welcome to the secrets of college planning i'm your host at the uva and today we're going to get some insight in some financial needs for college at the college level my guests today are from wells fargo and they are  the marketing relations manager for education financial services and he can he's the district manager for community banking and welcome to the show wanted to me yeah no problem so usually i start my guess when i went to college great and yourself i am actually a nontraditional student i didn't go to college choice twenty four i was an adult student and so i went to i was from the midwest so i went to university was concentrated my undergrad here and then did graduate work at marquette university i'm a walking when i was working there wow fantastic so let's just go back in time how did you pick the schools what what was the process that you went through the pick the schools sure so for me it was pretty easy riker's was i said i was the launch you're about to graduate how do you go from college to wells fargo how did it how did you have what was the path that you took so i did interesting story i was recruited from with  the career fair of my junior year and at the time i was working with another company completely out of industry i wanted to have an internship more in the line of what i was graduating or studying so i tend to the craft fair and by chance i met one of our wells fargo  lines of work and here i am today and yourself my mood a little different i came out of college the last time the market retreated in one thousand nine hundred seven and so i interviewed for some financial positions university and i ended up in a role that management at the university and so from there was recruited to work from one of our legacy nor west bank which then became wells fargo and i have been with because it's not just the student and sole when they receive funds whatever those sources from if they can be disciplined enough to put part away towards college you know obviously you're a student you're young you want to spend a little bit on yourself y know but to establish an account and then any better speaking about the five twenty nine plans the family can get into they can have relatives contribute into all that sort of thing but discipline is the key you know the more money you put away prior to that first class in college the better off you are because you can take less loan i think to your point it really is discipline right and that's something that we try to instill our customers those type of savings behaviors early and whether that be through five twenty nine college savings plans or even your regular checking or savings account that we see as mom and dad or family members holding for the children it really does create some discipline around your personal finance saving because the idea of college savings can be a little bit right so really the we always promote the idea of early start right discipline right practices and really following guidance of whether it's your your local banker but starting early is very important ensuring that the parents have a good understanding of how that works as well really helps develop some good banking behaviors with children so no student is sixteen seventeen years old goes to work for the first  time what should that student be doing with their paycheck what out how do they go about saving money that's where it starts right so you know we find that our children are miners typically the extent of their banking really really will be the check or that they receive from grandma grandpa but at the age of fifteen sixteen seventeen that's where we find that our are students or saving they're making deposits and we find typically at that age the best way to really help them guide that that portion or that that part of their life is services like direct deposit but along with that we really tried to educate the parent as much as we do with the children to really help create more oversight and really shift a little banking behaviors early ok and we think that you know it's actually it's all about you know just thinking about you know if you're planning to go to college when you're thinking you're going to need money which most people do of course out of the savings i you know it's not all going to be scholarship so put away what you can put away so that can do at wells fargo or any institute to help them along with you know some of the other things that they might get from the school absolutely late soft more year early junior year they need to start looking at what scholarships are available we support a scholarship search engine there are numerous out there but we happen to support one and the one that we support has over seven million scholarships that it sear crossed for a potential spend of forty one billion dollars and how does that work how does that that system or if the student goes in and puts in there their own personal data in their family data might be family history a chievement they are award they've received it scans all that passed the scholarships and of course the scholarship foundation set up their own criteria so you never know what's going to trigger a response and it comes back with a listing of potential scholarships so how many can someone actually get if they just put in their stuff that is what the average that someone usually did i don't know that to be asked with the anthony you know and it's going to vary a lot based on the could be from one to what i want to whatever i mean you know because the list could be very very long and if that's the case when i'm talking to families i suggest they take a look and see which ones they think they have the better chance of receiving because obviously you've got to download the application completed return it by a deadline so  you know that's why starting late software early junior your gives them time to get those applications pulled together completed yeah and scholarship money as we all know is the best form to pay for college because it's not coming out of the fam pocket i've had people on for most four go before one of the things that comes up was it's not always the first choice to go to an institute where to go first what's the what's the first choice that parents should be going to not just the banking institution should be that should be their last resort in my correct in saying for financing yeah  if it's financing wise the bank that best option might be a federal program you don't know until you have all the data which is why it's key to start early but it's on the parents point of view is it if if there was some place where they could go and find out everything all at one time is that's the key to this whole thing is there anything out there that's like that we try very hard you know with our advice and guidance model there are calculators there are starting  points we have a website get college ready and all of that directs families into various niches on what they may be looking for whether it's searching for a scholarship or looking with financings available all of that and that is a single point for us so how about students for summer programs is there is there things that students can do work wise in the summer is something where they can make extra savings somewhere how college students that are opening their house for the first time whatever money they're getting from mom and dad or i need to show funds are going from let's say financial aid or student loans that money typically goes very very quickly so one of the benefits that we found and and working with parents college we have offers where they can receive direct deposit so forth so how about the amount that you know i'm a high school student i'm working twenty hours a week i'm probably making two hundred dollars a week one because often times when you're going to school you're transitioning from living with mom and dad now you're in school budgeting is someone who knows where it starts because again you'll find in the beginning of a semester at the end of the semester a lot of students i've seen those ones go very quickly so what we have was fargo that's were designed to help support and help better manage that is a budgeting calculator we have a lot of them service through our mobile banking balance alerts to help keep up our student keep track of the spending over one and then to answer your question on how much it really depends on how the neither of the will right if they're paying for their own rent or is that other trick question though i mean a lot of those decisions well there's not one formula to fit everything it really something that should be taught by and guided by the parents we took them so is it something that parents can learn in the high schools is there a financial night that the high schools do do do do banks actually go to those type of things or is it just colleges that would go yeah the part of what i do is i partner with those high school guidance counselors as do many of my colleagues and we go out and do some in ours all fall and the whole timetable for seniors in high schools move forward this year because of the change when they complete the financial aid form so this is getting to be real compact id almost every other night during the week sometimes we're doing sessions around the state and yes they're available they're out there some of course are more frequent in certain areas than others depending on how large your guidance offices etc how many staff they have but they can get the information they need if they're available to go to those and ask the question know so so going going to those particular nights when they learned that that those events well there's usually tables set up with various participants to ask questions at outside of the event but the as early as elementary school all the way through high school and college so we really tailor those those education sessions based on the audience but we will cover everything from credit establishing credibility credit to personal finance how to budget  what is credit right what is good credit how do you maintain good credit well that's a good question what is credit what is what is good credit for a family to do that credit credit essentially is your trustworthiness to repay how much you know right you know one of the things that we find typically with a lot of the younger you are going to college you know this is the first taste of freedom so they're extent or their exposure to banking like i said would just be wherever grandma grandpa got the checks for taking money to savings account but well the challenges and is that when they turn eighteen that money is theirs and really without that guidance of how to spend the money you know we find that oftentimes that way guidance you know mistakes happen right and credit is one of those things where we find that our customers that maybe have graduated college need support decisions in college and are now paying for it after the fact so when it comes to refinancing school loans when it comes to purchasing their first vehicle the home they're at a disadvantage because they have a properly maintained credit right so what we do is we explain what credit is just like i said earlier it's it's you demonstrating your ability to pay essentially but that in and of itself doesn't necessarily build a pathway for credit it really is important to understand a different dynamics how to maintain good credit how to repair it if you means mistakes and that's something that we do very well at the bank and we take great deal of pride of educating our customers with now i don't know there's the student have to have some type of credit or a lot of these kids don't have jobs or is it just based on mom and dad pens on the product i guess for you know in my realm because they don't have credit quite often if they want a private front lawn from the bank to supplement what they're receiving from the school they're going to need a cosigner because you like he said just simply don't have the credit necessary and they're most likely not full time employed while going to college right so they need to bring a or table to get the lot more so in recent years than previous in my student loans were all costarred by my parents now outside that row and you're looking at other other credit right or other forms of credit whether that be a credit card or a low on line of credit all the loans that will look at you know will look closely at more spending habits of course you know when we think about our younger or younger students because of the lack of credit history  it does become more challenging for them which is why we always encourage parents to get involved get involved early you want to demonstrate to the bank that you have a relationship where you can demonstrate that you have a good steady relationship and those are things that contribute to whether or not or how much you know that city could be eligible for you know what do you what do you find those you know the name of the show is secrets of college planning so secret is really the big the biggest thing where do you find where parents go wrong you know what's the secret that maybe someone always misses i can start oh good you know where things that i've observed even in my own journey of a student finding thing is it's extremely point that parent and child or student know very clearly types of loans that are taking out because we think about student loans it's not just a federal loan that you could be applying for you could be a state where the private loan subsidized and so on so forth right  and some of the pitfalls when you're taking out that many different forms of credit is that mean you can consolidate the too right there's different types of loans that can be consolidate into other so really providing a good education good foundation know understanding how and what their rights are you know what their rights are as a bar and how they can consolidate those loans later on in life are very very important and that's something that i think many parents  for and most importantly the ball or ends up learning the hard way in many cases you know if that partly educated and to not only well in for my realm in my world it's to start early so you get those general questions answered early and then you can that miss the detailed questions that pop up because if you don't have your general understanding of what questions to ask yeah you can ask the right question and so don't wait until you're a senior in high school to start the process know start earlier than that and so families are families are trying to save as early is kids being born these days with college costs anywhere from thirty thousand to sixty seventy thousand a year and so on  what do you think you can told some of these families you know what's the first this way to save so much money is possible to do that yeah you know i think like i said the  general audience thinks of savings they're thinking of the your passbook account if they give account that you're putting money and getting stamps and that's what that's the traditional way of saving there is there are four more options right so whether we have  our financial advisor partners that specialize in student financing with a five twenty nine plan just covered all programs and in addition to that you have you know systematic savings you have custodial savings accounts that are designed to really get early start the idea really is to know what your options are that's really the most important thing and really working with an advisor or working with your local bank to create a plan right because when when the plan starts early that's really when we find the stress levels come down right and that's really the idea behind going to your local branch or local bank and really helping strategize and i always hear about families always taking out home equity loans of their always you know doing it to just go and give it to the kids for college what do you think about families doing that kind of stuff grego sort from my standpoint again it goes back to every family situation is different for some families that may not be a better option but unless you know all the individual family circumstances you can't judge that and so that's where they need to work with their financial advisor closely and compare and use you know if that's the best option for them and that's the lowest cost option that may be the best choice really so you know it's not just the the rate or the cost there's obviously different tax implications as well right now you know when you and without giving any bank kind of understood the lay of those options for you because to create a point that really well may be the best option so that brings me to another point that a lot of families don't even have the financial advisers do what what does someone do to find  financial advisor or do they go to their local bank is that what they do yeah absolutely it works for us sure you know because that's what the frontline bankers are trained to do is to give them the advice they need to get started ok and it's just it's just different accounts that they can open and that kind of stuff that they'll give them a little understanding yeah you know we buy the accounts that are pretty straightforward right where you think of my checking account or savings account for the where that customer is in the life stage right now and based on what those needs to be then we have partners in the bank that specialize in specific areas whether it's retirement it's retirement planning education finance we have the team members that are able to identify the very well point you know really helping the customers know what their options are really starts with coming in having a banker that you can trust and work closely with and the from there depending on how your needs change throughout life you're working with the bank because we had a three is that beneficial for them to do those kind of things for the grandparent or yes a student that you see because you're exactly it's money and they have to bowl less in most cases so it's definitely beneficial for the student you know you probably speak better to the implications for the grandparents you know it's something that's become more and more common and sole you know it what we do not provide however is tax twice we provide you know banking when it comes to some of the tax benefits yes there are benefits that are out there the best i could suggest anthony would be for anyone who is looking along those lines again strategic would you like to give you want to start off yeah i think a lot of the theme we're hearing right now is discipline early start it's not as bad as we might think as you may think i have two children one of the youngest of three children that have  surprised that and you know what you're you're going to be obligated to once you get to college or so without the surprise you can plan for the unknown and then when it comes it's no longer known well thank you very much for coming i appreciate