Hi,
my parents are in their 70s and have retired for over 10 years. I’m a US citizen but my parents aren’t and we live abroad.
In the country we live, my parents are required to file taxes, and haven’t done so in over 10 years.
On paper, it seems that they have a lot of assets but most of them are their retirement funds. I attend a private school that costs almost 2k because I’m not eligible for the public school system in my country.
I’ve tried using net price calculators but it says I’m only eligible for about $1000 of aid. What can I do? My parents are unwilling to pay too much for my college tuition!
Go to uni in HK. Are they your biological parents? You are about 17, right? I am one of the older parents around and I am nowhere near my 70’s.
Is this for fall 2015 or 2016? What are your SAT, ACT, GPA stats? You are 17 and your mom is 50-60 years older than you?!? Are these retirement funds in specified retirement accounts or not? What is your FAFSA EFC?
Are your parent assets all in actual retirement accounts? Things like tax sheltered annuities and IRS’s? Do those exist in their country. If so, the balances in those accounts are not considered assets. But the distributions they take are a form of income.
Do your parents own real estate in addition to your primary residence?
If your family does have their retirement money in regular savings, yes…it is counted as an asset for FAFSA purposes At 5.6% of its value…not the whole thing.
Your parents would have to have very significant savings to account for all but $1000 in college costs.
At 5.6%…about 25% of that asset would be expected per FAFSA to be contributed to your college costs for all four years, and that doesn’t include any interest the accounts would earn.
The net price calculators are not particularly accurate for students living abroad…just aren’t.
What colleges are you targeting? And when do you graduate from HS?
By the way…if a school asks for your parent tax return, and they were required to file bu didn’t…I’m not sure that is going to help you. I know they live abroad and would have a foreign tax return, but a school requesting their return is going to exoect to see it.
Ok…added info. I just read all of your past posts. In one, you say you are attending one of the best public high schools in your country. And go on to say you have been accepted to private. Why the change if you were already enrolled in that terrific public high school? You have posted about vacations in this country and expensive summer programs.
How are these things being funded?
^With the money the parents should have paid in taxes for the past 10 years?
@thumper1 I had a medical condition to prevented me from going to school. They wouldn’t let me go back to school because I skipped too many days so I had to switch to the private school I am in right now
I’m mainly targeting at schools in the Southern California area, since most of my family are there and I’m not really a big fan of snow and rain
I currently have a 3.68 (unweighted), SAT 1880 ACT 30. Applying for Fall 2016
As for summer programs and vacations, my grandparents also live in the US so they pay for my ticket so I can visit them in the summer and I get some financial aid for the one summer program I attended.
In where I live, if you earn under a certain amount of money each year, you aren’t required to file taxes at all, so that’s why my parents have not filed taxes in 10 years
Is there any way that your parents can document that they are exempt from filing? That may help if questioned.
What to do? The obvious answer is to go where your parents can afford. That is the situation you are in. But you made it sound like your parents were illegally not filing taxes. If they are exempt, then you can fill out a Non Filer Statement, I believe there is one on the College Board site. Or you can make your own declaration, the schools will tell you what they want. As far as retirement money, in the US, you have to count all your assets except ones in retirement accounts 401K and pension plans. In your financial statement, you would put an addendum to describe exactly what the savings and investments are and what kind of accounts.
Wait, so your parents are in their 70s and your grandparents are in California? They must be close to 100!
Is there any reason why you want to go to college in the USA?
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Wait, so your parents are in their 70s and your grandparents are in California? They must be close to 100!
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lol…and if parents are in their 70s, then they had this student in their 50s.
My dad is in his 70s and my mom is in her mid 50s
Ok. That’s different from your first post that your parents are in their 70s. You also changed your mind on their taxes - required to file, but then not required. Why not provide accurate information in the first place?
You are not going to like any of this post…but here goes.
In my opinion, is highly unlikely you will garner merit aid from a U.S. university that will cover most of your costs to attend. Merit aid is for the tippy top applicants at most universities here…think top 2% of accepted students. Your stats are fine…a tad above the national average…but they are not the stats usually associated with very large merit awards?
So, clarify please…is your mid-50’s mom also retired? Any chance she could get a job to help support your college costs?
Regarding your parents tax filing status…and the $1000 net costs you are getting when doing the net price calculators…something isn’t right here. You say that incomes below a certain amount are exempt from filing in your country. But a $1000 net cost implies either extrememly significant income OR very extremely significant assets.
And anyway…for financial aid purposes HERE, you will still need to list the income and assets on your FAFSA and Profile forms, and document it. This includes retirement income in almost all cases. It’s still income.