<p>i heard that most colleges expect your family to contribute around 1/3 of their income toward your college tuition, but i don't know if that's pre-tax, post-tax, or even TRUE. i'd appreciate if anyone could clarify this...</p>
<p>also, does anyone know approx. where the maximum-income cutoff for need-based aid would be for a family with one child and both parents employed?</p>
<p>It does seem that informal polls on the board have resulted in "around" 1/5 to as much as 1/3 of after tax income being assessed as "available for college expenses.
Now some of this will be for room and board, ( which I assume is being paid anyway), some will be used for transportation costs ( an area where you can scrimp) and books along with other personal expenses ( nother place you can scrimp a lot).</p>
<p>You can get a better idea of your EFC by plugging numbers into web calculators like at <a href="http://www.finaid.com%5B/url%5D">www.finaid.com</a> if your tax situation isn't too complicated.</p>
<p>income is assessed at a higher rate than assets.
here are more links to get free info
<a href="http://www.nextstudent.com/tools_and_resources/top_tips.asp%5B/url%5D">http://www.nextstudent.com/tools_and_resources/top_tips.asp</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/before014.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/before014.htm</a></p>