How to keep in-state permanent residence as a med student?

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calivianya

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Hi guys!

I’m a rising 3rd year DO student, and my school is sending me out of state for third year rotations quite against my will. :( I’m trying to figure out what to do about my in-state residency.

I am absolutely NOT staying in my third year rotation state for my fourth year, so this is definitely a temporary move.

I’m getting out-of-state tuition right now for the DO program, but I’m also getting a MPH, and since I started that after I moved to where I am now, I’m currently getting in-state tuition for that. The MPH tuition is going to be really unaffordable really fast if I lose my in-state residency, so I would like to keep my residence in this state.

I also paid what feels like a million dollars (more like $800+) in fees to sort out my car registration when I moved here, so I’m not too fond of the thought of paying initial state registration fees this year, next year, and likely the year after that, not to mention the hassle of constantly changing my car insurance.

My current apartment is the address on my driver’s license, which is also where my car is registered, and obviously, I’m about to lose my current apartment. I know it’s legal to keep an address that you don’t actually live at as a student since I’ve got lots of med school friends with out of state driver’s licenses who never switched over despite living here for two years now, but they have family living at their driver’s license addresses. I have no family living in this state, unfortunately.

I know this is a problem for fourth year students that spend most of the year living in sublets or hotels for auditions, too, so I would appreciate help/advice from anyone who’s lost their permanent address and what they did about it.

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You're going to need to go out of state for your 3rd year rotations? I thought Idaho.com only did crap like that. Your options to maintain state residency are limited. Essentially, the best way is to have some earned income in whatever state you are attempting to maintain a residency in. I don't think the other angles apply to you. ...Like still being a dependent on your parents tax return, and you could claim their state as your state of residence. Or, in another case, we have some friends from Indiana who bought a condo in NC as a vacation place, and their daughter claimed NC as her state of residence to get in-state tuition at the University of North Carolina's Med school even though she was an Indiana resident.

If you have a compelling reason not to go out-of-state for your 3rd year rotations, you should petition the clinical rotations staff at your school to allow you to stay in-state for your rotations. Maybe you have done this...
 
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You're going to need to go out of state for your 3rd year rotations? I thought Idaho.com only did crap like that. Your options to maintain state residency are limited. Essentially, the best way is to have some earned income in whatever state you are attempting to maintain a residency in. I don't think the other angles apply to you. ...Like still being a dependent on your parents tax return, and you could claim their state as your state of residence. Or, in another case, we have some friends from Indiana who bought a condo in NC as a vacation place, and their daughter claimed NC as her state of residence to get in-state tuition at the University of North Carolina's Med school even though she was an Indiana resident.

If you have a compelling reason not to go out-of-state for your 3rd year rotations, you should petition the clinical rotations staff at your school to allow you to stay in-state for your rotations. Maybe you have done this...

Nah, there’s a few places with OOS crap. We have a super undesirable site that only two people get sent to every year out of 230 ish students (LOL I’ll be rotating with some Idaho people there) and this year nobody wanted it. Surprise, my name was drawn pretty far down in the rotation site lottery (212th), so they had to go pretty far down my preference list, and I landed there. I swear, I’ve had nothing but bad luck since I started DO school.

I’m definitely not a dependent. I’m in my 30s, so I’m a nontrad, which is why I ended up in this spot. Haven’t claimed my parents’ residence as my place since 2006 when I turned 18 and moved into my own place, and my mom lives in NC anyway so it wouldn’t have helped here (neither my school nor my OOS rotation site is in NC). And my mom is poor, and I’m poor, so the vacation home thing is definitely not happening. I wish!

My school was really strict on the no petitioning without *very* compelling reasons, like a special needs child in a school for the deaf or currently undergoing cancer treatment and not wanting to change oncologists kind of compelling. I figured I didn’t meet the criteria since all I want is to keep my in-state tuition for the MPH degree and I have no other ties here. Besides, on the document where we ranked our preferences, I checked the box that I was in the MPH program and they banished me to the boondocks anyway, so clearly they don’t care about moving people who are dual enrolled in one of their other programs or this wouldn’t have happened to me in the first place.

Probably gonna have to drop the MPH anyway with the way this is going. Classes are live online and start at 6p. My site is a time zone over, so they’ll start at 5p my time. Wonder what my chances of making it home from the hospital and being logged in by 5p are. :dead:

Thanks for trying. I could possibly try the earned money thing - we have come home days every semester and I bet I could do some UberEats or Doordash or something in the few days I’m here to have income in this state, if that’s all it takes. I’ll have to look into that further.
 
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Dude...what school do you go to? Sounds like hell
 
Dude...what school do you go to? Sounds like hell

I think I’d identify myself saying it, at least if any of my classmates are on here. There are only two of us going to this site that’s in a different time zone, and everyone in the class knows who we are because we got a lot of sympathy for being exiled there in the first place.

Let’s just say it’s a well-established school with decades of history and multiple local rotation sites; I just got the extremely sharp end of the pointy stick.
 
Could you get a UPS store mailbox? It looks like a regular street address on paper so you could change your drivers license to that, but not use it for any important mail during the year you're away. I think some of them even offer services like checking your mail for you and forwarding, for a fee.
 
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Could you get a UPS store mailbox? It looks like a regular street address on paper so you could change your drivers license to that, but not use it for any important mail during the year you're away. I think some of them even offer services like checking your mail for you and forwarding, for a fee.

I’m thinking about that! I found it on an RV site. I’m going to try. I’ve been googling laws related to those and I can’t find anything specifically for my state. Some states will accept that and some won’t... maybe I can slide under the radar with it in mine.
 
If I were in your shoes, I would probably not change my drivers license address even though I'm moving from that spot. You're going to be gone for one year min, two years max. At least for the first year, I'd think of it as simply going off to a different site for third year rotation but your home and home school and all that is back in x location, indicated by your license.

You're a DO student. If we all had to change our addresses each time we moved, it would be a **** show. I've now moved three times in 4 years. And now in three different states. Granted, I've kept my drivers license set to my home address where I grew up, and my parents still live there. But nonetheless, If I were in your shoes I wouldn't go through the hassle of changing addresses again.
 
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Car insurance companies are very good at finding out if you have moved. Government not so much unless you are on the radar
 
Dude...what school do you go to? Sounds like hell

Is this not common in DO schools? I go to KCU and it's the same here. Not enough rotation spots for everyone in the immediate area, so some unlucky few get sent to really bad areas. I googled a few of our rotation sites when selecting my rank list and I was surprised they could even find a single doctor to precept all of our rotations in certain cities
 
My wife still has a DL from the state we lived in 7 years ago. Nobody really cares. The state puts up a big fuss about it because they want the money, but if you are pulled over there isn't really anything that can happen. I still have a DL from a previous state/address where nobody lives that I know. You should be able to maintain your current state of residence as long as you don't get a job in the new state. Getting a job in the new state will cause a problem because of the new tax location.
 
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Is this not common in DO schools? I go to KCU and it's the same here. Not enough rotation spots for everyone in the immediate area, so some unlucky few get sent to really bad areas. I googled a few of our rotation sites when selecting my rank list and I was surprised they could even find a single doctor to precept all of our rotations in certain cities
I guess I'm lucky. All of our sites are in the same state and within 3-4 hours of home base.
 
My wife still has a DL from the state we lived in 7 years ago. Nobody really cares. The state puts up a big fuss about it because they want the money, but if you are pulled over there isn't really anything that can happen. I still have a DL from a previous state/address where nobody lives that I know. You should be able to maintain your current state of residence as long as you don't get a job in the new state. Getting a job in the new state will cause a problem because of the new tax location.

That’s good to know. I figured it would cause legal problems to keep my same address, but if it doesn’t, that’s great!
 
Just beware of the new Real ID rules concerning drivers licenses, the requirement has been pushed back until October 2021, but is still looming out there.

Unless your state allows "non-federal compliant" drivers licenses (not valid for airport, military base or federal building etc. access) where you do not provide all of the required identity documents, you will need to provide a utility bill, tuition bill, insurance declaration etc. as evidence you actually live at the address given for a Real ID. Now if your license won't expire until you are in residency - great.
 
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Just beware of the new Real ID rules concerning drivers licenses, the requirement has been pushed back until October 2021, but is still looming out there.

Unless your state allows "non-federal compliant" drivers licenses (not valid for airport, military base or federal building etc. access) where you do not provide all of the required identity documents, you will need to provide a utility bill, tuition bill, insurance declaration etc. as evidence you actually live at the address given for a Real ID. Now if your license won't expire until you are in residency - great.

This is a good point. If your current ID isn't a real ID, OP, I would go get a new one that's real ID compliant, then you should be good for at least a year.
 
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My wife still has a DL from the state we lived in 7 years ago. Nobody really cares. The state puts up a big fuss about it because they want the money, but if you are pulled over there isn't really anything that can happen. I still have a DL from a previous state/address where nobody lives that I know. You should be able to maintain your current state of residence as long as you don't get a job in the new state. Getting a job in the new state will cause a problem because of the new tax location.
This is state dependent. There are lots of states where, if you're pulled over and show an OOS license but it's clear you actually live there, you get a ticket and a fine.

To the OP: If you're mostly worried about the MPH tuition, why not just ask the school if they will maintain the in state rate for you? Since they are the ones forcing you to move, seems like they should just continue the in state rate. Doesn't help with the license woes, etc.
 
This is state dependent. There are lots of states where, if you're pulled over and show an OOS license but it's clear you actually live there, you get a ticket and a fine.

To the OP: If you're mostly worried about the MPH tuition, why not just ask the school if they will maintain the in state rate for you? Since they are the ones forcing you to move, seems like they should just continue the in state rate. Doesn't help with the license woes, etc.

As long as it’s just a ticket and a fine, I’ll just pay it. It sucks but it is what it is. One more thing that turned out to be expensive about deciding to go to med school.

I have emailed our student services people about my tuition. I’m hoping they’ll let me know something soon.
 
This is state dependent. There are lots of states where, if you're pulled over and show an OOS license but it's clear you actually live there, you get a ticket and a fine.

But how do they know you live there? I also don’t update my license plates unless I have to. Most states let you renew registration remotely
 
Hi guys!

I’m a rising 3rd year DO student, and my school is sending me out of state for third year rotations quite against my will. :( I’m trying to figure out what to do about my in-state residency.

I am absolutely NOT staying in my third year rotation state for my fourth year, so this is definitely a temporary move.

I’m getting out-of-state tuition right now for the DO program, but I’m also getting a MPH, and since I started that after I moved to where I am now, I’m currently getting in-state tuition for that. The MPH tuition is going to be really unaffordable really fast if I lose my in-state residency, so I would like to keep my residence in this state.

I also paid what feels like a million dollars (more like $800+) in fees to sort out my car registration when I moved here, so I’m not too fond of the thought of paying initial state registration fees this year, next year, and likely the year after that, not to mention the hassle of constantly changing my car insurance.

My current apartment is the address on my driver’s license, which is also where my car is registered, and obviously, I’m about to lose my current apartment. I know it’s legal to keep an address that you don’t actually live at as a student since I’ve got lots of med school friends with out of state driver’s licenses who never switched over despite living here for two years now, but they have family living at their driver’s license addresses. I have no family living in this state, unfortunately.

I know this is a problem for fourth year students that spend most of the year living in sublets or hotels for auditions, too, so I would appreciate help/advice from anyone who’s lost their permanent address and what they did about it.
Keep your current residence or use a friends address that is in the state you want, where you can send mail. A PO Box could work, and there are services for establishing residencies in states for people who love in RVs full time so it can be done. Using a trustworthy friends/families members address is easiest tho.
 
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This is state dependent. There are lots of states where, if you're pulled over and show an OOS license but it's clear you actually live there, you get a ticket and a fine.

To the OP: If you're mostly worried about the MPH tuition, why not just ask the school if they will maintain the in state rate for you? Since they are the ones forcing you to move, seems like they should just continue the in state rate. Doesn't help with the license woes, etc.
He could just say he’s a student, and they wouldn’t ask anymore, even if he was pulled over. I have a buddy who has had a Montana license for years despite living in the south, it’s a little more hassle to buy a car, but that’s really it.
 
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