I was wondering if I should send the fafsa and css documents before I send my common app for an ed school. I was wondering if that was what colleges would prefer. Any thoughts? Thanks.
As long as the school get them by the deadline, they don’t care which comes first.
There may be good reasons to send the FAFSA/CSS in first - depending on your financial situation. For families with modest incomes and little savings, the best way to maximize potential financial aid on a CSS app may involve filing when you have depleted your savings/minimized your assets. Buying the replacement car, paying off the credit card debt, prepaying the annual winter heating oil contract, prepay car payments, etc. and it might not be hard to whittle down your safety cushion from say $25-$30K to $15-$20K. If you have $10K less in assets, that is $10K less that the schools will want you to use for college. Depending on the school’s FA policy, tweaks like this, all perfectly legit, can mean you may qualify for much more FA. Run the NPC at your schools and see what happens if you have $10K less available. For families like ours, when we were looking at schools for D before she had applied, we noticed this amount could mean anywhere from $500 to $3400 more financial aid. Many families here at CC don’t seem to think $500 makes a big difference, but to us it certainly did.
Other families may find it makes more sense to file CSS much later - as in, they can predict cash flow and their “snapshot” will look more favorable to them after they make their family payment for a sibling’s Spring semester tuition - perhaps not billed/paid until early January.
I applaud you for thinking ahead, and considering what your (and your family’s) financial situation might be now vs. even just a few months down the road.