What families qualify for financial aid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I guess everything is relative. $3000 is not a small mortgage to me. at all. Retirement contributions also seem like a luxury.

I really don't think you should be sending your children to private school if you cannot make any contributions to your retirement. I don't think there's a financial planner out there who would say this is a good idea.

But see - that's the thing. It's a choice. My financial planner says on my HHI of $670K a year (gross) I should be saving over $200K towards retirement. So what do I cut? Do I not send DCs 1 and 2 to private school and save it? The thing is, if I choose to send them anyway, I recognize that is a choice I have made (and do make - sorry financial planner). I don't expect somebody to give me financial aid because I can run numbers to show how tight we have it because of our $6+K a month mortgage and our $1K a week nanny and the $200K a year our advisor says we should be saving. I understand those are choices I have made.

I think if you have an HHI much above $100K a year you really should be ineligible for aid absent some kind of severe medical expenses or something. This is what most colleges do, and I say this as a person who was able to get only $1,800 of aid her first year in college (at a very expensive top tier school) because at that point there were 3 of us in college! I was ineligible for any kind of aid, with a household income of $60K a year, after that!

[Anonymous]

Gotta love DC---where 130K is "working poor" and 250K gives you a bare bones lifestyle with no vacations and "old cars" (per 2 previous posters).
Seriously, this place is unreal at times.

[Anonymous]

Schools that can afford it give financial aid to middle class families because they want those families at the schools. Imagine if Top 3 were filled with only the super-rich and the very poor. They need kids in between.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gotta love DC---where 130K is "working poor" and 250K gives you a bare bones lifestyle with no vacations and "old cars" (per 2 previous posters).
Seriously, this place is unreal at times.

Totally agree, but that is because it is an expensive place, not because the residents are crazy. I venture it would be similar in NY, Boston, San Francisco, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Schools that can afford it give financial aid to middle class families because they want those families at the schools. Imagine if Top 3 were filled with only the super-rich and the very poor. They need kids in between.

I can imagine it, and it's a nightmare. It's the "in between" families that give the Top 3 schools the grounding and semblance of reality that our family seeks for our 2 children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I guess everything is relative. $3000 is not a small mortgage to me. at all. Retirement contributions also seem like a luxury.

I really don't think you should be sending your children to private school if you cannot make any contributions to your retirement. I don't think there's a financial planner out there who would say this is a good idea.

But see - that's the thing. It's a choice. My financial planner says on my HHI of $670K a year (gross) I should be saving over $200K towards retirement. So what do I cut? Do I not send DCs 1 and 2 to private school and save it? The thing is, if I choose to send them anyway, I recognize that is a choice I have made (and do make - sorry financial planner). I don't expect somebody to give me financial aid because I can run numbers to show how tight we have it because of our $6+K a month mortgage and our $1K a week nanny and the $200K a year our advisor says we should be saving. I understand those are choices I have made.

I think if you have an HHI much above $100K a year you really should be ineligible for aid absent some kind of severe medical expenses or something. This is what most colleges do, and I say this as a person who was able to get only $1,800 of aid her first year in college (at a very expensive top tier school) because at that point there were 3 of us in college! I was ineligible for any kind of aid, with a household income of $60K a year, after that!

Pathetic.

[Anonymous]

I attended an Open House in the fall given by AIMS (MD Independent Schools). During their financial aid session Q and A, someone asked if schools look at money contributed towards college savings and the answer was a definite "Yes." They said if you could afford to contribute money each money towards a college education, you could use that money towards tuition right now at a private school. There was a definite silence throughout the room b/c I guess most people thought the answer would be "No." So if you are putting away serious $$$ in a 529 plan, the schools will take that into consideration when you apply for aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I guess everything is relative. $3000 is not a small mortgage to me. at all. Retirement contributions also seem like a luxury.

I really don't think you should be sending your children to private school if you cannot make any contributions to your retirement. I don't think there's a financial planner out there who would say this is a good idea.

But see - that's the thing. It's a choice. My financial planner says on my HHI of $670K a year (gross) I should be saving over $200K towards retirement. So what do I cut? Do I not send DCs 1 and 2 to private school and save it? The thing is, if I choose to send them anyway, I recognize that is a choice I have made (and do make - sorry financial planner). I don't expect somebody to give me financial aid because I can run numbers to show how tight we have it because of our $6+K a month mortgage and our $1K a week nanny and the $200K a year our advisor says we should be saving. I understand those are choices I have made.

I think if you have an HHI much above $100K a year you really should be ineligible for aid absent some kind of severe medical expenses or something. This is what most colleges do, and I say this as a person who was able to get only $1,800 of aid her first year in college (at a very expensive top tier school) because at that point there were 3 of us in college! I was ineligible for any kind of aid, with a household income of $60K a year, after that!

$670K a year . . . I am fairly certain that if you lived in an area where the homes weren't $1+ you could afford to send your Dear Whatevers to your favorite top tier school(s).

PP, your choices are absolutely ridiculous. You make more than enough money, and you're asking for a break.

I do really love this board for the entertainment.

those poor, poor rich folks!

[Anonymous]

PP, I think you missed the point of the other PPs post.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP, I think you missed the point of the other PPs post.

I think PP's point distilled down to it's logical conclusion is that the elite private schools should be populated only by the rich to super-rich.

We make slightly more than the 600K figure cited by PP and our DCs attend one of the Big Three. Our DC's closest friends seem to be from the "middle class" (relatively speaking) of D.C., and would not be there but for financial aid or tuition grants through the World Bank/IMF. As both DH and I come from very modest roots, notwithstanding our now not so modest incomes, we are secretly happy that this is the case. It provides a nice counter-balance to many of the super-rich kids (and their families) whose values and expectations regarding such things as Spring break vacations are truly out of whack with most of the rest of America. It is for this reason that we contribute quite a bit to the Annual Fund and pay ungodly sums for trinkets at the annual auctions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools that can afford it give financial aid to middle class families because they want those families at the schools. Imagine if Top 3 were filled with only the super-rich and the very poor. They need kids in between.

I can imagine it, and it's a nightmare. It's the "in between" families that give the Top 3 schools the grounding and semblance of reality that our family seeks for our 2 children.

Agreed!

Thank you parents and schools who make financial aid available to the "in betweeners"!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gotta love DC---where 130K is "working poor" and 250K gives you a bare bones lifestyle with no vacations and "old cars" (per 2 previous posters).
Seriously, this place is unreal at times.

130K in this area is not a significant amount of money. I am grateful for what we have been blessed with and appreciate that schools are willing to provide financial aid to in between families.

[Anonymous]

There are also other circumstances to consider, such as who the HHi income is supporting. What if you are supporting an elderly parent? What if medical costs are high? The schools use the School and Student Service for Financial Aid for a reason. The questionnaire factors in home equity, mortgage/rental payments, med costs, vacations, cars, savings, debt and everything else you can think of. So you end up with a calculation which shows how much you as a aprent can contribute. the form even has my kid contributing to his own tuition since he does have a tiny 529 plan already. Forget the fact there would be a penalty to use that money now...

So people who do have a household income of 200K may still qualify, depending on all sorts of other factors.

Qualify does not equal free ride however. We still pay an awful lot, and frankly more than we can afford.

[Anonymous]

I have enjoyed reading this thread. A friend recently said to me something along the lines of she doesnt *believe* in financial aid for private school (I didnt ask what she thought about college) and if they could no longer afford it (due lets say to the current economic woes) they would switch to public not ask for aid. Her argument was something like private school is private like a club and if you can't afford it you dont belong. I didn't have much to say but it bothered me and I have been mulling it over and several of these posts make me look at the whole financial aid thing from new and varied perspectives. Lots of your posts have been interesting. Its something for me to ponder especially since we really stretch to pay private school tuition but many posters would apparently think we are ridiculous (rich) and our mortgage is too big and have no room to whine (which we actually don't except to ourselves! ). Anyways thanks for an interesting discussion.

[Anonymous]

When schools ask me to donate to and bid generously at the auction to support "socio-economic diversity," I wasn't thinking that the money was going to the kid of the Admissions Director's buddy who makes 200K. I thought it was providing real opportunities to people who might not otherwise have them - children from families headed by a single mom who doesn't have ten degrees, for example. There is a difference between upper middle class families who will otherwise be able to supplement their children's public school education with plenty of enrichment activities and families who can't do that because of money or circumstances. I guess I should NOT suggest to my secretary, who makes about $75K, that she apply her child to one of these schools as I was going to do because she is too poor for all of you all to want there. It's just those nice upper middle class families making $200K a year who are just not quite rich enough that you want to see in the class. Some diversity.

I may have to re-think my bidding and auction donations this year.