I do often use this blog to remind myself what my plans are. It can be helpful to look back months later to see what I did as well. This post is about how I plan to handle the tuition bill due Sept 12.
The total bill is $7,198.55. The housing portion is $5,154.55. The tuition portion is $2,044.00. The housing portion will come from our daughter's Education Savings Account (ESA) which is currently invested in mutual fund. The remainder is coming from savings/current cash.
I could pay $20 a semester to divide this bill into three equal payments. But that's just more outflow that I don't think is necessary. Initially, I'm simply going to transfer the full payment from our savings. We have quite a bit of cash in our emergency fund and from the proceeds of two homes.
The goal is then to pay ourselves back before the end of the year. We are adjusting our withholding to 18 (yes, that is not a typo) to have no Federal withholding for the remainder of the year. This will increase my husband's paychecks by $259.36. There are 8 paychecks remaining for 2015. This will result in $2,074.88 back into our savings account. Notice that is just over the amount of fall tuition. 
Because we are paying this tuition out of pocket we can claim it on our taxes with the American Opportunity Tax Credit.
The housing portion needs to come from our daughter's ESA account in order to pay ourselves back. Since the market is crazy, I'm not going to withdraw the full amount right now. Instead I'm going to withdraw in three equal portions of $1718. Currently I plan to wait to see if the market stabilizes a bit more later in September, but worse case wait until mid to late October to make the first withdrawal.
That's the plan. I think it is a pretty good one, too. No student loans, yet! Would you do anything different?
Tuition Plan (Second Post Today)
August 31st, 2015 at 02:02 pm
August 31st, 2015 at 02:17 pm 1441027031
August 31st, 2015 at 04:14 pm 1441034090
August 31st, 2015 at 04:19 pm 1441034377
August 31st, 2015 at 05:42 pm 1441039358
I seem to be one of those people who operate on past experiences. Since my dad required brothers and I to have 'skin in the game,' we worked summers and part time Mutual Fund accounts that ultimately funded their post secondary educations. A lot of the money came from a combination of their efforts and gifts of money for birthdays, Christmas and rewards to acknowledge special effort.
I know your DD has special talent and wonder if she will develop a plan to contribute to costs after completing her freshman year. As a lecturer or instructor, I usually could identify students who were holding down jobs to fund their courses and those who relied on parents to pay the full tab.
August 31st, 2015 at 05:48 pm 1441039716
Please understand these are merely unedited thoughts...not to be interpreted as anything but unedited thoughts
August 31st, 2015 at 05:55 pm 1441040139
...Since my dad required brothers and I to have 'skin in the game,' we worked summers and part time Mutual Fund accounts that ultimately funded their post secondary educations. A lot of the money came from a combination of their efforts and gifts of money for birthdays, Christmas and rewards to acknowledge special effort.
September 1st, 2015 at 05:23 pm 1441124603
September 2nd, 2015 at 04:18 am 1441163934