<p>At what $$ income/asset point should one not even bother to apply for Fin.Aid? </p>
<p>Probably too general a question, but figured I'd toss it out there. Any ballpark estimates?</p>
<p>I'd say over 300k. But for some merit scholarships you need to file a fafsa anyway.</p>
<p>Would that be everything combined?</p>
<p>And does it include houses as assets?</p>
<p>(Don't worry, I won't depend on this site for final info! Just curious as to what people think.)</p>
<p>I can tell you what we decided..
We went ahead and filed the FAFSA since it was free. It is unlikely we will get aid, but a few colleges said they use it for Merit and it is also used for Stafford loans that are available to everyone.
For the CSS (which costs $) we only filed with colleges that replied that it was used for Merit aid (only a couple)</p>
<p>We knew we would not be eligible for financial aid. I think the cut off figure is over $100,000 but under $200,000, but maybe if you have 8 kids in college (four sets of twins?) it is worth applying if you make $200,000...</p>
<p>We did the same thing as lightmom. My D applied to 9 colleges. Two definitely give no merit aid, so we didn't send the FAFSA to them, but we went ahead and sent our FAFSA to the others, as long as it was free - one specifically said they wanted a FAFSA for merit aid and one implied that it wanted a FAFSA for merit aid. I was entertained that the FAFSA said our expected family contribution for my daughter's freshman year was $99,999 - more than tuition, room and board! Maybe they know something we don't know about how much money my daughter will spend next year on books, pizza, and bubble tea!?!?!</p>
<p>I submitted it early in the morning on Friday, Feb 1, and it just got officially processed today (Monday Feb 4). One of the colleges said it had a Feb 1 deadline for financial aid; hope we are okay, since we are not really using it for financial aid, just filing it because we think they want us to file it.</p>
<p>We only spent money to send the CSS profile to the three colleges that suggested they wanted the CSS profile in order to consider kids for merit aid.</p>
<p>It's certainly not just income but for the CSS, everything comes under consideration. Play around with the CSS EFC calculator to test hypotheticals (I'm not saying to juggle numbers on the form, just test to see the impact, just for interest's sake!). See how house value is involved. Kind of shocking when you live in a region where the house value is high (but have the smallest house in the neighborhood--our situation!). (I know, I know, we chose to live here. I've read those threads.) Savings have a very big impact, too. So I wouldn't look at a salary level as being an indicator.</p>
<p>We found that for certain merit scholarships--BU, actually--the FAFSA and CSS are required. It's spelled out on their site. Doesn't matter your EFC.</p>
<p>Sorry I can't remember where they are, but there are threads in this Fin Aid forum with this very topic, some with some pretty lengthy discussions about privacy and the like.</p>
<p>Are parents' retirement accounts taken into account in the calculations?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Are parents' retirement accounts taken into account in the calculations?
[/quote]
Not for FAFSA (as long as they are proper retirement account - 401ks, IRAs etc).</p>
<p>CSS I don't know.</p>
<p>What about businesses that employ less than 100 people?</p>
<p>I would say, unless your child has a huge trust fund then file the fafsa.
You need to have filed it for a PLUS loan or for Stafford loans for your kids. If for no other reason to keep options open.</p>
<p>FAFSA doesn't take into consideration your retirement or equity in your home.</p>
<p>pre-tax 401k contributions are added right back in to your available income on the fafsa.</p>
<p>$$ in a traditional or roth IRA are not</p>
<p>IMO that whole BU issue is ridiculous.....It takes hours, days to fill out these forms...Why you have to do that if you are not applying for financial aid is beyond me.......(now watch, my d will end up with that as her #1 school and we will have to pay full freight b/c my H was too busy/lazy to spend his little free time filling out the FAFSA form)....</p>
<p>Once you do your taxes then the FAFSA takes like 15 minutes.<br>
The Profile is another story. Had to do that one a few years ago but fortunately my kids haven't chosen schools since then that required it.</p>
<p>It must have been the profile that made him crazy......</p>