<p>I am currently a freshman in college. I guess I should be fairly excited about that. I got into the top school of my choice and I'm doing fairly well there. However, I am not paying for school in the way I planned to.</p>
<p>Both my parents are part-time teachers and my dad will probably be forced to retire soon. The FAFSA, however, do to my parent's retirement savings, seems to think my parents, who make less than $80,000 a year combined, can pay for my $52,000 a year college expenses. In my panic to attend school, I managed to get a full-ride Army ROTC scholarship, but I have found that serving the Army for eight years after I graduate is the last thing I want to do. I really don't want the military to be in control of my life for the next twelve years, not to mention the way they run ROTC does a pretty good job of screwing over anyone who attends a school that has above community college level studies. </p>
<p>Most scholarships ask for your FAFSA results and there are not as many scholarships for undergraduates versus incoming freshman. I've been looking for scholarships since I got home for winterbreak, but I have found very few I can apply to, let alone hope to win.</p>
<p>Any advice on what I should do to help my situation?</p>
<p>the amount in your parents retirement accounts is not part of the FAFSA calculation. They DO count the amount of tax deferred money you put into retirement accounts (401K or regular IRA) as income in the year you put it there. But it your parents are sitting on a large retirement nest egg (and it’s in a retirement account, not a regular mutual fund or other savings account), then those funds not considered as assets.</p>
<p>If your parents’ retirement savings are in RETIREMENT accounts…the balances in those accounts are NOT considered in the FAFSA calculation. If your parents have their retirement “money” in regular savings, CDs or something of that kind…that was not good planning with regard to financial aid for college. Those would be considered liquid assets but even so, only 5.6% of those accounts would be considered in the calculations available for college bills.</p>
<p>If your parents are claiming retirement accounts as assets, they are not filling out the FAFSA properly. The instructions specifically state that retirement accounts are NOT included. If their savings is not in retirement accounts, they do have to claim them … because those are not retirement funds. They are savings. If that’s where they have put retirement money, then yes … the FAFSA will hate you. My advice in that case is to find a state school that is affordable without aid other than loans.</p>