The Fafsa is a breeze. The CSS is harder because it has so many questions. In some cases, the answers are not straight facts. Eg, the ‘next year’ income and expenses. Or, ‘market value’ of your home isn’t what neighbors sold for or your tax assessment.
But as said above, you’re collecting all this info anyway. You answer these questions, easy or not, it isn’t the person filling it out for you. So go ahead and enter your own detail on the forms.
Get a copy of the forms now. Google some of the sites that walk you through the CSS process.
I never worried about printing back-up because I knew I could pull it from filed records. The colleges are not out to get you. If you make a simple, honest mistake, they work with you. Eg, one year, we forgot D2 also had 1099 income and the college asked for the corrected forms, but the amount was too small for them to re-run aid calculations. Or, in some cases, they can go outside their usual rules, if you have (a limited variety) of special circumstances.
The FA rests a lot on your tax info, but doesn’t fully follow the IRS ways. Eg, certain deducations IRS allows are added back in for FA. But you go through the forms and answer as they request.
I hated doing all this. But pay someone else? Not. You can ask questions here.