529 Plan Qualified Distributions Forum

[wisc130]

I own a home (mortgage is in my name only, title is in my name + S.O.) and am wondering what types of home expenses qualify as "room and board" expenses for 529 plan distributions. I've read that my mortgage payment itself will qualify, but what about other expenses like utilities, property tax, and food? My school's estimated COL is higher than my annual mortgage expense, so I'd like to include some other factors as qualified expenses.

To make things more complicated, My S.O. and I live together and have shared finances. Assuming the items mentioned above are qualified expenses, do I need to divide by two so as to only account for "my portion"? I'm curious if there are any other law student homeowners out there who could share their experience with using 529 distributions.

Thanks

[Tiago Splitter]

I own a home (mortgage is in my name only, title is in my name + S.O.) and am wondering what types of home expenses qualify as "room and board" expenses for 529 plan distributions. I've read that my mortgage payment itself will qualify, but what about other expenses like utilities, property tax, and food? My school's estimated COL is higher than my annual mortgage expense, so I'd like to include some other factors as qualified expenses.

To make things more complicated, My S.O. and I live together and have shared finances. Assuming the items mentioned above are qualified expenses, do I need to divide by two so as to only account for "my portion"? I'm curious if there are any other law student homeowners out there who could share their experience with using 529 distributions.

Thanks

You can withdraw as much as the school budgets for off campus students and consider it a qualified distribution. The rest of the stuff doesn't matter.