I continue to talk to folks and continue to talk to clients that call me. And if you’re ready, excellent. Let me see your transcript. Because if you’re promoting a 3.8 GPA and your transcript says 3.2 GPA, then let's just have a conversation about what that means.
All right? I'm writing an article for a little newspaper up here in North Boston. And, you know, one of my statements is, continues to be, everybody needs higher education after high school. Higher education after high school, but it doesn't always have to be through traditional college.
Yeah. And then you add in, we’re purchasing an expensive product, the second most expensive product that most people will make in a lifetime. Yeah, maybe third if you start saving for your retirement, but buying a home, saving for retirement, and the cost of raising kids, including college, is a pretty expensive venture.
Christine: Yeah.
Tom: and the likes of having people that are going to say to a family when it’s knocking on the doorstep of the junior year. And unfortunately, you haven’t saved any money. And unfortunately, you’re not a candidate for full financial aid. You gotta worry about it.
Christine: Yeah, that was actually one of the topics on our original list of things to talk about:
“We haven’t saved a dime and we’ll never afford college.”
Can you afford college if you haven’t saved for it? I mean, students can’t because they just don’t have that kind of money in their pocket, but can parents afford to help their students with college?
Tom: The answer is yes, with a good conversation about what is considered reasonable debt.
What is considered: the lifetime earning potential of the individual. So if we approach it from the standpoint of being like a 30-year mortgage, yes, we can borrow it and pay it off over time. But then the complications come along the way and students don’t survive, they don’t continue, they don’t reach the education potential that they think they should have, and they get upset and it starts this pendulum.
So, if we agree that higher education after high school is a required resource for individuals to be personally and financially successful in life, then we have to figure out what’s the best path to get there. We have to individualize it.
We have to individualize it.
And we can’t do that. It’s so hard. It’s so hard for families, for individuals, for even me, Preachy Tom, to not get past the, the, the things that others have, you know, I mean, I can’t watch HGTV with my wife because I see all these beautiful homes that peoples have and all this wonderful stuff and I’m thinking to myself, what a crappy husband. What a shitty provider I have been for the last 45 years because we still live in a house that was built in 1903, and it’s cold at night in the winter, and we’re not, in the things we see on TV. And then I have to stop and think to myself, what’s the risk? What's the reward? What came out of this old, old home? And how are they doing? And can I go visit them four times a year?
Christine: Especially when it’s cold? 😜
Yeah, unfortunately, they’re in North Carolina. They’re cold, too.
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