<p>My parents have owned a house in Pennsylvania for over 20 years. We have spent every summer there and occasionally visit in the winter. The rest of the year we live in New Jersey and I attend school here. I am thinking about attending Penn State. Will I qualify for in-state tuition?</p>
<p>No…you’re a resident of NJ…your parents pay taxes in NJ. They have an investment in PA.</p>
<p>[url=<a href=“http://www.bursar.psu.edu/faq.cfm?sc=residency]No.[/url”>FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions | Office of the Bursar]No.[/url</a>]</p>
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Simply owning property in another state that you occasionally visit isn’t the same as actually living, working, and going to school there.</p>
<p>Your family has residence is in NJ…that is where you will be eligible for instate tuition. As noted above, vacation homes are NOT considered your primary residence…they are a VACATION residence, not your family’s permanent place of residence.</p>
<p>Based on gardna’s link above, it looks like you might consider a [residency</a> appeal](<a href=“http://www.bursar.psu.edu/appeal.cfm]residency”>Residency Review | Office of the Bursar). If you can move into that summer home full time before the start of school, or live there during breaks at school, you might be able to get them to offer you in-state tuition rate.s It is probably too late for this year but it might not be so much for next year.</p>
<p>Bedouin, you are posting inaccurate information yet again. Did you actually read the page you linked to? You cannot gain PA residency if you relocate for educational purposes. Living in PA on breaks won’t do it. </p>
<p>Stop posting inaccurate information all over CC. I don’t know why you are doing it, but you are leading people astray.</p>
<p>Bedouin is incorrect – </p>
<p>In order to establish residency, the individual must live in the state for 12 months prior to the beginning of school.</p>
<p>Students must also be independent – otherwise the residency of the parent is the residency of the student. Parents can’t help with school, take out loans, provide any support or declare the student on their taxes, for the 12 months prior and continuing through school.</p>
<p>What grade is the student in? Is there any particular reason why the parents cannot move into this summer home permanently? If the student is not a junior or a senior, there might still be time to become domiciled and file the appeal (if it is even necessary).</p>
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<p>You are the one who is leading people astray, with uninformed doomsaying. We are all trying to help students here get into the best schools that they can afford, and by discouraging them from even considering certain alternatives you are (without meaning to, I’m sure) inadvertently causing them to give up hope before they have even had a chance to see how it would work out.</p>
<p>OP, ignore Bedouin’s “advice.” You really have no basis for a residency appeal at this point, because it is quite clear that your parents are residents of NJ and not PA and therefore, you are a resident of NJ and not PA.</p>
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<p>Well…certainly if the WHOLE family relocates to PA ONE YEAR prior to this student enrolling in college they could establish residency IN PA…but that is NOT what the OP was asking. The OP wanted to know if owning and using a vacation home in PA would be the acid test for instate residency…NO NO NO…it won’t be.</p>
<p>So…to the OP…if you want to leave your current high school for the last year, and your parents are able to either work from their NEW permanent home in PA or can get new jobs…then go for it.</p>
<p>But the way it stands right now…OP…your family resides in NJ, not PA. NJ is where you have instate residency for tuition purposes.</p>
<p>Bedouin…please answer the question the person is asking. This OP did not ASK what would happen if his family relocated permanently to the vacation home.</p>
<p>Bedouin…</p>
<p>The parents’ places of employment are in New Jersey, their jobs are NOT in PA where their vacation home is. They can’t “move in” to their vacation home for a year to establish residency. If that were an option, they would have considered. it.</p>
<p>Bedouin, you are simply posting inaccurate information all over CC. Others on this thread and other threads you have entered have agreed with me and no one has come to your defense. That should tell you something. </p>
<p>I’m willing to grant you that your intentions are good but giving false hope and inaccurate information is hurting people.</p>
<p>Bedouin – you consistently give inaccurate information or advice that is not in the best interest of the students posting. You recommend private loans for students again and again – which leads me to believe that you have some vested interest in the private student loan business. No rational adult would advise that a student take out private loans in addition to the allowed stafford loan amount leaving them in debt more than $27,000 (which is the amount if the maximum stafford loans are taken). And there are no currently available private loans which have terms better than the stafford loans.</p>
<p>Wow Bedouin you don’t have many fans. And while you might have an alternate agenda, I also have to wonder the same thing about other posters. The OP asked the question about what constituted instate PA residency. But the shouts of “you can’t do that” also makes me wonder about their agenda. Some are able to get the instate tuition after some time, others are not.</p>
<p>The exerpt that Garda quoted doesn’t indicate that PA takes the view that the residency of a dependent student is derived from the parents. It seems to be giving weight to the student’s domicile, which is currently NJ. However, if the student’s domicile changed to PA (ie. student moves the the PA home before starting school, and does all the things expected of a PA resident such as driver’s license, voter reg, bill paying, etc.) then he MAY be classified as a resident. I’m just basing this from what I’m reading above, but there are certain states (NY is one, but there is a one year domicile requirement) where it is easier for a student to gain residency than others.</p>
<p>OP, every school has an office that determines residency and College Board also publishes state residency requirements on their website. You may want to read the full reg for yourself and discuss with your parents and the college. It would certainly be worth the investment of time if you were able to achieve this! Please let us know what you find out…</p>
<p>I think we have a new term here, “Bedouinisms”, which refers to conflicting information contained in a single sentence! I don’t think anyone is going to give a lot of consideration to these posts, but there is the occasional flash of a different, and quite valid, perspective. I think we’re sometimes guilty of posting the same answer to students, particularly when it comes to loan questions, without fully considering the options…or at least explaining the options so the kid can make a fully informed decision. For example, posts about loan amounts generally state the monthly repayment under a 10-year schedule but don’t mention the alternatives (IBR/ICR) at all and we often don’t know what the student’s major is either. This could be a factor where students are eligible for student loan forgiveness and/or the TEACH grant, which is another often overlooked program.</p>
<p>* My parents have owned a house in Pennsylvania for over 20 years. We have spent every summer there and occasionally visit in the winter. The rest of the year we live in New Jersey and I attend school here. I am thinking about attending Penn State. Will I qualify for in-state tuition? *</p>
<p>I think there has been a natural assumption that since this is a vacation home that they only spend time in during vacations, that this is not a place that is close to the child’s school and probably not near the parents’ job, either. The OP didn’t indicate a desire to change schools for his senior year. </p>
<p>For the OP’s state resident status to change, his family would have to move there this summer and do all the things that go along with moving to another state (car tags, etc), change high schools, and perhaps the parents would have to change jobs if their current jobs aren’t near the PA home.</p>
<p>I agree with Thumper. If the family, or one parent takes up residence in the house in PA, and taxes are paid on that basis–residence in PA, PA residency can be established. The exact rules for this need to be checked at the particular college because it can differ.</p>
<p>When we looked at UMich, the admissions officer there told our group that she had to pay OOS rates for UMich for her son the first year there since she did not have a year of residency there at that time. It wasn’t until his sophomore year that the family was given state residency status and the son could get in state rates. Things can differ, however, at other colleges. </p>
<p>As a rule, however, it is your parents’ residencies, not yours that decides where you get in state rates. I know a number of kids in NE boarding schools, that live elsewhere, and though they spend more time in the state where they go to school, and their parents may even have a weekend home there, they are considered residents of where their parents have their primary residence. Though my husband paid Connecticut state taxes for years from working there, we did not get in state CT college tuition privileges since we did not live there.<br>
Sk8rmom, you are right, that there might be a way since schools have their own way of determining residence. I know that in PA when my cousin moved there, they looked at his drivers license date, and he did need to be there for a period of time to get in state rates for a class he wanted to take. But that is that particular school in PA, and not necessarily Penn state.<br>
Though NY may have the one year rule, it is not always enforced at many of the community colleges. I say that because I know a number of folks who have gotten in state rates without a second look from our local comm colleges when it is pretty clear they should be paying OOS rates. Even out of country au paars are registered as in state for some courses. This I know as a fact. The school just doesn’t bother to check or make a deal out of the issue. You show a document with your address on it that is in state and you get the in state rate despite all of the small print on the web site and paperwork. </p>
<p>However, when my son took a community college course up in Erie, they checked right down to his county residence. We had to pay out of county rates, and get reimburesed by our county. And he had been living up there for 4 years. Made no sense because I could have made a good strong argument that he was in county by definition of the documents there, but that’s just the way they processed everyone, and there are many, in his particular situation. They were not about to budge.</p>
<p>sk8rmom – I followed Gardna’s posted link [Penn</a> State Office of the Bursar](<a href=“FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions | Office of the Bursar”>FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions | Office of the Bursar) and read the info. Many times people read these forums and don’t dig deep enough to get the whole picture – I just wanted to make certain that anyone reading this thread understands that changing residency while a dependent student is almost impossible unless the state has rules allowing it (which PA doesn’t). </p>
<p>A student does have to prove independent status in order to change residency, even with 12 months continuous residence:</p>
<p>" Each petition is reviewed individually on the basis of all evidence submitted by the petitioner. Accordingly, it is not possible to list a specific combination of factors or set of circumstances, which if met, would ensure reclassification for tuition purposes. However, there are certain documents which are typically suggested: the deed or lease to your principal domicile, a Pennsylvania state tax return, and Pennsylvania documents such as driver’s license, voter registration, vehicle registration, etc. These are all appropriate items to provide. A petitioner may submit copies of any information that will help document her/his principal domicile is in Pennsylvania. Keep in mind that Penn State must retain the items in your residency file, so submit only COPIES of the documents. The information should be that of a student’s parent(s) or legal guardian(s), if the student is dependent. A student seeking to show her/his independence should submit her/his own information, in addition to documentation of independent status. "</p>
<p>“A student under the age of 21 is presumed to have the domicile of his/her parent(s) or legal guardian(s), unless the student has maintained continuous residence in the Commonwealth for other than educational purposes for a period of at least 12 months immediately prior to his/her initial enrollment at The Pennsylvania State University, and, the student continues to maintain such separate residence.”</p>
<p>"Accompanying the previously suggested materials, a student may wish to submit a copy of his/her parent(s)’ Federal tax return or a notarized statement from them indicating they are not providing the student’s support or claiming the student as a dependent for tax reasons. Students receiving Financial Aid should be classified as independent for Financial Aid purposes. In addition, if the parents have taken out loans to support the student’s education (such as PLUS loans), the student would not be considered independent, unless compelling evidence to the contrary is presented. The student should be prepared to show that he/she has sufficient means to support him/herself. "</p>
<p>so – in order for this student to save the cost of OOS tuition at a school in Penn, he/she would have to live in the state for 12 months, without attending any school. Additionally, the student would have to support themselves for 12+ months, cannot apply for FA as a dependent student (and can’t apply as an independent student for FA unless they meet the independent requirements listed in the FAFSA) – so no FA, and can’t be declared on parent’s income taxes. Hardly seems worth the savings of the OOS tuition.</p>
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<p>First off, what possible alternate agenda could people on here POSSIBLY have?</p>
<p>People on here (except Bed) answered the OP’s question based on the school that the OP wants to go to. If the school says no, that means no. So “you can’t do that” would be accurate, not an alternate agenda.</p>
<p>My experience dovetails that of cpt’s…we have kids without NY, or even US, residency attending college at instate rates although NY’s official residency rules are very similar to PA’s. My dependent D was granted instate rates at a state U near where we own property through an OOS tuition waiver. What I was trying to say is that it may be unlikely that this particular student will meet the letter of the statute, but the school may grant an exception/waiver in certain cases. Only the residency officer at his intended school can make that final determination. These regs are not state laws when they’re used for determining residency for tuition purposes…often they serve more as guidelines for the schools to follow. Imho, it’s worth his time to read the regs and have a conversation with the school, if nothing else it will give him a better understanding of obtain and interpret information. YMMV</p>