<p>@Mom2aphysicsgeek Thank you for clarifying that. I was kinda confused… And thank you for the thread! Although our situations are almost scarily similar lol. </p>
<p>SugarBubble - I recall a thread where you tried to give someone bad information about moving assets into a 529 account. Maybe because you read that thread and saw there was a way that student could reduce EFC, you think there are tricks where you can do that. But that was a student in a very difficult position with a super low income family and I think a parent death. They had assets in a student name. That was not like your situation. Your situation is straightforward in that parent income is too high for need based. I hope you finally understand that in your situation there is nothing to reduce EFC (short of loss of jobs which would have other bad consequences.) No hidden tricks.</p>
<p>So people are suggesting routes other people take who can’t get need based aid. Lower cost colleges is one. Colleges that will give you merit is another. Take USC off your list. Too expensive and you won’t get merit. UMissouri is a good suggestion but a bit out of price range. When and if you increase test scores post again. Meanwhile do look over the automatic merit threads. You might not like the ones you can get into as much as your own instate, but maybe there is something.</p>
<p>@BrownParent Actually, that’s not at all why I’m asking. I actually wasn’t considering that at all since that person came into an inheritance and my situation is nothing like that so it wouldn’t make sense for me to base my thread on the premise of that, and in fact, the intent of this forum doesn’t matter as much as the content of my OP, but thanks for telling me that anyway. And my advice was neither worst or better than yours. It’s a matter of opinion. </p>
<p>You want to know how to lower your family EFC. Yes, there are some ways of doing this, by shifting some assets around. Say your family has a large mortgage and also a large amount sitting in the bank or in assets. If they paid off the mortgage, those assets are no longer included because FAFSA does not include home equity. However, parental assets do have a protection allowance based on number of dependents and age of the older parent. What’s left after that allowance is assessed at about 5.6%. Where the FAFSA EFC formula, and most any financial aid formula is heavily weighted is in INCOME. That is the AGI on your parents 1040. As Thumper and others have stated, income is the primary component of EFC. Your parents, your family makes money, a percentage of that goes onto the EFC. To get any guaranteed aid, ones EFC has to be lower than the mid $5K range; that gets you into PELL grant range. NY state TAP kicks in around the $80K income range. The maximum such programs pay are in the $5K range. Being in NY state pretty much assures those of low income that the tuition is covered. But our state tutions is not that high anyways, and financial aid generally only guarantees to cover that tuition. Most low income kids get tuition covered at the SUNY and CUNYs if their need so indicates, but when it comes to room and board, they still have to come up with it them selves. The system does not guarantee, nor does it cover living expenses most of the time. So it’s not as though having an EFC of even Zero is a financial aid panacea. No school I know guarantees to cover the need as defined by FAFSA EFC.</p>
<p>The other thing that lowers EFC is having two dependent full time students in college at the same time, as that pretty much cuts the parental EFC in half per student. So when you and your brother are both in college, that will happen. But when your brother is no longer a full time student, your parents’ part of the EFC will then double for you. </p>
<p>Right now, with parents willing to pay mid $20K in costs, if you can come up with some money too by working this summer and during the school year, and if you take out the $5500 in Direct Loans, you can swing going away to any of the SUNYs and some of the lower cost OOS colleges. IF you look at school with merit money for which your stats qualify you, the field opens a bit more. As I say to many students, it’s fine to also see what other higher cost colleges will come up with in terms of merit money, and in your case, fin aid with two in college (with the understanding that the cost will increase when you are the only one in college). But also make sure you have some school that you know are affordable and that will take you. You have a number of such possibilities. </p>
<p>To understand what posters are referring to, read through finaid.org, go find book like Financial Aid for Dummies, understand that, no matter the scheme, the college FA folks are aware of the tricks some families come up with. Understand that 200k is considered high income, top tier- and FA is geared to families making much, much less. Discretionary choices- the new car, high mortgage, hs tuition, supporting relatives, lifestyle choices, etc- don’t turn a comfortable family into a needy family, for college aid. These are seen as decisions a high income/high assets family has control of (versus a family that can’t.)</p>
<p>CC had been advising kids nearly forever, to go for merit aid, when the possibility of FA is slim to none. Not all your college choices and options will be a matter of what you want. There will be compromises.</p>
<p>Even Harvard doesn’t give much on 200k. When you hear stories or see headlines, you miss that the high income families getting some aid have other circumstances- eg, 3 or 4 kids simultaneously in college. This FA stuff is not as simple as finding some angle. If you could just shift money around, lots of savvy wealthy folks would be doing it. </p>
<p>Start looking into merit possibilities at schools that want your hs record. As everyone is saying, OOS public schools just don’t have much to give, in the first place- and earmark aid priority for in-state kids. This is reality. </p>
<p>@cptofthehouse @lookingforward I do have a summer job. I was gonna use that money to pay for another SAT prep class and materials to bring my grade up. I should no longer do that and just save it?</p>
<p>SugarBubbleTea, I’m sorry you have to go through this. I gather from your discussion of CUNY that you live in NYC. </p>
<p>Some of the SUNYs like Binghamton are very good. </p>
<p>University of Florida is very difficult to get into out of state. Schools like Wisconsin are around $40K OOS. </p>
<p>Some ideas:
Are you taking enough AP courses to get sophomore standing. If you only need to go to college for 3 years, your can save 25%. Having your parents take short-term loans would make sense in this case. </p>
<p>Some more affordable schools:
University of Minnesota Twin Cities and University of Kentucky are around $30K - tuition, room plus board.
Howard University ~ 32K</p>
<p>Canadian colleges can be affordable. The best schools with a journalism program are the University of British Columbia in Vancouver or the University of Toronto Scarborough. There are other schools that have it too. Somehow, I think you can be a journalist without majoring in journalism, so you can look into McGill, Toronto and Queen’s University (Basically about 2 hours north of Syracuse) also. Also, if I recall correctly, your tuition stays the same for all 4 years, but you’d have to check on that. </p>
<p>Universities in Israel are affordable. There are some English language programs. </p>
<p>If you have enough APs, universities in England are only 3 years. That might work. </p>
<p>You are not doomed. Good luck!</p>
<p>You need to learn what finaid is really about. You need to run numbers. And understand them. No matter what you do with current earnings, college costs run four years. You’d need to make that missing money every year of college. Pick a number: if college costs 50k and your parents pay 25, you are 25 short. With the Direct loans, that takes care of $5500-7500 (loans are higher as you go through.) An on-campus job, IF you qualify, will toss in maybe 2k. </p>
<p>There is no shame in going to an affordable school. If you look around, many prominent journalists went wherever and worked their butts off to garner the right experiences and polish their work. It’s a field that requires the right assertiveness and the ability to ferret out info and evaluate. Are you in NY? Look for the in-state public colleges with the best writing programs. </p>
<p>@ClassisRockerDad I have taken as many as possible and they are not nearly enough to get me any substantial credit Also, I dont have any exam results. :(</p>
<p>@lookingforward I have a SUNY and a few CUNYs on my list. This thread was basically referring to few OOS public and privates. But thankfully, my mom and I have a meeting with my college counselor today, so we will definitely clear some things up :)</p>
<p>My one son’s SATs and grades were lower than yours. We told him we’d pay $35K a year. We’d come up with that amount from savings, current income and borrowing through PLUS if necessary. He’d have to come up with any excess. If he’d picked a SUNY, he would have his way paid by us and could afford some nice extras as well. No pressure to make money over the summer, keep his savings, no loans on his part. He also got some merit awards, one actually full tuition from some local private colleges. So his lowest cost school would have been the one tuition free, but he really wanted to go away some distance for college. A lot of his peers, by the way, took that school up on that offer. </p>
<p>Also on his list were some OOS publics and lower cost privates. He ended up with a number of them that were affordable, barely so, but he doesn’t NEED to take out the loans. But he had some money saved for college, works summers and some during the school year. For junior and senior years, he lives off campus for a lot less than what the school charges for room and board. He is very frugal. Still, it’s been tight and he did take out the Direct loan for about $3500 his sophomore year when he had to drop his job at school second semester and wanted to go on a trip that summer which not only cost money, but cut into his summer work hours. He paid it off but it was painful. He understands now how it feels to pay off a loan. So his costs are $40K a year and we give him $35K of it. Really, it comes to more than that as we do also spend some money on gifts, handouts, visits, etc, other discretionary things on him too, but that is about how it works. So, you can look at some of the other OOS schools and see what the cost would be for you. If your parents can swing $35k and you boroow and pitch in, a number of them are affordable to you.</p>
<p>Your college counselor is likely not well versed in the money side. Many just say “you’ll be ok. Apply”.</p>
<p>Your college counselor should, however, be able to direct you to less costly options.</p>
<p>There is a thread with a stick pin at the top of this forum that has low price college options. Look at that one too. I believe everything on it is less than. $25,000 a year.</p>
<p>@cptofthehouse How has paying the loan been so far for him?</p>
<p>@thumper1 yeah lol, aside from telling us to apply in state, she doesn’t really give us names of cheaper options for us. She’s been reccomending all these privates for me and I’m just like “Nooo! I can’t afford this!” :P</p>
<p>I sold some land and I had planned to put the proceeds toward the mortgage. However, after my D started applying to colleges and decided on the one she would attend, I realized that my college funds were greatly underfunded, so I used some of the proceeds from the land sale to increase the amount in her 529. So now I have around $31K in the 529, $42K in savings bonds (of which I hope not to use as a last resort) and another $15 in a savings account. I’m currently funding the 529 at a $1,400/month pace, even though she will be starting college in August.</p>
<p>Just wondering if I should stop funding the 529 and put that money into another investment vehicle to fund college? The 529 is invested in an ultra safe fund (can only make one transaction/year), but I do get to reduce my state income tax liability by the amount I put into the 529. </p>
<p>Thanks in advance for any suggestions!!</p>
<p>SugarBubbletea, my son borrowed $3500 and took a year and a half to pay it pack. Wanted to repay it in 10 months, couldn’t do it and meet expenses. It’s paid.</p>
<p>He had to live on a very strict budget which was difficult for him with a lot of college kids who had carte blanche to spend as they pleased. He had to force him self to look for those who didn’t have that kind of horn of plenty in terms of cash and credit cards. Because he did and is frankly spoiled in terms of standard of living. </p>
<p>My other son went to Suny Buffalo, and it was a lot easy sailing for him financially. You’ll get into the Honors college likely with your grades and possibly test score and get $2500 in awards. Also the off campus housing there is cheap, plentiful and the thing to do. Jobs available for kids too. Take a look there. Great school, IMO too. </p>
<p>I think it is strange to ask how to lower your EFC. Even if it gets to $0 all you really get out of that is a Pell grant, which is an income based government program for those in need. Would you ask “How do I qualify for food stamps?” and food stamps are also an income based program for those in need.</p>
<p>If you do qualify, then you need to figure out the best way to spend that government money. The max anyone gets is $5700, and just like with food stamps, you can get more value from the money if you shop wisely. You can spend it all on organic produce at Whole Foods or you can get twice as much at the Safeway. You can use that $5700 for 1/10th of your tuition at a big name school, or you can use it for 100% of tuition at a in-state school or community college.</p>
<p>The school can grant more in financial aid if it wants to, but nothing is guaranteed and, as most have posted here, unlikely at many of the schools you’ve listed.</p>
<p>Unless you are really rich, it is hard to afford oos public or private schools. You need to be realistic. Look up the NPC and ask your parents how much they can support you per year. You are not likely to get much need based aid (if any) or merit aid. Factor in the amount of student loan and your part time job to see what would be the maximal amount you can afford per year. Then apply only to schools under that budget. There are reach schools that are difficult to get in, but there are financial reach schools that are near impossible to get in too. You really don’t want to have a large debt after college.</p>
<p>There are ways to lower one’s EFC. And one should know them. And the OP should know them when we get to that point. First, he needs to find out if it even matters. With two kids in college at the same time, it is possible that the OP qualifies for some fin aid from private schools like Syaracuse, and maybe even state schools. If that is the case, lowering the EFC by following some of those guidelines can make a difference. But in terms of entitlements, like PELL, it’s highly unlikely it will happen as the threshhold for that is too low. Also the OP needs to know what the EFC will bounce back up to (just about double for him) when the sibling is no longer a full time student. The other thing is that no school guarantees to meet need as defined by EFC anyways. </p>
<p>But if the OP does look like he might qualify for some aid these first years, it’s important that he have any money in his own name be used to repay his expenses to his parents and they can set up an account for him with parent name and SSn first, but joint with kid to avoid the 20% hit on student asset over the smaller 5.6% hit on parental that is over their protected allowance. or put it into a 529 where it is treated as a parental asset. OP should get parental numbers, run some NPC numbers and play around with it seeing, where some changes can be made. Not a whole lot many times, but things like avoiding moving certain funds around if it can be helped hat make it a reportable gain could be relevant. </p>
<p>Very few families can afford four years of OOS sticker price regardless of income.
OP, If I were you, I’d probably go to a community college the first two years and then transfer to the OOS public of your choice.</p>
<p>@billcsho “Unless you are really rich, it is hard to afford oos public or private schools.” </p>
<p>I totally disagree with you on this!! If you find the right school where your stats are in the 75% percentile range many of those OOS schools (not necessarily the public ones) can, and often provide very generous merit aid packages. So, in many respects your statement is not accurate.</p>