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<p>What living situations are assumed?</p>
<p>A CC in California estimates $12,300 for commuting from the parents’ house (with well padded room and board and misc. expenses that many parents do not consider when looking at college costs, probably because they are hidden in other parts of the household budget) and $19,302 living on one’s own: <a href=“https://www.deanza.edu/financialaid/coa.html”>https://www.deanza.edu/financialaid/coa.html</a> . Just tuition and books are $3,246.</p>
<p>A likely situation is that the $60,000 income family has a student graduate from high school and goes off to CC. The FAFSA EFC may be $4,000 to $8,000, but the family directly pays $3,246 in tuition and books, so it appears that they are paying less than FAFSA EFC. However, that does not include continued but hidden home costs associated with the student like food, utilities, transportation costs, and misc. costs (clothing, medical and dental services, etc.) that could raise the actual cost to be higher than FAFSA EFC (but lower than $18,000).</p>
<p>Note that the assumption that living at the parents’ house is “free” somewhat distorts the economic decisions relating to college attendance. Many parents are more than willing to let the student live at home for college (including use of a car or parents paying for bus passes) but would not offer that amount of money toward living expenses at a college away from home (they may not even know how much that is, due to it being scattered about various household budget categories, if they even track their household budget closely enough).</p>