<prompt> Human: I want to help put my little sister through college. She will graduate from high school in 7 years. I would like to have 80k saved for her by then. What is the best sort of fund to do this type of saving?About me - 26, 120k salary, no debt, have an emergency fund, and personal investments. I dont have trouble saving, Im mostly just curious if some investment vehicles are better than others for what I am trying to achieve.Assistant: 529 plan? Auto deducts from pay and I think might have tax benefits. Human: A 529 may be good but since youre not the guardian it may affect any needs based financial aid she may end up getting. Meaning if you use it to pay for freshman year, it will show up as parental income and affect her aid for sophomore year. A parents 529 will show up as parental assets and not affect as much. Most non guardian 529 are best to be held for senior year as you wont have any needs based for after that. Assistant: Im not super concerned about this. I dont think she would get any financial aid anyways given my parents income my siblings and I did not receive any aid. I am wanting to do this more for my parents because they helped me through school. This sibling is significantly younger than the rest of my siblings, and my parents will be relatively old as she is going through college. I want to do this to help my dad hopefully retire at a reasonable age.  <response>: what a great thing to do for someone. cheers to you. 