Wendell Scott of Rogersville is a real estate agent and financial planner who has helped many parents find ways to pay for their children's college educations. He says there are many ways to pay for college, including savings plans and 529 plans.

Most parents, he says, begin thinking about how to pay for college when their children are still very small. And that is a good idea; skyrocketing tuitions even at smaller schools, can make the prospect of financing a college education very daunting. Like planning for retirement, he says that it is never too soon to get a strategy in place.

It's important, says Wendell Scott of Rogersville, to take advantage of opportunities that will help your savings increase in value. He tells his clients that one of the most important things they can do is learn about compounding, which can make small investments become sizeable. As a hypothetical example, he says that by putting away two hundred dollars each month from the time a child is born until the time he or she turns eighteen, parents would have contributed a total of $43,200. But with compound interest, that money would earn more than $53,000 in compound interest – in other words, it would more than double in size.

An ordinary savings account is a good place to store emergency funds, although Wendell Scott of Rogersville says they are not good for college savings because the interest rate paid on them is often less than the rate of inflation. That means that the money in the savings account would not grow as fast as the rising cost of college. Still, the money is safe there, and with easy access it is good to have it for a rainy day, and a good place to store it in the short to medium term.

Money market accounts usually come with higher interest rates than most savings accounts. There is often a minimum initial deposit required – about a thousand dollars, says Wendell Scott of Rogersville. They too are good for the short to medium term.
Certificates of Deposit, or CDs, typically earn more interest than savings bond and come with equally little risk. But Wendell Scott of Rogersville says that you are required to keep you money in the CD for a fixed period, anywhere from three months to ten years. If you take the money out before the end of that period there is a penalty.

There are other options, but Wendell Scott of Rogersville says the important thing is to start sooner rather than later. College is expensive, but with a good plan it can be done.