<p>I'm the first kid in my family, so we've never done this before. Can anyone give me an overview of what FAFSA does for you? The advantages and disadvantages? </p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>The FAFSA is a financial aid application form. You put your family financial information on the form and it will generate something called an SAR (Student Aid Report). On that SAR will be an EFC (expected family contribution). If your EFC per FAFSA is below $5000 you would get a portion at least of the Pell grant. The closer to $0 EFC, the larger your Pell would be. The FAFSA EFC is also used to determine other federally funded need based aid such as Perkins loans, SEOG (if your school has it), and federal work study. Some states use the FAFSA EFC to determine need based aid for lower income students.</p>
<p>The EFC is largely based on your family’s income. Assets are added into the equation too. </p>
<p>EVERYONE completing a FAFSA is eligible to take out a Stafford loan which for freshmen is $5500 in the student’s name only.</p>
<p>I personally cannot think of a disadvantage to completing the FAFSA.</p>
<p>^^The only people I know that have never filled out a FAFSA write checks for all their kids’ college expenses and don’t even flinch because the money comes out of trust funds.</p>
<p>What do you have to do after you fill it out? Does it get sent to your colleges?</p>
<p>When you are completing the FAFSA, it will give you an opportunity to search for up to ten institutions to send your results to. You just have to type in the name of the place and the city and then click on the right school.</p>
<p>If you are applying to more than ten, be sure to list the ones with the closest application dates. Then wait a day or so until you get your email indicating that your FAFSA has been processed. At that time, you can re-enter the system and change the names of the places that need to receive the form, and re-send it so that it goes to the next set of schools.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>The only people I know that have never filled out a FAFSA write checks for all their kids’ college expenses and don’t even flinch because the money comes out of trust funds.</p>
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<p>No FAFSA this year … no trust fund. We pay for school with my (not so high) income. EFC is too high for anything but loans, and don’t want to go there … he borrowed freshman year to get some skin in the game, though.</p>
<p>It depends on the school. If it’s a state school & you know you are not getting any aid other than loans, and you know you don’t want to borrow … no reason to apply. If it’s needed for scholarship consideration, though, file … the student may still get the scholarship even if you have a high EFC. For private schools, it depends on how high your income and assets are, and whether you will need to borrow for school. If you might need to borrow, then fill it out.</p>
<p>If you have an EFC that isn’t ridiculously high (that is, higher than the cost of attendance), it is a good idea to complete the FAFSA. The student might at least get work study … and you never know what kind of school grant might come your way.</p>
<p>Don’t forget state grants … many required filing the FAFSA.</p>
<p>Oh, I see you are the student. Have you talked to your parents? Do they know how much the schools you are interested in cost? Are they able to pay for school without any aid? If not, fill out the FAFSA. In fact, fill it out, anyway … it doesn’t hurt.</p>