National Student Loan

Going to school full time means you can’t have a full time job at the same time. You probably will be scarce on cash and running from week to week on a shoestring budget. Here is what you can do to scratch and save all you can:

Save money today
First of all, all the money you can save before you jump into your student career is that much less you will have to care about. If you currently have a job, try and put aside as much as you can every week starting right now.
Let’s do a little math: if you currently earn $200 a week working part time or summer job, can you spare 25% of that amount every week ? If you still have 6 months in front of you before entering University than that is $50 X 24 weeks = $1200! That’s a whole lot of food or whatever else you will need.

Keep your expenses low
Rent and related bills is a big part of living expenses. Try and find roommates if you have your own rent or find someone who will take you in with them. Most schools have message boards someplace where you can pin on roommate offers or speak with someone at your school student association.

If electricity is not included in the rent, keep the heat down at the most, at least when nobody’s home or in the night while sleeping.

Cut up the credit card
Don’t use credit cards at all. Interest rates will spiral you down into hard to get out situation. If you must use a credit card, then ALWAYS pay the complete bill at the end of the month.

Use public transportation
If you can spare having a car while you attend school then do not think it over. Furthermore, if you currently have a car then sell it and save the money. Commute your way to school and home by foot, on bicycle or use the public transportation system. Paying for a car at that crucial moment is a luxury.

Learn to cook
If you are not use to cooking yourself healthy meals than go head and learn it. There is plenty of useful and free resources on the web to start you off with cooking and meal planing. Eating in restaurants and at the school cafeteria is very expensive on the long run and usually not the most healthy of choices. That way you will save on money and keep yourself fit for long days of hard thinking and work.

Find a part time job
If you can manage to work a day or two evenings or the week end that will make you much needed spare money. Try and find a job in a cafe or other service job where you may get a slow shift that will make it possible to read a little or study sometime.

All in all, you just need to be conscious that every dollar that you not spare is that much more that you will owe at the end. Keep yourself disciplined and stay vigilant of every opportunity to save a dollar more.

Keep on reading with the other sections or revisit the one you speed over:

Scholarships and grants

Student loans

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 18th, 2009 at 11:15 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.