Saving Your Way Through College

Once you’re in college, you may pay less attention to finances and more attention to trying to live independently now that you’re out of the house. Besides tuition costs, over-spending and carelessly buying things during college is a large source of debt for many college students. Here are a few tips to help you save money while you’re in college, and still have a great time discovering your freedom.

Food: Try finding new places to eat meals. A great way to save money is to get together with your friends each night and eat at their place. Then once a week, have dinner at your place. If you get enough friends together, you’ll each be paying for only a couple of meals a week. Over time this can really add up. Be sure to check out the student cafeteria. Sometimes they offer healthy food for reasonable prices. As an example, UNR’s student cafeteria gives free fruit to their students.

Textbooks: Unless it is completely necessary, do not buy your books new. A full semester of books can run over $500, which is ridiculous for books you will probably only use once in your life. Instead, buy your books used and then sell them back to the school at the end of the semester. You can also sell them online and possibly make more money for them. Another option is to rent textbooks instead of buying them by using chegg.com (http://www.chegg.com). They send you the books you need, and when you’re done you send them back. While you don’t get money back, you can save hundreds of dollars upfront.

Tuition: Look into scholarships and grants before you ever look into loans. Depending on how much your tuition is, you can cut out a large chunk with grants and scholarships. Even though there may be a lot of forms, in the end if you receive the financial aid it really is worth it. Don’t be afraid to ask for help, because sometimes people don’t take the time to fill out the forms which means the money is left untouched and ready to be used.

Starting your life out of the house can be scary, but debt later in life can be even scarier. If you take these steps, you will be on the way to protecting yourself from financial hardships. While it may not cut all of your debt, any amount saved helps.