<p>Do NOT throw out the article. Yes, the schools get to determine what your financial need is, but this is not a way for them to pull the wool over your eyes. A college would get a VERY bad reputation very quickly if they claimed they meet full financial need and then asked a family with $100,000 in income to take a loan for $40,000 each year. Main thing is to first get accepted by these mostly elite colleges. Then, MANY of them use the Net Price Calculator provided by CollegeBoard,org, and in the case of two colleges on that list of 62 that I contacted, they use it very closely when determining what they will offer. Finally, the main difference between most of those schools is that some will meet full financial need WITHOUT including ANY loans at all – student or parent (Colby College is one of those), and some WILL include that. And, for those that DO include student loans, the loan amount is USUALLY pretty reasonable…from $2,000 to $5000 per year in the several that I have researched when looking at colleges for my high school daughter. As the average student loan debt for ALL college students today is over $27,000, if you can get a degree from one of those elite colleges with debt of $20,000 or LESS, then that’s something to consider. Finally, just because you are eligible for a loan doesn’t mean you have to take one. Most of the schools want the student to provide between $2,000 and $2,500 each year from working. This can be done with a work-study job alone, and then if the student is able to find some summer employment (no guarantee) then they can add to that (however, this will increase the amount the university will want from the family the next year, but it’s not exactly a wash).</p>
<p>If you have $400,000 in assets, that is something that could reasonably make you have to pay a whole lot more.</p>