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I'm a potential non-traditional student who's trying to explain to his wife how it is possible to go to law school and not walk out with $125,000 - $200,000 in debt. She's heard the horror stories about people graduating with huge debts, and that along with the fact that I'd only have around 25 years or so as a practicing lawyer to pay that off has her a little on the uneasy side.

I've talked with some friends who are lawyers, and the sense I've gotten is that for students who get fairly typical merit-based aid packages (say, anywhere from 25% to 50% off for someone who is closer to the 75th percentile than the 25th percentile), the reason they wind up with big debts is because they take out so much money for living expenses, which depending on the area can easily be $20,000 - $30,000 per year. Since my wife has a good job that pays well, certainly well enough to support a middle-class life in the areas I'm looking at, there would be little need to take out loans for living expenses.

Just looking for any feedback on this, what are people's observations on how people can rack up a $150,000 debt going to a $35,000/year law school? Is my insight correct, that it's mostly living expenses that cause people to run up these huge debts, at least assuming there was a decent-but-not-terrific merit-based aid package in the mix? Or am I missing something?

Yea, I go a regional school and even in a low cost of living area the COL is higher than what I pay in tuition. I would think for a lot of people with scholarships this would be the case.

Edit: If not higher at the very least COL usually is a very significant cost.

This really can add to your debt problems. I know people who got significantly larger scholarships than I did but ended up with close to the same total debt, because I was able to get by each year with about $10K of living expenses. I did have a little money saved up before starting school, and I did get a paying job 2L summer, so those helped. 2L year was rough, though. I did this in a pretty low COL city, though.

If you look for smaller apartments in somewhat older buildings, or share a 2 BR with a roommate, you can get by in some places paying not much more than like 6K per year for rent/heat. I went without internet (this doubled as motivation for me to stay at the school library and study, and if I needed to check my e-mail, I had my phone), shopped at Aldi, rode my bike as much as possible (no filling up the gas tank). I still had $100 or so dollars a month to go out to bar review/have fun (plus whatever I saved up before LS and during 2L summer).

Can you be more specific? What schools have tuition of $35,000? Where are you looking?

NYSprague wrote:Can you be more specific? What schools have tuition of $35,000? Where are you looking?

The schools in my area that I'm considering include UVa, George Mason, Georgetown, Washington & Lee, William & Mary, and Richmond. GM is $25,000 (I'm a Virginia resident), William & Mary is $30,000, and UVa is $52,000. I'm sure there's a couple thousand dollars in fees, books, etc. on top of these. Two of those (Georgetown, George Mason) are in DC and living expenses are high, whereas the others are in lower-cost areas.

Obviously a lot depends on what schools might offer in merit-based aid. Getting $10,000 in aid from GM cuts that tuition pretty substantially, while that same $10,000 grant from UVa puts a modest dent in tuition.

Also, my $35,000 is just a rough number AFTER any merit-based aid. Who knows, maybe I don't get a dime in aid offers from anyone? I'm just trying to nail down the COL element in these massive student debt numbers I keep hearing.

Should also note this is for 2015 entry, not 2014.

Don't be an idiot and spend all sorts of money on stuff you can't afford. Then you don't have to worry about this problem. -gdane.

I bet your wife loves the idea that she's gonna work to support y'all so you can go to lawl school, especially when you frame it like that