<p>My daughter has several US savings bonds (series EE) with numbers on the face that sum to $1,450. Two questions:</p>
<p>1) should they be included in the student's assets on the fafsa?</p>
<p>2) if so, how would we valuate them? I am not sure when they mature.</p>
<p>Yes they have to be reported as student assets on FAFSA. There is a website where you can enter the numbers and find out the current valuues. I will see if I can find it.</p>
<p>Here you go
Calculate</a> the Value of Your Paper Savings Bond(s)</p>
<p>You can save the valuation & then just pull it up & have it update each year. My D is saving her bonds for law school, so we just update with new values each year. I think there's a break on taxes if you use them for education, so make sure you check that out - you wouldn't want to wait until after the kid graduates & then have her stuck with a huge tax bill (that she probably never considered before she spent the proceeds!).</p>
<p>Unfortunately the tax break is only applicable to parents using the E bonds for education. It the student was under 24 when they were issued in their name then no tax break. Which is a really stupid and illogical rule in my opinion!</p>
<p>OOOh, that stinks! I hadn't looked into it because I just heard about it - no reason to bother now.</p>
<p>Makes you wonder what they are thinking when they make these rules. It would seem to me to be very logical to encourage people to buy bonds for their kids that could be used for education tax free.</p>
<p>I wonder if a way round it would be to cash them and put them into a student owned 529 account. For an undergrad that would be reported as a parent asset. And withdrawals would be tax free as long as they are for qualified expenses. I don't know if that would work but it seems like it might (any tax experts out there?).</p>
<p>See how they're titled. They might be titled Parent or Child, or Parent and Child. And the SS# on the bond might be the parent, or the child, or the purchaser.</p>
<p>In our experience, when we've cashed some of these in previously, they were titled Parent or Child. We were given the option when we cashed them in whose SS# to use on the paperwork for redeeming. If the tax break is only available to the parent, and if you have that option, it might make sense to cash them in the parent's name.</p>
<p>kelsmom and swimcatsmom, both of you seem to have pretty good handles on financial aid, and I can't recall if either of you does this in a professional capacity. If so, if you could weigh in on the thread here, <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/music-major/673438-can-stafford-loan-used-towards-buying-musical-instrument.html%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/music-major/673438-can-stafford-loan-used-towards-buying-musical-instrument.html</a> your input would be valuable.</p>
<p>Sorry for the hijack.</p>
<p>Thanks.</p>
<p>Done. BTW, yes, I am in the business.</p>
<p>Thank you.</p>
<p>Kelsmom-thx for your response to other my thread. Different issue here. Just remembered that my son has probably 10 EE $50 savings bonds given to him between probably 1995 and 2005. Completely forgot about them when it came to FAFSA. What do I do now?! If we don't get need-based aid for the coming year, can I just report it next year?</p>
<p>Just go to fafsa.ed.gov & go to box 3 (correct a submitted FAFSA, I think, is the option). Update student assets to reflect that investment. It won't make much difference, to be honest - but you'll feel good about being honest! :)</p>
<p>NOTE: ANY time you update, make sure both student & parent sign with a PIN - otherwise, you mess things up.</p>
<p>Thanks Kelsmom!</p>
<p>thanks for the great input. Does anyone know whether these bonds mature and can only be taken out at maturity? I have not plugged in the numbers yet on that website.</p>
<p>You can redeem them with some penalties if they have been held for less than 5 years and with no penalties if they have been held for more than 5 years.</p>
<p>Individual</a> - EE/E Savings Bonds</p>
<p>1.3% interest rate - sheesh - probably won't have too much in taxes to worry about anyway.</p>
<p>i kno i have some savings bonds given to me 17 years ago[when i was born] so im sure theyve matured by now. theres about 3800 dollars worth and i didnt kno we had to enter it on fafsa so ill go back and correct it but wont that raise my EFC. my efc now is 7800 so that 3800 would rly come in handy, i dont want to take a loan out but its not ethical to withhold that info. will it effect my efc?</p>
<p>bumppppppp</p>
<p>First check the values of them. Some take a long time to mature so they may not have reached face value yet.</p>
<p>Yes they will probably increase your EFC. If they are in the student name then 20% of their value would go to the EFC. If they are in the parent's name and are over the protected asset allowance then they would add about 5.6% of the value to the EFC.</p>
<p>thxx i have one more question. i used a website posted earlier to see if my savings bonds have matured and some of them have but most did not so will fafsa take that into consideration?</p>