The standard fee for a 10-week session at the Dream House is $3,105. (This is a slight change from the $3000 we posted before, but it doesn't actually change anything in reality. Click here for an explanation.)  We have some scholarships available.

Your fee covers: the help and support of  houseparents, resource coordinator, goals and dreams coach, meeting facilitator, a bed in a furnished room, all meals, use of the house's library, computers, basic personal toiletries (shampoo, toothpaste, soap, etc.), living and work spaces, kitchen, garden, and other resources. You'll need extra money for:

We think you'll be perfectly fine bringing the lower end of this amount--about $270. But if you want to take college classes, private lessons of any kind, eat out a lot, etc., you'll want to plan for that. 

Deposit and payment schedule

A $1035 deposit is due with your application/registration form, and holds your spot. $100 is non-refundable under any circumstances, unless we for some reason cancel the session you have registered for. The remaining $935 is also non-refundable, unless the house fills up completely with 16 residents for that session. 

Your second payment of $1035 is due 2 weeks before you arrive, and your final payment of $1035 is due at the end of your first month. Both of these are completely non-refundable unless the session is canceled.

credit card payments vs. check/money order/cash payments

To make it more convenient for some people to pay, we do accept credit cards. Since we can't legally charge an extra fee for credit card users, but we CAN give a discount for folks who pay with checks, that's what we're doing. We have increased the prices by $105, or 3.5% (the amount the credit card company takes from us) and will give a $105 discount to folks who pay with checks or money orders. We have carefully trimmed our Dream House budget as tight as possible, to keep the cost to you low, and therefore can't afford to absorb credit card processing fees.

What if you're registering for more than one session? 

In that case, you may elect to pay a $500 deposit for each additional session after the first. If you are registering for sessions 3 and/or 4, and are paying with a check, please pay those deposits with separate, individual checks. (This is because we will not cash checks for Sessions 3 or 4 until three months prior to the start of each session.)  

What if you're applying for a scholarship?

Click here for information on scholarships, including deposit information. 

Why is the deposit  nonrefundable?

For Session 1: We cannot personally risk renting a house, finalizing staff hiring, etc., until we are certain that there is enough interest in the Dream House to cover our costs. As soon as we receive 16 deposits, we will go ahead and do those things. So, you can see that if someone were to cancel after we set the process in motion, and no one else stepped in to fill her place, we would lose money. (Similarly, after Session 1, we will plan to continue the Dream House for additional sessions only if we have enough registrants.) For these reasons we will refund money only if your place is taken.