Schedule C is used when the business is not incorporated. When a business is incorporated, a different set of forms is used.
According to a report I just read, families that own a small business will now have to report the net worth of the small business on the FAFSA. Your parents will likely have to ask their accountant for this information. Because this is new, it is unclear what specific questions they will ask.
We had to fill out the CSS Profile for our small business and had to answer the following questions.
PLEASE NOTE: The CSS Profile has questions that are specific to individual colleges. Your questions may or may not be the same as these, depending on which colleges you are applying to, but these questions can give you a sense of what they ask. Also, they will very likely ask for copies of the businessās tax returns (likely the 1120 or 1120-S) and that is where they will see any deductions that they want to add back in to income. Income is assessed very heavily for financial aid purposes, so adding deductions back to income can ācostā a family a lot in financial aid.
Here are the CSS questions that we filled out for our small family business:
Percent of parent ownership of the business
Do other family members have an ownership in the business
Date the business was started
Does this business employ more than 100 full-time employees
On which tax form is this business reported?
Current market value of the business - parentsā portion only
Current amount owed on the business - parentsā portion only
Gross receipts for this business - parentsā portion only
Total expenses for this business - parentsā portion only
Do other family members receive a salary or wage from this business?
If yes, provide information about family members in #10
Provide any additional information or special circumstances about this business
For your circumstances, it is likely a bad thing. In previous years, the FAFSA excluded businesses that had fewer than 100 employees. Now they will be including all businesses, unless family income is less than $59,999. That means that in the past, for FAFSA-only schools, students didnāt have to report family business information if the business had fewer than 100 employees. Now they do.
For CSS Profile schools, families almost always have had to report business information, regardless of the number of employees, so no change there.
I agree with everyone else that you definitely need to find a few schools that you like and that you can afford without need-based financial aid. That would be schools that you can afford based on the 25-30k that your parents told you was available to you plus the federal student loans that you are eligible for ($5500 for the first year; 6500 for second year; 7500 for third year; 7500 fourth year) plus any savings or income you can earn yourself. Add in a few colleges where you qualify for automatic merit. This is because the calculations for need-based financial aid can be very āunfriendlyā to families who run a small business. You can always try at some of these schools but they may not give you nearly enough need-based aid.
I hope they will. But based on the lack of info it seems, Iām hopeful theyāll have the necessary info to do so. Just an observation from the chat but maybe an incorrect one. @MMRose touched upon my concern two messages ago.
CSS and IDOC. Fafsa is easy. You can even have much of the info electronically downloaded from the IRS.
You can use the IRS data retrieval tool to upload information from the taxes to the FAFSAā¦but not if there have been any amendments to the forms. I think. @kelsmom under what circumstances is the DRT NOT able to be used.
The new way of obtaining tax information for FAFSA (effective 2024-25) allows almost everyone to use it successfully without jumping through hoops. For example, if the studentās parents filed taxes separately, both parentsā tax forms will be used (both parents will need to give consent). I am not sure what happens with amended returns, and the federal website is currently undergoing maintenance, so I canāt search for that answer - but I sort of remember that maybe that can be handled without issues (again, though, not sure). The only other thing that would cause issues would be a parent who married or divorced after the base year. In those cases, the tax information would need to be transferred & the student would have to submit documentation to make any necessary adjustments to the financial aid office to allow them to remove income from anyone whose income doesnāt need to be counted for the student.
Maybe they mean it will only cost them 1k for tuition?
OP, just remember that a collegeās ācost of attendanceā has several components: tuition and fees; and room and board. It is important to account for all of these when figuring out college costs.
A āfull rideā covers everything. A full-tuition scholarship will still mean that the family needs to pay room and board.
Tuition, fees, room and board are the billable costs meaning that these are billed to you by the college.
In addition, cost of attendance includes transportation, books, discretionary spending money, and even health insurance if your family plan wonāt cover you at your college. These additional costs are not billed to you by the collegeā¦but they are there. Donāt forget about those.
As MWFan indicated, you need to have schools on your list that will meet the $25-30k price via sticker price alone or via merit aid. Several schools have been mentioned upthread, but as there are now 572 posts, this quote might help jog your memory on them.
TCNJ is The College of New Jersey
These are schools like SUNY Binghamton, U. at Buffalo, etc. They are the public universities of New York.
Posts 443 & 444 from @bgbg4us and @EconPop give more details on Nebraska and Cincy.
Adding on to these, make sure to do a deep dive at your in-state publics of U. of Alabama (Huntsville, Birmingham, and Tuscaloosa) as well as Auburn, and any other in-state publics that catch your fancy.
This is none of my business and you donāt need to answer, but I donāt understand how they can pay that much for college if they do not have any assets or savings. That doesnāt make sense to me (again, it is none of my business and an answer is not necessary).
Please make sure that their retirement is being funded and they will not have to pay back tremendous loans with limited funds.
It sounds like Auburn has competitive merit, meaning not assured. With your stats itās as possible as much as $10,500 but not assured (if Iām reading correctly). It looks like nearly $12,600 in tuition for in state for the year so the delta could be a tad over $2k. So well within budget.
Bama is guaranteed merit. It looks like full tuition would be covered. UAH also appears to be full tuition assured. So all three would be in budget with Bama and UAH assured low low cost and Auburn likely. It is interesting to note that UAH grads earn the most of any of the publics in Alabama but while it offers many majors, the school does have more of a STEM slant than the others.
I actually read through all 579 posts of this thread and my summary would be:
apply to Bama, Auburn, and UAH. The apps are open, use them to train for the more important apps and iron out the wrinkles. Apply to Honors, too.
Theyāll be solely in case sth goes wrong with the rest -because you want to go elsewhere - but theyāre good backups to have
Apply to Miami-Ohio Honors, UNebraska Raikes, UNew Mexico, UCincinnati Honors, ULouisville Honors, Kansas Honors: Iām willing to bet 2-3 of these will come through for you (admission+merit) and therefore will become better safeties than the previous ones.
seconding Olin for a reach - sounds like their environment (robotics, hands on collaboration, small classes) and their ECE major would be right up your alley. Read their website and run the NPC.
Harvey Mudd might be too intense for you based on what you said.
forget about UCs and CSUS/Polytechs. If you want to apply to CA, look into USC (beside Harvey Mudd).
Cornell has several colleges that house STEM majors. Review them all carefully. That being said, why not Penn? Itās cold there, itās urban, and the Jerome Fisher program may be of special interest though ājustā CS or CSE at Penn would likely be sufficiently challenging! This would be a super reach.
forget about Penn State: no merit scholarships. UMD might have some, but theyāre super competitive.
If you like the cold, what about UMN-Twin cities? Not sure itād be within budget but CS/cse is pretty good. In the same vein, UWisconsin. Basically, once you have all 3 instate universities + 4-5 from the 2nd paragraph completed and sent, keep running NPCs and go for it.
-Remember, you have to be willing to walk away from an acceptance if itās nor within budget.
and my summary would be: