<p>How much error is allowed in the value of assets such as savings accounts, automobiles, real estate, etc? My parents are only giving me rough estimates, but I suspect they are rounding down whenever they can because they think it will get them more aid. I'm more worried that the information will later have to be verified, so I'd rather just be as accurate as possible right now (especially with that warning of a $20,000 fine and jail time for fraud). I've also been wondering, how exactly would they verify assets? I mean, something like the value of your home and mortgage payments may be easily verified, but what about savings accounts and stuff like that? What's stopping someone from just withdrawing all their money and keeping it on hand or something?</p>
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<p>Assets include CASH. </p>
<p>Your balances (account balances) are supposed to be reported ACCURATELY as of the day of filing of your FAFSA. </p>
<p>If your parents REALLY want their accounts to be “a little lower”…then they should pay their bills the day before you file the FAFSA.</p>
<p>BUT really, unless they are making THOUSANDS of dollars in “adjustments” to the asset numbers, it’s not going to make a huge difference in your EFC. Parent assets have an amount of asset protection (that varies). Above that asset protection, they are assessed at 5.6%. So for $10,000 in assets, the amount would be $560. Is that worth being dishonest about? I don’t think so.</p>
<p>^^Financial accounts fluxuate, housing values go up and down. Generally I pick a point in time and grit my teeth and put down a number. For real estate values, I e-mal a girlfriend that is a realtor and have her send me back an e-mail based on comps, print the e-mail and put it in my file each year, some people use an assessed value, others use their gut. For most other things I have a statement or I go-online and do a screen shot or download if I can and tuck those in the file. Checking/savings I do the FAFSA and now the Profile at the end of the month after the bills are paid…most parents ‘get’ what they need to put down that passes the “smell” test. When parents do taxes the taxes will capture interest, dividends, capital gains or loss and the deductions gather mortage interest, real estate taxes, medical etc. With some basic understanding of the dynamics someone in a finaid position can look numbers pulled from a tax form vs. information about assets, etc. and make an educated guess if things look copacetic. As an adult I find the “car” questions hilarious, but we drive ancient cars that have literally zero value except to us. It’s pretty easy to look up the blue book or retail value of a car. I would go with the position that you trust your parents and not fret. Our kids do their part which is pretty simple as they both file the EZ tax form to regain the taxes witheld on their part-time job earnings. I’m always impressed by kids that do the whole thing themselves so bravo to you.</p>
<p>If im gonna add corrections, is it ok if my fafsa numbers are different from my css profile since the fafsa is what they look at most? Its really just my savings and my parents’ savings that i think should be fixed.</p>
<p>^ lol shouldn’t have lied! but i have some differences too in the student checking savings account from FAFSA and css. i don’t think it raelly matters though. its only a $100 difference. i filed my css like 3 hrs after fafsa. i guess i could just say i paid my cell phone bill w/in that time frame :)</p>
<p>mom of 3, have you ever heard any guidance as to how long we need to keep the back up documents, i began this FAFSA thing in 2001 and would love to begin purging my files ;)</p>
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<p>No…you shouldn’t “lie” and I do hope you are kidding.</p>
<p>There might be some instances where your assets (bank accounts etc) might differ from your Profile to your FAFSA. For example, our kids both submitted priority deadline Profile forms which were due by November 1. FAFSA wasn’t done until January. Account balances are “of the day of filing”. Clearly, the amounts in our accounts in November were not identical to the date in January. </p>
<p>BUT our income information and anything else that was from the tax forms was IDENTICAL once we amended both the FAFSA and Profile at the beginning of February.</p>
<p>Somemom…I’m keeping all of my kids’ FAFSA and Profile information also. I’ve got “stuff” back to 2003. Since my graduate son is now repaying loans, I think I can probably ditch most of the FAFSA/Profile “stuff” and just keep the Direct Loan mailings. BUT that’s my opinion (and I haven’t shredded anything…yet).</p>