[ThePrince]

I've seen residence go both ways: I've had friend (intentionally not pluralized) take advantage of the proximity to campus to maximize work efficiency, but sadly, more often than not I've seen it go the other way and rez just turns into a huge party and grades suffer as a result.

On the issue of buying vs. renting, my personal opinion is housing is a low priority investment. The headache that comes with owning a house, as well as the opportunity cost of money that could be better spent elsewhere shows me that it's not very desirable to own a house, unless you're planning on living in it for an extended period of time. Another thing that puckluck has forgotten to mention in his advocation of buying, is that if you were to buy now and sell in a few years, you'd have to pay capital gains tax as well, which really diminishes your profit levels. I guess you could mitigate that by putting the house in your daughter's name, and have it as her primary residence...not sure if you are into that.