Sticker price is not net price
Published tuition, fees, housing, food, books, transportation, and personal expenses form the cost of attendance. Grants, scholarships, and work-study reduce the amount the family must fund.
College Cost Calculator
Project tuition, fees, housing, books, transportation, and personal costs with separate inflation rates, aid, work-study, family cash, college savings, contribution growth, investment fees and tax drag, loan origination and subsidy, capitalization, Chart.js scenarios, and a yearly funding ledger.
College price, aid, savings, family cash, and student-debt plan
Follow the funding plan from today through graduation and repayment
Separate tuition from living costs, apply different escalation rates, project savings and contributions, grants, work-study and family cash, calculate yearly funding gaps and loan origination, capitalize unsubsidized interest, and connect graduation debt to repayment burden.
Plan with context
College planning starts with net price and ends with a funding path through graduation.
One blended annual cost hides the decisions that matter. Tuition and living expenses can rise differently, aid can renew imperfectly, investments have a limited horizon, and each annual funding gap changes eventual student debt.
Tuition and living costs deserve separate inflation
Academic charges and housing or personal expenses do not necessarily rise together. Projecting them independently creates a more useful future-year budget.
Aid must renew every year
A first-year scholarship may have GPA, enrollment, residency, or program conditions and may not increase with tuition. An aid-growth assumption should be supported by the award terms.
Savings risk changes near enrollment
Market returns can help during a long accumulation period, but a large decline near the first tuition bill can create immediate borrowing. Fees, taxes, and a more conservative allocation should be visible.
Loan fees increase borrowing
When an origination fee is deducted, the student must borrow more than the school receives. Unsubsidized interest can then accrue and capitalize before repayment.
Starting salary frames repayment burden
A projected payment should be compared with conservative entry-level income, taxes, housing, and other obligations—not only the expected lifetime value of a degree.
Included
Six annual cost categories, separate academic and living-cost inflation, years until enrollment and attendance duration, scholarships and aid growth, work-study, family cash and growth, target savings share, current savings, monthly contributions and annual increase, gross return, plan fees, tax drag, projected savings at enrollment, required starting contribution, loan rate and origination fee, subsidized share, paid or capitalized school interest, repayment term, starting-income burden, tuition sensitivity, Chart.js sources and annual paths, and a yearly ledger.
Not included
School-specific cost databases, official net-price calculations, FAFSA or institutional methodology, Student Aid Index, asset treatment, tax credits, state 529 deductions, prepaid tuition, 529 ownership and beneficiary changes, qualified-expense determinations, federal annual and aggregate loan limits, grant eligibility, grace periods, income-driven repayment, forgiveness, or investment volatility.
Use it well
Run every candidate school's official net-price calculator, compare current award letters rather than sticker prices, test aid renewal conditions, distinguish qualified 529 expenses, reduce investment risk as bills approach, limit borrowing by year, and compare projected payment with a realistic after-tax first-job budget.