<p>So this is really important for my family. We have a fairly high house hold income and quite a bit in savings.</p>
<p>$200,000> per year</p>
<p>However, my family cannot afford to pay $50,000 per year for college.</p>
<p>How can I maximize the amount of need based aid I can I get? I know it won't be more than 1/2 of the cost, but I need to try to get my aid as high as possible. What do you recommend that I do?</p>
<p>Will withdrawing our savings increase my aid? Or will taking out a second mortgage on our home help? Because we only have a year left on our mortgage.</p>
<p>Any advice will help, but preferably something that doesn't involve loans. For my family, that is a last resort. </p>
<p>There are a lot of schools that cost less than $50,000/year. Your in state option is probably $25K or less including room and board. Less if you live at home.</p>
<p>@sylvan8798 Well, I’m taking about OOS public schools. I definitely have financial safeties like the CUNYs, but I’m more so talking about aid for the privates and OOS publics on my list like Syracuse, University of Wisconsin- Madison, and the University of Florida. Do you have any advice for those schools?</p>
<p>Need based LOANS? Your maximum STUDENT loan for freshman year is $5500 Direct loan. That’s it. Anything beyond that will either require a cosigner or your parents will need to take the loan.</p>
<p>You will NOT get “need based loans” for half of your costs. In fact, with incomes in excess of $200,000, you will not get need based aid at all.</p>
<p>Whoops! @thumper1 I did NOT mean loans. That was a type, sorry! I mean need based AID. Sorry! </p>
<p>But the point is that I know I will not get much in need based loans. That’s the point of this thread. I’m asking how I can increase those chances though. </p>
<p>Also, are there any special bank accounts my family should be considering? Thank you!</p>
<p>I think you want to focus on merit based aid. What are your SAT’s/GPA? Some OOS publics give guaranteed merit money based on stats. Also, you should only need 40k for Wisconsin or Florida, even without any merit money. It’s still a lot but it’s 10 grand less than you said at the outset. How much can you earn toward your college costs? 5k? 10k? How much can your parents contribute? Can they at least match what you’re paying? How about some of the SUNY’s? </p>
<p>Can’t or Won’t pay? Since they have money in savings and a high income I’m sure they could afford to pay. </p>
<p>Your primary home value isn’t included in the Fafsa. Savings are accounted at like 3% EPC I believe. At 200k income, your EPC will be over 40k just based on income alone. </p>
<p>I agree with the post above. Your best bet will be merit aid from schools that you are overqualified for. </p>
<p>P.S. I would advise against OOS public schools, they just quite frankly aren’t worth them money, I would look into smaller privates if I were in your shoes. </p>
<p>Well my parents pay out of pocket for my brother, but he’s transferring out of his community college to a CUNY. He should be graduating in 2 years or so. So I assume as of right now, the number they can pay is around 25K, but as my brother gets settled into a job, I can assume that number will gradually increase to maybe around 30K to 35K.</p>
<p>I’m looking into Hunter college and StonyBrook.</p>
<p>Right now, my UW GPA is 3.71. I have taken the most demanding schedule available and I have just around 1700 on the SAT. However, I am currently enrolled in a prep course which will bring my grade up (hopefully) to somewhere around 1900. I will do some intensive prep over the summer so I can (hopefully) get to around 2100 in the fall.</p>
<p>You’re not going to qualify for need based aid at even the most generous schools based on income alone. You might look for merit aid but that will have nothing to do with your income and savings.</p>
<p>@halfemptypockets @bomerr They can’t pay. They have financial commitments that won’t appear on the FAFSA. Just two examples: They pay for my grandma’s rent every month, which isn’t cheap. They also take care of her basic living necessities monthly. Also, my brother is in college</p>
<p>well, OOS publics don’t usually give much/any need-based aid, so expect to pay all costs. </p>
<p>they arent going to care if you somehow magically reduce your EFC in half, they wont give you aid for the rest…other than loans.</p>
<p>why should they? Publics need their aid for their resident students. YOU dont pay taxes there.<br>
they charge high OOS rates for a reason. would it make sense to charge those high rates and then cover them with need-based aid??? why bother charging the high OOS rates???</p>
<p>there really isnt anything your parents can do other than quit their jobs. EFC is mostly based on income, and theirs is too high.</p>
<p>If both you and your brother goto college at the same time the on the fafsa will drop in half. So if your EPC is 60k right now, it’ll drop to 30k. (privates may calculate is differently) But at 30k EPC you’ll still be above any federal aid (besides stafford loans). </p>
<p>The living expanses for your grandma would appear on the CSS profile. So maybe if you are lucky the CSS profile would help you get more aid than Fafsa. Regardless the aid would be a drop in the bucket. </p>
<p>Bottom-line, take out stafford loans, take out parent plus loans (if you really need too) and use the savings to pay for your college. </p>
<p>Will income dictate my aid completely? Will moving savings or withdrawing them change anything? Also, are there any special accounts I can consider or special things I should consider when applying for aid? Even when applying to private schools? I have more private schools on my list than public schools. </p>
<p>Thank you all so much for answering in such a timely fashion!</p>
<p>^ I told you, assets are added to EPC by about 3%. income is the base for your EPC. at 200k there income will give you an EPC in excess of 40k. All schools will give you around 12,5k in loans. Added together you are (almost) at the COA right there. </p>
<p>You need to look at less expensive schools and at schools that will give merit scholarships. A second mortgage does not help at schools that use the FAFSA. A second mortgage would be able to be used to pay for your education, and your parents could claim a tax deduction for the interest on the mortgage, instead of paying interest on a Parents Plus loan. But the money taken out on that second mortgage would be counted as an asset.</p>
<p>Taking care of grandparents, as much as it seems obligatory, is considered a choice, or discretionary spending. Just because your parents choose to take care of her, and at an expensive rate (according to what you have shared) does not mean any school is going to cough up its money to give you more financial aid. At your family income level, even Harvard, which is reputed to be the most generous in the country, would probably not consider you in “need” of need-based aid. If it were the case, lots of people would send off money to relatives, or buy yachts, or very expensive houses, and then claim hardship for financial aid. Actually, many do, and we see them here on CC. But all of those things are choices, and your family could “choose” to spend their money differently. They could. Or as another poster said, they could quit their jobs.</p>
<p>@radimom My grandmother is an immigrant so she has not retirement funds to pay for living expenses. Also, no one else in my family can afford to provide for her so if the other option is leaving her in a shelter, I’m not sure taking care of her is a choice…</p>
<p>@KKmama Thank you for telling me that. We could’ve made a big mistake!</p>