Mrs. Budgetsaresexy got accepted to Grad School!

This is a HUGE day for us, Hooray!!! She's been working like crazy on all her applications, and killing the GRE's, and it's now coming to fruition :) Without going into it too much (she's not as carefree w/ the open details as myself) she now has 2 acceptances and 4 no's out of the 9 total applied to. This is very good as the odds of getting into just 1 well respected school in her field is extremely hard.

Of course, with every positive comes it's negatives, and as you can imagine this will have a major impact on our finances. The steady $50k she brings in not only allows us to save more, but also allows us to live a financially comfortable life. In a good 6 months though, this hefty sum will quickly dissipate as school begins. Sure it'll more than even out over the years, but YIKES!

There are a couple variables here that will totally make things easier or harder for us in this adventure. Here's what we got:

1. Full Scholarship: A lot of PhD programs offer a majority of their accepted students full tuition. This is HOTTTT! Can you imagine scratching off that $150k loan + interest that you'd otherwise have to get? This is a dream come true for all PF'ers :) And anyone else too of course! ha ha...
2. Stipend: From what i understand, this would be IN ADDITION TO the whole scholarship stuff. So not only would the tuition be totally paid from the start, but then you'd receive an additional stream of $ while studying! Granted it wouldn't even be close to the $50k we're used to getting, but that's still incredible. Talk about having less stress while you're immersed in hardcore education for 4+ years.

So, which possibilities are in the air for us at this moment? As it stands, both. The first school, which is at the bottom of her list, has granted her a full scholarship so far (AWESOME!), but no word yet on the stipend situation. The second school, currently her top choice, has just recently notified her of her acceptance with no additional details as yet.

Either way, i totally support her decision 100%. Getting a Masters or PhD is a dream for many and has consistently shown higher results down the road, so I'm proud of anyone going after it. Receiving both a scholarship and stipend will obviously make things much more easier money-wise, but i have total faith we'll be able to navigate the financial waters just fine :) Congrats again baby!


***UPDATE: April 7th***

The Mrs. picked her school! Before I tell you which one she chose, a few more details came about. The lower rated one (barely, really) has offered her a stipend TOO. So that one not only pays the full ride, but also gives her a little side income as well! The higher rated school offered her nothing, just acceptance into the school - which is still pretty damn hard to get.

So, after hours of soul searching and speaking around with students and colleagues, she has chosen the full ride one!! Cuh-ching! haha... While i did my best not to sway her one way or the other, it's pretty obvious this helps our financial situation the most :) I'm sure i'll go into more details down the road, as this affects us in many many ways. But yay!

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