Go Big or Go Home

When you're looking for ways to save money, the best place to start is with your recurring expenses. If you can save a little money every month, every week, or every day, that can add up to huge savings over the course of your degree. Your single largest monthly expense is most likely going to be your apartment, and so that's a great place to start saving a lot of money.

The first place to start when choosing an apartment is to figure out what you need, based on your family situation. My wife and I have two children, and we might have another before we finish school. We decided, though, that our boys could learn to share a room. If we have another kid before I finish school, he will only be a few months old when we leave, and so we decided he could either stay in our room or share a room with his brothers. Since we were willing to do this, we were able to get by with a two bedroom apartment, which will save us thousands of dollars over the four years we'll be here.

Some readers might have other things that are important to them. For example, do you need an office at home? I personally have a very hard time studying at home with two children to distract me, but if you're able to study effectively at home you might decide that being around your family more often is worth the extra $100 a month for another room. Others might need some sort of a yard, where they can let their children go out and play. The important thing is to weigh how much use you will get out of the thing you're paying extra for. If you only plan to use your office on Saturdays, and the difference between the two bedroom you could have rented and the three bedroom you have to rent to get your office is $100 a month, you're paying $25 for each day you study at home. Could you study in your bedroom that one day a week, or at the school or library? If you could, that would save you almost $5,000 over the course of four years.

I recommend starting with a list of the things you would like, and how much are they worth to you. How many bedrooms would you like? Could you get by with one less? How much is that extra bedroom worth to you, in terms of monthly rent? How much is the back yard worth? The apartment swimming pool? How much extra do you need to pay for a washer and dryer in your apartment? How does that compare to what you would pay if you had to do several loads of laundry every week at a laundromat? By putting concrete numbers on these things before you start shopping for an apartment, you are more likely to make a wise decision about where to rent, and you could end up saving thousands of dollars.