<p>To add on to what Dufus wrote:</p>
<p>Some schools only use the federal methodology to calculate financial aid (the fafsa said you made "X" amount of $ your EFC is Y- no ifs ands or buts) Some school use the combination of both institutional methodology and Federal Methodology (federal in terms of being eligible for pell grants & stafford loans) They will ask for a CSS profile or their own financial aid supplement. Schools using a combination of both may end up giving you a lower EFC than a school using the FAFSA alone. The CSS profile looks at how your money was spent, it takesinto consideration your age, kids in private school and how much you pay. It also protects a portion of your parents income based on their age.</p>
<p>If you attend a school that is not need blind (need aware, need sensitive) needing aid is not going to help your cause because schools know that many students who apply ED will not need aid (they will have a nice portion of full paid students who have committed and they don't have to worry about negotiating aid).</p>
<p>Apply ED to BU could be tricky because they state in their aid package that they have need based merit aid. So if you need aid , you must be at the top of the application pool to get the big bucks. </p>
<p>There is only a handful of schools that are both need blind and meet 100% of your demonstrated need. These schools tend to be very selective. At worse if you were to max out on all of the first year loans available to you, it would be $2625 Subsidized stafford, $4000 perkins and $4000 unsubsidized stafford ($10,625 this could happen if you have an EFC of 0 or 30,000 if you attend a school that the COA is $40,000) you just don't know what you are going to get, but the school would have still met your demonstrated need. </p>
<p>Depending on the school, the person with the "0" efc may have gotten a package with no loans, from another school which s/he could have used to negotiate a better package.</p>
<p>An overwhelming number of the country's 3000 colleges gap (they do not meet 100% of your demonstrated need (the cap could literally be in the $10,000's) you have no way of knowing until you get the package and no recourse other than attending your local shool.</p>
<p>There are many components that go into calculating financial aid. If you are house rich, it could mean a big difference in the EFC you get from a school. Some schools calculate home equity at 5%, others may calculate at 2 %. If you have 500,000 worth of equity in your home your EFC could be anywhere from $10,000 to $25,000. YThis does not even take into consideration your parents salary, money in the bank, 401k deductions or assets in your name (college funds, savings bonds etc).</p>