<p>My older daughter is a sophomore in college. I am listed as the custodial parent but she actually lives with her dad and me about equal amounts of the time. My ex claims her as a dependent (through divorce stipulation--we each get one child to deduct), and he also signs her FAFSA. My ex pays the tuition bill and I pay half of this daughter's tuition and college expenses directly to my ex.</p>
<p>This is the way it worked with my oldest child--only I did the FAFSA and took the loans/paid the bills and my ex reimbursed me.</p>
<p>Now to the youngest child: This daughter lives with me all of the time and I claim her as a dependent. My ex will be responsible for half of her tuition and college expenses, paying to me directly. </p>
<p>Here's the question: While I technically will be paying half of the expenses of two daughters in college, the worksheet makes it sound like I can't list my older daughter as a college student (and possibly reap the rewards of that expense) because she doesn't live with me more than 50% of the time. </p>
<p>Can anybody tell me if I am reading this right? Hate to lose something I might be entitled to. But then how I think I am reading it kind of makes sense to me because if ex is doing older daughter's FAFSA, he's the one who is responsible for the loans even though I am legally (through the stipulation) responsible as well. AARGH!
Thanks for any clarity on this!</p>
<p>Your older daughter: lives with you and her Dad about 50/50. In this case, the parent who will provide most of her support from July '07 through June '08 can include her as a "household member" on the FAFSA (currently that's question #66). They use a "support test" rather than a "residency test" to answer this question for the current applicant's siblings. So you should be able to include the oldest daughter as a household member if you provide 51% of the support.</p>
<p>Then, Q#67 asks re: the number of college students in the "household". If you included the oldest daughter as a "household member" in Q#66, you can include her as a college student in the household for purposes of this question.</p>
<p>Who claims a child as a dependent for tax purposes is a different issue. It doesn't have to "match" the household member question. </p>
<p>Including her as a household member on FAFSA will increase your income protection allowance, a good thing. And including her as a household member in college will effectively cut your EFC for this daughter in half, also a good thing.</p>
<p>BUT-- you may have a problem if Dad has already included oldest daughter as a member of his household on her FAFSA for the same year (which sounds likely). You can't file as separated, and then both claim the oldest daughter as a household member during the same FAFSA year.</p>
<p>Excellent point and put clearly enough for me to understand! Of course we can't both claim Oldest Daughter in two places. That answers the question. Thank you.</p>
<p>Thinking about this a bit further-- you'd probably be better off, financial aid-wise, if either you and your ex arranged to show both daughters as part of the same household (either yours or his) on their FAFSA's. That cuts the parental contribution to the EFC for each of them in half (two kids from the same household in college at the same time).</p>
<p>By splitting the kids into two different households (on the FAFSA, anyway), you don't get that benefit, and your total family EFC could be about double what it would be if both were in the same household. But since FAFSA uses the support test to determine household membership, maybe you don't have any flexibility in that regard.</p>
<p>In the perfect world that would be the way to go, especially since Ex's household shows less income, but you are right in intuiting that there is not that flexibility. Filing through Dad's househould, financial aid for Oldest Daughter is good. Filing through my household for Young Daughter will be not so good since I am now remarried to a well paid professional--and was aghast to find out that his income and assets count on Young Daughter's FAFSA, even though a prenupt makes it clear that he is not responsible for my kids' educations!</p>