My "Children’s" College Money

I just finished paying for my college degree.  My fiancé has one year left until he graduates.  He will then be consumed with paying off the amount on his loan that he will have left upon graduation.  We estimate this to be about 30K more or less.  While he will be able to work and earn an awesome salary right away.  We will not be DINKs (Dual Income No Kids).  One of my friends used that and I  could not resist using it. 

Once he starts working I will begin my masters degree at the University of Puerto Rico.  This could cost about 3K a semester and the degree should take no more than 2 years.  Thus this will cost about 12K.  I should have the money saved from my current job to pay my tuition out right.  The fiancé will handle paying his loan and the small day to day expenses of living in a tiny apartment and trying not to spend a dime. 

It will probably be an odd time in our lives.  Us both having degrees and yet still living like we were when we had no degrees at all.  Wealth is accumulated over a long period of time.  It is not won overnight like the lottery. 

After our stay in Puerto Rico we plan to move to the Miami area.  I will attend University of Miami in Coral Gables (south of Miami) Florida.  I will finish my PhD and go on to be a professor.  I should get funding for the PhD but any estimation is impossible.  This one we will just have to wait and see how much they offer me and do a financial plan accordingly.  Bottom line though is that I won’t be earning money until I am about 36 years old or so.

 Thus my question is not how do I afford the BMW, my big question is how do I save for children’s college???  We don’t even have any yet and I am already worried about this.  Anyways just for fun I went to save money for college.com and did a little estimator.  Since I could not put in a negative number for the future year that I will inevitably have children I did the estimator with the child being 0 years old and below are my results.

World’s Simplest* College Cost Calculator

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Results

100% of your total college costs will be $312,166. You will need to make monthly contributions of $602 to meet this cost.

Here are the assumptions we’ve made. Feel free to change these assumptions and recalculate the results by pressing “Submit” below.

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Your child:

Will be attending a college that currently costs $ annually. [Help]
Has years until college. [Help]
Will attend college for years on a basis.

You:

Wish to save enough to pay for % of projected college costs. [Help]
Wish to meet your savings goal by the time your child college. [Help]
Currently have $ in your college savings.
Wish to make contributions to your college savings.
Expect college costs to increase by % per year. [Help]
Expect to earn % after-tax each year in your college savings fund. [Help]

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