How much did you spend applying to Derm this year?

[JDMD243.0]

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I just gonked my finances on mint.com and found that I spent just shy of $11,000 since August on applications, externships, hotels, rental cars, plane tickets etc. I imagine I'm a fairly typical derm applicant (8 weeks away rotations, applied to 90 derm and 30 prelim/ty programs, 11 derm interviews and 8 prelim ty interviews). Did the usual scouring of southwest, expedia, hotwire etc for deals.

Did I overspend? I suppose I could have saved some cash by hitting up more friends to stay with them and/or sharing rides/hotels with other applicants. Sure hope I match this year, can't imagine going through this again 😱

 

[tdog2983]

I had a similar distribution of aways, interviews, etc.. drove anywhere under 8 hours. mostly stayed with friends relatives in various cities. Spent approx. $3500

 

[hawk126]

If you applied to 90 derms and 30 prelims/Ty's and only spent 3500 on applications, aways, and travel then I take my hat off to you. Not trying to bust your b*lls, but I applied to about 20 fewer programs and dropped 2 grand on apps alone. 1500 bucks for travel and lodging for 20 interviews is a feat.

 

[JDMD243.0]

I guess there's probably a difference depending on where one lives. I live out west and driving to other programs isn't much of an option when the closest med school is >500 miles away.

 

[tdog2983]

Ill provide some added clarification- I think the point is that the cost of the application process can vary greatly from 1 applicant to another...

VSAS fees- $60
2 away rotations- Stayed with friends/family; spent approx $500 on food/gas at each= $1000
60 derm apps, 7 prelims/transition year apps- $1235
13 total interviews- Mostly stayed with friends/family, 2 flights, 2 nights in hotel rooms (always used Priceline, never paid more than $50 a night), gas, food- $1000

Total- approx $3500

I did apply to approx 50 less programs than OP probably accounting for a bulk of the difference in cost.

 

[vicinihil]

Our school has a nice alumni program where they try to put you up with alumni in every city so I only spent 10% of my interview nights in a hotel room so that saved me a whole bunch of money. I'm also couples matching so I interviewed for a lot of prelim spots.

 

[dermhopefull11]

Total cost (applications + interviews) for me= $2,000 (actually a little less than that). Applied to 29 programs total (25 Derm + 4 prelim). Ended up with 14 interview offers, ended up going on 12, stayed with friends, never rented hotel rooms.
Flights ended up being $1,100 with a little help from the SW credit card (get 25K initially in free miles which = up to 2 round trip flights).
Overall I'm incredibly happy with my decision to apply to fewer programs. I got wonderful (legal) feedback from my #1 and am confident I'll match there.

 

[sore eye asses]

Total cost (applications + interviews) for me= $2,000 (actually a little less than that). Applied to 29 programs total (25 Derm + 4 prelim). Ended up with 14 interview offers, ended up going on 12, stayed with friends, never rented hotel rooms.
Flights ended up being $1,100 with a little help from the SW credit card (get 25K initially in free miles which = up to 2 round trip flights).
Overall I'm incredibly happy with my decision to apply to fewer programs. I got wonderful (legal) feedback from my #1 and am confident I'll match there.

I take back my last post. I was in a grumpy mood when I typed it. Apologies.

 

[sjonesy]

Wow I'm amazed about how much the op spent, is this the mean? or is it the higher end of the spectrum?