Reader and beyond for other posts and sites about saving money for college so that I can start putting together my plan.

SavingForCollege.com, 7 parts tutorial to introduce you to the basics of saving money for college. The site is chockful of useful information, tools, and calculators. I will be visiting it often over the next few weeks.
The Simple Dollar, Five Financial Moves I Made Within Three Days Of The Birth Of My Daughter. Trent has been saving money for his daughter even before she was born, and these are the moves he made afterward.
Advance Personal Finance, Rolling Over Savings Bonds Into a 529 Plan
CFO: Chief Family Officer, Comparing College Savings Plans. CFO provided link to Bankrate.com and the handy chart comparing 529 plans, prepaid tuition plans, and Coverdell education savings accounts.
Millionaire Mommy Next Door, 110 Personal Finance Calculators: Fast Answers For Your Financial Questions. This was an awesome post with a nice College section.
My Two Dollars, Top 529 Plans For Your Child’s Education Per Kiplinger’s Magazine. This post highlighted some of the best 529 plans; unfortunately, New York was not one of them.
Punny Money, How to Contribute to Your Family Financially Without Earning a Dime… Guest Poster, Robin Shreeves shared, “Upromise works with hundreds of merchants and when you spend money at those merchants a small percentage of what you spend gets donated back to you to use for college savings…3% off all you spend will go into a college savings account for the kid.”
Free Money Finance, 529s Are the Undisputed Kings of College Savings. This post detailed five “rules” for making the most of your 529 and quoted Money Magazine saying, “You’d now be a fool to save for college any other way but in a 529 plan. The real question then is not whether to save for college in a 529 account but which one to pick.”
Blueprint for Financial Prosperity, Introduction to 529 Education Plans.
My New Choice, Parenting Mistake #1 :: Ignoring Their Retirement. The author shared, “Remember, the kids can always take student loans, while no one will give you a loan for retirement.”

Favorites from the M-Network:

Christian Finance, Are you a risk-taker?
Gather Little By Little, How Do You Know You’re in Debt?
Being Frugal, How to dress your kids well on the cheap
Plonkee Money, inflation is good…sometimes
I’ve Paid For This Twice Already…, The fine line between frugality and obsession
The Dough Roller, WARNING: Converting an Index Fund to an ETF May Increase Your Wealth

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday

Pinyo is the brain behind Moolanomy personal finance blog and a few other web sites. If you like this article, please subscribe for free daily email updates.

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5 Comments

Dawn, 16. September 2007, 5:41

Pinyo, Great resources for 529 College Savings information. Thank you.

Similarly, I have published http://www.529Saver.com which is also an objective guide to high quality 529 resources. This information compliments yours well. I hope this is of help to you and your readers.

Regards,
Dawn at 529Saver.com
Chief Family Officer, 16. September 2007, 6:20

Thanks for the mention - I hope you found that post helpful. I do think that $400,000+ is more realistic if your child wants to attend one of the most expensive schools (Cal Tech, for example, is at $40K per year already, if you include room and board), but those schools do tend to be the most generous with aid also (I suppose they have to be!).
jim, 16. September 2007, 6:42

Thanks for the link!
Lynnae @ Being Frugal, 16. September 2007, 7:38

Thanks for the mention!
Pinyo, 16. September 2007, 9:10

@Dawn - welcome to Moolanomy and thank you for sharing the link. It looks like a good directory of resources.

@CFO - Another commenter offered his thought on how much to save for college: “I decided that I donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t have to be prepared to pay for his entire education. My plan is to tell him I can pay for all of a public school education. If he wants to go to a private school for some reason, I will encourage him, but heÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ll have to take out loans for part of it. I want to help him keep his loans to a minimum, but I think itÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s actually a good thing to put some of the responsibility on him so that he values his education more, etc.”

I really like his idea about saving enough for good public education and let the child share the burden if he/she wants to go to a more expensive school. This makes a lot of sense to me. Beside, I doubt I can save $400k without jeopardizing my own retirement and lifestyle.

@Jim and Lynnae - no problem. The pleasure was mine.