A great education is the best possible start in life and for most parents ensuring they can provide for their children’s education, from primary school right through to third level, is crucial.
The problem is that many parents get to grips with the costs when it’s too late and end up having to fund everything out of day-to-day expenditure.
Education in Ireland is supposed to be free, but each year back-to-school costs are rising for families. The cost of putting just one child through school can easily run into tens of thousands of euro. If you have two or more children then you’re going to have to dig even deeper to sustain the cost of their educational needs over the long-term.
An estimate/ research done by Zurich Life shows the minimum cost of education for children in Ireland from primary school to college graduation is €40,000*.
*Source Zurich Life based on data published in 2015/16
It’s clear to see that the cost of education is high and increases over the years.
It makes sense to plan ahead and build up your savings year-on-year.
There are many savings plans available that you can gradually build up the funds necessary to support your children’s education.
The table below illustrates just how much regular savings can grow with a Zurich Life Easy Access Savings plan. For example, if you saved the Government child benefit of €140 per month for five years (as of January 2016) from when your child was born, by the time they started school you could have built up savings of €9,277 in time to fund this crucial stage in their education.
