i'd say if you can go to school for software engineering, go for it. apply to all the schools you want to go to (and some safety schools), pour your soul into the admissions process and SATs and choose a B.S. in CS at the best school you get into.

when i faced the decision to go back to school, there were a few forces at work:

1) the money i could have made elsewhere: i lived the life of a startup and came out the other side of it not rich but with plenty of financial security. this kind of comfort can not be understated. if you seriously think in a year or two you can save at least $50-$100k by working, then do it. know that if you go this route it will affect your financial aid (if you are eligible for it).

2) the value of a degree (vs just getting by on talent): many years ago i was a math major at a top 10 world university. i got drafted by a startup during the dotcom boom and decided to take the 6-figure salary and put my education on hold. for 10 years i never thought twice about this. that was until i got bored in my field and thought about making a change. the thing is that 10 years before as a math major i could get any computer science job with the proper amount of experience. but looking around now, that just isn't true. to really be eligible for [nearly] anything, one needs at least a BS in computer science. search around on job sites if you want to verify this. smaller companies are willing to take you for the experience you have, but larger companies aren't.

3) school is a fun and worthwhile thing. a good CS program will teach you true software engineering. no matter how interested and motivated i was to do book learning on my own, nothing has even come close to the formal training i've had as a CS major. All of those hard exams and impossible assignments where i stayed up for 3 days and nobody was willing to lend a helping hand. well, i solved those problems, got decent grades, and now my knowledge is solid. this in itself is a reward. so much so that when i finish my master's i'm considering going for a doctorate. it's that rewarding.

4) lastly, of all the things in this world, nobody can ever take a good degree away from you. you can lose your house, your car, your wife, your dog, your favorite whatever, but that college degree sticks around. as does the knowledge you worked hard for and the strength gained from challenges you overcame. you will become a better and more interesting person as a result. this is not to say that people who don't finish don't persevere and have rewarding lives...my school experience has actually been quite miserable and i miss the life i had before. but for all the punishment i've endured, i can truly say i've come out ahead.

there are plenty of people who have dropped out of college and succeeded wildly. gates, zuckerburg, biz stone, ev williams, jobs, ... and the list goes on. but when you're younger 4 years is such a small amount of time to spend on something. and when you're 24 and have a nice degree, you won't think twice about it .

look into financial aid/scholarships/grant money. i've managed to get my entire education paid for taking full time classes and getting good grades. it's amounted to roughly $29k (tax free) a year. plenty to get by on for a few years.

best of luck!