Anonymous wrote:Maybe she can get married and then her aid would be dependent on her and her 18-22yr old husband. Does FAFSA work that way?

If there's a prize for the most idiotic response on this thread, WE HAVE A WINNER.

Anonymous wrote:We put parameters on the types of schools DH and I will pay for our kids to go to for college. If stepDH pays for DD’s college, will he get to have a say in where she goes, or does everyone who thinks he should pay think he should just write the check and stay quiet?

I can’t speak for everyone else but I think he should at a minimum pay a portion of something reasonable- not necessarily the whole thing at any particular school. However, if it were me, I wouldn’t have married someone who didn’t want to create a family and life with me that was the full equal (or at least something approaching equal) of his first family. To me, that’s not really how families or marriages should work. Doesn’t mean I think his biological kids’ inheritance should be split with a stepdaughter, but it does mean that - ideally- he might find it in himself to help with a portion of things like education expenses, or perhaps co-sign a loan with his stepdaughter if she someday needs a car for work and her mom’s finances aren’t in order. Treating his wife’s kid like she has nothing to do with him is pretty low.

- second wife who doesn’t work or have a pre-nup

Maybe she can get married and then her aid would be dependent on her and her 18-22yr old husband. Does FAFSA work that way?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My parents were legal immigrants here and we had absolutely nothing. I picked the college I wanted, the city I wanted, and when I got in, I went to that college. I worked, I borrowed money under my name, and got grants and scholarships and whatever I could scrape. I had a ton of loans but I’m paying them off.

Your daughter isn’t unhappy that DH isn’t paying for her, deep down she’s unhappy because by your actions and words you are forcing her to pick going to a college she doesn’t want to go. Young people don’t get the impact of loans, but they’re young, let them choose their path and you gave your advice. You should simply say pick the school you want, I’ll contribute what I can, ans the rest will be loans you’ll have to pay. Support her on her decision. Stop focusing on the step family and telling her to go to UMD. She wants a fun college a great name college a place she’s be proud and happy at. Give your advice about loans ans then let her go forth with that decision.

The difference here is that because it sounds like your parents did not have that much money, you probably qualify for grants and scholarships and loans. The daughter and the situation has been screwed over by the mothers remarriage. Most colleges particularly private colleges will factor in the stepfather’s assets. If he didn’t exist, she’d probably get a lot of aid. But now she has the worst of both worlds. He does exist, he does have a lot of money, which will screw her out of most colleges financial aid, but he’s not willing to pay for her college education.

I have thought about this a lot because I have a net worth around three million and I’m dating someone with two teenage daughters. My boyfriend is well educated but is not in a high-paying job. Same for their mother. Without me in the picture, they should qualify for a lot of aid. Well, at least some aid. I’m not willing to shell out $600,000 for their kids to go to college. So my feeling is I either need to not marry him until they are out of college, or help pay for their education if I screw over their financial aid prospects by being married to their dad.

This is what I’ve been able to glean from random googling about financial aid and stepparents, anyway. I think with state schools you can often get away with not putting the stepparent on the form, but with most private colleges, they are going to ask for the stepparents assets apparently especially if the stepparent lives in the household where the kid lives most of the time.

If anyone knows differently, please fill me in, because I would love to marry their father, and not have my assets count towards their financial aid forms. But they’re not my kids, I didn’t raise them, we have a good relationship but I doubt they will take care of me in my old age, etc., so I really need to save that $600,000 for my own retirement. But if that’s my feeling, I’m pretty sure my solution needs to be to not marry him at this point. Or at least until they apply to college and we figure out where they are going. If they go to state school, no big deal, I don’t mind throwing in 10,000 or so a year to help them graduate without loans or with minimal loans.

Are the posters on here going to beat up this woman because she says clearly that she is not going to give her SO’s daughters 600k???

No because they are not married and she is not screwing up their FAFSA. She is asking the pertinent questions in advance.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Look, the situation is what it is. She has 30k she can decide what to do with. The rest is up to her. That’s not going to change unless she gets a scholarship.

Mostly, I want to know what to say to her to get her to stop lashing out at her step siblings and my H. I’ve tried talking to her and get nowhere.

You’re a cold witch . Mommy got what she want. Now inconvenient DD needs to stop making mommy’s new life uncomfortable. The lack of empathy is stunning.

OP - the only thing you can say is the truth. That FAFSA is based on the parents’ income. You and her father do not have money to pay for college and you married people who don’t want to pay for her college. She is understandable distraught that your choices and her father’s choices have left her in a bad spot - she is not eligible for aid and she is not supported by her family. If your husband’s kids are a bit older, it was really short sighted that you didn’t think this through and delay marriage or discuss his financial contribution for college. Does he know she is upset? What does he have to say?

I think your daughter needs to work with a college counselor or someone more knowledgeable about student aid to help her navigate this. She can’t be the only kid in this situation. She also needs to make scholarship research and applications a full time job.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Look, the situation is what it is. She has 30k she can decide what to do with. The rest is up to her. That’s not going to change unless she gets a scholarship.

Mostly, I want to know what to say to her to get her to stop lashing out at her step siblings and my H. I’ve tried talking to her and get nowhere.

You’re a cold witch . Mommy got what she want. Now inconvenient DD needs to stop making mommy’s new life uncomfortable. The lack of empathy is stunning.

I am stunned by OP's response. She clearly cares far more about her new H and his money than her own daughter.

OP, if your H won't help, then go out and get a job that will pay enough to help your DD with college. It wouldn't be so bad if the H's kids weren't being given so much more. How can you not see what you've done to your DD? She really will be bitter and resent you for the rest of your life. You better hope the H and his kids will take care of you when you're old.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Look, the situation is what it is. She has 30k she can decide what to do with. The rest is up to her. That’s not going to change unless she gets a scholarship.

Mostly, I want to know what to say to her to get her to stop lashing out at her step siblings and my H. I’ve tried talking to her and get nowhere.

You’re a cold witch . Mommy got what she want. Now inconvenient DD needs to stop making mommy’s new life uncomfortable. The lack of empathy is stunning.

Anonymous wrote:It really does depend what you’re doing for her for school. I’d it’s “here’s $1000 enjoy your crippling loans while your stepfather and I vacation in Bali” then yeah she’s going to resent being the only person in the family expected to live the standard of living of a divorced single parent family...having lost the one financial benefit that she would have received.

Exactly. How does op not see this? They married when dd was 12/13. That is still very young and impressionable. Of course she has expectations

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you hadn't married him then she would get aid to go to these schools, but still would not have the latest Phones, cars, trips, etc that you speak of. She would then get to the school and envy the other students who did have these "privileges".

You can try to help her see that both of your lives could be a lot worse if you have not married. I assume that you are living in a more stable house hold and do not have the stress of needing to worry about where the rent/mortgage payment would come from.

Going to college with someone who has more than you is way different from living in a household with a sibling who is given more than you. How can people understand that?

+100.
Feel really sorry for this kid. It is like the adults are setting her up.
Btw OP, she didn’t choose her bio dad. You did !

My husband and I married when my son was 12. That didn’t change a thing wrt college. We paid for it together. Our combined income determined his FAFSA status.
You are asking a lot of your teenager daughter to understand this. Like many of the adults on this thread, I don’t understand it. How has this not even been a conversation between you and your current husband? You sound like a kept woman.

The total expected cost to attend Amherst is about $85K/year. https://www.amherst.edu/offices/financialaid/firstyear_transfer/costs_amherst/node/28612

This comes out to $340K over 4 years. So, I get that it’s not fully $400K, but if you’ve only got $30K saved, the $60K difference between $340K and $400K doesn’t really matter.

You all really think this man should fork over FOUR HUNDRED K just because he’s been banging her mother for the past few years?

I don't see how you got to $400,000, but I am not blaming the stepfather for his attitude. I am blaming the MOTHER. IMO, she owes a duty of loyalty to her D and had the obligation to check on the effect marriage would have on her D's ability to receive financial aid.

My hunch.....wealthy stepdad didn't want to pay for stepD's college. In my book, that was his right. He probably made it clear to mom that he would not pay for stepD's college before they married. There's probably a prenup and that's part of what's in it. That's probably why mom cannot even discuss the issue with him. He probably told her his position before they married and got her to agree in writing. His willingness to marry her was probably conditioned on her acceptance of the fact that he would not pay AND that his assets will go to his children.

She agreed because she wanted the lifestyle and didn't even THINK about what this could mean for her D. Yes, if someone asked me to sign a prenup stating that I would not ask him to contribute $ to pay for my kids' education, I certainly would try to figure out how I could pay for it and whether being married would matter. Moreover, if it did matter A LOT, I would tell that man that I could not marry him until my kids finished college UNLESS he would pay for their college.

If he is as wealthy as mom claims and she earns as little as she claims and they file a joint tax return, he pays a lot less income tax as a result. If stepD is claimed as a dependent, that also decreases his taxes slightly. It also stops some last minute effort to claim that her dad has custody of her.

The $30,000 mom has saved is about enough to pay for ONE year of college at U Maryland.(Upthread, someone said it's curently $28,000, it will probably go up a bit before D actually enrolls.)$30,000 is not enough for her to go to an overseas school for "free,"as suggested above, because she still has to pay for living expenses and if you look at the amounts listed plus fees, she might be able to get through 2 years at most IF she didn't return to the US during those 2 years AND the exchange rate doesn't move in the wrong direction.

I'm not familiar with the laws of the nations listed, but at least in the UK, the number of hours a foreign student can work is severely limited; it's unlikely that the D can work enough to earn the remaining costs. So, that really isn't a workable plan.

20 years ago, it was possible to work your way through many public universities without going into much debt. That's really not easy to do now. It's probable that U Maryland will cost about $120,000 for 4 years and it would be nearly impossible for the D to borrow and earn $90,000.

The way the message says the D can live with mom and stepdad during breaks and summers suggests living at "home" and commuting to a community college isn't even an option.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t understand why your daughter can’t take out loans. Is she planning on supporting you and your husband in your old age? If no, then she needs to figure out her own college payment plan.

There is a limit on the loans that a student can take out without her parents cosigning. It's about 1 year of instate tuition. Usually students who need more than than that qualify for grants, but she doesn't because her mother is married.

But a student can't just take out 90K in loans. It doesn't work that way.

Right. This is how the government fixed the student loan problem, parents are expected to take the loans now. School is way to expensive but this girl misses out on need based aid due to her step father.

We put parameters on the types of schools DH and I will pay for our kids to go to for college. If stepDH pays for DD’s college, will he get to have a say in where she goes, or does everyone who thinks he should pay think he should just write the check and stay quiet?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow, I’m surprised by all the responses against OP!

You all really think this man should fork over FOUR HUNDRED K just because he’s been banging her mother for the past few years?

I’m the immigrant PP - no we’re against OP because she’s not letting her daughter decide what she wants to do. Her DH has nothing to do
With this and it’s the red herring here.

I’m the PP and yet again the immigrant PP and I agree 100%! Makes me wonder if I have a twin