<p>Does anyone have any tips for using the online calculators for divorced parents? This would be for private colleges. Is it safe to add both gross incomes and calculate? How are the calculations for the 2nd parent's household figured into this?</p>
<p>I'm not sure about this, but for the Profile, I believe the income and assets of both the custodial parents (and spouse if there is one) and non-custodial parent (and spouse if there is one) are treated as income and assets in total with no differentiation because the parents are divorced, and this includes home equity for both, I believe. That is why, if you do not want to report non-custodial parent income and assets when you are filing for finaid you should consider FAFSA only schools. The FAFSA uses only custodial parent (and spouse) information, and does not use home equity.</p>
<p>Add the income and assets for all parents/step parents together and you will be in the ballpark.</p>
<p>I don't think so -- I think that will give worst case scenario, but I don't think most colleges would simply add up all the income and treat it as if there was one household. They won't reveal their formulas, and the online calculator is pretty useless as a predictor when there is noncustodial parent income involved.</p>
<p>But if I run a fictional scenario, 1 parent age 50, 1 kid, $50K income - on finaid.org using institutional methodology, I get a $5000 parental contribution -- if I turn that into 2 parents, 1 kid, $100K income, each parent earning $50K - and run the figures -- the parental contribution become $18.7K --- which makes very little sense. If the family was together, shared household, then $100K would mean a lot and that would be a reasonable EFC -- but 2 separate households, then that makes no sense.</p>
<p>I think its more logical to run the figures separately on the calculators -- that is run a calculation for the custodial household, the run the noncustodial household separately as if it were custodial -- and then add the 2 parent contributions together (being careful not to double count the student contribution). </p>
<p>I think that way would account for the separate households and probably come out closer to the way the colleges are considering it.</p>
<p>Maybe if both households are near equal, but my experience is somewhat worse.</p>
<p>Somehow the above posts make things look far more grim than I experienced. Although the above EFC would be higher with any assets brought into the equation. </p>
<p>I was really depressed about the 'non-custodial parent' in my case making far more than me and impacting the financial aid offered. The schools we received Fin aid packages from had his income information from the non custodial parent form. I don't know his exact income. But in the end, it turned out not to matter, as the offers we received were based on the FAFSA from my form alone as the custodial parent. The financial aid person at my daughter's school said they base offers on the FAFSA, despite other information. Some schools also wanted to know whether we had a divorce agreement on paying for college. These were non Profile schools. Which brings me to the question, what do they do with that non custodial parent information? Regardless, I'm greatful, and feel this has been the one place in this whole divorced life scenario where being a single parent has been advantageous. Now it still isn't cheap, but I was relieved to know I can still scrape along. </p>
<p>Now should any married parents be jealous, with your higher combined incomes, feel free to compare lifestyles!</p>