Whatever he declares as his housing stipend will have to be listed as an untaxed benefit for FAFSA.
"Affordable and generous"is not in the language of our California schools.
We did have student athletes transfer to Montana, South Dakota and Canadian schools for generous aid packages.
But you are richer because of the housing benefit - because you are less poor since your parents don’t have to pay for that themselves (nor do they apparently have to pay income tax on the value of it).
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Also, my dad has a living allowance that makes this affordable. However, I don’t imagine that many people in our income-bracket own a home this expensive.
I do not know how large the housing allowance is (small I imagine). That income comes from my dad’s employer (church).
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Well, you do need to find that out, and it would get listed under “untaxed income”. Even if it’s only $500 a month, and that would be lowish for a pastor, then that would $6000 added to untaxed income.
You have a 197 PSAT. Likely with some practice, you could raise that for the junior year PSAT.
@DrGoogle – UC Merced DID offer a guaranteed transfer option a couple of years ago to students who were, at the time of admission, close to the admission cuts for the other UC campuses mentioned. I believe it was only for in-state students – the only reason I mentioned it here was that the low take-up rate was, to me, an indication that students who went to Merced were generally pleased with it. It is the only UC that takes WUE students. However, I still don’t know how the UC FA packaging works for lower income students under WUE. It might still be too expensive.
I did assume your dad may be a pastor when you mentioned self employed.
I do think you will want to keep away from debt as much as possible. If you do raise your PSAT to NM status, you most likely will have some more affordable options.
Sorry I didn’t spell out that UA was Univ of Alabama. Some sometimes think about Arizona with the designation. If you have lurked on CC long enough, you would uncover how the OOS merit scholarships and the growth in facilities and faculty in STEM has made UA very popular with cost-consciousness while seeking an OOS school option. Here is a good explanation of how this has come to be:
http://admissions.ucmerced.edu/wue
Merced with WUE is still $40k - well above the $16k the OP can afford per year.
CSU Monterey is a pretty compelling value at $18k with WUE - a part time job will certainly fill that gap.
https://csumb.edu/admissions/western-undergraduate-exchange
Take a look at Oregon Tech and Western Washington and UNR. They are in a similar price range and worth a look.
Thanks again guys! I will definitely take a look at these schools and share the discoveries with my folks. 