Even if the EFC was $107k for your family, so $53k for each student, do you think you’d get a lot of need based FA?
If you really don’t want to pay full price for college, your kids need to target schools that give merit aid to kids like them (scores, gpa). It a choice many many families have to make every year. However, it is FINE. There are many good colleges that give a lot in merit aid.
Yeah. Believe it or not, there are actually a lot of people in your same boat. Because of significant savings outside of retirement funds, we had an EFC for one child at $138k. At that point, we just had to decide if a school that will cost us $300,000 is “worth it”. In S19’s case, we decided that it is. But that was after a lot of hand wringing and feet stomping that we’d have to pay that much. We looked at that money as a way for my H to retire by a certain age. Just fyi, at many elite private schools, 50% or more of families are full pay. You aren’t alone in trying to decide if you want to spend your savings on this.
We will be looking at the possibility of spending full freight for D21 as well.
I don’t even know why you are filling in FAFSA. I think the premise is dubious.
“If you have $1 mil and your cost basis is 0… etc etc etc” Really LOL?
@Sybylla People don’t know if they’ll be getting aid until they start looking at NPCs or file FAFSA. I’ll be the first to say that we didn’t know for sure that we wouldn’t get any need based money until I ran a few NPCs during S19’s junior year. I didn’t know how it worked. I didn’t know that having a lot of savings means the government expects us to spend it on college. How would we know that? I don’t blame the OP for not knowing. Now, he probably should not be surprised this late in the game though.
And there’s a lot of denial that happens when one sees a high EFC…even when a family has the money. It’s a large chunk of change and it’s a gut check on if the family really wants to spend that much on school. Colleges LOVE to say the “average price” that students pay and families hear that number a LOT during admissions meetings when touring schools. Every time we visited a school, someone in financial aid would proudly say “don’t be scared off by the ticket price - the average cost is more like $28k per student”. This was at schools like Davidson and Colby. So, either you believe that and think that might apply to you (they make it sound like it applies to everyone so it’s easy to believe it!!) or you’ve already run the NPC and you are grumpy that you are going to be paying $72k when the “average” is $28k.
Bottom line is that I don’t blame the OP. The messages parents hear are that hardly anyone pays full price. It’s only when you do the analysis that you realize you will.
FAFSA is required for all merit aid.
What’s funny here?
We never filed FAFSA or CSS so we did not have any experience. From few of our friends who were in more or less similar situation, NPC was not accurate and BTW they did get discounts from Ivy league schools after their kids were admitted.
I expected total per family EFC for both twins would be less than $100K.
FAFSA is not required for all merit aid at all colleges. Certainly, it may be required for merit aid at SOME colleges.
Most people don’t have $1 million (or $1.9 million) in stocks with a cost basis of zero. Even if it was an inheritance, your basis would not be zero. It’s a silly premise because it’s not very likely to have any basis in reality.
FAFSA just uses a formula that calculates a percent of income and a percent of countable assets, so the skies the limit on what it can end up being, but it’s really only used for need based Pell grants (sub 6K EFC) and qualifying for Stafford loans. I would assume if you’re looking at Ivies that they would all use CSS profile for the most part for figuring institutional aid.
But really with your income and assets I can’t see you not being full pay.
What colleges?
One of my kids had to file the FAFSA and Profile in order for merit aid to be disbursed…but NOT for it to be awarded.
My other kid had to do the forms because need was a component of SOME merit awards.
Are you positive these forms are required for merit? There are only a handful of schools with this requirement.
In terms of your EFC, on income of $350,000 a year alone, your EFC would have been more than $100,000 total for the two kids. Add in the $2 million in assets and you have an additional $100,000 plus added to your EFC.
You have been asking questions about finances for at least a year. Did you ever run a net price calculator?
We did not complete the FASFA and D was awarded merit aid at a number of schools.
Very few schools require FAFSA for merit. I would call the schools on the list to confirm. I did call the four schools on S19’s list that gave merit and none required FAFSA to be considered for merit.
There are no discounts at the Ivies for families with the OP’s situation. If he knows families who got need based aid at an Ivy then they do not have the same financial situation. Just run the NPCs on their websites. You’ll see.
Is OP an adult?
They did not have your financial picture.
And anyway…don’t count other people’s money…or even believe all they tell you. We had very good friends who insisted their kid got a sizable merit scholarship from a college that does not ever give merit aid. We just smiled and nodded.
ETA…are you divorced? Do you own a business or are you self employed? Do you own real estate in addition to your primary residence? If NO to all three, run some net price calculators…got GA Tech, Hopkins, MIT…and see what they give you for a net cost.
This is extremely common. People love to claim that their child got something extra, even when it’s a flat out lie. There are also some parents who will call work study offers and loan eligibility “merit” aid.
Yeah, it’s quite possible your friends aren’t being completely honest about the “discount”. And do you really know they have nearly 2 million in countable assets? Just because they’re in your same social circle and act wealthy doesn’t mean they are.
Here is your thread from a year ago…with a LOT of the same advice. Run the net price calculators. For each million in assets $56,000 will be added to your family contribution.
So in this past year, did you ever run a net price calculator for the schools your twins will be applying to? Again…if you are not divorced, don’t own a business, are not self employed, and don’t own real estate in addition to your primary residence, the Net Price calculators will give you a decent estimate of your net costs.
Try them.
But more important…what IS the annual budget per twin for college. They need to know that. If you can only give them $25,000 a year towards college, they need to know that…now.
Seems to me that it’s not a matter of having the money to pay for a full priced private school. It would just be the willingness to part with the money.
You will not receive financial aid and will have to decide what you are comfortable spending. Run the NPCs.