What happens if you do not get in off the waitlist at the UC. Every parent is concerned with where the stock market is , well 99% of parents, it does seem like you want both parts of pie, you applied ED and you and your parents took that leap knowing what it meant and it may have been the reason you got in and someone else did not. It does not sound like a parent has lost a job, it is one thing to worry about their investments and another to say, how there is no way we can now pay this bc of x. Also a college is not gonna care about your brothers college education. Harsh perhaps but true. I really think you need to have a chat with your folks, and right now there is no seat for you at the UC, what happens if you do not get off the waitlist?
@NJdad7090 - Nowhere is it written that @rawspagetti has to start college this fall. If the ED institution is unaffordable, rawspagetti can stay put in CA where there are well-worn CA CC to UC/CSU pathways. And frankly, that is a better choice than burning through a bunch of cash at the ED institution only to have return to a CA CC after one semester or year.
Did you actually apply for FA/complete the FAFSA, etc. to the ED school?
Well, at the time the brother applies the family situation will be taken into account and lower assets by then and/or OP still being at college will help their FA calculations. So yes, indirectly “the system” should care about it even if this college doesn’t (As already pointed, a calculation that anyway should have happened before the ED application).