Perhaps a solution is to 'save’the difference between Vanderbilt and the higher cost school, set it aside in cash in a pillow (so to speak), never touch it, and to plan to use it for the Vanderbilt cost increases…
@moonpie, Great for you that your 3rd is accomplished and bright enough for those schools, but UGH that there’s another 4 years of undergrad tuition to go for you 
Here’s hoping you get great financial aid!
Off topic, but would you mind a private message from me about your D1’s med school search experience? Vandy D is a junior about to start the process, and I would love to hear the good and the bad about the process.
Is a financial aid package of 60,000 reasonable for an income of 110k, 120k?
2017-2018 COA is $64, 654. Are you asking whether being given $60,000 in grant aid is reasonable for an income of $110-120k?
How many in the family? How many in college at the same time? Private school fees for younger children? Large medical bills? Home equity?
There are too many variables beyond just income. Have you run the NPC on Vanderbilt’s website?
Sorry. That’s the COA for 2016-2017.
We have a very simple financial situation - no self employment income, no big non-retirement investments. D, who graduated 5 years ago, got phenomenal aid … which actually increased annually. When she was a senior, her brother was in college, and her aid increased significantly. Have aid policies changed over the last few years?
2017-2018 COA is $64, 654. Are you asking whether being given $60,000 in grant aid is reasonable for an income of $110-120k? (Yes, I was asking that question.)
How many in the family? 4
How many in college at the same time? first child to go
Private school fees for younger children? no
Large medical bills? no
Home equity? middle class ish 400k
There are too many variables beyond just income. Have you run the NPC on Vanderbilt’s website? yes
What did the NPC say @Dreamitdoit?
@Belle315 I am only expected to pay $5000. Im not sure if thats really accurate or not.
$5000 per year*
Ok, well, as I said there are many pieces to the puzzle.
I just ran the NPC with salary 110000 (combined), parents married, 400k in home equity. No medical bills, no private school tuition, no investments, and no earnings/savings/investments for the student. It showed about 42k in grant aid for the first year. That left about 24k plus a $2300 student contribution to be paid. Obviously there are differences between my hypothetical and your actual.
I will tell you that we have a bit higher income, BUT we have 8 in our family with 2 currently in college. We do have some medical bills and some (small) private tuition. We have nowhere near 400k in home equity, and otherwise a very simple financial picture. Our EFC is higher than 5000k.
I am guessing you have some other factors that are affecting the results that I don’t know about. Either that, or there is a mistake somewhere.
@Belle315 I am super confused about how it all works, and I’m worried that the price of the school yearly will be higher than the estimated price because Vandy is my dream university. About the house, maybe they factored in that we owe like 250k on the house.
Yes, I think your parents may have less home equity than you think.
Here’s what I can offer for encouragement. The NPC was accurate for us when we ran it while D was still a high school senior. In fact, we actually got even better aid than we expected for her first year. If you are putting in accurate information, you should be getting a pretty accurate NPC.
If you are still worried, I would suggest you make a call to the financial aid department and ask them if they will stand by the NPC results. We actually did this with a peer school to Vandy, and they said they would NOT honor the NPC. We met with them in person with tax returns, etc., and they ran the NPC themselves with our information, then told us they would NOT honor that EFC. Needless to say, they were instantly scratched off the list. I feel that Vandy will be more honorable.
My mom’s cpa said to not apply for financial aid at all, because we wouldn’t get any financial aid and it would give out too much information. I don’t know if the cpa is right?
Upthread you ran the NPC (as did Belle315) and it said you would be offered FA. I think your cpa probably doesn’t know much about college FA and is basing that statement on your income alone (having a sibling in college makes a big difference). Unless s/he is some kind of FA expert or there is new information since you posted earlier, I would stick with what the NPC says. I wouldn’t leave that kind of money on the table. As for too much information, well, if you want them to give you money you have to give them the information.
I totally agree with @ClaremontMom.
My best friend is a CPA, and she will admit that she knows nothing about how financial aid works, especially at schools like Vandy that meet full need and offer good aid even to those families with greater than average incomes.
LOTS of families give their information (including ours) year after year to be eligible for financial aid. I believe the risk of anything nefarious being done with that information is very, very low.