My accountant just scared me.

[dirty ethel rackham]

There is a company here that will fill out the FAFSA for you. We didn't use it bc our situation is straight forward but I know of others who did.

 

Maybe there is one in your area?

 

Why would you need to pay a company to do this? Filling out FAFSA is not that hard.  Gathering the data (like getting taxes done) would be the hard part, which is what you would need to do when paying a company to do it for you.  We even had to do the CSS profile last year and the form was the easy part.  Gathering the data (which no one else could do that for us unless I gave them passwords to all our accounts) was the hard part. 

 

[Wildcat]

She wants to go away from home for four years. Not *very* far away, but in her perfect scenario, she would be near, but off-campus at a large university, with roommates, cooking her own food, and able to keep her cat. Granted, there are not a lot of places where she can have *ALL* of those perks from day one, but, for example, colleges that require living on-campus for all four years are instantly eliminated from the maybe pile. It is a deal-breaker. So, in a hierarchy of best-to-worst, it would go like this for her:

1. Live off campus close to a large school, but not at home, all four years.

2. Live on-campus for required first year, then move off for the remaining three.

3. Live at home while commuting for up to two years; at least she could cook her own food and play with her cat.

4. Live on campus for all four years - she does not want this at all.

 

I do think it important that she has the experience she hopes for if possible, but I also have always believed that what we can afford is a significant factor. I would not lead my kids to imagine that we will come up with the money to finance any experience she desires, KWIM? I'm a big believer in the Reality Check.

 

I'm afraid my post made it sound like we let the kids pick a school and wrote a check when the reality was they picked a school and we decided if it fit our budget, then that was fine. We are of the mindset that college is what you make of it (for the most part), and we also didn't want to be burdened with lots of loans (us or the kids).

 

Your dd may find her priorities change once she gets to school. Ds went with the intent of living off campus after the first year and decided to stay on campus all four years due to the proximity to classes and a major lack of parking.

 

That's the long way of saying I would start with what your dd wants, look at scholarships and determine what you can afford/are able to pay, and if the FAFSA is needed, just do your best on it and not let your accountant scare you. His advice may have been best for his kid(s), but it may not be best for yours.

 

 

Then, that is what she should aim for if you can swing it financially. (Said by parent whose child chose to attend a small LAC with 50% coverage vs a small LAC where she would have had to pay for her books... It was her choice. And, I think she made the right one.) If it is going to put you into a financial struggle or taking out loans vs not, then you have a tougher choice. 

 

:iagree:

 

I thought (from something I read on this board?) that you could file a FAFSA in later years only if you had filed it for freshman year.

Also, circumstances change - Mark Kantowicz (sp?) at NYT says 1 in 6 high-school seniors have a parent lose his/her job that year. So, just because it seems like a freshman won't qualify for need-based aid ... well, things could change.

I also remember something about this. I wonder if it was particular schools, though? What concerns me now is what I read about needing the FAFSA for work study. Ds is hoping to do this, so I guess he'll need to check on that before he gets his hopes up, as we haven't filled out the FASFA. 

[Kareni]

I thought (from something I read on this board?) that you could file a FAFSA in later years only if you had filed it for freshman year.

Also, circumstances change - Mark Kantowicz (sp?) at NYT says 1 in 6 high-school seniors have a parent lose his/her job that year. So, just because it seems like a freshman won't qualify for need-based aid ... well, things could change.

 

My daughter's college did something like this.  They would offer financial aid to a student only if she filed the FAFSA and CSS Profile prior to her freshmen year.  If she did not, the college would not offer financial aid beginning in a subsequent year. 

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Lolly]

My daughter's college did something like this.  They would offer financial aid to a student only if she filed the FAFSA and CSS Profile prior to her freshmen year.  If she did not, the college would not offer financial aid beginning in a subsequent year. 

 

Regards,

Kareni

But, you are talking about financial aid through the school. I am fairly certain that the school cannot just refuse Pell Grants and federal loans unless there are academic requirements that are not being met. To say that fafsa cannot be filled out/utilized after the freshman year is not the same thing as not qualifying for aid through the school. They can make whatever regulations they want on those, pretty much.

[Kareni]

But, you are talking about financial aid through the school. I am fairly certain that the school cannot just refuse Pell Grants and federal loans unless there are academic requirements that are not being met. To say that fafsa cannot be filled out/utilized after the freshman year is not the same thing as not qualifying for aid through the school. They can make whatever regulations they want on those, pretty much.

 

That's a good point, Lolly.  I just checked the website of my daughter's alma mater, and I see that they now have an option to apply only for Federal Aid (in which case one need not submit the Profile).  I believe that this option did not exist when my daughter first applied there.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[unsinkable]

Why would you need to pay a company to do this? Filling out FAFSA is not that hard. Gathering the data (like getting taxes done) would be the hard part, which is what you would need to do when paying a company to do it for you. We even had to do the CSS profile last year and the form was the easy part. Gathering the data (which no one else could do that for us unless I gave them passwords to all our accounts) was the hard part.

 

I guess people who used them felt they were worthwhile.

 

It was just a suggestion bc Quill said her financial situation is complicated.

 

Everyone, please ignore my bonehead suggestion! I'm just some moron on the Internet!

[Catwoman]

I guess people who used them felt they were worthwhile.

 

It was just a suggestion bc Quill said her financial situation is complicated.

 

Everyone, please ignore my bonehead suggestion! I'm just some moron on the Internet!

I thought your suggestion made a lot of sense, given Quill's original post. :)

[unsinkable]

I thought your suggestion made a lot of sense, given Quill's original post. :)

Thanks.

 

I thought so, too bc Quill said she thought the FAFSA would be tricky bc of their complicated financial situation.

[Catwoman]

Thanks.

 

I thought so, too bc Quill said she thought the FAFSA would be tricky bc of their complicated financial situation.

Several of our clients have used those services, and these are educated, successful people, so that's why I thought it was a good suggestion for Quill, too.

 

My ds won't be applying to colleges for another few years, so I don't have any personal experience with filling out the forms.

[Guest]

I guess people who used them felt they were worthwhile.

 

It was just a suggestion bc Quill said her financial situation is complicated.

 

Everyone, please ignore my bonehead suggestion! I'm just some moron on the Internet!

Yeah, it actually crossed my mind to see if my accountant provides this service. He already does our taxes, can access our files, and most likely has a better grip on all the individual weirdnesses of our finances than I do. So, it's not inconceivable that I would do it!

 

I'm sure FAFSA is not very difficult, and most likely once I have done it, it will be easier in the future. But ATM, there are several unknowns. For instance, dh is a partner in BIL's company. We owns rentals. The income from the rentals goes to the company. Yet the properties we rent are (some of them) in our personal names. Others are in BIL's name. So, I don't know yet how, or if, some of these things will be listed.

[unsinkable]

Yeah, it actually crossed my mind to see if my accountant provides this service. He already does our taxes, can access our files, and most likely has a better grip on all the individual weirdnesses of our finances than I do. So, it's not inconceivable that I would do it!

 

I'm sure FAFSA is not very difficult, and most likely once I have done it, it will be easier in the future. But ATM, there are several unknowns. For instance, dh is a partner in BIL's company. We owns rentals. The income from the rentals goes to the company. Yet the properties we rent are (some of them) in our personal names. Others are in BIL's name. So, I don't know yet how, or if, some of these things will be listed.

It was easy for us and look less than an hour.

 

I can see how with different income streams and resources it might get complicated.

 

I certainly don't want you to waste any money on something you could handle on your own.

[maize]

My daughter's college did something like this. They would offer financial aid to a student only if she filed the FAFSA and CSS Profile prior to her freshmen year. If she did not, the college would not offer financial aid beginning in a subsequent year.

 

Regards,

Kareni

This is probably because the college is not need-blind in admissions and chooses who to send acceptance letters to every year based partly on what percentage of the entering class will need financial aid

If they admit some students with the understanding that they will not need to provide financial aid they do not want to have many of those come back the next year requesting aid. It seems unfair but the college has a need to make sure it remains financially solvent.

[Carol in Cal.]

My daughter just started her freshman year.

We were among those who did not qualify for aid, but she got scholarship offers all over the place.  Every single one was contingent on filling out a FAFSA, but not contingent on what was IN the FAFSA.  I don't know why this is, but it is true.  And the scholarships were committed before the FAFSA was due, but we had to finish the FAFSA by the end of Jan at the latest.

 

That was challenging for various reasons, and from now on I will be doing a much better job of staying ahead of our finances so that I can fill this out during Christmas break.

[creekland]

Several of our clients have used those services, and these are educated, successful people, so that's why I thought it was a good suggestion for Quill, too.

 

My ds won't be applying to colleges for another few years, so I don't have any personal experience with filling out the forms.

 

FWIW, these companies are generally considered scams and rank #1 on our school's list of things to avoid when looking at financial aid for college.  As was mentioned earlier, the tricky part is having to get all the info to put ON the form and the companies do not do this for a person.  They merely fill in the blanks.

 

I'm sure some do choose to use them - like any other scam - OR those who have enough $$ that they don't bother looking into it and are just wanting someone else to fill in the blanks for them.  If they were to look at it... they might be surprised at how little they are getting for their $$.

 

But perhaps that's just places around here.  Maybe elsewhere there are others that do things differently?

[unsinkable]

The place here was a financial services firm and college planning and FAFSA completion is one of the things they did.

 

I like said above...ignore my advice. I'm not trying to advocate a scam or have anyone waste money on a scam.

[creekland]

The place here was a financial services firm and college planning and FAFSA completion is one of the things they did.

 

I like said above...ignore my advice. I'm not trying to advocate a scam or have anyone waste money on a scam.

 

I'm not so sure your advice ought to be ignored to be honest.  I think it's good when a bit of info or things we've (collectively) seen is put into a thread, then others can share what they've heard, seen, or experienced too.

 

It's entirely possible that a financial services firm (overall) could be far more beneficial than some of the scam places that merely promise to fill out FAFSAs and/or "find scholarships" for a nice fee.  If the firm were to do taxes for someone, then use that info to fill out a FAFSA, this would be more likely and not the same thing as a scam (pending how much they charged for the "easy" part after doing taxes).

 

That said... I thought about linking our guidance office's warning about FAFSA/scholarship places, but I don't really need to make it that easy to figure out where I work.

 

Suffice it to offer the usual advice of checking out a service or place carefully before spending $$.  Some potentially could indeed be worth it, others not.

[unsinkable]

Here is some general advice like you mentioned, creekland:

 

https://studentaid.ed.gov/types/scams

 

Don’t Pay for the FAFSA®

 

Several websites offer help filing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) for a fee. These sites are not affiliated with or endorsed by the U.S. Department of Education. We urge you not to pay these sites for assistance that you can get for free elsewhere. The official FAFSA is at www.fafsa.gov, and you can get free help from

 

the financial aid office at your college or the college(s) you’re thinking about attending;

the FAFSA’s online help at www.fafsa.gov; and

the Federal Student Aid Information Center.

 

If you are asked for your credit card information while filling out the FAFSA online, you are not at the official government site. Remember, the FAFSA site address has .gov in it!

[unsinkable]

I also have an IRL friend who ALMOST used one of the scam sites accidentally. He thought he was on the .gov site but didnt really pay attention. Fortunately, he had realized it and didn't pay anything or have any bad outcomes.

 

In his defense, he was going through some serious health issues and was in a get 'er done mode and not noticing what site he was on.

[flyingiguana]

Here's the thing about the FAFSA -- it doesn't actually need to be exact to the penny if you are not expecting to get anything through it.

 

So if it's complicated to add up all your assets, I wouldn't worry too much about it.  This is a real difficulty, I found, if there is any real estate involved.  Who knows what it's worth at this exact moment?  And you certainly don't want to have it assessed for the FAFSA (talk about overkill).  Get kind of close to what you think it might be and don't worry about it.

 

For your income situation -- if you are filling out the 1040 (or some version of it), the FAFSA can go look up your info and put it in for you once you've filled out your taxes.  In fact, the school we're working with insists that we do this after taxes are filed (even if we filed the FAFSA first).  So there should really be nothing complicated about it.  You won't need your accountant.  Or his advice.

 

So, no, you don't want to tear up the FAFSA.  And it's really not all that complicated to fill out.  (Although, I am saying that after our nightmare 1040 this year.  For which we had no accountant.  Mostly because I didn't trust they would get it right.  It was that bad.)  If the college requires it for you to receive merit aid, then just go ahead and do it.

 

On the CC issue -- it varies.  Some very bright kids can get a lot out of CC.  If the CC is a good one.  If the student WANTS to ease in to college.  If there is a good transfer system from CC to the college the student wants to go to.  If the student has no clue at all what they want to do and if it MIGHT be a stem field but they just aren't sure yet  --I say this, because the student could go out and try stem classes at the CC without "wasting" credits on their 4 yr scholarship.  Or try out history classes in the same way.  Because they might run out of credits on the scholarship at a 4 yr school if they spend too much time trying things out.  And stem majors tend to burn up a lot of classes.  In sequences that take up 3-4 years.  Oftentimes, a student can ding around for a year or two and then be perfectly capable of majoring in history of English.  But doing that in stem is harder.

 

My guess is that for most colleges, transfer and freshman scholarships tend to be pretty similar.  (Although there may be particular colleges where this isn't the case).  I don't know where he's getting his info about transfer scholarships being better.  I've never heard that before.  Maybe he knows one kid who got a decent transfer scholarship and another kid who got nothing entering as a freshman?  Well, he's an accountant, not a statistician.

 

And yes, many schools require a FAFSA for any sort of aid at all -- govt funded or not. 

 

 

 

 

[flyingiguana]

Yeah, it actually crossed my mind to see if my accountant provides this service. He already does our taxes, can access our files, and most likely has a better grip on all the individual weirdnesses of our finances than I do. So, it's not inconceivable that I would do it!

 

I'm sure FAFSA is not very difficult, and most likely once I have done it, it will be easier in the future. But ATM, there are several unknowns. For instance, dh is a partner in BIL's company. We owns rentals. The income from the rentals goes to the company. Yet the properties we rent are (some of them) in our personal names. Others are in BIL's name. So, I don't know yet how, or if, some of these things will be listed.

 

Just to be clear -- if all this financial activity is already on your 1040, then everything you need from income streams will automatically transfer to the FAFSA if you authorize it.  This happens at the official govt FAFSA site and you don't need to pay to have it happen.

 

The only complicated part I found was in adding up assets.  And I don't think you have to be exact.   This is particularly true if you have a lot of assets.  Once you get over some cut off, I don't think they honestly care anyway.  If you are part owner in a company, I assume you just claim the percent of company assets that you own.

 

I made some kind of off the cuff estimate on real estate and left it at that.  If you want to get really nitpicky, you could maybe use zillow.

 

I already knew we weren't going to qualify for anything (by using that calculator thingy), so I tended to overestimate a little.  In case anyone did care, I could point out that I was erring on the right side, as far as the govt was concerned.  Or colleges that might be using the info for aid decisions.

[Gwen in VA]

All kinds of colleges require the FAFSA for all aid, not just financial.

 

Why do college that give need-blind merit aid do this?

 

1) All students who receive merit aid are eligible for work-study opportunities if and only if they fill out the FAFSA. Work-study opportunities are at least partially funded by the federal gov't. My kids attended on a full-tuition and a full-ride scholarship respectively, and they both did work-study -- for the work experience. For one of them it was more like an internship in her field of interest, not a job. Not all the benefits of a work-study are financial! But the Feds will not provide the funding for work-study if students don't fill out the FAFSA.

 

2) How is the college going to see how its merit aid affects the diversity of the student body if they don't have financial info on the recipients? I can definitely see the benefit to the college of knowing how its need-blind merit aid affects the diversity of the student body. (One student at my kids' college attended on a full-ride. Her parents had multiple summer homes and helicopter skiing was their sport of choice on their exotic winter vacations -- clearly the college was not influenced by the info on the FAFSA when making merit aid decisions!)

 

For us, the choice was easy. My kids could not have attended really any of the colleges they applied to without merit aid. We wanted them to go to a college more challenging than the community college. Filling out the FAFSA was necessary for getting merit aid. Therefore, we filled out the FAFSA.

 

What our numbers were didn't affect the merit aid. The mere act of filling out the FAFSA helped my kids get merit aid and so they were able to attend top colleges.

 

Is filling out the FAFSA a pain? Of course. But for us spending a few hours filling out a form so our kids might be eligible for merit aid that would allow them to attend a great college was well worth it.

 

 

[Catwoman]

FWIW, these companies are generally considered scams and rank #1 on our school's list of things to avoid when looking at financial aid for college.  As was mentioned earlier, the tricky part is having to get all the info to put ON the form and the companies do not do this for a person.  They merely fill in the blanks.

 

I'm sure some do choose to use them - like any other scam - OR those who have enough $$ that they don't bother looking into it and are just wanting someone else to fill in the blanks for them.  If they were to look at it... they might be surprised at how little they are getting for their $$.

 

But perhaps that's just places around here.  Maybe elsewhere there are others that do things differently?

You could be absolutely right about those places -- I know our clients seemed happy with them, but I don't know any of the details, or what other services they were providing. My big problem with a service like that would be having to give them so much personal financial information. It's bad enough that we will have to provide the info to colleges (when we won't qualify for financial aid anyway.)

[Bootsie]

 

On the CC issue -- it varies.  Some very bright kids can get a lot out of CC.  If the CC is a good one.  If the student WANTS to ease in to college.  If there is a good transfer system from CC to the college the student wants to go to.  If the student has no clue at all what they want to do and if it MIGHT be a stem field but they just aren't sure yet  --I say this, because the student could go out and try stem classes at the CC without "wasting" credits on their 4 yr scholarship.  Or try out history classes in the same way.  Because they might run out of credits on the scholarship at a 4 yr school if they spend too much time trying things out.  And stem majors tend to burn up a lot of classes.  In sequences that take up 3-4 years.  Oftentimes, a student can ding around for a year or two and then be perfectly capable of majoring in history of English.  But doing that in stem is harder.

 

 

 

If your attending a state university in some states, you must be careful about this.  In Texas, there is an "excess credit" rule.  If a student takes more than 30 credit hours beyond their degree plan, those additional hours are charged at out-of-state tuition rates.  So, I student would not be able to go college 50 hours at their community college and then receive 120 credits toward their degree at the university with in-state tuition.  The last 20 hours would be charged at out-of-state tuition rates.  

[flyingiguana]

If your attending a state university in some states, you must be careful about this.  In Texas, there is an "excess credit" rule.  If a student takes more than 30 credit hours beyond their degree plan, those additional hours are charged at out-of-state tuition rates.  So, I student would not be able to go college 50 hours at their community college and then receive 120 credits toward their degree at the university with in-state tuition.  The last 20 hours would be charged at out-of-state tuition rates.  

 

Wow.  That's a bit cheap.  I'd never heard of that in any of the states that I've lived in  ( And I've generally been pretty aware of the state school policies).

 

There continues to be a trend in the US toward making higher education unaffordable.  My guess is that the next couple generations are going to be regretting this in one way or another.

 

This has been happening at the same time as high schools have eliminated training in areas that wouldn't require a college degree -- automotive work etc.

 

And with all the talk about remedial classes that many colleges find it necessary to provide, I'm left wondering what high school is even FOR anymore.  On average.  Yes, there is a subset of kids who get a good education in high school, but there's a lot who don't.

 

[chiguirre]

If your attending a state university in some states, you must be careful about this.  In Texas, there is an "excess credit" rule.  If a student takes more than 30 credit hours beyond their degree plan, those additional hours are charged at out-of-state tuition rates.  So, I student would not be able to go college 50 hours at their community college and then receive 120 credits toward their degree at the university with in-state tuition.  The last 20 hours would be charged at out-of-state tuition rates.

Do you know if that applies if you want to do two bachelors degrees simultaneously and need the extra credits to fulfill the requirements for both?

[maize]

Do you know if that applies if you want to do two bachelors degrees simultaneously and need the extra credits to fulfill the requirements for both?

It may apply, check with the specific school. Sometimes there is a appeal process--I had to go through this in college because I had so many AP and IB credits that the school was going to charge me graduate tuition my senior year as I had surpassed the number of credit hours allowed to be eligible for undergraduate tuition. The appeal was easy, I just explained the circumstances and they waived the extra tuition.

[J-rap]

Sounds like you have a lot of good advice, and I agree that there isn't a right or wrong answer.

 

I'll just throw some things out there that I've learned.

 

Our financial situation is very complex too, although if you have a good accountant who is preparing your taxes (which is what we needed to do), then FAFSA is pretty straightforward.  I did it in about half an hour and panicked because it felt too easy!

 

Make sure CC credits fully transfer to other colleges/universities in your state.  One of my kids did about a year's worth of AP courses (and scored high on the tests) and a year's worth of CC credits and found that not a single private university in our state would accept more than half of them.  State colleges were the only answer.

 

Also, I disagree that living off-campus is more expensive than living on-campus.  My son did that in NYC and saved about half.  My daughter is doing it now and is probably only spending 25% what she'd be spending living on campus.  I know it has to do with the area, etc., and maybe we were lucky.

 

However, if your daughter does go to a 4-year college that's away from home, I'd still recommend she live on campus for at least one year or even a semester so that she can get to know other students.  She'll probably get to know other students who want to live off-campus the next year.

 

Two years of CC and two years of transferring somewhere is a great solution for some.  I can't believe how much money we saved for our one child going the CC to state college route.

 

That said, I think this child would have absolutely loved it at a big university or a private LAC.  Just didn't work out because of circumstances.  I wish it had.

 

I went to a CC for two years in California because at the time, they were free.  Maybe it was the time or the place, but I found it to be a poor atmosphere.  It was not a healthy environment for me.  However, I think times have changed.  Maybe it was just the late 70's in general...

 

Another daughter just began at a small LAC this month.  She got a great merit scholarship before we even filled out the FAFSA.  We were hoping the FAFSA would bring in even more money, but it didn't this year.  It did allow her to get an on-campus job, however.  We'll fill out the FAFSA again next year.

 

There are so many routes to a college degree these days, and all of them can work.  You can always shoot for the higher goals and then have a back-up plan.  Things will fall into place. 

[Lolly]

Agreeing with above poster. Many places, it is far cheaper to live off campus than in university housing. 

[flyingiguana]

In some places, it is far cheaper to eat off campus and skip the meal plan. Even if you eat out most meals.

 

This is the case for the college where my daughter is right now. She's living at home (even more savings), but when she starts to feel guilty about spending money to eat out when she's on campus, I just laugh. The meal plan is so expensive -- you could have prime rib every night instead. I remind her of what she's saving us by living at home and skipping that meal plan.

[LMV]

We lucked out and didn't need to do the FAFSA for our eldest daughter because she is receiving an athletic scholarship.

 

Our next daughter will technically be considered an independent student for FAFSA purposes. It feels more than a little fraudulent to allow her to complete the FAFSA that way so I have no idea what we will end up doing.  She very well may end up with a full athletic scholarship like her sister which would make things easier.

[Bootsie]

Wow.  That's a bit cheap.  I'd never heard of that in any of the states that I've lived in  ( And I've generally been pretty aware of the state school policies).

 

There continues to be a trend in the US toward making higher education unaffordable.  My guess is that the next couple generations are going to be regretting this in one way or another.

 

This has been happening at the same time as high schools have eliminated training in areas that wouldn't require a college degree -- automotive work etc.

 

And with all the talk about remedial classes that many colleges find it necessary to provide, I'm left wondering what high school is even FOR anymore.  On average.  Yes, there is a subset of kids who get a good education in high school, but there's a lot who don't.

 

 

The idea behind this is that state taxpayers should have to subsidize someone who is not actively pursuing a degree.  Most undergraduate degrees require the completion of 120 credit hours.  So, someone who has taken 150 hours and does not yet have a degree has accumulated 25% more hours than required for a degree.  In Texas, remedial coursework, dual-credit courses that met high school graduation requirements, courses at private schools, and courses out of state do not count toward this 30 hour excess rule.  I am not sure what rules apply to double majors who are simultaneously pursuing two degrees.  Students can petition for exceptions to be made.

 

Many students who hit the thirty hour excess credit rule have either dropped many courses (enrollment is considered if the student was in the course at "census date" several weeks into the semester because at that point state funding is determined) or they are retaking classes to improve their GPA.

[horsellian]

Our next daughter will technically be considered an independent student for FAFSA purposes. It feels more than a little fraudulent to allow her to complete the FAFSA that way so I have no idea what we will end up doing.

 

If she's an independent student within the rules, then she's an independent student, and I'd fill it in on that basis - it's not fraud if you're following the rules.

 

(The system in the UK is a bit different, but as I got married before I finished university, I was then considered an independent student, and my parents' income wasn't considered for my course fees & student loan, which made a big difference to me.)

[Guest]

Sounds like you have a lot of good advice, and I agree that there isn't a right or wrong answer.

 

I'll just throw some things out there that I've learned.

 

Our financial situation is very complex too, although if you have a good accountant who is preparing your taxes (which is what we needed to do), then FAFSA is pretty straightforward. I did it in about half an hour and panicked because it felt too easy!

 

Make sure CC credits fully transfer to other colleges/universities in your state. One of my kids did about a year's worth of AP courses (and scored high on the tests) and a year's worth of CC credits and found that not a single private university in our state would accept more than half of them. State colleges were the only answer.

 

Also, I disagree that living off-campus is more expensive than living on-campus. My son did that in NYC and saved about half. My daughter is doing it now and is probably only spending 25% what she'd be spending living on campus. I know it has to do with the area, etc., and maybe we were lucky.

 

However, if your daughter does go to a 4-year college that's away from home, I'd still recommend she live on campus for at least one year or even a semester so that she can get to know other students. She'll probably get to know other students who want to live off-campus the next year.

 

Two years of CC and two years of transferring somewhere is a great solution for some. I can't believe how much money we saved for our one child going the CC to state college route.

 

That said, I think this child would have absolutely loved it at a big university or a private LAC. Just didn't work out because of circumstances. I wish it had.

 

I went to a CC for two years in California because at the time, they were free. Maybe it was the time or the place, but I found it to be a poor atmosphere. It was not a healthy environment for me. However, I think times have changed. Maybe it was just the late 70's in general...

 

Another daughter just began at a small LAC this month. She got a great merit scholarship before we even filled out the FAFSA. We were hoping the FAFSA would bring in even more money, but it didn't this year. It did allow her to get an on-campus job, however. We'll fill out the FAFSA again next year.

 

There are so many routes to a college degree these days, and all of them can work. You can always shoot for the higher goals and then have a back-up plan. Things will fall into place.

Thank you for your thorough post. I agree with so much of what you say here. I do think living off-campus is most often less expensive, at least for most of the areas where she is looking. Most of her colleges require on-campus at minimum one year. Originally, I wasn't pleased, but I do think it helps a student get involved and make friends if they are on-campus for at least a year.

[LMV]

If she's an independent student within the rules, then she's an independent student, and I'd fill it in on that basis - it's not fraud if you're following the rules.

 

(The system in the UK is a bit different, but as I got married before I finished university, I was then considered an independent student, and my parents' income wasn't considered for my course fees & student loan, which made a big difference to me.)

 

When I said it felt fraudulent I meant in an ethical and, or, moral sense.  By definition, she will be considered an independent student because we didn't finalize her adoption until the summer she was thirteen so she was in foster care after her thirteenth birthday.  Thus if she fills out the FAFSA as an independent student it would  clearly not be fraudulent in any legal sense.  It would also not give the clearest and most honest picture of the financial resources available to her.  Most independent students are not provided with fully funded college funds by their parents. It very well may end up a moot point because she may end up with a full athletic scholarship. 

[rebbyribs]

1) dd has said before she thinks all her honors, NHS, etc. would have been essentially a waste if she was "just" going to CC. Out of her close friends, she is the only one taking math, fourth-year language, and AP lit this year, because she wants to have the healthy resume. (Wait - I lie. There is one girl she hangs with who is on an ambitious college track.) she just told me "so-and-so dropped math, science and an AP, because she expects to get a sports scholarship."

 

 

I don't know anything about college financial aid, but the above is an example of the sunk-costs fallacy.  Your daughter's honors classes, NHS etc. are opening up more opportunities for her.  But going forward, she'll need to choose the best option for her future, regardless of whether it was something she would've been able to do if she'd slacked off more this year.