How to Save For Your Kid's College

One of the topics that I am most passionate about is saving for my kids to go to college. Today, I want to share with you exactly how we contribute to our kids’ college savings account, when we set it up and even how much we contribute each month. 

My parents and grandparents saved for us to go to college and my undergraduate tuition was completely covered. I could not be more grateful for this and am teaching my kids just how important it is to save money for college. 

With the help of Virginia529, it is super easy to set up an Invest529 savings account for your children. The account is tax-free and makes the perfect gift. For holiday gifts, you can actually purchase Invest529 gift cards at select Target and H-E-B retail locations,  and on Walmart.com, which is awesome for getting family to contribute to kids’ Invest529 accounts. You definitely will not regret saving early! 

You can also consider setting up a UGMA account which is a way for minors to have money without needing an attorney for trust documents. It is a wonderful option for saving money.

For each of my three kids, we set up their Invest529 savings account within one month of them being born. My husband handles setting up each of their accounts and gets it going as soon as we can. The sooner you start, the more your savings can grow to by the time your child will need it for college.

Like I said, it is extremely important to us to save for our kids to go to college. That means that we often skip doing things that cost a lot of money in order to be able to save for our kids to go to college. I use a ton of coupons, shop sales, buy things second hand, cook most meals at home, etc. to be able to save for our children to go to college. 

We contribute $150 per month to each of our kid's college savings accounts. If we get any gifts of money for the kids for their birthday, Christmas, etc., we add that money right to their college savings account.

For our kids, we have the $150 for each kid come out of our accounts each month automatically so that we never forget to do it. Plus, it is super easy to do it this way. 

Honestly, there is no gift that I would like more for any of my kids for a holiday than money that goes into their college savings accounts. Toys are great, but they only get played with for a little bit and we have so many. My parents have their own Invest529 accounts each of their grandchildren and contribute a certain amount each month automatically, which we appreciate so much.

I know that it can be uncomfortable to ask for money, but if you are asking for it in place of a gift for your kid's college, family and friends are sure to understand and may love to contribute.

As you can tell, I am very passionate about saving for my kids to go to college. It is something that I knew that we would do before my kids were even born and it is one of our top saving priorities. We budget for it just like we do saving for retirement and I am so happy to be able to help my children for their future.