Author: administración

College tuition refunds are rare. Many colleges only give a full refund if you withdraw before the first day of class, and most stop refunding anything at all within about a month of the start date. Check your own school’s schedule now, because the window closes faster than most families expect. If a withdrawal is on the table, the financial impact of dropping out of college goes well beyond the lost semester.The numbers make this worth taking seriously. For 2025-26, the College Board puts average published tuition and fees at $11,950 for in-state students at public four-year schools and $45,000…

The average 529 account holds $35,956, and parents who own a 529 have $45,752 saved for college on average.Saving $96 a month from birth gets you $37,328 at 18, about 40% of four years of in-state tuition. $630 a month gets you $245,427, a full in-state ride including housing and food. How much should you have in a 529 plan? The short answer: about $96 a month from birth, or roughly $37,000 by the time your child is 18, if your goal is to cover a solid chunk of in-state tuition and fees.If you want to pay for everything at…

Sallie surveyed 511 U.S. scholarship applicants (both students who won at least one award and students who applied but never won) and published the results as The Scholarship Winner Playbook. The findings point to a short list of behaviors that consistently showed up among winners: starting early, applying in volume, getting essays reviewed, and reapplying after rejections. It’s a useful data set for anyone working through how to find college scholarships right now. The headline numbers: 63% of winners started applying during high school or earlier, about 1 in 3 winners (34%) collected 3 or more awards, and winners applied…

High-yield savings account rates held steady to start Septmeber. With the Fed looking at rate increases, banks are using this opportunity to capture savers.As of September 7, 2026, some online banks are still offering interest rates up to 4.15% APY. This is still much better than the average of 0.38% APY, according to the FDIC.Banks and credit unions are constantly adjusting their annual percentage yields (APYs) as markets react to Federal Reserve policy and inflation data, so staying up to date can make a real difference. Here’s where the best savings rates stand today — and what you should know…

by AshleyA new season, and a new season of financial lessons.Big news around here – my teenagers got their first “real” jobs!! They were both hired as seasonal workers at the Pumpkin Patch. It’s only 5 weekends in the month of October, but it’s a perfect first entry-point to the workforce.Caveat: I say “real” job with quotations because they have worked for me (for my business), and also done odd jobs like pet-sitting and babysitting. But this is the first W2 position in their lives.I love that it’s short-term because we have a pretty packed schedule in-between all the new…

If you own a short-term rental and you’ve taken depreciation on it, especially through a cost segregation study, there’s a tax bill waiting for you at the exit that most investors never see coming. It’s called depreciation recapture, and for short-term rental owners specifically, it works differently than most people assume. Understanding it before you list the property, not after you’ve accepted an offer, is the difference between a clean exit and an unpleasant call from your CPA. This isn’t an argument against taking depreciation. You should take every deduction available to you, including a cost segregation study if the…

Pick up a phone, tilt it, and the screen rotates. The interaction feels like magic in the way most well-engineered things do: instant, silent, boring in its reliability. Underneath, though, something genuinely mechanical is happening. A tiny structure carved out of silicon is bending under gravity, and a circuit is measuring how far it bent. The component is called a MEMS accelerometer — micro-electro-mechanical system — and it is the closest thing modern electronics has to a moving part in the classical sense. It has beams. It has a mass. The mass sags when you tilt the phone, exactly the…

Are There Student Loans That Pay Directly To You?This question is about student loans. No. All qualified education loans are paid directly to the school first. There are NO student loans that pay directly to you. Federal loans are required by law to be paid directly to the Title IV eligible institution. Private education loans must also be paid directly to the school to be a qualified education loan.This is a common myth that we see spread each year. The idea that there may be a student loan that is paid directly to you (sometimes called direct-to-consumer loans). This is…

What Is A Negative SAI (Student Aid Index)?This question is about the student aid index. A negative Student Aid Index is not a problem. It means your FAFSA shows the highest level of financial need.Every SAI from 0 down to -1,500 qualifies for the maximum Pell Grant. The negative number itself does not unlock extra federal dollars.Colleges convert a negative SAI to zero when they create your financial aid award, which is why two students with the same -1,500 SAI can face very different net prices.Graduate students can have a negative SAI too, but Pell Grants are for undergraduates only.If your…

Key Points The SIMPLE Act (H.R. 10220) would require the Department of Education to notify federal borrowers who are 31 days delinquent and automatically move them into the lowest-payment income-driven repayment plan at 75 days if they haven’t chosen one. The bill lets the IRS share tax return data with the Department of Education so payments can be set without borrower paperwork. Borrowers with no adjusted gross income on file and only pre-July 2026 loans would get a $0 payment automatically. The auto-enrollment provisions wouldn’t take effect until July 1, 2028. Prior versions in 2016 and 2024 never advanced past…