CSS Profile and Divorced Parents with Unequal Assets

ucbalumnus
Sun, 22 Nov 2020 01:46:44 +0000

maryrich;d-2201197:

Also, does the CSS profile require the divorces parents to work together on the financial side? Does it let each parent see the financial info of the other? It was not an amicable divorce at all unfortunately as hard as I tried. I’m worried he won’t give up his info if it means I will be able to see it.

What does our child do if my ex won’t give up the information to complete the CSS? Due to my living outside the school district ex is custodial parent but very clueless when it comes to these things.

1. Not all CSS Profile colleges require the CSS Non-custodial Profile. https://profile.collegeboard.org/profile/ppi/participatingInstitutions.aspx lists which do, but verify on the college web site, since some of the information is incorrect or out of date.

2. With respect to working together on finances, both must cooperate with whoever runs the college net price calculators if you want any chance of them being accurate for giving financial aid estimates before applying. In many cases, the divorced parents are not willing to disclose their finances to each other, so the net price calculators will be a garbage-in-garbage-out situation.

3. The actual CSS Profile gives the divorced parents each a separate login so that they can enter their financials privately from the other.

4. However, once a college gives an actual financial aid offer, someone who knows the offer and one parent's financials can reverse-engineer the other parent's financials using the college's net price calculator.

5. If either parent will not give financial information at all, then the student will not get financial aid from colleges that require both parents' finances. if the *custodial* parent refuses, then that will be a problem at all colleges that use the usual types of financial aid methodology that depends on the custodial parent finances (whether or not the college also requires the non-custodial parent finances).