Workbook — College · Created October 5, 2026 · 1 min read
Four-Year College Cost Comparison
Compare offers on net price across four years. Sticker price is fiction.
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Award letters are not written to be compared. Each one mixes grants you keep with loans you repay, and quotes a single year. This puts four schools side by side on the only number that matters: net cost across four years.
Download: CollegeCostComparison.xlsx — free, no email required, and it opens in Excel, Numbers or Google Sheets.
What This Workbook Does
- Four columns, one per school, so offers sit beside each other rather than in four envelopes.
- Cost of attendance broken out, with grants and scholarships separated from loans.
- Net price per year and across four years — including the years the award letter does not mention.
How to Use It
- Enter each school in its own column, straight from the award letter.
- Separate gift aid from loans. An offer that looks generous is often mostly borrowing.
- Multiply out to four years, and check whether the aid is guaranteed for all four or only the first.
- Compare the four-year net figures. That is the comparison the letters are not making for you.
What It Will Not Do
Aid packages change year to year, and merit awards often carry a GPA condition. Confirm renewal terms with each school before treating year one as representative.
Every workbook on this site is free. The full set — budgeting, debt, career, real estate and the kids’ sheets — is on the Worksheets & Planners page.
Where to go next: Paying for College — the funding sources behind the columns; The FAFSA Timeline — when the aid numbers arrive; Student Loan Repayment — what the loan half of the offer becomes later.