How
I Started With College Planning
When
my daughter was born, I started saving
for her college education expenses the day she was born. I still have
the Series EE Savings Bond that I bought that day. I thought I had this
college savings gig by the tail.
Through
the early years of her life, I
continued buying the Savings Bonds through payroll deduction, and began
to build up quite a little nest egg, and was feeling pretty good about
it. Then, one day when she was about 8 years old, I ran across a
calculator on a website that helped you to figure out how much college
was going to cost.
To
put it mildly, I was stunned.
All
of those Savings Bonds I had been buying
weren't even going to come close. It was time to make some changes, and
quick! Thankfully, I had checked into this early enough to make some
adjustments to our savings plan. Time, as you probably
already
know, is
a very important element in any savings plan.
Of
course, 529 plans had not been introduced
yet, so I started setting more money aside in a growth-oriented mutual
fund. This fund has grown through regular contributions and has
increased in value, and I’m happy to say that we’re
now “on track” with her savings plan.
(She’s 19 now, and will be mortified when she finds out that
she’s the subject of my story!)
With
the introduction of the 529 plans and
Coverdell Education Savings Accounts (ESAs), I started doing some
reading on them, just to see if they would fit into our overall savings
plan. We have now moved a portion of our savings from the mutual fund
over to the BrightStart plan, which provided a nice income tax
deduction (against Illinois tax).
During
this research for savings options, I
learned about the National Institute of Certified College Planners
(NICCP). Through this organization, I studied and earned the Certified
College Planning Specialist (CCPS) designation, which not only helped
me with my own college savings situation, but also has provided me with
the knowledge and skills to provide assistance to other parents and
grandparents in similar situations
College
Savings planning is now available to
Illinois families through Blankenship Financial Planning, Ltd.. You can
click here
to find more
information on Blankenship
Financial Planning.