What "hurts" & "helps" in CSS PROFILE - parental med school debt, parental retirement savings, etc?

Paying for College
1

My spouse is a physician and our family income is high (above $250K). Understandably, our EFC from the FAFSA is also high – unfortunately way too high than we can actually pay. Partly this is because we are still paying off considerable medical school debt. Spouse went to med school slightly later in life, and unless you’re independently loaded, med school loans were just our cost of doing business to having a fulfilling, well-paid career. I’m not complaining at all - we are so much better off than the vast majority of people, and I have no doubt that my kids will have quality college educations at many types of schools. We’re so lucky.

But I AM wondering if we will be hurt or helped when we fill out the CSS Profile for various schools where my D17 is applying. I know all colleges use their own mysterious institutional formulae with the CSS Profile and institutional grant aid, but can we expect that our considerable med school debt will influence what they think we can pay?

We have been aggressively saving for retirement (see: late to med school & therefore fewer years of earning). Does our retirement savings “count against us” in this process?

Thanks for helping to remove some of the mystery! :slight_smile:

2

Probably ‘hurt.’ Student loans are consumer debt, and most schools don’t consider it. Lots of people, not just doctors, started saving for retirement late. Too late. The amount you have contributed to retirement in prior years usually is not considered an asset (isn’t on fafsa), but the amount you currently contribute is added back into income .

You need to assume you will not get need based financial aid, and look for merit aid or an affordable school at full pay with an income of $250k.

3

Unfortunately, you’re not going to get aid. Your income is just too high. Plus, you probably have business deductions which will be added back in. Plus, if your H owns or partly owns his practice, that will have a value.

And, your annual contributions to retirement will get added back in. Does NOT matter that you started saving later in life.

Do you work? If not, then maybe you could bring in the money needed to help pay for DD’s college.

Debt doesn’t matter to colleges unless it was from a catastrophic illness.


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But I AM wondering if we will be hurt or helped when we fill out the CSS Profile for various schools where my D17 is applying.

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STOP right there. Unless you’re going to pay full price for those schools, do not let your DD apply to all of those schools. Maybe one or two “just to see”.

You’ll have to break the news to your child that need based aid schools aren’t affordable unless you decide to pay for them.

It’s much better to disappoint your child NOW, rather than wait until spring when she has acceptances to schools that you won’t pay for. THAT would be a disaster! She may whine and throw a fit now, but she’ll have every right to be furious if she learns in the spring that she has no affordable schools except maybe a safety that she’s not keen on attending.

How much can you pay each year? That will decide where your DD should apply. Tell your DD how much you will pay per year.

What are your DD’s stats?

Craft a school list based on what you can pay AND where your DD’s stats will get merit to fund the difference.

Make sure that she applies to at LEAST 3 schools that you know FOR SURE that all costs will be covered by your funds and ASSURED merit…and that she really likes those schools and they will accept her.

Example of determining an affordable school, if you can only pay $15k-20k per year, then your DD will need to apply to schools where she will FOR SURE get a full tuition scholarship so that your funds can pay for room, board, fees, and books.

4

Forgot to add…

The NPCs will not likely be accurate for you because of the business deductions, etc.


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Hi - I would love if folks could give me (and my D, a rising senior) any suggestions for schools that she may want to add to her list to consider. She’s low on “safety schools” too. Her are some details:

White “sporty & outdoorsy” MN girl, upper-middle class, liberal/progressive, non-religious, will need extensive merit aid as what we can pay (up to $25K or so) is well below our EFC. (We’ve run net price calculators on all the schools on her “maybe” list and they range wildly – who knows for merit aid??)

Stats from her tiny STEM charter school (doesn’t offer many APs and has no “honors”):
3.7 UW GPA (school doesn’t rank), ACT = 35, 3 APS (two 4’s and one 5), one UMN physics course, senior year full-time at local private university for dual-credit (calc-based physics, Calc 2 and 3, and other stuff)

ECs = captain of XC, nordic ski & track teams, HS robotics sub-team lead, plays french horn & sings (bands, choir, show choir), a couple years volunteering for local horse therapy nonprofit

Her preferences:
Prefers non-competitive “feel” of a school – we’ve heard negative things about a lot of east coast “blue blood” LACs
Prefers no to little Greek influence - she’s not a drinker or “partier”
Will probably major in natural or physical sciences (eg. physics or biology or ??)
Musical opportunities but not as a major
Prefers setting with “a shred of culture” – not nuts about tiny towns & won’'t have a car to get to “culture”
Smaller school preferred (ie. not huge university)
Nothing overly religious
Will probably run XC and track, depending on school/team/coach (has nice stats for her to fit into regional Division III conferences) - would love to ski nordic (sadly, only one on her list so far even has competitive nordic)
<<<

If you can pay $25k per year, and your DD has strong stats, then find schools where she’ll get nearly a full tuition scholarship. Looks like she needs at least a $30k-40k per year merit award.

5

PSAT score?

6

If your daughter is apply to start college in Fall 2017, you will be completing the 2017-2018 FAFSA and Profile (Profile if required by the schools). You will use 2015 tax return information, and that is the tax return you will be linking to your FAFSA.

Retirement: any amount you contribute to a tax deferred retirement account in 2015 will be added back in as incime for financial aid calculation purposes.

The balances in retirement accounts (TSA, IRS, etc) are not listed as assets on the FAFSA. But Profile does have a question that asks these balances. It is not like,y that they are used in the calculation.

If you have “retirement” money set aside in any accounts that are not real retirement accounts, they will be counted as assets.

Loans: the repayment of your college loans will not be a factor in determining need based finacial aid.

Husbands Med School Debt: this will have no impact on the calculations for need based aid…at all.

The calculation for need based aid is largely based on income…and then assets. A family income above $250,000 a year will not net need based aid at an college I can think of.

Your daughter has good stats, with a very strong ACT score. You will likely be full pay at all Division III schools…they don’t give athletic scholarships…at all.

7

Depending on where your daughter is applying you might consider appealing to have the parent educational loan debt considered. Many top schools will consider it. As the others have said though you need to be ready to tell DD no if the school is unaffordable. The comments about business deductions are real concerns but I did not see where you (OP) mentioned that there was a business involved.

All of that being said your daughter being a female with strong stats interested in STEM will receive plenty of merit money from any number of above average small to medium sized engineering schools. It might be worth calling a financial aid or admission office and doing the NPC with them. The merits that use stats can be tricky but the school will be able to tell you the difference between “mostly As” and “As and Bs” for example.

8

Natural sciences are not engineering…

9

Some CSS schools will consider the amount paid per year towards your student loans. I don’t think total debt counts, though.

10

Then apply only to schools that you can actually pay. Don’t fall in the trap of letting D apply to schools you clearly cannot afford-- I’ve read too many times in this forum how that turns out…

There are PLENTY of attractive schools which offer substantial merit aid.

FYI
http://www.kiplinger.com/tool/college/T014-S001-kiplinger-s-best-values-in-private-colleges/

11

You don’t have to study engineering at an engineering school. That is a misconception and the part of the reason they will give you merit money.

Yes, the allowance would be for total educational debt payments made during a year not usually for the amount of the outstanding debt.

12

Am I the only one here who doesn’t see the point of a 250k+ family filling out the CSS? What am I missing?

13

I don’t unless it’s required for some merit award (I had to fill it out when my D was a freshman but not after that).

14

I say…complete the forms. You never know what the future will bring. What will happen if your main breadwinner loses income? You would want the college to reconsider your award.

They would need to consider your prior income…and such to the new level.

The last thing you will want to do if you have a financial hardship is give info about your prior good income.

Plus…you just never know!

15

Thanks for everyone’s feedback. I will try to respond to some of your questions & comments:

Why do CSS Profile - because several of the colleges on D17’s current list (including some good academic & financial matches, according to their NPCs) require it.

We have no business deductions.

PSAT: 220 NMSC Index (1460 total score); hoping for NMSF status in our state (MN)

D has very little interest in an “engineering school” because she worries she’ll be more limited in strictly “applied sciences” and wonders what if she ends up wanting to do more basic science? Also, her older brother (D16) is in engineering school and she’s spent years with engineers and future-engineers at her school and on her HS robotics team. She does not like what she sees for her future as a female in that environment always.

D17 does not have her heart set on any of the schools, though she really likes several & can see herself there. We have been frank with her from the get-go about what we can pay & how that will affect final decisions. We have done NPCs on all the schools that are currently on her probable list, many of which estimate grant and merit aid with her stats.

Is the CSS Profile (at the several that require it from her list) likely to end up changing the grant & scholarship amounts that they’ve estimated in NPCs - lower or higher? So for example, Lawrence U’s NPC estimates “scholarships & grants” at $27,500. I have no way of knowing if that estimate is mostly merit-based – I’m assuming it is merit-based but could part of it be “grants” (need-based?), maybe because we’ll have two kids in college at that time (which I did put into NPCs)? Another example: College of Wooster estimates $28,450 in combined grant & merit aid – is that likely to be mostly merit or a combo, and if a combo, will our CSS end up lowering that (albeit estimated) figure once we file?

I appreciate all the help - thank you. :slight_smile:

16

Having two students in college at the same time WILL reduce your family contribution at schools,that guarantee to meet full need. Typically each Profile school would be 60% of what having on,y one in school would be. So if your son’s family contribution was $50,000 a year…for Tw kids…each would have a $30,000 contribution.

While both of your kids are in school you will have a lot of bills (we have been there!).

Once your son is out of college, would you be able to,divert his college money paid to your daughter?

17

Most of NPC’s I used told you what the ‘scholarships and grants’ were. Some schools call things grants, others scholarships, but often they have nothing to do with need. Ex., my daughter has ‘merit aid’ based on her scores and gpa, but also has two grants from the school, one based on having visited the school before applying and the other called an alum grant which was for ‘knowing’ and alum before applying.

See if you can figure out from the school’s webpages what the basis was for the ‘grants’. It might be very clear from a chart of gpa/score that she’ll get that amount if you make $50k or $250k.

18

@thumper1, once S16 is done, we’ll have one more year where D17 and S20 are in college at the same time - a total of 5 years with 2 in college at the same time. It’s after the girl graduates that will be super scary. We’re really (mostly jokingly) hoping D20 wants to be a naval engineer just like his older brother, who has a full-tuition scholarship at his tiny niche school. Sadly, we couldn’t get D17 to bite. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

19

with that PSAT score your DD is likely to qualify for National Merit Scholar Finalist status., as long as her SAT scores are inline.
time to start looking at THESE colleges/ U’s that offer merit $$ to NMSF’s:
http://nmfscholarships.yolasite.com/

I highly recommend she apply EARLY to U Southern Calif, which has a fabulous engineering program, Liberal Arts program and offers accepted NMF’s automatic 1/2 tuition scholarships.
the trick is- she needs to be accepted, and in order for her to do that- she needs to show the LOVE- which is easy to do as there is a LOT to love at USC these days!

20

@twoinanddone Very interesting! Would you mind sharing what your daughter’s school is (here or in private message)? I will take your advice to try to tease out the differences in their gift aid.

By the way, how great that she got extra $$ for having visited the school before applying since that’s clear “demonstration of interest,” but WOW - what a major advantage for people who can afford to travel to visit before applying! We’ve done several visits but nothing like the elaborate (and lengthy) road and/or air flight trips that I read about here on CC. Those are just not in our budget. What in the world do poor kids do?? Yikes.

Not to make you feel bad of course – just musing on how so much of this whole college game is set up to help students from families that already have the resources (financial, social, cultural, academic) resources to navigate this system.

Thanks again