Your Handbook to (Financially) Surviving College

College can be devastating — to your wallet, that is. Between rising tuition and textbook prices and the cost of housing (student or otherwise), more and more students are finding it impossible to get through college without amassing some serious debt.

And financial institutions know it, too. They create all kinds of products to target needy college students — student loans and credit cards being the most common. There’s a reason why banks and credit card companies practically throw money at college students, and it’s not out of a sense of altruism. They know that if they lend you money now, they will be earning interest on it for the next decade — at the very least.

So how to avoid getting screwed by moneygrubbing financial institutions? Bob Sullivan has some answers for you in his fantastic little book, Gotcha Capitalism. Although the point of the book is to expose the sneaky fees businesses hit us with every day, there are several pertinent chapters for college students: one on student loans, one on credit cards, and one on cell phones.

Since pretty much every college student these days has at least one of each of those things, Gotcha is practically a handbook for surviving college without burying yourself in debt.

Gotcha Capitalism is chock-full of all kinds of little interesting tidbits. For example, did you know that banks aren’t always up front about which student loans are government funded and which are private? This is important information for college students, since the government loans have lower interest rates, and therefore will cost you less over the long run. Also, banks find ways to make it difficult for you to compare student loans. They don’t want you to know that you’ll be paying through the nose!

Another important note is that student loans aren’t really a source of free money in college. Since payments generally don’t start until after graduation, most people don’t realize that the interest starts accruing right away. You could owe a lot more on graduation day than you had originally counted on!

Speaking of what you’ll owe on graduation day, have you actually sat down to figure out how it’ll translate into monthly payments? Nothing screws your social life like having $400 payments to make every month.

The chapters on credit cards and cell phones are also illuminating. For example, Sullivan discusses how credit card companies will find any way to raise your interest rates, even if you’re a model consumer. If you so much as pay a utility bill late, they can hike your rate! Cell phone companies aren’t any better — they’re masters at finding fees to charge you on top of your monthly rate, usually hiking your bill by about 10 percent.

Although Sullivan didn’t really write Gotcha Capitalism specifically for college students, his message to us is pretty clear: The less you spend, the better off you’ll be. It’s a big bad world out there, and there are all kinds of businesses ready to capitalize on a college student’s vulnerabilities. Don’t let them screw you — make sure you know how to fight back!