I’m pretty sure you’re wrong about being about to create two separate Profiles, but I couldn’t easily find the reference. Yes the Profile can be submitted at different times, just like you can go in and add a college later to receive the FAFSA, but you’re just adding a recipient, not creating a whole new form. Just let this be a heads up to anyone in this situation. Rules are always changing too.
That is exactly what we did but I was not convinced that the college wouldn’t see or use the guardian financial info since it’s such an unusual situation. That particular school did not remotely meet need, and yes, I know it doesn’t have to, it’s not a full needs school, etc., etc., but neither are the two FAFSA-only colleges that did in fact (unexpectedly) meet full need and without overloading on loans. (Sample of three, I’m not trying to “prove” anything here, just share our experience)
The unfortunate (depending on your point of view) part about filing FAFSA as independent is the higher loan max. We did not want the student to incur over $20,000 in loans during the four years. The Profile school’s award included $9500 in loans for freshman year alone and still left a gap of over $11,000. While the FAFSA-only colleges also offered higher loan amounts, with work study and summer earnings, the student could get by with just the subsidized loans and possibly not even take the full amount.
I don’t know where people are getting their information, but we just went through this process and I have a FinAid award in hand with Federal Direct Unsubsidized Loan amount of $6,000 for freshman year.