Maria lives in Pasadena with her husband and three sons. Her oldest studies Marine Biology at UC Santa Barbara, her middle son attends Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and her youngest is a junior in high school.
Maria’s biggest success story so far has been having enough money set aside in her ScholarShare account to cover costs for her future Marine Biologist to complete a semester abroad.
She advises parents just starting out with a college savings strategy to keep on track with college costs, “I thought we were doing such a great job saving and now, I wish I would have saved more”.
For parents getting ready to start taking distributions from their ScholarShare account, Maria suggests “Make sure you set up your payment plan with the University and your 529 plan ahead of time. It can sometimes take a week or so to get funds to the University and every day you are late, there are fines. Research how to do this ahead of time and it is smooth as silk!”