state school v out of state (OOS)

[gogetter898]

do most people prefer to go to their state school for medical school? as in if they get into their state schools it's pretty much a done deal and theyre ignoring the rest of their med school acceptances?

I'm very drawn to an out of state program right now bc of location in a city i love; however, it ranks about the same as my state school and would end up costing me 80k more over the course of four years. would it be naive of me to just want to leave my home state of indiana and go out of state for med school at a higher cost?

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[wydoc]

This decision really doesn't need to be made until you've been accepted to both of those options, and no matter how strong of an applicant you are. Apply to any school you could possibly see yourself attending and see what happens! When it comes to that decision, it's not totally crazy to consider a more expensive option. If you want to complete residency in the region of the OOS program, it could be advantageous to go there for medical school. Or maybe you value your happiness being in a cool city at 20k per year (totally valid). 80k is not a huge deal compared to your future salary. You also may need to take scholarships and financial aid into account.

 

[CorgiLoaf]

Only you can answer that question. 80k would probably become around 110k after compounding 5.3% interest during repayment.
I suspect most people would prefer to save the 110k but like @wydoc said, it depends on your happiness.
If you are truly happy in that city and are motivated to pursue different opportunities/excel, then that 110k might be a great investment.

 

[Obnoxious Dad]

Year after year approximately 60% of all medical students attend medical school in their home state. See this table which is also available in EXCEL:

https://www.aamc.org/media/5976/download

A few years ago I created a table in Excel which classified each school as private, public, military or (because of language differences) based in Puerto Rico. It turns out that approximately 50% of all US MD students attend a state owned medical school in their home state. This stems from lower costs and bias in the admissions process.

That $80,000 tuition difference is going to grow to about $110,000 by the time you finish residency. Furthermore, Indiana is a relatively low cost state. Finally, IU is a well regarded medical school.

 

[Goro]

do most people prefer to go to their state school for medical school? as in if they get into their state schools it's pretty much a done deal and theyre ignoring the rest of their med school acceptances?

I'm very drawn to an out of state program right now bc of location in a city i love; however, it ranks about the same as my state school and would end up costing me 80k more over the course of four years. would it be naive of me to just want to leave my home state of indiana and go out of state for med school at a higher cost?

For many people, they don't have a choice.

For others, it may depend upon COA, tuition, the desire to do something new,

And yes, it's naive to want to pay the equivalent of a new Tesla just to move to a new city.

 

[gogetter898]

This decision really doesn't need to be made until you've been accepted to both of those options, and no matter how strong of an applicant you are. Apply to any school you could possibly see yourself attending and see what happens! When it comes to that decision, it's not totally crazy to consider a more expensive option. If you want to complete residency in the region of the OOS program, it could be advantageous to go there for medical school. Or maybe you value your happiness being in a cool city at 20k per year (totally valid). 80k is not a huge deal compared to your future salary. You also may need to take scholarships and financial aid into account.

I went with your approach when I applied to med schools and applied to several schools in cities I would love to live in to see what would happen. I've been accepted to different MD programs and narrowed my choices down to two so far (still waiting to hear back from two more schools with upcoming interview dates scheduled) - one OOS school i love location and program-wise and my in-state school. Could you speak a little bit to how I may be able to get more scholarships to alleviate some of the burden of cost for both schools? I have been extended a financial aid package from another school that I eliminated from my top choices and it only outlined loans...would I apply to scholarships externally and is it too late?

Also, thank you for your input. It's refreshing to hear someone speak a little to the cost of happiness instead of just being being completely focused on the cost and practicalities - I just dont know if an extra 80-100k in loans is worth it, however - would you say thats feasible or too much?

 

[wydoc]

I went with your approach when I applied to med schools and applied to several schools in cities I would love to live in to see what would happen. I've been accepted to different MD programs and narrowed my choices down to two so far (still waiting to hear back from two more schools with upcoming interview dates scheduled) - one OOS school i love location and program-wise and my in-state school. Could you speak a little bit to how I may be able to get more scholarships to alleviate some of the burden of cost for both schools? I have been extended a financial aid package from another school that I eliminated from my top choices and it only outlined loans...would I apply to scholarships externally and is it too late?

Also, thank you for your input. It's refreshing to hear someone speak a little to the cost of happiness instead of just being being completely focused on the cost and practicalities - I just dont know if an extra 80-100k in loans is worth it, however - would you say thats feasible or too much?

Gotcha, I didn't realize you had already applied/gotten into these programs! You could post a thread on the "Help Me Decide" forum for more specific input.

External scholarships may be worth applying for, but most of them are only a few hundred each or maybe a one time payment of 1-2k so unless you score a ton of them, it probably isn't worth it. I was more talking about institutional aid that the schools themselves would offer you. If they have already sent you your financial aid package, it's worth a shot to email them about your 80k predicament and see if they can help you out! It seems like many people do this every year with varying success rates.

If it still ends up being 80k different, it kind of just depends on your goals. If you want to be a family practice doc and have a bunch of kids and buy a big house soon after residency, maybe you would wish you had chosen the cheaper option (I think 80k more in loans would cost just less than $1000 per month). If you think you may want to go into a more lucrative specialty or aren't as worried about having as much money off the bat, it probably won't matter as much. I'm curious what this private school is! Feel free to pm if you aren't comfortable posting it on here...

 

[GreenDuck12]

To add onto the post above about the long term cost of an additional $80,000 in loans growing to $110,000, the long term cost of that is much more. If those same dollars were invested in an index fund at 8%, over the course of a 36 year career would grow to be $1,760,000. That’s a lot less around the time of retirement for OOS.

 

[wydoc]

To add onto the post above about the long term cost of an additional $80,000 in loans growing to $110,000, the long term cost of that is much more. If those same dollars were invested in an index fund at 8%, over the course of a 36 year career would grow to be $1,760,000. That’s a lot less around the time of retirement for OOS.

Well loans are usually paid within 8-10 years (but could be done a lot sooner). From there, you can invest a larger portion of your income without significantly affecting lifestyle and make up for lost gains over time. Opportunity cost of those funds is definitely real, but you've exaggerated the effect.

This is coming from someone who is choosing the cheapest option for medical school, but I think for some people it could be worth it to pay more. 80k is nothing to sneeze at, but if it sets someone up to enjoy med school more and more easily match/get hired in a region they want to live... I could see the value there.

Definitely good to be aware of the full cost of one's decisions though!

 

[GreenDuck12]

Well loans are usually paid within 8-10 years (but could be done a lot sooner). From there, you can invest a larger portion of your income without significantly affecting lifestyle and make up for lost gains over time. Opportunity cost of those funds is definitely real, but you've exaggerated the effect.

This is coming from someone who is choosing the cheapest option for medical school, but I think for some people it could be worth it to pay more. 80k is nothing to sneeze at, but if it sets someone up to enjoy med school more and more easily match/get hired in a region they want to live... I could see the value there.

Definitely good to be aware of the full cost of one's decisions though!

I do agree it is a simplification but I don’t quite see how it is an exaggeration. The compound effect of a 5-6% interest rate combined with the opportunity cost of a (hypothetical) 8% return those funds can impact one’s long term financial outlook by hundreds of thousands if not more. In this case I use the rule of 72 (at an 8% annual return, one’s initial amount doubles every 9 years - 110 > 220> 440 > 880 > 1760) as a simple illustration of the cost of using those dollars to attend a more expensive school. To be sure, those dollars can be considered well spent for the reasons you articulate above but I think it is important to be clear eyed about it. And certainly one can manage to meet one’s financial end goal with discipline later on and investing more later on to catch up, but the effect of those loans is certain - barring loan foregiveness etc. As my schools financial planner likes to remind us - every dollar borrowed has a long term financial ripple effect on your ability to build wealth. Personally, I only applied to and attend an inexpensive medical school so I am biased.