<p>We've completed our EFC for FAFSA, as my brother is currently attending college, at a CSU. At this point, it's around $10,000. I'll be applying to a number of private schools, and was wondering how my financial aid package will compare to this EFC. Assuming that these colleges grant 100% of demonstrated need, would I only be paying $10,000? Or will my actual award be considerably different? Thanks for any help.</p>
<p>In the rare event that 100% of demonstrated need is met, your aid package can contain federal grant aid (Pell), federal loans, federal work-study, state-based grants (if your home state offers grants that can be used at that institution), institutional scholarships/grants, and (if the college/university also offers these) institutional loans. Provided that the college/university in question uses only the FAFSA, then yes, it is possible that your family might only be asked to pay $10,000 up front. But please note that federal work-study requires that you actually find a job on campus and that you earn that money during the school year, and any federal or institutional loans will need to be paid back later (and with interest), so in truth what you will have to pay will be more than just $10,000.</p>
<p>Not to mention, of course, that very few institutions meet 100% of need, and of those that do, almost all will use the CSS Profile or their own formulas which can result in expected contributions wildly different from the FAFSA EFC.</p>
<p>You first have to determine whether:</p>
<p>1) the school meets 100% of need…most don’t.</p>
<p>2) If the school gives a lot of aid, it likely uses CSS Profile…NOT FAFSA. </p>
<p>3) Will your brother’s aid increase or will your parents still have to pay what they were paying before EFC was split. Many times, when a sibling starts college, a student does NOT get more aid even though EFC was split. Many families are unpleasantly surprised to learn that their older child did not get more aid when the younger sibling starts college. </p>
<p>Since it sounds like your older sibling attends a Calif public (a CSU), and his EFC was about $20k when only one child was in college, it’s very unlikely that he will get any aid (beyond a loan) when you start college…even tho his EFC will also be about $10k. </p>
<p>You need to discuss all of this with your parents.</p>
<p>Thanks for the help. My brother does not receive any financial aid from his college (CSUs don’t generally have aid available). I’m just worried about applying ED to college and not being able to afford it, even with 100% aid.</p>
<p>We can realistically afford about $20,000-$25,000, if we were to take out loans.</p>
<p>We can realistically afford about $20,000-$25,000, if we were to take out loans.</p>
<p>Is this what you’re guessing or what your parents are SAYING? many parents can’t/won’t take out loans, so you’d better ask them if and how much they’d be willing to take out in loans. </p>
<p>So, it looks like your parents will still be full-freight for your sibling. Have you gone to the NPC on your ED school’s website to get an idea of what to expect? Have your parents do the NPC with you since they know more about things like assets, home equity, etc than you probably do. </p>
<p>Your own FA package will contain loans unless you get accepted to one of the few “no loan” schools.</p>
<p>In theory, when two are in college, the family Fafsa EFC ends up being split. Even with a second sudent now in college, public schools are likely not going to be able to offer aid to bring your brother’s costs down much. The wild card for you is the CSS Profile, used by many privates, which can ask about all sorts of assets/expenses, to get an idea of your family’s financial strength, beyond what the Fafsa looks at. Then each college has its own(secret) formula to deterine what they think your family can pay. </p>
<p>You can run a college’s NPC/Net Price Calculator (via their finaid web pages,) to see an estimate the aid you might get. Many posters will tell you that ED is an issue because you don’t get your official aid award til after you file the final Fafsa and CSS (after 1/1.) But, the NPC could show you if you are in shooting range. That’s a start. Good luck- let us know.</p>
<p>cross-posted.</p>
<p>“We can realistically afford about $20,000-$25,000, if we were to take out loans.”</p>
<p>That statement makes me nervous. As other posters have pointed out, the FA package that schools offer will likely already contain loans and may not even cover the EFC. I would strongly discourage you from planning to use loans to meet the EFC.</p>
<p>Just using imaginary numbers, if a school’s COA is $50k and your EFC is $30K, your need would be $20k. However, you might be offered only $15k of FA, so you will need to come up with $5k more than your EFC. This is called “gapping” and is not untypical. In addition, the $15k FA offer will include $2k of work study as well as perhaps $8k of loans. They will actually only be offering you $5k of grants and will simply be providing the means for you to receive the other $10k of the $15k that they list as FA.</p>
<p>Thus, you will have $8k in loans from the school as well as potentially $5k in loans to make up the gap between EFC and FA. In my mind this is a deceptive practice, even though most schools do it. If you are planning to use loans to cover part of your $30k EFC (and multiply for four years of undergraduate work) then you can see how quickly student debt can escalate.</p>