My wife is doing this, and while I agree the price is actually sane, the service can be extremely poor and horribly demoralizing, especially if you are bright and used to getting things done. Even at the flagship campuses of a community college system. The administrative functions of the school are extremely poor. Some of the instructors are OK others are downright unqualified to teach anything. When there are problems with registration (putting her in the wrong classes), or with instructors (teaching things that are wrong and grading accordingly), or advising (she has had a new advisor almost every semester and the degree requirements change about as often), there is nobody to go to (they think you are another whiner that just wants to complain your way out of the rules) and no recourse other than suck it up and suffer through.

So far she is looking likely graduate with an associates degree free after tax incentives. She is quite disillusioned with the idea now though and many areas of study she was previously very interested in she cannot stand now because it brings up memories of wretched experiences with. I'm not sure she'll be able to stand another two years in this sort of environment though, it feels like such a waste of time to the point where no piece of paper could be worth this much punishment.

The difference between her experience and my recent one in a masters program at a top tier university (largely paid by my employer or else I wouldn't have bothered) is night and day. The facilities work. The administration works. You can take the classes you want and the registration system works. Everything can be done online without standing in lines. If you actually want to talk to a person you can walk in and do it rather than setting up an appointment a month in advance. Instructors teach current knowledge and get their facts mostly correct. If you ask them questions they can usually answer them. They treat you like a human being rather than a child they are there to babysit. The other students don't think you are a god because you can show up on time and do some homework.

I don't intend to generalize to all community colleges, I am sure there are some OK ones, but at least with the ones I've had experiences with you may have to deal with an unreasonable level of BS in exchange for the discounted tuition. Because of the way the in county / in state rules work you often can't shop around too much and may be stuck with whatever school is where you live.