Do families actually pay the sticker price?
Most families pay less than the published price, and at well-funded private colleges the gap can be very large. The number that matters is net price after grants and scholarships. Every U.S. college is required to publish a net price calculator, and running it early is the single most useful financial step a family can take.
Why the published number is misleading
Colleges discount heavily, through need-based aid, merit awards or both, and the published price functions partly as a starting point. A private college listing a very high total cost may end up cheaper for a given family than a public university listing far less, depending on aid. Comparing sticker prices tells you almost nothing about what two schools would cost you.
Net price calculators
Federally required, available on every college's site, and free. They are estimates and their quality varies, but running them for a handful of schools in eleventh grade converts a vague financial worry into numbers you can plan around. Do this before the list is final, not after decisions arrive.
Read past the headline
Check whether an award renews for four years or applies only to the first, whether it depends on maintaining a grade point average, and whether the estimate includes travel, books and health insurance. Then separate grants from loans, because an offer presented as a large total may contain a lot of borrowing.
Where this belongs in the process
Early. The most avoidable painful moment in this whole process is a student admitted in March to a school the family cannot pay for in April. That is a list-building failure, and it is entirely preventable with an afternoon of net price calculators.