What should I reasonably pay for DD to go to Uni

Fang_3

No wonder she wants to leave with her step-father. His income will be taken into account when she's assessed so it's really nice that he won't even help you give her even a little financial support.

ceebeeby

Thanks everyone for all the really helpful comments.

Just a couple of responses to questions:

- because we're in Scotland, applications have already been submitted to Uni's. She applied to 5, not the one local to us though, even though I did suggest she put it down as a back-up. So far, one has responded offering her a conditional, which based on her results she will easily get into.
- her father has already said he will not be contributing anything whatsoever - he has confirmed this to both her and me. Her step-father is already paying hefty maintenance for his 18 year old son who is doing a "full-time" (12 hours a week) college course, his son also receives EMA and is determined to stay in college for as long as possible. DH and DD have fallen out big time and both have disowned each other (being me is not a barrell of laughs at the minute)
- if it were a means tested student loan there is no way she would get it as our combined income would be too high. Our debt however is massive!
- DD has half-heartedly applied for jobs, she handed in some CVs about 6 months ago, but didn't follow them up and has made no effort since. She does 2 hours cleaning a week one night after school and receives £10 for that from an elderly neighbour. If she did a better job, I'm sure this elderly neighbour would have recommended her to others, however, I know she does the bare minimum to keep the job and nothing more! She spends the majority of Saturdays and Sundays in her bedroom on her laptop or watching TV! She studies reasonably hard, and is not a massive party animal although does go out occasionally. She is sloppy and untidy (a normal teen!) and has no interest in the quality of anything.
- Her attitude has changed massively in the last 12 months. There is no such thing as a reasonable conversation with her. She believes she is really hard done by, that everyone in the world lets her down, that everything that goes wrong is someone elses' fault, and that anything I say (even if it's come for your dinner) is having a go!!! She tells the world what an awful life she has and how she is bullied by her step-dad (who has looked after her since she was a year old!) - and I must say they have horrible rows but she gives as good as she gets! She also regularly tells anyone who will listen (including me) how she can't wait to leave home. I have told her that this is a nasty thing to say, and a couple of weeks before Christmas when she said this, I told her just to go there and then, because if she was that miserable, and there was no way to fix it for her, then she should move to her Dads (who she sees twice a year) in England (we don't have any other relatives in the UK) - and she can come and visit me twice a year and think I'm wonderful instead! That blew over but only because I refused to pay for her flight to her Dads!

Before anyone asks, her friends are all 'decent' - she's never done drugs, doesn't smoke, drinks very occasionally in other peoples houses (she actually doesn't like it very much), doesn't have a regular boyfriend, but has been on a few dates (she's been seeing a boy from school for about a month and he seems very pleasant - we have met him), she is a B+ / A Grade student (by the end of this term she will have 7 Highers and 2 Advanced Highers) - she just has a phenomenal amount of stinky attitude about how good she is and how carp anyone else including her family is.

I do not want her to be destitute, but she is keen to say how dreadful everything is, but not willing to do anything whatsoever about it. It's as if she's waiting for me to solve it by "sending" her to Uni - but that's not my choice - it's hers - and I don't want to be destitute either by picking up the tab for her. She has every luxury you could imagine except her own car, but she's expecting one for her 18th!

We don't have a big family at all, so there isn't anyone else she can go and stay with in this country.

She is not a monster (although I've probably made her sound like one in this post), she is spoilt, but doesn't directly demand anything (she's too lazy to do anything that energetic!!), and she can be incredibly kind.

I just feel totally lost with her at the minute!

GothicStirling

Typical teenager I'm afraid.

You're right, it's her choice to go to Uni, so she should be paying for her own education. Would you pay her mortgage? Car payments? She needs a sound lesson in life.

The reality is, if she doesn't get some real work experience while at university, she'll find it virtually impossible to find employment with a degree. She seems to have 'the world owes me' complex, and she needs it banged out of her soon for her own good.

GothicStirling

Has she applied to SAAS yet for funding? It's getting close to the cut off date, then she really will have financial problems in September.

Voyager2002

I think that going away to university makes a lot of sense for her (and for everyone else). The question is, how to finance everything?

Firstly, she should apply for the student loan and any grants available. You will be asked to give details of your circumstances (income; other student children being supported etc.) and will be given a figure for the appropriate parental contribution. If neither her father nor her step-father are able/willing to find the specified amount, then several options are available:
1. Under certain circumstances, the family income can be ignored and the student can receive the full grant and loan. Usually this is when there has been a complete relationship breakdown and the student and family are absolutely estranged. The legal test for this is fairly stringent, and it is not an easy option. However, I would imagine that the student welfare officer would know the details. From what you have said, I doubt whether this is an option for your family;
2. The most obvious way to raise the money needed would be for a student at your local university to rent your daughter's room while she is away studying.

Oldernotwiser

When you say that you'd have to get a part time job, do you mean on top of your regular job or don't you work at all? (Just trying to get a bigger picture.)

Also, has she only applied to Scottish universities? (apologies if I've missed this, it's a bit early for me!)

Derivative

I have no idea how Student Loans work in Scotland so pardon me if this doesn't apply.

In England lowest band recieve £2100/term loan/grant combined. This is enough to live on provided you don't charge her more than £100pm rent or so.

There should be no need for you to give her any money. She will only need to take on a PT job if your household income is above the thresholds.

Individual universities also have bursaries for low income students too.

I study 200 miles from home and pay my Mum £20pw when I'm home to offset child benefit.

edit: Forgot to mention, this is if she's staying away from home. I believe Student Loans pay out less if you stay home. I believe it is generally a given that people move out for University as their hometown doesn't offer the correct course or reputation.

Fang_3

EdgEy wrote: »

I have no idea how Student Loans work in Scotland so pardon me if this doesn't apply.

In England lowest band recieve £2100/term loan/grant combined. This is enough to live on provided you don't charge her more than £100pm rent or so.

There should be no need for you to give her any money. She will only need to take on a PT job if your household income is above the thresholds.

Individual universities also have bursaries for low income students too.

I study 200 miles from home and pay my Mum £20pw when I'm home to offset child benefit.

edit: Forgot to mention, this is if she's staying away from home. I believe Student Loans pay out less if you stay home. I believe it is generally a given that people move out for University as their hometown doesn't offer the correct course or reputation.

Do you not mean the highest rates?

When I was eligible 2005-2008 I received an absolutely massive loan of just over £3000 PER YEAR. So I doubt the rates have shot up that much.

The OP has already stated that their income will be way over the threshold and that her daughter will be moving away so half of what you say doesn't apply. The rest just doesn't make sense. Did you bother to read the OP's posts?

Fang_3

ceebeeby wrote: »

Thanks everyone for all the really helpful comments.

Just a couple of responses to questions:

- because we're in Scotland, applications have already been submitted to Uni's. She applied to 5, not the one local to us though, even though I did suggest she put it down as a back-up. So far, one has responded offering her a conditional, which based on her results she will easily get into.
- her father has already said he will not be contributing anything whatsoever - he has confirmed this to both her and me. Her step-father is already paying hefty maintenance for his 18 year old son who is doing a "full-time" (12 hours a week) college course, his son also receives EMA and is determined to stay in college for as long as possible. DH and DD have fallen out big time and both have disowned each other (being me is not a barrell of laughs at the minute)
- if it were a means tested student loan there is no way she would get it as our combined income would be too high. Our debt however is massive!
- DD has half-heartedly applied for jobs, she handed in some CVs about 6 months ago, but didn't follow them up and has made no effort since. She does 2 hours cleaning a week one night after school and receives £10 for that from an elderly neighbour. If she did a better job, I'm sure this elderly neighbour would have recommended her to others, however, I know she does the bare minimum to keep the job and nothing more! She spends the majority of Saturdays and Sundays in her bedroom on her laptop or watching TV! She studies reasonably hard, and is not a massive party animal although does go out occasionally. She is sloppy and untidy (a normal teen!) and has no interest in the quality of anything.
- Her attitude has changed massively in the last 12 months. There is no such thing as a reasonable conversation with her. She believes she is really hard done by, that everyone in the world lets her down, that everything that goes wrong is someone elses' fault, and that anything I say (even if it's come for your dinner) is having a go!!! She tells the world what an awful life she has and how she is bullied by her step-dad (who has looked after her since she was a year old!) - and I must say they have horrible rows but she gives as good as she gets! She also regularly tells anyone who will listen (including me) how she can't wait to leave home. I have told her that this is a nasty thing to say, and a couple of weeks before Christmas when she said this, I told her just to go there and then, because if she was that miserable, and there was no way to fix it for her, then she should move to her Dads (who she sees twice a year) in England (we don't have any other relatives in the UK) - and she can come and visit me twice a year and think I'm wonderful instead! That blew over but only because I refused to pay for her flight to her Dads!

Before anyone asks, her friends are all 'decent' - she's never done drugs, doesn't smoke, drinks very occasionally in other peoples houses (she actually doesn't like it very much), doesn't have a regular boyfriend, but has been on a few dates (she's been seeing a boy from school for about a month and he seems very pleasant - we have met him), she is a B+ / A Grade student (by the end of this term she will have 7 Highers and 2 Advanced Highers) - she just has a phenomenal amount of stinky attitude about how good she is and how carp anyone else including her family is.

I do not want her to be destitute, but she is keen to say how dreadful everything is, but not willing to do anything whatsoever about it. It's as if she's waiting for me to solve it by "sending" her to Uni - but that's not my choice - it's hers - and I don't want to be destitute either by picking up the tab for her. She has every luxury you could imagine except her own car, but she's expecting one for her 18th!

We don't have a big family at all, so there isn't anyone else she can go and stay with in this country.

She is not a monster (although I've probably made her sound like one in this post), she is spoilt, but doesn't directly demand anything (she's too lazy to do anything that energetic!!), and she can be incredibly kind.

I just feel totally lost with her at the minute!

It's perfectly reasonable for her to have to get a part-time job. I don't think it's at all reasonable for any of her parents, including her step-father not to support her considering it's his income that is preventing her from getting a decent level of student support.

There certainly seems to be more going on here than a difficult teenager, or at least it seems that way to me. If I were you I'd actually be having a serious conversation with your husband about what the hell he's playing at because he seems quite childish to me, especially if he's brought her up since she was one. Then again I think your comments also betray an anger at your step-son, so perhaps it's a game of tit for tat. Quite who's the tit, I'm not sure.

ceebeeby

Hi again and thanks for more sound advice.

I work full-time already, so this would be part-time on top of my full-time job. I would be taxed at the higher rate for anything I did, so would have to work double plus to make any sort of additional monies.
She has only applied to Scottish Universities, and will not pay tuition fees.
She has not applied for any student loans / grants etc.
We are not low income at all, however, we have huge debts that eat into that income.
My DH would NEVER agree to a stranger living in the house (i.e. renting out her room) although that does make very good sense.

She will not engage in any sort of conversation around this - and whenever I try to raise it, it results in flounces, tears, sarcasm and general !!!!!iness (am I allowed to type that on MSE).

Now - she DOES have a legitimate gripe with regards to finance with me! About 4 years ago, I used funds from a savings account I had been putting by for her, to buy a second property abroad. This property is now up for sale - however, she wants that money now and thinks that if she had it, she wouldn't need a student loan. I have told her, that I will - on her demand - give her back instantly every single penny that SHE put into the account (christening money / birthdays money / Xmas money etc.) which comes to just over £1000 (well, I'd put it in for her on her behalf). However, the money that I'd saved for her which comes to nearly £4,000 (the plan was to have £5k for her when she left home) I wouldn't be able to give her until the house sells - and there is no point in her making a fuss, because I don't have it, so there is no point ranting about it! If she makes the demand for the £1000 it won't kill me, but I would be upset because she knows I would have to struggle to get it (Just to put this in perspective, I've already paid £1000 for her to have 2 holidays this year - one with school, one with her friends!!!). Obviously she believes the full £5k to be hers, and by me not giving it to her now when she needs it the most, she sees it that she is being forced into looking at other finance options that she wouldn't have to had I not used the money.

Anyway, I have asked her to speak to a teacher I know she trusts well who may be able to point her in the right direction, but because this requires initiative and effort, I don't know how much she will do about it!

I genuinely want to guide and direct her, but do not want to do it for her! However, happy (and want to very much) be by her side and support her in whatever decisions she makes, but don't think that is necessarily always financially. Although again, willing to do what I can.