<p>My daughter’s dream school is Duke, and she has the grades, test scores, and extra curriculars to hopefully get in. Our income is low as we have a small business that has not been doing too well. We do have substantial savings, though, but we are afraid to commit to such high tuition should our finances continue in this direction. ( we are 50-ish).</p>
<p>I know you have a better chance of getting in with ED, but financially you may not get the whole picture.</p>
<p>Does anyone know how heavily non-retirement savings are looked at as compared to income when applying for financial aid? According to the fafsa calculator, she would get a full scholarship, but with the Profile, I’m not so sure…</p>
<p>Duke uses the FAFSA (federal methodology) for eligibility for federal aid: Pell grants, SEOG, Federal work study, subsidized stafford loans. The CSS profile, which will asked more detailed questions about your finances will be used to determine how Duke disburses their institutional aid.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that any losses written off against your business are added back in on the FAFSA so you EFC may end up going up.</p>
<p>Assets are assessed at ~5.6%. If you have 100,000 in savings, your EFC will go up by 5600.</p>
<p>Are you sure she would get a full scholarship with FAFSA? If you have substantial savings I would not expect this to be the case, depending on your definition of substantial of course. If you are in your 50s I would expect any savings over $50-60k to affect the EFC at a rate of about 5.6%. There is a formula on FAFSA where assets are ignored, but often small business owners are not eligible for that because one of the possible requirements is that you are eligible to file a 1040A/EZ return (though eligibility for means tested benefits or a dislocated worker status can also work).</p>
<p>As far as profile is concerned, each school uses data their own way. If you have substantial assets they probably will affect you with profile schools. Also the treatment of business expenses losses may be treated differently by profile schools (ie some may be disallowed). If FA is an important issue, I would suggest not applying ED. You have no way of comparing offers from different schools so would be making the decision blindfolded. You might get a better offer elsewhere. Or you could turn down an ED offer because of insufficient aid, and then find it was your best offer. You have no way of knowing.</p>
<p>Well, the fafsa calculator that is linked to the Duke fin aid website gave us a total of $4000 per year as our efc. Duke claims that if your income is under $60K (which ours is) that you will have no loans to payback.</p>
<p>As far as other schools, we have the Florida prepaid college plan, and our tuition and one year of housing is prepaid. That would leave us with just room and board for 3 years to pay for, and we are pretty confident about her acceptance into UF or FSU.</p>
<p>If she is happy with the Florida options, and wants to apply to Duke as her one “dream” school, then ED would be fine. Some kids are happy with a list that is composed of several “safeties” and one “reach”. If however, she has several other “matchy to reachy” schools that she might consider, and she’d like to be able to compare aid packages, ED isn’t such a good idea.</p>
<p>The no loans for certain income often come with a caveat that you have “typical assets” for that income. I don’t know about Duke specifically, but check their website. </p>
<p>For the FAFSA link check that you entered all data correctly. For instance something seemingly unimportant such as the type of tax return you file can make you eligible for your assets to be ignored, or ineligible for your assets to be ignored.</p>
<p>The school will ONLY use FAFSA to determine federal aid, which is NOT MUCH. Do not misunderstand what EFC means. That is not the most you have to pay…it’s a misnomer!!!</p>
<p>So…even at a FAFSA-only school, having a low EFC does NOT mean that you don’t have to pay much!!! Most schools do not have much aid to give and gap. Schools are NOT obligated AT ALL to meet EFC. </p>
<p>The school will use CSS Profile to determine your “family contribution.”</p>
<p>The school WILL expect you to use some of that non-retirement savings.</p>
<p>Self-employed people OFTEN find the schools that use CSS Profile are NOT generous to them because those schools often “add back in” deductions that you’ve taken.</p>
<p>If your D applies ED, make sure that she ALSO applies to various schools where she would get large merit (before those early scholarship deadlines!! Often in Dec!!!). </p>
<p>ED isn’t a good idea when finances are iffy.</p>
<p>And, yes, the no loans deal is often tied to assets as well.</p>
<p>Typical assets usually means straight forward income from work and assets such as a primary home. having a small business is not a typical asset and they do not consider fluctuations in income for the self-employed a special circumstance. </p>
<p>Also linking Duke’s Financial Aid Guide to special circumstances</p>
<p>you will need to use a calculator that will calculate your EFC using both the federal and the institutional methodologies. Your FAFSA EFC only determines your eligibility for Federal/entitlement aid.</p>
<p>Great advice, everyone. Thank you for the quick responses. It is very confusing, and I am not a dummy, but when I used the calculator found on the Duke website, it literally estimated our contribution at $4k per year and I was so excited…then I realized that I needed a reality check so I went straight to the CC mavens.</p>
<p>She is working now on the apps for about 5 schools and plans to finish by the end of September, she is really on top of it, which is why I am trying to get on top of the financial aid end. STRESS!</p>
<p>If you used the net price calculator on Duke’s website, it links you to the College Board. This net price calculator is not a “FAFSA calculator”, but is programmed to specifically show you an estimate of Duke’s institutional aid, assuming you put your correct financials in. It captures business losses, home equity, etc. You mention substantial savings - that is captured in the calculator, so as long as you entered your financials correctly, and don’t have anything missing, you can feel pretty confident that you are in the ballpark. </p>
<p>You might also consider calling and talking to someone in Duke’s FA office and talk through your situation just to get a better level of comfort that you have represented your financial situation accurately. My experience with Duke’s FA office has been extremely positive. They are very helpful.</p>
<p>Ok, so though I did not speak directly to the FA adviser, we did email back and forth. here is her reply:</p>
<p>We do provide significant funding to families whose earnings are less than $60,000, and a certain level of asset protection is allowed for each family. Until we complete the ED estimate, I wont be able to provide any specifics on how your assets may impact your contribution, but if you reported them in the net price calculator, it should have computed your contribution very closely to what our office would have determined. Contributions for families whose income is below $60,000 does not exclude assets entirely, so depending on the amounts available in equity, savings, investments, etc., you may still have to use a portion of your assets to fund a portion of your daughters education. </p>
<p>So, I guess we will see what happens in a few months…</p>
<p>Our EFC was a little above 6700. We are paying about 1 and 1/2 times that for the school my D chose, which gave her a very generous scholarship and a grant too. Some of the schools to which she was accepted expected us to pay a bit over 3 times the EFC - not workable for us. While our D had a “dream school” that was “meets need” we did not allow her to apply ED - we needed to be able to compare financial offers. She chose the school that offered her the best financial deal. A tier 2 school that has much to offer academically and financially. I learned so much here on this site. You were wise to seek the wisdom offered by so many here!</p>
<p>Well, we are letting her apply ED because Duke is so competitive, you have a better chance of getting in ED than RD. We already know that a FL state school will only cost about $5K for us per year, with the prepaid tuition plan and Bright Futures scholarship, so we are rolling the dice on this one…we will see how it turns out.</p>
<p>And here is the update:
D has been accepted to Duke, and they have offered us a grant for 75% of the costs! This leaves us with about $15k per year, we can make this work. SO proud, so thrilled!!!</p>
<p>Congrats. I missed this thread back in Sept. S is now a junior at Duke, is doing well, and loves it. </p>
<p>We went through your pre-application angst as well. Like you, their finaid package matched our expectations. I don’t want to get your hopes up, but our final package freshman year was actually a little better than the ED-estimate. Not much, but some. Caveat, we have a pretty straghtforward financial situation. No businesses, rental properties, etc. </p>
<p>Biggest sticker shock comes when you look into getting tickets to a basketball game. Haha. </p>
<p>You wanna see something nuts, go check Stubhub for tix to the UNC game. I think i could get a Super Bowl ticket cheaper. That said, if you’re even a little basketball fan, it’s worth going to a non-UNC game. Tix are still ridiculous relative to most college b-ball venues, but it is a crazy and fun experience. And should be experienced at least once if at all possible.</p>