guessing on aid amounts

Parents Forum
1

<p>Ok, my nerves are shot. Besides the FAFSA needing to be redone (for a minor error, should not change EFC more than a tiny amount), I was told by one LAC financial aid office that, as I posted, they want the FAFSA to include DD1 in grad school, but they take that back when they do institutional aid. They will not count her as in school. I am unclear if they count her as in family or not.</p>

<p>Does this I mean I should assume my numbers for actual financial aid package will be about double the EFC? </p>

<p>The good part is that if they don't count her and it's in my price range I can stop worrying about affording year 3 and 4 when DD will be done with grad school. </p>

<p>Also, are any of the caculators online accurate for intitutional aid in general. woe is me, dd1 is not Princeton material. It is the most affordable school even when not counting DD1 in grad school. sigh. </p>

<p>I used collegedata to run costs but it works off the fafsa number. I had always thought the profile would come out lower, since it looks at my medical out-of-pocket, my ancient and dying toyota (help!) and my total lack of any assets. </p>

<p>Feedback?</p>

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<p>bumping myself</p>

3

<p>Our experience was income was weighted much heavier than expenses.
In fact I don't see where expenses are accounted for at all unless you just had to pay out of pocket for something like a transplant- and then you would submit that info to the school directly.
While they want you to submit info- re type of car etc. I think it is more to rule out that you don't have something like a 2008 Lamborgini while claiming 50K in income, rather than allowing for repair bills.</p>

<p>I found finaid.org to have accurate federal and institutional calculators.
Keep in mind EFC mostly helps when school offers 100% of need.
I wouldn't even count your older daughter- I assume for tax purposes she isn't a dependent- then if a school does happen to count her- it would be a plus!</p>