Folks, there’s no hard and fast cutoff number like food stamps. If the household income is $500k, financial aid will not be forthcoming in almost every case. Then again, there could be a circumstance in which such a family WOULD get FA—let’s say the earned income was $100k and unearned income was $400k due to an early distribution from a 401k that was used to pay medical bills and to rebuild the house after super-storm Sandy and the school is Yale. See where I’m going? In that case, Yale would likely use professional judgment to ignore the $400k. That’s why the answer is IT DEPENDS.