Fuzzy’s Financial Blog

Came across an article on Kiplinger today for Best 529 College-Savings Plans. While the best time to have hopped back into your childs 529 plan if you got out would of been at the bottom of the collapse try timing that and making sure you could survive without the money. Now would be the best time to get back into a 529 plan. The market is recovering, job losses are halting and there are tax advantages to think of. The article is really good and gives a number of suggestions and includes a state by state break down of your better options.

I reviewed my 529 plans that I have and while not booming they on average have stayed positive I have 3 different 529 plans, 1 for each of my children. My best one had a return over the past 6 months of 6.3% and my worst was at 1.2% but this is money that has been set aside and well help pay for my childrens education. You should give 529 plans a look if you ahve children or are planning to have children.

Investing in a 529 plan should only happen though after you have insured that you are saving enough each paycheck for retirement, then making sure you have a 3-6 month emergency savings saved up, then that you have enough to maintain your current lifestyle. Only then should you save torwards your childs future.

If you cannot directly save for your childs education you may want to check out some of the rewards programs out there. Many of these college savings rewards programs can be used with other rewards depending on the form of shopping. UPromise is a great program, you can setup your grocery vip card in it and earn a small amount on some qualified grocery purchases automatically if the product has the UPromise seal on it, you can also register your credit cards with it and earn a percentage on restaurant visits and even online shopping purchases. The next program I like is LittleGrad this is all online shopping but it can add up also. Another primarily online shopping only program is BabyMint. Some of these programs can also be further linked with Sage Scholars which will perform a virtual match when used for a number of colleges and universities within their program, this does not only link to a few of the rewards programs but cans also be used to link 529 plan contributions and many others to it.

So even if you do not have the money you can start through a rewards program and then kick off a 529 plan when you have the money. Yet another program out there is called Earn Your Future with this program you and your family and friends can make pledges for your child based on their grades. That way your kids are taking part in their future and the harder they work the more the will have saved torwards their education.

The bottom line is that their are many programs and opportunities out there. Some of these programs requires straight up cash to start others are free. No matter which way you go start saving now, and even if you are doing a 529 plan do not forget about the free programs out there that you can use to help.  There are even some credit cards that do rewards in the form of college savings. Many of these programs can be overlapped and should to gain you maximum adavantage.