Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Despite everyone thinking that all Harvard alums are rich, I guarantee you that there are many of them who make just above $200k and live in expensive metro areas. So this does nothing for them as the cost of tuition keeps going up 5% a year.

If you have a big mortgage and high property taxes (both required to live in a decent school district, unless you are paying for private), some money saved but not a lot, and are making $250k-$300k, you are hosed.

No one is crying for us, but there is a growing donut hole of those too rich to qualify for these programs, but not rich enough for paying almost $100k a year to be easy.

This is a performance by Harvard. Typical.

Big mortgages are a choice. They should be looked at. &200k is more than many of us make and we still manage to save.

The cost of living somewhere with good schools is high. Whether it is rent, mortgage or whatever.

Let's say you took out loans to go to Harvard then took out more loans to go to med school. Had a kid near end of residency at age 30. Good practice but nothing extravagant - $250k HHI. Paying off loans until your kid is well into elementary school then finally start to save a bit. Live in a nice town with decent schools but nowhere fancy, but in a major metro area with high home prices/rents and taxes. You will qualify for little of any aid but paying that tuition, especially if you have multiple kids, is very difficult.

Setting these arbitrary cutoffs where there is such a binary is silly. But it makes for great headlines.

For all the cynics
1) this is a lot of students: Harvard said more than 25% of Harvard families have total incomes less than $100,000 and for those making up to 200k, they said they will at a minimum pay tuition - and there is not a fall off cliff for the family making $210K as they
2) 55% of Harvard students are on financial aid - so no there is not a cliff. They note those making over $200k may be eligible
3) They don't count home equity. They do say they count assets. For those of you with $5m in assets, typically that would itself provide some type of income via dividends etc. but yes, it does appear that assets will be factored in. Would be strange if it was not that way but whatever.
4) The school is not perfect by any means but this is helpful for many and will provide pressure for their peers who haven't moved this far to come closer.

is Yale a lot stingier?

Anonymous wrote:Great news for many families.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/17/us/politics/harvard-free-tuition.html

Penn already did this and Princeton and MIT are similar. Harvard is late to the party. Smart and not super rich is the new preference of the top universities and they seek to have 60% on some amount of financial aid so full pays are the minority. These specific schools already have 52-55% on need based aid.

Anonymous wrote:Despite everyone thinking that all Harvard alums are rich, I guarantee you that there are many of them who make just above $200k and live in expensive metro areas. So this does nothing for them as the cost of tuition keeps going up 5% a year.

If you have a big mortgage and high property taxes (both required to live in a decent school district, unless you are paying for private), some money saved but not a lot, and are making $250k-$300k, you are hosed.

No one is crying for us, but there is a growing donut hole of those too rich to qualify for these programs, but not rich enough for paying almost $100k a year to be easy.

This is a performance by Harvard. Typical.

Big mortgages are a choice. They should be looked at. &200k is more than many of us make and we still manage to save.

Despite everyone thinking that all Harvard alums are rich, I guarantee you that there are many of them who make just above $200k and live in expensive metro areas. So this does nothing for them as the cost of tuition keeps going up 5% a year.

If you have a big mortgage and high property taxes (both required to live in a decent school district, unless you are paying for private), some money saved but not a lot, and are making $250k-$300k, you are hosed.

No one is crying for us, but there is a growing donut hole of those too rich to qualify for these programs, but not rich enough for paying almost $100k a year to be easy.

This is a performance by Harvard. Typical.

Anonymous wrote:Maybe I should make my husband quit his job for 4 years. I make $195k

If you have a house and any bank account or retirement contributions, won’t work- assets included. Or I would be first in line to quit for 4 years!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our NW is a couple of M. But income is below $200k. Would our kid qualify?

See for yourself. Use the college Net Price Calculators.

I thought I remembered when playing with numbers on the calculators that can put in 50,000 or even less for salary and as long as have “couple M” in assets shows parents able to fund 500,000 or more- so you’re toast.

Anonymous wrote:Our NW is a couple of M. But income is below $200k. Would our kid qualify?

See for yourself. Use the college Net Price Calculators.

Anonymous wrote:Our NW is a couple of M. But income is below $200k. Would our kid qualify?

They consider net worth. Of course not.

Our NW is a couple of M. But income is below $200k. Would our kid qualify?

Anonymous wrote:What happens if your income increases for the next school year FAFSA application? Do they decrease your aid?

Need-based aid depends on your need. If your income goes up, your need goes down.

That said, there is a lag in which year of tax documents you submit. So, if I recall - someone correct this if it's wrong - you submit your 2023 tax return with the 2024-25 FAFSA that determines aid for the 2025-26 school year.

Also remember that the CSS Profile requires you to submit information on assets.

Anonymous wrote:What happens if your income increases for the next school year FAFSA application? Do they decrease your aid?

Of course.

What happens if your income increases for the next school year FAFSA application? Do they decrease your aid?

Anonymous wrote:I will disown my child for this they are on their own lol

You are not making sense. You would disown your child so they could get full financial aid from Harvard? Setting aside fraud, today's announcement about aid levels changes nothing about the school meeting full need. Nothing new here.