Student loan nightmare. Man finds out his student loan balance is 200k after he graduates

[MissB]

20. Our state school is $26k/year.

That's up from $24,500 last year.

It will actually be cheaper for my son (senior in high school) to choose one of the two private universities that have offered him full tuition scholarships.

Even though the private universities cost $65k/year, our out of pocket costs will be less than $18k/year- again, beating the state university cost hands down. Our state system can't afford to offer high stat kids enough $ to make it worth their while. The private universities my son is looking at are tier 1 research universities.

We planned all along to send our kids to the instate universities. Private universities can have some amazing endowments that they use for merit or financial aid. People shouldn't dismiss them out of hand. We will have him wait until the end of April to make his decision but that's only so we can let the entire process shake itself out - he's still in the running for two full rides.

So yeah, rich or on scholarship but don't forget merit!