Monday, November 5, 2012

College Debt Hits Well-Off

Depending upon your definition of upper middle class, which the Red defines as households with annual incomes of $94,535 to $205,335, this group of people saw the largest increases in student loan debt.

Although these figures may represent a huge income to some, remember as most American know the value of $100k income today isn't what it used to be as we noted in this post $100,000 income: No big deal anymore.

The issue with this income level is that parents take in a greater amount of income so that they miss out on financial aid, but they don't make enough to be able to cover the rising costs of tuition that someone in the next income bracket would be able to afford.  As one family put it, it's like being in financial purgatory.

Full WSJ story here
  • The Journal's analysis defined upper-middle-income households as those with annual incomes between the 80th and 95th percentiles of all households nationwide. Among this group, 25.6% had student-loan debt in 2010, up from 19.5% in 2007. For all households, the portion with student loan debt rose to 19.1% in 2010 from 15.2% in 2007.
  • The amount borrowed by upper-middle-income families, meanwhile, has soared. They owed an average of $32,869 in college loans in 2010, up from $26,639 in 2007, after adjusting for inflation, according to the Journal's analysis.
  • According to the Cooperative Institutional Research Program at the University of California at Los Angeles, which surveys more than 200,000 freshmen, the portion of last year's freshmen who said cost was a "very important" factor when picking a college increased by 20.7% since 2007 for students with family incomes of $150,000 or more, the biggest jump for any income group, says John Pryor, the program's director.
  • But with college costs rising, twin blows from falling home values and the stock market plunge of 2008-09 have sent many families over the edge. On average, upper-middle-income households' median net worth fell 19%, to $369,320, in 2010 from three years earlier, according to Journal calculations.
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