Agree maplerock.
I remember when my DS1 went off to college it was 28K. 4 years later it was 41K. My DD started IS college at VT in 10, it was 16K, and over 22K within 4 years. DS2's tuition this year went up 10% AGAIN.
If you take into consideration that our economy has not kept up to that pace, every year the middle class takes another hit. You are in that sweet spot. Too much to qualify for grants or financial scholarships, but not enough to pay without digging yourself or kid into more debt.
I have had at least 2 kids in college at any given time for 4 years. This year Bullet and I are doing the yippee skippee dance because we are down to 1, and we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. We started this back in 08 and 16 is when we get to dance.
Bullet and I had our kids young. My youngest was born before I was 29. We have that ability now to start redumping big money into our retirement because of how much we had to take out for our kids. My sister and sister in law both have 18 year olds and are 55+. I have friends that had their first at 40.
~ They enjoyed life before having kids...lots of amazing vacays to places like Hawaii, Turks, London, etc. Now they are going OH CRAP I will be 60 when they are done with college, some will be 62, hard to recoup any nest egg you depleted before you hit 65.
The funny thing is I was the youngest of siblings and friends to have kids. I joked with 1 friend(groomsmen at my wedding) that has a 5 year old son. My DS just got married last May. I said to him: if they (my DS and his wife) have a daughter in the next 18 months, it could be possible your son could marry my granddaughter. What put him into a tailspin was not that, but that he had a DD that was going to turn 7, and he now realized that the big bills were going to be starting when he was looking at being 60. Braces aren't cheap. Cars and insurance are even more expensive than braces. College is more expensive than the used car. Wedding, even if you are just helping out can run into the thousands for a small wedding.
~ The light bulb went off and he laughed. He said well I guess I won't be retiring until I am 72.
Sorry for going off track.