Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why did you even complete FASFA. You people are fools and refuse to believe what actual need based aid consists of.

Or....maybe you don't realize that some scholarship programs require FAFSA. Some are for merit aid (which I suspect you are against this family from getting - I'm not). Bit some of these are programs that have honors-like academic benefits tied to them - so even families who can afford to attend without any sort of aid will want to be considered.

Can you name any? I had heard this too, but when I have asked college officials they act like I'm crazy and say they have never heard of this.

Different poster. Some schools don't allow students to apply for financial aid if circumstances change in later years unless they submit a FASFA in year 1.

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Anonymous wrote:Our EFC is 230k. We don’t even make that much 300k with both parents working + 2 million assets

You make $300K and $2 Million in assets, you have plenty of money to pay for college.

You are quite presumptuous; I am in the same situation financially and I have worked my tail off my entire life for my assets and income. I support elderly parents and fund my retirement and my children’s inheritance. I have also saved diligently for college but to assume that I can pay full price for college without it hurting is stupid. I will have 3 in college at the same time for a few years (Full price will be easily over 200,000/year). I am sick of people just saying that those with finances need to shut up and just pay pay pay…. I’ve worked so hard to pay my share and your share and your brother’s share and your neighbors share and I am getting really really tired of it.

WTF.

You are happily funding their inheritance but are upset about paying for college.

WT actual F.

My thoughts exactly! A smart person would fund their college education, as that will have a much greater value than getting $$$ when you are 45+. It will set the foundation for your kid's future and the best gift you can give them is a debt free college experience (doesn't have to be Ivy---just affordable debt free at a good college)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our EFC is 230k. We don’t even make that much 300k with both parents working + 2 million assets

You make $300K and $2 Million in assets, you have plenty of money to pay for college.

You are quite presumptuous; I am in the same situation financially and I have worked my tail off my entire life for my assets and income. I support elderly parents and fund my retirement and my children’s inheritance. I have also saved diligently for college but to assume that I can pay full price for college without it hurting is stupid. I will have 3 in college at the same time for a few years (Full price will be easily over 200,000/year). I am sick of people just saying that those with finances need to shut up and just pay pay pay…. I’ve worked so hard to pay my share and your share and your brother’s share and your neighbors share and I am getting really really tired of it.

But once again, you choose to have it such that there will be 3 in college at the same time. Me, my kids are 4 years apart in school, one of the reasons for doing that was so we would only have 1 in undergrad at the same time.
Why are you funding your "children's inheritance"? Seems silly to do that when they would benefit much more from having college paid for (or mostly paid for), even if it's only a $40K/year school (nothing wrong with those schools---I don't believe in debt for college if you can choose somewhere affordable).

Anonymous wrote:Filling out the fafsa is so easy there is no reason not to unless you have zero need for loans and/or your school doesn't require it for any school based or merit aid.

I did not find it that *easy*. Maybe it's easy if you have almost no assets. Also, I'm self employed, so I wasn't even sure what income I should use.

Anonymous wrote:Especially when I have to pay for your test optional snowflake with grade inflation mediocre high school performance when my own high scoring test submitted (after studying diligently) straight A grade earning kid can’t get in because we don’t check the “URM” or “first-gen” or whatever else “needs a chance” box is in style these days.

+1 well stated

Anyone making $250k or close to that amount shouldn’t bother with FAFSA

Filling out the fafsa is so easy there is no reason not to unless you have zero need for loans and/or your school doesn't require it for any school based or merit aid.

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Anonymous wrote:Some schools merit scholarships still require FAFSA be completed. Got an even higher number when we did ours. Kid chose a different school with no merit. Never filling out a FAFSA again (unless the younger one is in the same position).

+1 I told DC go in state. We get zilch. Our EFC was something really high, too, not as high as OP's though.

I'm not paying $70k per year. We are UMC but we are trying to save fore retirement and another DC's college fund. College costs are insane.

Same here. DH and I both graduated from Va public universities in the late 80’s/early 90’s when tuition, fees, and room & board totaled around $10K/year. Now, those same schools are closer to $30k-$40k. We told our kids that VA has a lot of public options and if they want private or OOS, they will need loans.

Cheapskate.

I am cheap, but also very smart.

Paying more for something doesn’t make it any better.

Congrats! You won a lifetime resentment award from your kid!!

Nope. My kids are smart enough to know that a higher price doesn’t equal a better education. There’s no reason for a good student who lives in VA to go OOS, unless they are looking to get far away from home

There are plenty of OOS schools that can match or beat the price of VA public options. Saying "in state only" is dumb. Saying our budget = what an in-state school would cost makes sense. Then it's on the kid to search for schools that can fit the budget. FWIW, My DD applied to several OOS public and private schools. All ended up cheaper for us than William & Mary, the only in-state public she was really interested in. She's going to a private LAC that will cost us about the same as Virginia Tech.

That’s great, but did the OOS school guarantee renewal of the aid package for all 4 years? I’ve heard stories of students learning that they have to pay a lot more after freshman year due to not meeting certain requirements like GPA, number of credits, or program of study.

Definately look at the requirements for merit. Both of my kids got substantial merit---only requirement for either was to maintain a 2.0/be a student in good standing. I figured we have bigger issues if they can't do that. But definately make sure it's not too high of a gpa req. Because a every your 4.0UW and 4.798843 W in HS can struggle to get a 3.0 in college, especially if premed/engineering/cs. But there are many schools where the only req is a 2.0 or 2.5 and that's reasonable to expect. btw, for both my kids, that was the only requirements for the merit---2.0 gpa and to have 12 credit hours each semester (ie be a full time student)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our EFC is 230k. We don’t even make that much 300k with both parents working + 2 million assets

You make $300K and $2 Million in assets, you have plenty of money to pay for college.

You are quite presumptuous; I am in the same situation financially and I have worked my tail off my entire life for my assets and income. I support elderly parents and fund my retirement and my children’s inheritance. I have also saved diligently for college but to assume that I can pay full price for college without it hurting is stupid. I will have 3 in college at the same time for a few years (Full price will be easily over 200,000/year). I am sick of people just saying that those with finances need to shut up and just pay pay pay…. I’ve worked so hard to pay my share and your share and your brother’s share and your neighbors share and I am getting really really tired of it.

WTF.

You are happily funding their inheritance but are upset about paying for college.

WT actual F.

Exactly. Cue the tiny viiolin. Many people also consider family planning for this very reason.

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Anonymous wrote:Some schools merit scholarships still require FAFSA be completed. Got an even higher number when we did ours. Kid chose a different school with no merit. Never filling out a FAFSA again (unless the younger one is in the same position).

+1 I told DC go in state. We get zilch. Our EFC was something really high, too, not as high as OP's though.

I'm not paying $70k per year. We are UMC but we are trying to save fore retirement and another DC's college fund. College costs are insane.

Same here. DH and I both graduated from Va public universities in the late 80’s/early 90’s when tuition, fees, and room & board totaled around $10K/year. Now, those same schools are closer to $30k-$40k. We told our kids that VA has a lot of public options and if they want private or OOS, they will need loans.

Cheapskate.

I am cheap, but also very smart.

Paying more for something doesn’t make it any better.

But you fail to understand you alone are blocking your kids from attending the better schools. If you and your spouse were unemployed no assets kids would get a free ride Ivy League if they got in. Instead you block them from that as you have the cash but refuse to spend it

Get a life---they are not stopping their kids from attending college. Just saying they are willing to pay $40k/year. There are tons of excellent schools their kids can attend for this price---all but about the T40-50 if they are good students. You don't owe your kids an ivy education. Their kids will do just fine at a good school that is affordable

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:You have assets, therefore, money to pay for school you are just choosing not to spend that asset/money on college. That is a choice.

It’s a wise choice. A college degree doesn’t need to be expensive to be good.

Yes but the underlying thread in all of these OMG MY EFC IS X. Is that they should get some type of aid for schools that they could literally cash flow from their income OR by selling a rental property. But they don't. They want aid. AID

Not necessarily. I don’t think the FAFSA takes into consideration the number of siblings, whether there are special needs or medical issues in the family, etc.

This is the first year where that is the case. Up until last year, number of kids in school did change the calculation. Extreme medical expenses, would show up in tax deductions, and in that way maybe change the FAFSA.

But the real takeaway for OP should simply be no one is happy with this calculation. It in no way says the family can pay this amount, or should pay this amount, only that compared to other families this is where it shakes out. There is very little federal funding directed toward higher education, and to the extent there ever was it wasn't tied to inflation. OP's number may be ridiculous, but doubtless OP can afford to send multiple kids to the college of their choice without aid, and really it's only when the EFC maxes out that it makes sense.

And the other PP is correct, nothing says even a state school will match EFC, that's the case for my DC this year.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some schools merit scholarships still require FAFSA be completed. Got an even higher number when we did ours. Kid chose a different school with no merit. Never filling out a FAFSA again (unless the younger one is in the same position).

+1 I told DC go in state. We get zilch. Our EFC was something really high, too, not as high as OP's though.

I'm not paying $70k per year. We are UMC but we are trying to save fore retirement and another DC's college fund. College costs are insane.

Same here. DH and I both graduated from Va public universities in the late 80’s/early 90’s when tuition, fees, and room & board totaled around $10K/year. Now, those same schools are closer to $30k-$40k. We told our kids that VA has a lot of public options and if they want private or OOS, they will need loans.

DP. Same with us. VA has far too many excellent universities for us to even consider OOS.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some schools merit scholarships still require FAFSA be completed. Got an even higher number when we did ours. Kid chose a different school with no merit. Never filling out a FAFSA again (unless the younger one is in the same position).

+1 I told DC go in state. We get zilch. Our EFC was something really high, too, not as high as OP's though.

I'm not paying $70k per year. We are UMC but we are trying to save fore retirement and another DC's college fund. College costs are insane.

Same here. DH and I both graduated from Va public universities in the late 80’s/early 90’s when tuition, fees, and room & board totaled around $10K/year. Now, those same schools are closer to $30k-$40k. We told our kids that VA has a lot of public options and if they want private or OOS, they will need loans.

Cheapskate.

I am cheap, but also very smart.

Paying more for something doesn’t make it any better.

+1000. Some don't have to flaunt their money.

Anonymous wrote:Especially when I have to pay for your test optional snowflake with grade inflation mediocre high school performance when my own high scoring test submitted (after studying diligently) straight A grade earning kid can’t get in because we don’t check the “URM” or “first-gen” or whatever else “needs a chance” box is in style these days.

How very white of you …

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our EFC is 230k. We don’t even make that much 300k with both parents working + 2 million assets

You make $300K and $2 Million in assets, you have plenty of money to pay for college.

You are quite presumptuous; I am in the same situation financially and I have worked my tail off my entire life for my assets and income. I support elderly parents and fund my retirement and my children’s inheritance. I have also saved diligently for college but to assume that I can pay full price for college without it hurting is stupid. I will have 3 in college at the same time for a few years (Full price will be easily over 200,000/year). I am sick of people just saying that those with finances need to shut up and just pay pay pay…. I’ve worked so hard to pay my share and your share and your brother’s share and your neighbors share and I am getting really really tired of it.

You don't think those with lower income and less savings also haven't worked their tail off and have the same responsibilities to parents, and even other things like SN kids. You can send your three kids to state schools and it will be much less. Problem solved.