There are certainly many families willing to pay full price, although for some, it may depend on the school they’re paying for.
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Sure, but they don’t want to pay full price! If they could get some kind of break, they’d take it … but they will pay full price if they don’t have a choice.
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On that CSS profile question, we put an honest answer of what we planned to contribute to college costs. Honestly, I think you are way overthinking this. There is absolutely no evidence that this field is used at all in terms of calculating financial aid, and it won’t be considered at all at need blind colleges.
Even for need aware colleges, the colleges will calculate the amount of financial aid they need to give you to attend. If they calculate that you need NO aid, then this won’t matter a bit at need aware schools, because the calculation will say they don’t need to provide you funding.
And for the record…merit aid is usually awarded by admissions. They won’t see that field on your CSS Profile…ever.
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Thanks.
2 posts were split to a new thread: CSS question
I just wanted to add that we called a (very helpful) university financial aid office with this exact question and they told us to not worry about what number goes in that field in that it is essentially irrelevant. This was a need blind institution.
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This was my attitude with my first kid because he was mostly applying to a few in-state publics and graduating in 2-3 years, so his 529 would cover it. So I skipped the hassle of all the forms and figured I’d worry about it later if I had to. This time around with the next kid I’ve given it more thought but it’s close to impossible to find advice on the one question that keeps rolling around in my mind…
If you believe you won’t qualify for need-based aid, and the school is need-aware, is there any benefit to applying anyway as a sort-of “proof” you can pay? 95% of advice given by counselors and articles say “ALWAYS APPLY even if you think…” And then there’s the common trope that says “Don’t worry, ability to pay rarely matters anyway, it will only apply to borderline applicants.” Okay, great. Can we please assume my kid is borderline!? Don’t we all feel borderline in this current application climate?
I’m embarrassed to say how many times I’ve snuck in and out of her common app flipping the “Will you be applying for need-based aid?” toggle back and forth trying to figure out if I should give them a head’s up or not.
Just because a family doesn’t qualify for need based aid, it does not mean they can afford (or want to afford) a full pay sticker price. Run the NPCs to know whether you will get need based aid or not. If not, no need to fill out the forms. Don’t overthink this.
This advice might have been meant to communicate that at some schools, if one doesn’t apply for need based FA as an incoming freshman, they can never apply for (institutional) need based in future years, even if the family’s financial situation changes.
This varies by (need aware) school…they are, after all, deciding which students with financial need they want to ‘invest’ in. Big picture one’s ability to pay does not matter in admissions at need blind schools (and most schools are need blind.)
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This is the case for international students, but there are only a handful of college with these restrictions for domestic students.
Just check and see.
I expect it makes no difference. However, if we want to overthink this, I’d argue the opposite: the need-aware school might wonder if you do have the ability and willingness to pay full freight since you applied for aid (presumably, at least in their mind, hoping to get something).
On the other hand, a student who did not apply for aid isn’t looking to get any and is a confirmed full pay student.
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Okay, those are good points. I admit I do enjoy a little overthinking from time to time, because why not? 
. I just wonder sometimes if they get zero financial info at all (as was the case when my son applied to schools) does that leave somewhat of a question mark in their minds as to any intent or ability to pay at all. Perhaps some families, or kids applying without guidance think it’ll look better and then just “take out a loan” later or something. But perhaps you’re right, and they consider them confirmed full pay and just go from there.
I did mull over the question first posed in this thread for a while as I was filling out the CSS Profile for the first time ever. I ended up just dividing her current 529 balance by 4 and rounding up a little. It does seem as though each school has their own process as you dig through the financial aid pages on their websites, whether they solely use the CSS for institutional aid, or FAFSA is required for any merit aid, etc.
In the end I’m just going to submit the aid apps and not worry about how it may or may not affect her chances anywhere, even if borderline. Especially since she is applying to so many out-of-state publics and expensive privates it doesn’t even seem financially responsible not to, fully paying or not. Thanks!!
We submit fafsa because my kids take the federal loans, and since we are one income it’s good to have it on file in case of job loss (my husband’s company starts giving severance packages around this time of year…). We’ve had 3 kids in college at the same time, the last time 3 publics, 1 in state, 2 oos, never received FA. My niece was very full pay, was deferred from her top choice, stats were a little low for this private university, but she was a legacy, was contacted before acceptance to confirm she was full pay.
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