From a grad student perspective, pretty easy, long as you live that lifestyle. You don't need a car. A bike gets you most places, and if you don't have one, the

From a grad student perspective, pretty easy, long as you live that lifestyle. You don't need a car. A bike gets you most places, and if you don't have one, the campus buses are pretty good and free. On campus housing is cheap relative to local prices and Stanford's graduate stipends are better than most other schools. We also mostly cooked ourselves, taking turns in a group, so that's pretty cheap too. If you have to eat out, the dining halls have some good options at a reasonable price. All in all, I could make ends meet and I generally had enough left over for the occasional dinner/drinks out, going skiing, life in general. I did have to dip into savings or borrow money for larger unexpected expenses from time to time though.