By Bruce Watson
Filed under: Job Market, College, College Savings Plans, How to Save Money, Saving
According to a recent report by Pew Research economist Richard Fry, 45 percent of recent college grads were living with their parents in 2011. While not nearly as high as the 85 percent figure cited by some news sources, this still represents a disturbing 13 percentage point jump over the number of boomerang grads in 2001.
It’s not hard to see why so many young adults are moving back home: Unemployment is high, wages are low, and many recent grads are having a hard time finding any jobs, much less work that pays well and uses their recently-acquired skills. According to a study released last month, 48 percent of recent grads are doing work that doesn’t require a college degree, and 38 percent have jobs that don’t actually require a high school diploma.
For students hoping to graduate into a real job — and a real apartment — the question becomes how to get the biggest return on a college education while incurring the smallest possible debt. This is serious conundrum: For the 2010-2011 school year, the average tuition and fees charged to an in-state student to attend a four-year public college or university was $12,967 — 60 percent more than it was 10 years ago, and almost three times as much as it was in the early 1990s. Factor in the cost of room and board — which has risen more slowly — and total average college costs are still about 60 percent higher than they were in 1991.
To cover these hefty bills, the average undergrad borrower ends up with approximately $26,600 in student debt. As an ever-growing percentage of students take on loans, the problem has reached epic proportions: In 2010, the total amount of student loans outstanding surpassed the total amount of U.S. credit card debt for the first time.
Here’s a video that offers a few tips for saving on college. Some of the figures have changed slightly since it was made, but the advice still holds:
Saving on Tuition
The obvious first step toward graduating with less debt lies in paying less money to your school. Luckily, there are many ways to cut costs. One smart path is to start off at a community college. Since many universities accept up to 60 units of transfer credits, it’s possible to spend your freshman and sophomore years at a two-year school, then finish up and get your sheepskin from a more expensive and prestigious institution.
The numbers are pretty clear: In 2010-2011, two years of tuition and fees at a four-year college averaged $25,934, plus $18,250 for room and board. At a community college, students paid an average of $6,190 total for the same two years. Additionally, given that most community college …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance