How accurate do you find the net price calculators to be? Especially is there is a non custodial parent?
If there is a non-custodial parent, that means the parents are divorced or something like that. The NPC will not be accurate.
ETA…some NPCs ask marital status. Maybe those are a little more accurate.
I will say,…for schools using the Profile and require the non-custodial parent form, I would be Leary of the results anyway.
It will be accurate for a FAFSA only school.
Also, apparently if your income is primarily 1099 or if you are a small business owner, the results for Profile schools may be misleading. Some Profile schools ask you to fill out a business supplement which is a bit of a PITA but I came to realize that at least those schools are looking at my real numbers instead of just assuming that I’m hiding assets somewhere inside the company.
I believe that, like non-custodial parent issues, FAFSA only schools will be accurate for business owners (at least in my brother’s experience with putting five children and step-children through FAFSA only colleges).
The thought is…net proce calculators are not as accurate if your parents are divorced, parents are self employed, parents own a business, family owns real estate other than their primary residence…and for international students.
Way off. NEU net price calculator had us at EFC of $10,000/year. NEU gave S a $15,000 scholarship and still asked us to pay $23,000/year. So it was off by $28,000/year( $23,000 + $15,000 - $10,000 = $28,000). I am thinking about asking NEU for my application fee and CSS profile money back.
Do you only have regular W-2 income? Parents not divorced? Don’t own a business? Don’t own real estate other than your primary residence? Not self employed?
With a non-custodial parent:
a. If the school uses FAFSA only or otherwise does not use the non-custodial parent, you can use the NPC with just the custodial parent finances.
b. If the school uses non-custodial parent information (which is nearly all schools using CSS Profile and/or which give good financial aid), you can try the NPC with both parents’ finances. However, some have said that they are not all that accurate even then (though it may depend on how detailed the questions the NPC asks about each parent). Income from small business, self employment, or real estate can make many of them less accurate.
Some poorly designed NPCs ask very few questions and may not be that accurate anyway. Examples are those where income is just given as a selection of ranges like $30,000-39,999, $40,000-49,999, etc…
I don’t get your math, @Mysonsdad. Does NEU promise to meet eed? If it doesnt, your EFC could be $10k, but you were gapped after your $15000 scholarship (merit, need based?) NEU just didn’t fill your gap with grants or scholarships.
I really found the NPCs I used very accurate. Single parent, two kids in college, W2 income and simple assets only. The calculator are usually for the current year or the past year, so tuition prices werent right but sometimes the merit awards are higher too it was easy enough to put the correct tuition in.
This detail always seems to get glossed over – or more often just omitted completely – in these forums.
Maybe this can be the thread where we all agree to start incorporating this important factor into the standard advice that gets doled out on the topic.
Is it true that $75K is the line in the sand between getting significant financial assistance and not getting hardly anything? Seems like that is the big cut off I see I net cost estimations on different websites.
What do you mean about $75,000 being the line in the sand? Need based financial,aid is awarded by colleges and each college has its own policies. Some schools award very generous need based aid for families with incomes of $100,000 a year or more.
Others give precious little need based aid beyond what you might be entitled to per your FAFSA EFC.
Ymmv depending on the college.
Thanks will just wait for financial award letters and talk to the financial aid office if or when I have specific questions.
For the schools we have heard from so far the calculator has been right within a few hundred dollars but we have standard w2 income nothing exciting going on.
@Baylorpoly no there is nothing special about above or below $75K income. The highly competitive 100% need met schools that cost close to $70K give need based aid up to close to $200K in income and perhaps higher if there are multiple kids in college. Other schools give no need based aid even if your EFC from the FAFSA is 0. The only thing that differed between schools was how much money they expected students to earn over the summer and/or work study during school.
We also got a financial aid award offer from Northeastern. The offer was about $3000 more expensive than the NPC said it would be. I don’t consider it way off but other schools look like they will be cheaper according to their NPCs.
Short answer: No.
Here’s a list of ~60 colleges that claim to meet 100% of demonstrated need:
http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2015/09/14/colleges-that-report-meeting-full-financial-need
Trinity College (Hartford, CT) is one of the ~60.
Here is a break-down of mean need-based aid, by family income, for Trinity families that received need-based aid:
http://www.trincoll.edu/AboutTrinity/offices/InstitutionalResearchPlanning/Documents/financialAid.pdf
Mean n-b aid is over $25K even for families making $150K and up.
Of course, other factors beside income also matter.
It would appear that typically, families making $75K or less can count on ~$50K+ to $60K+ in need-based aid from a so-called full-need school. It may make sense to think of $75K (or a little more) as a lower boundary for the upper middle income “donut hole” (the income range that may not be low enough for adequate n-b aid, yet isn’t rich enough to make cost a non-issue, when comparing private schools to in-state public alternatives.) However, if it’s any kind of “line in the sand”, it’s not very clear or fixed.
I noticed big differences between the college board net price calculators vs the college websites calculators. The college board calculators give a much lower estimate than the individual colleges websites. Has anybody else experienced the same?
The colleges themselves may have merit or other awards that can get added in. For example, my daughter’s school gives a grant for visiting the school before accepting. The CB calculator wouldn’t know that, so can’t put it on the reward page. The CB calculator can only give the basics.
Some colleges use the College Board net price calculator template with their own customizations.
The college’s financial aid web site should point to a net price calculator either on its own web site or at a third party that it contracts with (like the College Board). A few colleges with poorly maintained web sites may have links both to an internal one and an external one, where one or the other is an old one that has been superceded. In the latter case, it may take some digging to figure out which is the correct one.