Parents Are Shelling Out More Money For Kids to Attend College

Parents opened their wallets more generously in the 2014-2015 school year, a report shows, reclaiming their place as the primary source of college funding for the first time since 2010.

Parental income and savings now cover 32% of college costs, surpassing scholarships and grants as the largest share of college funding, according to the How American Pays for College 2015 survey, released by Sallie Mae. The percentage of college funding contributed by parents’ savings and income had hovered at and below 30% since it nosedived from 37% in 2010.

Parents are paying more for college in part because it’s costing more. The amount that families spent on college rose to an average of $24,164 this year — a 16% gain from $20,882 in 2014.

But the increased wallet-opening isn’t just linked to rising tuition. Parents are less worried about a volatile economy impacting their ability to pay for college. Only 17% of parents reported extreme concern that losing a job would impact their income, compared to 23% in 2014. In 2015, 62% of families eliminated potential colleges because of the cost, down from 68% in 2014 and the lowest percentage since 2009. The financial worries of parents — which were at record levels in 2010 as loan rates rose and the value of savings diminished — had eased significantly by 2015. Whereas a quarter of parents in 2010 recorded “extreme worry” about college costs because they were concerned about the value of their homes, only 6% said the same in 2015.

In addition to parental income and savings, 30% of college funding, on average, came from grants and scholarships in 2015, while 16% came from student borrowing, 11% from student income and savings, 6% from parental borrowing, and 5% from friends and family.

Despite the widespread coverage of student loan burdens, the majority of families did not take out loans to pay for college. When they did, the students were the ones who signed the dotted line three-quarters of the time. Families with students enrolled at private four-year colleges were far more likely to borrow (with 56% taking out loans) than those in four-year, or two-year public schools, where 43% and 22% of families took out loans, respectively.