Do you know how much college will cost for your little one? You can use this calculator to find out. It estimates that if my son (19 months) goes to college at a public in state school it will cost $77000!! If that is true, I need all the help I can get.
UPromise.com is one of the tools I use to help save for my son’s college and I highly recommend it. It is simple to use and can yield some great savings. You can even tie it directly to a 529 plan (tax free college savings tool) and invite your friends and family to help.
For those of you who play the CVS game, if you enter your CVS card number you will automatically get credit for any UPromise products. I have gotten items for free at CVS before (using coupons and ECB’s) that happened to be UPromise items so I ended up with money in my UPromise account as well!
Grocery cards are the same. If you have a grocery card then you can enter it and it will track what you purchase and give you UPromise credit for some of the items. Also enter your credit cards and it will give you credit (up to 8%) for participating restaurants and food chains! It is easy. Once you enter those numbers in it will automatically credit you when you make the eligible purchases. You don’t have to do anything more.
They have recently added UPromise coupons. I put all the coupons on my account at the start of the month so if I happen to buy one of those items I will get credit. You can use “regular” coupons when you purchase the item – you will still get UPromise coupon credit. The coupons are usually pretty high value.
The other way you can add to your account is to shop through them. When you do this a percentage of your purchase will go into your account. You will be given a special guest link that you can send to friends and family so the items they purchase will also give you credit! If you have friends and family who want to put all their savings toward your account then they can set one up and have it sent to you! This is often a great idea for grandparents.
There are also travel deals, deals if you are selling your home, and special UPromise deals. Check them out!
I hope I have helped convince you to at least give it a shot. You can start out small (just enter your CVS and grocery card numbers) and then grow from there. Go to UPromise.com and start your child’s (or your own!) account today 🙂
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I believe that the figures they give you for college are low also. When you figure in room and board for a private college, you are looking at about $27,000. for a private college and $ 11,000. – 12,000. for a state college. Some serious saving has to be done for those costs!
That is crazy! I believe it though. I went to a private school that cost $21K/year and it’s been almost 10 years since I started, LOL! Luckily I had some scholarships…
This is wonderful! Thank you so much for sharing and explaining it! I didn’t realize how expensive college will be for my kids. I definitely need all the college tips I can get for ways to save money for my their education expenses. This will be a great thing for me to try!
you’re welcome 🙂