Hello, I’m currently freaking out because I was reading about some tax stuff today (completely incidentally) and I came across tax information regarding requirements for filing. For a dependent, if you make more than 6k in earned income, you are required to file. It’s a bit more if you are not a dependent.
That’s the rub. It got me a little anxious, so I went ahead and I called my parents. I was under the impression that they did not use me as a dependent in 2015, but I was wrong. So, since combining my money I made from scholarships I received that went over education expenses, as well as the money I made at a job I worked at in high school, I might have been over the amount that would necessitate filing. I’m not 100% sure, but it’s possible.
There’s the problem. FAFSA requires you to file any required taxes to receive financial aid. And I’ve already received financial aid for the past two years based upon 2015. My parents reported their income and filed, and I reported my income, at least, but it didn’t include any scholarship stuff because the fafsa form only asked for anything reported to the IRS (and I didn’t report anything because I’m dumb).
I was actually asked for verification last year, too, and it went fine. I was asked for my parent’s tax transcripts, as well as a nonfiler form for myself, and everything went through okay. But I’m still freaking out. If I was supposed to file, I shouldn’t have received aid, right? But I did. And I’m a full ride, full pell student, as well. My family is freakin broke. But I still had to file taxes… and I didn’t… and now I’m not sure what to do and I’m terrified that if I report anything, FAFSA will make me pay back everything I received in the past two years, I’ll lose my scholarship, and all of my credits will be revoked. So I’m not sure what to do. Does anyone have experience with this?
Back when you filed that FAFSA…what was your total family income? Any chance it was under $29,999? And someone in your family qualified for free reduced lunch…or your parents could file a 1040A or 1040EZ?
If you parent income was below $29,999 and you qualified for free reduced lunch or another means tested benefit…or your mom filed a 1040A or 1040EZ tax form…I believe you would have an auto $0 EFC…and I don’t think your income would have been reported.
Well, my EFC was something like $500 the last two years, so I don’t think that’s correct and I don’t think it applies.
I guess I need to know what to do if I, in fact, did need to file taxes in 2015 and didn’t. Will my financial aid be revoked from the past two years? What about my university aid? I’m freaking out right now because there’s a possibility that I did need to pay taxes and I don’t know what I should do here.
@thumper1 I think for auto zero, parent income has to be under $25,000.
When you filed your FAFSA for 2016/17 and 2017/18 what was your earned income you reported for 2015? Did you use box 1 of your W2 (gross federal wages)?
Did you have any work study income in 2015 or 2016?
What was the total of scholarships and grants, what was the total of tuition, fees and books for 2016, 2017?
You probably didn’t have any (taxable) scholarships and grants yet in 2015 if you started college in 2016.
For your job in 2015 was there federal tax withheld? It is listed on W2.
But @mommdc makes a good point. If you didn’t start college until fall 2016…then for both 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 FAFSA forms, you would be reporting income from 2015…when you were NOT in college yet…so would have had zero dollars in scholarships to report on your taxes at all…right?
Now…did you file the 2016 tax return? Because you will need that for 2018-2019 FAFSA…and in that…if you started college in fall 2016, you would have one semester worth of scholarship money to report IF that exceeds the amount for QEE.
I did have taxable scholarships in 2015 because I had half a semester of room and board. But some of the money after tuition and fees also went to books and supplies that I needed for class, although I didn’t itemize those. I suppose I could estimate that after adding non-tuition and fee related expenses and my income for that period, I would have made under $6000, but is estimation enough?
I did use the box 1 of my W2 and it was around 2500. I didn’t report any financial aid because I didn’t file taxes and I didn’t know I had to include financial aid in income, I only included my earned income from work.
In 2016 I earned around $600 in work study, but it was a part of my 2016 taxes and thus only on my most recent fafsa
I also said that I was not going to file and they did a verification on me, in which I gave a nonfiling form. So they know I didn’t file.
I know, and the aid for 2016/2017 and 2017/2018 was based on 2015 income, and those years are the years I’m asking about. I didn’t file in 2015 and I might have had to do. What do I do? What’s going to happen to me? Do they have any experience with this?
If you started college in Fall 2015, you would have had a FULL semester of room and board scholarship money, the fall 2015 semester…what was that amount? It’s half of the year total.
That 1/2 YEAR worth of room/board scholarship was “income” for the 2015 tax year whichnwas used for 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 FAFSA forms.
I received around 11200 in scholarships/grants/aid excluding loans. My tuition was around 5400, including education-relevant fees. I don’t know how much I spent on books… I know I spent a lot my first semester, but I don’t remember how much. But I don’t think it’d lower my amount of taxable enough to matter.
Ok you cannot estimate income for FAFSA or tax return.
For 2016/17 FAFSA and 2017/18 FAFSA, since your 2015 earned income was under $6,310, your FAFSA EFC should not be affected.
Had you filed taxes and reported taxable scholarships for 2015 on your tax return, then the FAFSA would have subtracted any taxable scholarships reported on tax return as part of AGI from income. So your earned income is all they would have counted anyway.
Now if you had W2 income and taxable scholarships of over $6,300 in 2015 then you should have filed a tax return.
You will have to add up all scholarships and grants received in 2015 and subtract tuition fees and books to arrive at the taxable amount.
For 2016 you do the same for the tax return. Report W 2 income and taxable scholarships.
For 2018/19 FAFSA you report 2016 AGI but then report income from need based employment (work study) where it asks for it and report taxable scholarships that were included in AGI where it asks for it.
“Now if you had W2 income and taxable scholarships of over $6,300 in 2015 then you should have filed a tax return.”
I had both. And I included my W2 income on the FAFSA. And combined, it might have been over 6300. So if I should have filed a tax return, what do I do now? And what’s going to happen to me?
For 2016 I reported both and filed taxes. I knew what to do this time around, I’d made more income from work, and I wasn’t a dependent. But I didn’t file in 2015 and I probably should have, so what do I do now and I’m I completely screwed? If I 100% did need to file, and I did not, and I didn’t know this until now, what do I do, two years later?
I earned $2507 at my job. None of the income from my job was work study. None of the money I’ve mentioned is work study, I excluded that from my calculations since I didn’t earn any work study in 2015 despite being offered (but I didn’t include the offered amount either)