I need some financial advice...

[Arista.MD]

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My husband stays at home with our children, and I go to work. I am applying for the 2004 entering class, and when I will start school our income will go away, since I will be a full time student.
We have no consumer debt, but no savings either, since my income is only enough to cover our living expenses.
Does anyone know how will this work out for the financial aid package for the first year?

Thanks.

 

[mfleur]

How does that work, your husband staying at home?

 

[Arista.MD]

What is wrong with a man staying at home to take care of children? If it was the other way around nobody will ever ask anything. Why can't women have a career? Do we have to always stay home and take care of the family? Men can do that do, sometimes even better than women. Every time I see one of these " oh, how come your husband stays home?" it really makes me upset. This is sexism in its pure form, it is assumed that the woman has to stay home and the man has to go to work, and it is ridiculous. We are in the 21st century now! And not only that but we are also in the United States!

 

[ckent]

You should be able to borrow ~30-50,000 of institutional aid depending on your school's financial aid office and your tuition. If you expect to take ~20,000 for tuition and fees, that gives you living expenses of 10-30,000 per year (non taxed of course, as it is debt). It's manageable. You probably shouldn't be taking any trips to disney world anytime soon, and you should try to save as much as you can now, but people have certainly done it before. If your children are old enough to go to school, asking your hubbie to work part time during school hours would probably help a lot with living expenses and keeping your total debt down. I would be giving you the same advice if you were a guy and your wife was a stay at home mom.

 

[Arista.MD]

Thank you very much for your answer.

 

[mpp]

One caveat is that the financial aid office may expect your spouse to work (regardless of your spouse's sex) when calculating eligibility for institutional grants and loans. But you should be still eligible for the $38,500 per year in federal loans if needed.