[Music]
lindsey's weather's lindsey's in
sheridan wyoming hi lindsey how are you
great thanks how are you thanks for
taking my call today sure what's up
so i was just crying my husband and i
are currently
making 529 contributions for our
daughter
and nieces and nephews and it kind of
came up in discussion what do we do
we want to be able to gift them all
equally but you know
what would be your recommendations or
thoughts on
you know if one of them went to a trade
school or something that doesn't cost
quite as much you know was kind of
thinking
you know what would we be able to do to
help them all equally if
they don't choose the same path in life
if that makes sense
if you had the same amount of money in
there what wouldn't be unequal
well my thought what you know like if
one of them went to a trade school that
only cost
twenty thousand dollars they would have
the money left over they'd have the
money left over wouldn't they
they would but i mean if it can't be
used for an educational purpose if
they're done with their education my
thought was you know if they're
do you have an idea like if we wanted to
perhaps help with like a
down payment on a house do you think
it's wise to invest it all in a 529
or go other routes so we have more than
one option
well i mean most people do not get
enough into their 529 to pay for college
okay and so most of the time this is a
theoretical discussion
so most of the time the answer is put
all you can in 529 because it's still
not going to be enough
even even for trade school now if you're
way way way ahead of the curve and
you've done a great job
and you're worried about having 200
dollars in a 529 and then they go do
something for 60 grand at a trade school
that's a valid concern then and if
you're really looking at those
actual numbers and that's actually
occurring today
then you say okay i'm going to split it
off i'm just going to put some and a
mutual fund in that kid's name
and i'm the custodian that's exactly
what we want to do yeah and that's a
custodian because are you okay
but i'm not doing that if you don't if
you have five thousand dollars in your
529 you're putting 50 bucks a month in
there i'm not doing that
i bet you don't lindsay though because
you're talking about a down payment even
i mean are you guys
how much is in the 529 today uh
we i mean they're all like one and two
years old
okay so you want to worry about it today
i you know i don't we
it just came up in discussion and we
thought well should we go this route
yes you should go this route you should
go this route until you have
enough in the 529 that it starts to be
an issue
and you know so if you get up to 100 or
something in a 529
after that you can start talking about
putting some of it somewhere else if you
think that kid might be a trade school
kid instead of a
uh you know a four-year kid and by the
way either one's fine with me
i'm great with that so uh but yeah but
but
don't don't split it off today and you
know fifty dollars or fifty dollars
there that'll drop you nuts yeah
and you're missing out on all the tax
benefits because it's gonna grow
tax-free
in that 529. so the college
world is a changing it's changing we're
talking about that during the break
i know and there's a lot of i mean i've
heard i think probably more in the last
two years and even more so since the
pandemic and everything and
how much online has gone and everything
i mean it's just it's crazy
that people really are kind of
questioning okay what's education going
to look like in 20 years right she said
that they're
those kids or the accounts are one or
two years old but if you have kit
littles and winston and i we're still
funding kids college we're still doing
it
um but i think it is an interesting
conversation though of what education
could look like in 20 years but you were
saying at the break you're like yeah but
it's higher education's not going away
you're still
going to be using those funds but it's i
don't know
no i mean are people going to
there's two things that have happened
that have jarred
everybody out of their their their uh
zombie-like sense about education and
one is
this student loan debacle epic failure
of the student loan system
and uh and one of the results of that
huge mess is that higher education is
has
shot through the roof in cost yeah so
it's so stinking expensive
that it's making everybody go this is
just stupid and then the second thing
that's happened is pandemic
now they're still trying to charge for
all that online
and they and you can't go back and
you're socially distanced and so there's
four people in the class or some kind of
crap
and they're going uh uh that's not
exactly the college experience and air
quotes i had in mind
and so they're going no i'm not paying
full price for you know
online if i'm gonna do online i'm gonna
jump on somewhere and take a 29
course screw this and so that has
changed the consumer's mindset
of education uh those two things have
have given
uh really given higher ed two black eyes
right now yeah and we
i know we don't have a crystal ball you
don't have a crystal ball but seriously
though what do you think
if you were to predict in 10 years i
mean like literally the online stuff has
just shaken everyone to the court
because
people are i mean everything like the
things you thought were never going to
happen happen during the pandemic and
people are so comfortable with the
internet there's i mean even ramsey plus
right we were able to launch
what was a standard class for so long
online and we
and it and it's amazing so like things
are changing so
quickly in that regard i mean you don't
have a crystal ball so it's unfair to
even ask but
i'm just curious your thoughts on what
education could look like
especially higher education where you're
paying well 40 grand a semester you know
a year at these private schools that
aren't even meeting now like
well it's wild obviously if they don't
start meeting
nobody's going i mean they're they're
going to lose all their customers
and so you know it's it's like if
churches don't keep meeting
don't start meeting again then you know
it's going to be there's going to be a
fallout there in this country that's
going to be unbelievable
and so if people don't get past um
th the fear on these things and start
coming back together then
um and i didn't think it would take as
long as it's taken i thought it'd be
back to normal by now so what the crap
do i know
so i don't know anything but um but i do
think higher ed
for the first time people are stepping
back and giving it a really hard look
and not to say that it's invalid because
i really do not think higher ed is
invalid i really think it's valid
i if um i would want all of my six grand
babies today to get a four-year degree
that would be my goal as their papa dave
am i going to be mad at them if they go
get a vo-tech degree no i'm not going to
be mad at them but i think there is a
benefit to a four-year education i still
believe that
now how we go about doing it yeah 18
years from today for little charles
right there maybe a whole different way
of doing it 17 he's almost a year
okay he could do it in 16 because he's
so smart
that's right 10 months genius