I'm heading off to the local university for three years. Thankfully I live in Germany which means no student loan BS and the university is maybe 20 min with a bike away.
Look into apprenticeships if you're just wanting to get into the trades, that way you can already earn money while training. Maybe your state government has some sort of "board of electricians" that deal with licensing, maybe they can help set you up.
I'm in the US myself and I have a family so minimizing costs (including opportunity cost of the time spent) is critical.