Food and financial advice for the college-bound

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

Bruce — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 20:01:25 GMT

School is expensive. You must make choices some easier than others. My advice is don't take advice from someone who says don't worry about money. Money management is the most important skill not taught in school. Freshman don't sign up for any credit cards until you have steady flow of income. Credit card will help your credit score a lot if you manage it correctly. I'm going into my Senior year and I had credit card for like 6 months and my credit score was 708 with making like 5 payments on time. Which helps me finance my student loans at a cheaper rate without a cosigner.

Couple Keys:

1. Never finance a degree like politcal science or government and politics if you except to go right to work after college. Also don't attend a four year school if you don't know what your major is thats a trap. That will cost 10 to 20 thousand dollars depending where you go.

2. Know what classes you have take way before you need to sign up for them. After the first semster and you know what your major is than plan out your next 7 semsters. You have to know prerequisites because if don't then you take all the wrong in classes and end up paying even more money for extra classes.

3. If you believe college is truly an investment for your future than make sure you do what you got to do to get that return on investment.

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

travelbum — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 18:48:13 GMT

coupons for domino's pizza, dime beer at happy hour, hot pot mac-n cheese... ah, the memories!!

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

Matty Brown — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 18:24:16 GMT

Guys, meet as many girls as you can while in college and for gosh sakes, drop your highschool girlfriend before starting college. It will make things much more fun...I wish I'd done it that way....

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

Scottie — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:56:59 GMT

Buy books online or not at all. DO NOT give your money to the University for overpriced books. And yes, the books are way overpriced. New editions every year is another way to screw over students. BUY ONLINE!

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

James — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:56:19 GMT

College life is a once in a lifetime experience which many of us wish they could live again. Most campuses have a meal plan to use. Dont worry about the money part for these 4 years and enjoy it. After that you will need to care about money all your life.

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

AXS — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:50:55 GMT

My daughter earned income in the summer from the typical teen jobs (fast food). Then I went over a budget telling her she had $45 to spend a week on necessities and the occaisonal night out. I told her "You have a meal plan paid for, use it!" No sense spending money to eat out when the meals are paid for. I also told her, we aren't the Rockefellers, this is all the money we have. She did well her freshman year. Her school must be unusual because she was able to find salads,fruits and veggies as well as lean protein like eggs, fish and chicken.

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

ASUGrad — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:43:16 GMT

I would tell college students that this is the only time in their life where they can be truly free to experience things that they never thought they would- staying up all night, rooming with their best friend,making choices on their own (going to class or not, going out or staying in to study, etc.) but that part of being "on your own" means taking the consequences for those actions, and not blaming anyone else for the things that go wrong- the teacher didn't give you a bad grade, you earned it. When I was in school, two or three of us would have "Family Dinner Nights" where we'd all bring one dish and cook together. It cut down on costs and gave us the feeling of having a family-type meal when we were so far away from our families.

Above all, enjoy this time!

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

Jason — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 12:45:33 GMT

The best advice I can give is do not use CC's to pay for things you want in college. If you live on campus and have a meal plan use it. Just be smart about what you buy, if you really don't need it don't buy it. If I would have not gotten into CC debt in college I'd have all kinds of expendable income now, and I've only been out of school 2 years now.

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

sparty on — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 14:34:35 GMT

The caf food at my dorm was definitely not the heathiest or most economical choice. Because they had to feed so many people, whatever they could make in bulk was the menu - which meant a ton of carbs. I was sick of pasta, potatoes, pizza and cheesy casseroles by the time I finished school. To their credit, they did have vegetables (usually broccoli or the standard "veggie medley") and a salad bar, but they were never fresh. Just like Nicole, I was shocked how much they charged for these meals. I had a friend from another school visit and eat with me in the caf, and they charged her $7.50. For that price, we could have gone out to a restaurant for some better quality food.

re: Food and financial advice for the college-bound

Nicole — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 05:31:22 GMT

Meal plans must be an astounding drain on money...once I forgot my ID and was shocked to be charged six-seven dollars before I could even get in and see if there was anything worth eating.

I will be happily cooking my own meals this time. They will be less wasteful, tastier, and probably more healthful too.