Kalypso Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 I know it has been posted before about how detailed the questions are, but I am frustrated after working on it this morning. What bothers me the most is that I have to hand over all this personal information without having an acceptance letter in hand. Something is not right about this system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luckymama Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 Oh wow, dd's only Profile school has already accepted her. That would tick me off too! Today I have to do an estimate of our taxes and an estimated FAFSA. I haven't even looked at the Profile yet :eek: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beth S Posted January 22, 2013 Share Posted January 22, 2013 Yes, we did the CSS for Vandy. Our motivation was that their policy is to meet the financial NEED of every admitted student. So . . . they want to determine that you really have a financial NEED. In talking with a friend (whose dd also applied), we felt like we had been FRISKED by the police. I just used the CSS "comments" space to explain the situations that were unusual. Glad ds decided against Vandy, so I only have the FAFSA to complete this year! Feeling your pain! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kareni Posted January 23, 2013 Share Posted January 23, 2013 Yes, we've had the (ahem) pleasure of filling out the Profile four times. Fun, fun .... Regards, Kareni Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hoggirl Posted January 26, 2013 Share Posted January 26, 2013 Is this required at some schools whether you have need or not? We wil not qualify for any need-based aid, but do some schools require it in order to receive merit-based aid? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beth S Posted January 26, 2013 Share Posted January 26, 2013 Just check with the colleges your student is applying to, to see if they require the CSS in addition to the FAFSA. My understanding is that some of the more selective colleges require it. Every school I've come in contact with requires you to fill out the FAFSA, as the first step for receiving merit-based aid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockala Posted January 26, 2013 Share Posted January 26, 2013 Of the eight school dd applied to- only one requires the CSS - Clark in Worcester. And they want both required by Feb 1st. Its a busy week here :) Kathy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kalypso Posted January 28, 2013 Author Share Posted January 28, 2013 I finally made myself finish yesterday. Now I only hope my estimates are good. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ms. Riding Hood Posted January 30, 2013 Share Posted January 30, 2013 I'm just logging on for the first time in forever and looking around the old stompin' grounds I saw this. I've done the PROFILE for the last four years, including the nightmarish business/farm supplement in triplicate, because we have a complicated setup here. This year am dancing with JOY that I've only got the FAFSA! I feel your pain. Best wishes to you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gwen in VA Posted January 31, 2013 Share Posted January 31, 2013 FWIW, my kids had to fill out the Profile for freshman year. Their merit aid required that they fill out the FAFSA every year, but thankfully they only had to fill out the Profile once each. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kathy in Richmond Posted January 31, 2013 Share Posted January 31, 2013 Ugh...you guys had to remind me. Year 8 of CSS Profile joy here. At least it's the last! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kareni Posted January 31, 2013 Share Posted January 31, 2013 Year 8 of CSS Profile joy here. At least it's the last! Yay! Regards, Kareni Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jackie in NE Posted January 31, 2013 Share Posted January 31, 2013 Clearly I am in the minority here, but I completed the CSS Profile for the first time this week, and as a former banker/commercial credit person, I really appreciated the intelligence of their questions. We have a complex financial profile. As ranchers, we are asset-rich, and cash poor. But when some of those big numbers move around and touch the front page of the tax return, it can muddy the financial picture. I also appreciated the intelligence of the software. I thought it was very user-friendly, and excellent at pointing out potential input errors. I much prefer the profile to the FAFSA. Just one geek's 2 cents. :tongue_smilie: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted January 31, 2013 Share Posted January 31, 2013 Clearly I am in the minority here, but I completed the CSS Profile for the first time this week, and as a former banker/commercial credit person, I really appreciated the intelligence of their questions. We have a complex financial profile. As ranchers, we are asset-rich, and cash poor. But when some of those big numbers move around and touch the front page of the tax return, it can muddy the financial picture. I also appreciated the intelligence of the software. I thought it was very user-friendly, and excellent at pointing out potential input errors. I much prefer the profile to the FAFSA. Just one geek's 2 cents. :tongue_smilie: That's good to know. An aquaintance of ours has a farm and wanted to send his son to a very expensive private school. They got no financial aid at all, despite being very poor other than the farm. Unfortunately, the farm made them look very rich on the fafsa form. As he put it. "It is a farm. It isn't as though I can use it for tuition." It sounds as though if the school had used the CSS Profile, they would have been eligible for the aid they needed. Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TravelingChris Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 No actually Profile is a lot worse than Fafsa for asset rich, cash poor, normally. It really depends. I don't remember exactly since I last did one three years ago but I think the Profile did not give an estimated family contribution like the Fafsa. It just compiled your information for the school to use. The profile exists so that the schools can see parts of the financial picture that fafsa doesn't show. LIke Fafsa doesn't look at home value. Profile does. If your home value is high, the colleges expect you to take out home equity loan and use that to pay the school. Now for people like us, not much if any house equity, no business or one that makes little, just plain income from jobs and normal mutual funds and savings, the Profile proabably won't do any good or harm. I know when my son was applying to schools that wanted Profile versus FAFSA they were very close in figuring out EFC but I think the one school that just used Profile actually figured that we could pay less than the schools that used both. That is because that school saw that the home we owned and rented was not making us any money, just costing us money. (We were renting out our home while we were stationed overseas- we weren't in the regular business of rentals and we were charging less rent than our mortgage because that was the most we could get but we ended up doing well because when we were coming back and knew we weren't being stationed where we lived before, we sold the house and made a bit of a profit.)/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jackie in NE Posted February 1, 2013 Share Posted February 1, 2013 No actually Profile is a lot worse than Fafsa for asset rich, cash poor, normally. It really depends. I don't remember exactly since I last did one three years ago but I think the Profile did not give an estimated family contribution like the Fafsa. It just compiled your information for the school to use. The profile exists so that the schools can see parts of the financial picture that fafsa doesn't show. LIke Fafsa doesn't look at home value. Profile does. If your home value is high, the colleges expect you to take out home equity loan and use that to pay the school. Now for people like us, not much if any house equity, no business or one that makes little, just plain income from jobs and normal mutual funds and savings, the Profile proabably won't do any good or harm. I know when my son was applying to schools that wanted Profile versus FAFSA they were very close in figuring out EFC but I think the one school that just used Profile actually figured that we could pay less than the schools that used both. That is because that school saw that the home we owned and rented was not making us any money, just costing us money. (We were renting out our home while we were stationed overseas- we weren't in the regular business of rentals and we were charging less rent than our mortgage because that was the most we could get but we ended up doing well because when we were coming back and knew we weren't being stationed where we lived before, we sold the house and made a bit of a profit.)/ Well, I guess we'll see how this turns out. It will be interesting. On the profile, my "home market value" was "0", because we live on our ranch, and the home has no value apart from the ranch. The value of the home (very nominal) is included in the value of the ranch real estate. We had a ranch-related capital gain last year, which was then plowed directly back into the ranch. On the profile, there was a lot of room to explain this one-time occurrence. Not so on the FAFSA. (At least I didn't see a place to do that.) Consequently, the EFC is huge. There is no cash lying around. There are no liquid investments. No retirement. Just cows walking around eating expensive hay and grazing on expensive real estate. Maybe I should send them pictures of our 1918 home (very basic), and my 1998 ranch pick-up! My plan at this point is to contact each school individually and explain the capital gain, and the true financial picture. It is what it is. We answered everything honestly. We will find a way to send dd to the school that we think is best for her. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ms. Riding Hood Posted March 5, 2013 Share Posted March 5, 2013 Just coming back to this thread, and I wanted to add that our family is a farm/ranch family as well. It's a very complex financial set-up, involving several LLC's...ugh, I get a chill just thinking of that PROFILE Farm Supplement again. But the point I wanted to make is this: ds's financial aid initially came back to us as nothing (pretty much). We were shocked. We appealed. I spoke to the fin. aid counselor assigned to us so many times. My dh spoke with her. Finally, in desperation, we were somehow (?) able to speak to the director of fin. aid at the school. He talked with my husband at great length, and still kept coming back to the same line..."but we just cannot do anything for you." My dh was pulling his hair out and in a random fit of pleading he began babbling about how he was looking out his window at the cornfield....and the fin. aid director said, "WAIT. What did you just say?" Uhhh, "I'm looking at the cornfield." F.A.: "Do you mean to say you LIVE on the FARM?" Dh: "Uh...yes. I am a farmer. I live on the farm." The F.A. said, "You will receive an email from me shortly reflecting this information." Literally, within five minutes we got an email and ds had a full scholarship. FULL. It was the craziest thing in the world. Keep in mind that this was after *clearly* answering the question on the PROFILE, FAFSA, Supplement...everywhere they asked "DO YOU LIVE ON THE FARM?" we always answered a resounding "YES!!" We'll never know how they missed that info, how we spoke to them soooo many times without results and then...Boom! Long story short, be persistent if you think you should be qualifying for money! Explain, explain, explain! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FaithManor Posted March 7, 2013 Share Posted March 7, 2013 Ms. Riding Hood, I am so glad it worked out for you! Let me say that my feelings concerning the CSS profile are bleak. I consider it to be a financial colonoscopy performed without the benefit of sedation or anesthesia. As far as I'm concerned, the colleges that require it, should be providing free rum to every parent prior to the deadline. When I first encountered the form over forms, the classical musician in me thought that the music that best illustrated my mood concerning it was either "Funeral March of the Marionettes" or "March to the Scaffold from Symphony Fantastique". The 5th Movement - "The Financial Aid Department Tango", oops I mean, "The Witches Dance" - is the postlude to the wretched work of completing the thing. Faith Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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