Opening a School

I would love to open my own martial arts school. It's a dream I've had since I was a little kid, and I've stuck with it. I've always wanted my school to look very traditional, like this dojo here http://www.canadagoju.com/abtassoc/images/honbu2.jpg

Except, I want the back wall to be like the front of the picture, and it will open up into a japanese garden (I live in Florida so it wont be too cold).

Next year, I'm going to college. Now, I would love to open a martial arts school full time. However, I also have a girlfriend who I've been seeing for 4 years. We plan on staying with each other. She thinks with buying a house, and starting a family after college, we won't be able to pull it off. That I'll never be able to afford to open the kind of school I want, pay off the loans I'd have from it, and make enough money with the money I'd make from a martial arts school. So it's a hard decision. First off, I have no idea how much a school like in that picture would cost to open. Could anyone give me a rough estimate? Also, if I was going to run a school full time what would be best to go to college for? I thought a master's in phsy. ed and minor in philosophy. Or is my girlfriend right? Should I go for my second, and much more stable choice, Psychology. That way I can get a stable income, have enough money to buy a nice house, start our family, and then eventually years down the road start my school after i've saved enough money?

Dreams are great, and having one like that as a goal is great too. Just, there's no way you could open up as nice a dojo as you want right out of college. You'll have to start out much smaller, basically a storefront, and save up and build up to being able to open a big nice studio.

Finish your dreams before you have kids or you are royally screwed.

You may want to look into taking some business classes also. You would want to have a very good handle on your expenses to open that kind of Dojo. (It is nice)

It is correct that you would need to start smaller and build up to that, the dream should not be the dojo but rather teaching. The grand Dojo could lead you to cut corners on theaching (watering it down etc. to keep and attract students that are not serious to make the $$$ you need.)

I strongly disagree with statement "Finish your dreams before you have kids or you are royally screwed. " Plan (this is what most people fail to do) and you can achieve your goals and raise a family.

email me if you would like a quick rundown on expected costs and such.

Oh don't worry proper training is the most important thing for me. I just have such big dreams for my school. I want to give my students the best training I can possibly give them. Thats definetly my number one priority by far. I just want to eventually give them an awesome place to train in. Let me give a description of what I'd eventually like my school to be like.

When you walk in, i want there to be a simple little store. It will have uniforms, sparring equipments, a large collection of books, and all sorts of Asian knick knacks. Then, you would walk into the training area. It would be a good size, and would have a very traditional luck to it. Since we're in Florida, I want the back to open up into a courtyard, that will have a Japanese Garden in it. Then to the opposite end of the coutyard will be a smaller room that will have weights and such in it for students to use.

Apeus, I just thought of something. Look into grants to help you start a business, as this is also "culture". This still won't buy the property or pay for the construction of what you want, but it will help you open up and stay open long enough to build the student base you'd need to move on to better situations.