<p>First of all, do they significantly raise it? Say, if they're 10% less than of yearly income? Also, do student savings affect the EFC more than parent savings? Is there actually a site that shows the fafsa formula?</p>
<p>There is no site that shows the FAFSA formula (as far as I know) but you can go to fafsa4caster.gov (it’s on the fafsa.ed.gov home page, lower left hand side of the sidebar) and plug in numbers, change them, crunch it around. This also saves your data until you are actually applying for financial aid.</p>
<p>Students assets have a larger impact $ for $. Students have no asset protection and 20% of their assets go to the EFC.</p>
<p>Parents have some asset protection based on the number of parents and the age of the older parent (no relationship to income). Any assets over the protected amounts @ 5.6% goes to the EFC.</p>
<p>Formula is here. </p>
<p>[IFAP</a> - EFC Formula Guide](<a href=“http://www.ifap.ed.gov/efcformulaguide/111408EFCFormulaGuide0910.html]IFAP”>http://www.ifap.ed.gov/efcformulaguide/111408EFCFormulaGuide0910.html)</p>
<p>Asset protection table is on page 19.</p>
<p>Student savings are assessed at the rate of 20% per year for FAFSA. There is no asset protection allowance for student assets.</p>
<p>Parent savings and any student-owned 529 accounts are assessed at the rate of 5.6% for FAFSA. There is an asset protection allowance for parent savings, the formula for which takes into account the age of the older parent. It’s generally between 35,000 and 50,000. This means the asset protection allowance is subtracted from the total parent asset number, and the remainder is multiplied by 5.6% to get the parent contribution from assets.</p>
<p>(cross-posted w/swimcatsmom)</p>