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Encouraging Heroes. You can be one too.

If you have children, one of your biggest responsibilities as a parent is to pay for their college education. However, college can be very expensive, even if you are sending your child to a college in the state where you live. Therefore, you need to make a plan to accomplish this goal. Here are some ways you can go about making sure you can afford your child’s education:

Start saving early

When your child is first born, it would be a good idea to start saving for his or her education. This may seem far too early to begin saving. However, college tuition fees are only going to get more expensive as the years go by. People who do not start saving early generally wait until the child is about to graduate high school. By that point, it is far too late. Open up a savings account and put a little money in each week. It does not need to be a lot, as long as it is something.

Invest in funds with growth potential

The majority of savings plans for education have a time frame of longer than 10 years. This will allow you to let the investment markets’ compounding growth do some of the heavy lifting for you. There are education investment funds that allow parents to decide between various risk and return profiles.

Gifts

When it is your child’s birthday, ask friends and relatives to donate to your child’s education fund, instead of buying toys and games. If they wish, they can split the amount they were going to spend in half. If they were going to buy a toy or game for $50, ask them to spend $25 on the toy and donate $25 into the education fund.

Take out a loan

If you have found it difficult to save money for your child’s education, a loan might be the solution to your problem. If you are a veteran, you can take advantage of a va streamline loan. It has the lowest interest rate of any refinance loan currently on the market. Also, in order to get a veteran va streamline loan, you will not need to verify your employment or income. This way, you will be able to secure the loan, even if you are going through a rough time financially.

Research grants

The government offers many educational grants for students that meet certain requirements. Since many people do not know that these grant programs exist, much of the money goes unclaimed. If you are below a certain income level, your child may easily qualify, so it is worth doing some research online to find out.

Earnest Parenting: helping parents save for college.