walked with mom for 55 min
While my sister and BIL make a lot of money they are the type of people who will always spend more than they make, so my parents and I knew they would have very little, if any, money saved for my nieces college. I feel that college is a necessity for the majority of kids these days. So my parents and I started saving money for their colleges when they were very little.
I decided to save $10,000.00 each (I have 2) and made that goal a couple years ago. All of the money is currently in stock index funds. My oldest niece is 14 so there's only 4 more years till she goes to college so I put $5000.00 of her college money into I-Bonds today. Currently they are paying 4.8%.
The reasons I decided on I-Bonds are:
1. The money is only locked up for one year after that I can get to it whenever I want with a 3-month interest penalty if it's before 5 years. After 5 years there are no interest penalties.
2. The interest rate is competitive with CDs. Compare 1 year CD with 1 year bond
3. I don't have to pay taxes on the interest until I cash the bonds in
4. I never have to pay state taxes on the bonds
5. It's very secure I don't have to worry about the value suddenly tanking right when I need it for my nieces college costs.
6. If inflation rates goes up, my interest rates will go up also.
7. I used Treasury Direct and I didn't have to pay anything to buy the bonds.
Over the next few years I plan to gradually move all of their college money into I-bonds.
Savings bonds
July 19th, 2005 at 03:34 am
July 19th, 2005 at 04:44 am 1121748266
http://www.savings-bonds-alert.com/
FYI - if you are using bonds for education, buy a mix of denominations. That way you can make change & redeem only what you need.
July 19th, 2005 at 06:23 pm 1121797394
July 20th, 2005 at 01:52 am 1121824340