Get the Princeton Review financial aid guide and read up on how aid is calculated. Your questions show that you don't really have a grasp on how the system works.

After you do some reading, you'll see what you need to know and probably won't need an adviser. Little adjustments like the amount on your credit card or your car payment aren't going to change very much. What can matter is where you have investments sitting. They don't look at retirement, but a certain percentage of parental savings are seen as available for spending. A much, much greater amount of funds in the child's name are assumed available. So if you have a large sum sitting in the wrong place, that can be a problem.

But if you are filling out the FAFSA for next year, this is water under the bridge.

Adjustments like that aren't going to make a huge difference. The maximum Pell grant is between 5k and 6K per year, but you pretty much need to be on free lunch, welfare, or food stamps to get that. Moving your assets around, buying/selling cars, etc might get you an additional few hundred dollars a year IF you are Pell eligible at all. Loan eligibility is pretty much the same for everyone.

There is a Pell grant calculator at fafsa.gov where you can get an idea of whether or not you are eligible. If you are eligible and 2 or 3 hundred dollars a year is going to make a HUGE difference for you in terms of tuition, then you can keep looking for someone who provides the service you are looking for, but I don't know if anyone does.

Signed,

College Financial Aid Advisor

If DC needs a car to commute to school, should I get that before filling out FAFSA/CSS?

Not trying to cheat. Both cars are old, 8 to 10 yrs. Does it make more sense to buy new-ish cars now with big down payments/close to full payoff or regular down payment and a monthly cost, since the formula seems to count savings and obligations?

Stop trying to cheat the system.

If you've got so many assets that you need to "adjust" them why not just pay the tuition?

Why are you trying to game the system?

any one know any advisors who can help me adjust my assets to get maximum aid?