Reply to The New America: Elite Privates forever out of reach for UMC?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm not seeing it. Our household income is $145,000. The net price calculators say our contribution at various private schools is under $300000 per year[/quote]

NPC (the simplified version that asks only about half a dozen questions) significantly underestimates your expected contribution since it doesn't look at many forms of assets.  When you fill out FAFSA you will get a shock when you see what it expects you to contribute.[/quote]

But the NPC for each school is more accurate for their own expectations.  We found them to be dead on the money.  They need to be for private schools because if you opt to apply ED the way out of it is if the financial aid doesn't match what the NPC predicted.  Private schools rely on the CSS profile and their own interpretation of it which has little to do with FAFSA.[/quote]

But the CSS profile does not give a family's expected contribution.  It is just a detailed information about a family's financial situation.  Only FAFSA gives what a family is expected to contribute.  We are going through the undergraduate application process right now.  We will see if any private schools will offer any financial aid.  The fAFSA says we don't qualify for any.  The CSS profile doesn't give any information on what we are expected to contribute.  When we used the quick EFC calculator (simplified EFC calculator that asks very few questions) found in certain private school websites, it gives three different dollar amounts of family contributions (lowest amount, likely amount, highest amount).  The highest amount is closest to but somewhat less than what FAFSA expects us to contribute.  And the FAFSA amount is higher than the COA of the schools. [/quote]
[b]
FAFSA only tells you if you qualify for federal aid. Lots of people get school-based aid even though their income is too high for FAFSA. [/quote]
[/b]
Thank you.  Your response gives me some hope.  We will know for sure in the next few months.[/quote]

NP.  Good luck to you.  We have three going thru the process.  We make too much to qualify for financial aid under FAFSA, but took out the unsubsidized $5500 loans so all children would have skin in the game.  Fortunately (I guess) my kids tried for the elite schools and SLACs and received no merit offers from the schools that interested them where they were accepted.  They were, however, offered out of the blue merit scholarships from some small SLACs you've never heard of which were willing to trade a $28K scholarship for DC's high ACT scores.  But those schools did not offer the programs that DC wanted.  So we are out of pocket for everything but the $5500+ loans.  Even after subtracting the $26K from the $75K of the slacs, UVA was the better deal so all three went to in-state Virginia schools, which was a huge blessing.  We banked the difference and with the help of this robust market now are able to pay for a good portion of the upcoming grad school fees.  We are MC.[/quote]

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