Figuring out how to build college list got easier for me once I stopped adding schools just because other people mentioned them. The best tip I got was to sort everything into 3 groups first: likelies, targets, and reaches, then cut anything I would not actually be happy to attend.
I made a super basic spreadsheet with cost, location, major strength, size, and deadline. If a school only looked good for prestige but failed most of my actual priorities, I removed it.
Also, try the “would I still apply here if nobody was impressed by the name?” test. That one saved me from building a random list of 18 schools I did not even like.
A smaller, balanced list is so much easier to manage and usually leads to better applications too.