We wanted to know what financial regrets college students had so you can avoid them.
So, we asked the realest of the real. The best people we know…Our friends.
Here are their top financial regrets from college.
1. Not Thinking More About Savings
This was by far the most popular response, and it went both ways: saving too much and not saving enough.
Some students/grads wished they hadn’t panicked as much about money and instead, just budgeted to have a better understanding of where they were financially. Often, they missed out on experiences they wouldn’t have again because they felt the need to save every single dollar.
On the other hand, several students expressed that they didn’t save enough or at all. While they might have worked while in school, most of their money went out the window. By graduation, they were left with very little to show for all their working hours.
How to Avoid: Make a budget or expense tracker. While it may be tedious, keeping track of all the money that comes in and goes out will help you see where you’re at financially. If that seems a bit overwhelming, commit to moving 10-20% of each paycheck over to your savings to start.
This will help ease your mind when it comes to understanding your finances because you’ll be able to see exactly where your money is going. Then, you’re able to give yourself a budget for fun things while also saving some too.
For budgeting, we recommend Mint, and for automated savings, we recommend Acorns.
2. Spending Money on the Wrong Things
So many students from our poll expressed regret associated with spending money on more material objects like late night food or clothing rather than experiences like attending a game or concert on campus.
The reality is, once you graduate, the only thing you can take with you are the memories. Sure, grabbing food late at night is fun, but so is being able to spontaneously agree to Uber off campus with your friends because you have the money to do so.
How to Avoid: Before purchasing material items, ask yourself if it’s completely necessary or if you’ll use it more than 30 times. For example, pencils for class are a material item but completely necessary, and you’ll use them more than 30 times. A $50 Halloween costume, however, isn’t necessary, and you’ll probably only wear it once. Ditch the costume and save the coin for something more meaningful.
3. Not Understanding Loans
This regret showed up in two ways in our poll: not understanding the difference between loan options and agreeing to one loan option without knowing about the others.
This is definitely an overwhelming part of the college process, and we don’t blame anyone for not knowing the difference between loans or fully understanding how they work.
That said, taking the time to answer these questions before agreeing to borrow from any one lender will likely save you a ton of time and money in the long run.
How to Avoid: Take a bit of time to read a few articles, watch some YouTube videos, or listen to some podcasts that explain the difference between loan options. Don’t commit to any one lender unless you feel confident in that decision.
4. Buying Every Textbook
*cue the sad tunes*
As a former college student myself, it took me a full two semesters to realize that buying books from the campus bookstore was costing me way more money than it should. I was also shocked to learn that I didn’t actually need to purchase every single book that was recommended to me.
My first semester, I purchased every book on every syllabus and probably didn’t open half of them. The folks in our poll shared a similar sentiment.
On average, college students pay more than $1,200 per year for textbooks.1 This is an exorbitant amount of money that is largely unnecessary to spend.
How to Avoid: When you get your syllabi the weeks leading up to classes, you may see books listed as “required.” Unless you get an email from the professor restating that requirement prior to class starting, we recommend waiting to get it until the first day of class. More often than not, professors won’t need you to have the book on the first day and will give you some time to get it.
This will allow you to look at all of your options before buying it from one place. Always do an initial google search for “[Book Title or ISBN] free pdf.” You will be surprised how many books are already online for free! If that doesn’t yield any promising results, we recommend using Slugbooks.com which will allow you to enter the book title or ISBN and compare prices across all online options.
Summary
The financial aspect of college is hard. There’s no way to sugarcoat it. But, by sharing financial regrets, we hope we can prevent you from making the same mistakes.
So, from one college student to another, cheers to making informed financial decisions.