<p>Fortunately, I was admitted EA to Chicago, and I really love the school and would be very happy there. I therefore have cut my list of RD schools down to basically only reaches.</p>
<p>Apparently my family answered a question incorrectly on the CSS Profile, which led Chicago to say that we are "ineligible" for financial aid. But we called them, and they are fixing the error; however, we won't be getting a fixed financial aid estimate until April.</p>
<p>Basically, my family makes ~25K/year. My dad is part of a real-estate business, which makes things complicated, but he seriously earns no income from it (the 25K is my mom's income). I know that Chicago's financial aid isn't too great, but I need a full ride in order to go to any school. How much can I expect from Chicago? What about the Odyssey scholarship? Should I apply for outside scholarships? I had trouble finding information on their website...</p>
<p>Should I add more schools to my list of RD schools, like maybe a financial safety or some matches with good financial aid? Though I can't imagine going to a safety knowing that I was admitted to Chicago... :/</p>
<p>You’re not going to get a full ride anywhere. Even if Chicago expects your parents to contribute nothing, you still have to do work-study and use some portion of summer savings (about $2k/year) for personal expenses.</p>
<p>If your parents make $25k/year and there’s nothing else you’re not telling us, then I would say just based on that info alone that you’ll get close to full aid. I have a friend whose parents made $30k/year with another sibling in college, and she only had to pay about $2k/year for room and board plus her personal expenses. The rest was covered, and she didn’t have to pay any tuition. But I don’t know how Chicago uses the fact that your father is a part of a real-estate business…</p>
<p>I, unfortunately, do know something about how Chicago (and anywhere comparable, but Chicago is especially tough) will look at a real estate company.</p>
<p>The problem with real estate partnerships is that it’s incredibly difficult to tell what’s really going on, especially if all you have is a tax return. Historically, there are many, many real estate partnerships that never showed a profit at all, but that generated plenty of cash for their partners. Sometimes the profits would show up later, through appreciation. Sometimes the profits would never show up but the partners kept the cash. So colleges (and anyone else who cared) got really gimlet-eyed when real estate people claimed that the weren’t making any money on their projects. Um, where did that Benz come from? I will note that Chicago’s Board of Trustees and donor committees are chock full of famous real estate tycoons who know how that game is played.</p>
<p>Now, in the current unbelievably crappy real estate environment, it is completely believable that there are real estate businesspeople out there who really, truly aren’t making any money. Chicago will recognize that. Chicago will also recognize that, if that’s the case, it won’t go on for very long, because the people will have to get jobs that actually pay them, even if it’s only greeting shoppers at Walmart. And before Chicago accepts that your dad is in the really-no-money category, it will want reams of information about his company, and probably lots of questions answered.</p>
<p>So . . . it’s perfectly possible that there will be a good outcome here for you, but it isn’t likely to be quick or easy. Nothing like correcting one error on the application.</p>
<p>My dad was actually considering getting his name off the business completely, because he really wants nothing to do with it anymore. Too bad that never happened. I will advise him to do so.</p>
I will advise him to do so.</p>