Financial planner and former college admissions consultant Tyler West joins The College Investor Audio Show at MilMoneyCon to talk about how families should actually approach paying for college — from 529 plans to commuter schools to the conversations parents aren't having with their kids.

Recorded live at MilMoneyCon, Robert Farrington sits down with Tyler West, an associate financial planner at CL Sheldon & Company who works with military and veteran families. Before financial planning, Tyler served in the Army, worked in higher ed at the University of Colorado, and ran his own college planning business advising high-net-worth families on admissions and financial aid.

His central message: families spend too much energy optimizing the savings vehicle and not enough on the conversation that actually determines whether the money is well spent.