What's more important- saving for college education or retirement?

I totally agree with Suze Orman~ by the way, I love Suze's advice. € I have 4 children and I have a college fund for each of them. I put 200 a year in each of there college accounts. Other than that, I save for retirement. When my kids are old enough to go to college, they will have this money as a start and the rest they will have to get student loans. I paid for my college with student loans and it helped motivate me to do better in college since I was payig for it myself.

I am really conflicted about this. My parents did both, saved for their retirement and put together decent college fund for both my brother and myself. They do very well. They have investments, plus my Dad has a pension. I have seen so many articles bout people over saving for retirement and how that if you put away $100 for 2 years in a 401K and it is invested properly that you can probably retire off of that. My ex and my current husband both had zero help with going to college and they think my son should struggle. I do not agree with that. Personally, I would put $50 per month in both accounts. if you started at birth, the child would have $11323 (at 4% interest compounded yearly) use towards college. You would have $10,800 + interest invested (I am sure the interest here would be 10 times higher than the college savings + employer contributions and you have longer to save). Every little small bit helps. Even if that is $10K in loans you are saving the kid, even if it may only cover 1 year of public college; better than nothing, better than the kid feeling like he HAS to join the military to afford school.

Due to personal reasons my parents weren't able to save up for me for college. I'm in my second year now and I have chosen for a part-time studies so I don't need a loan but can pay my college of my part-time salary. It's not ideal and it's hard work as it asks the same of you as daytime, fulltime college but it's pressed together in 6 hours of evening college on two nights. Sometimes you start work at 7.30 am and you finish college at 9.30 pm, and you still need to drive an hour home. If in the future I am able to help save up for my childs education I would, but having to work hard for college does make you grow up and become responsible.

I love Suze! Imagine the idea of putting money away for retirement..the main idea is to use time and interest as an ally. The more time and the better the interest the more you make! Perfect sense. If you put too much toward your kids education the more time and interest you lose. As far as my situation is concerned I have 4 teens and a 3 yer old. The teens will have to take out some loans to get through school (that is called taking responsibility) but the 3 year old has lots of time....I can easily start an account for her with enought time and interest to take care of her and our retirement!

I think that saving for a retirement fund is a little more important, my son starts college in september and he will be receiving £30 pounds a week for every week that he attends it. Plus he is working at weekends and in his spare time, so he will have plenty of money to support himself. Dont get me wrong if he needs a little extra help, and we can, he will get it, but the rest is up to him. If I put all my money into getting him through college etc, what will happen to me when I can no longer earn any money, because I am surely not going to expect my son to look after me.

As for my personal experience, since my parents are both retire and the pension they are getting from SSS are not enough. Me and my siblings would contribute for their decent living every month. I am not complaining but I am just telling what I saw and experience with my retired parents - the hardship of retiring without any savings. They cannot do things they want to do like travel or buy luxury items for them because they have to live within the monthly allowance they got from us. We (the children) are also striving to make a living. So what I did, I already bought a pension plan for my retirement when I was 24 years old. It was my goal when I was still single. I started my retirement fund because the longer I let my money stay with the company, the more I earn. Now that I am married, I have to save money for my future kid's college education and then afterwards, i want to save more for my retirement fund. I don't want to rely to my children for my financial needs in the future. What I want to get from them when I retire is their time and not money.