There is no written proof by any college that I have seen that they use the retirement assets, or car values as part of their financial aid formula. However, having heard the question asked, as to whether those asset values are ever or never used, it’s been confirmed at three colleges, at parent FA meeting with the FA Officer that the values are used at certain thresholds that they decline to give.
Increasingly, colleges are coming up with financial aid plans (Rice Incentive an example, Hopkins doing something similar last I heard), where financial aid is “guaranteed” at certain threshold of income provided “ordinary financial circumstances” are present. The schools leave that definition open, as things like extraordinary assets, a very expensive house, huge qualified plan assets, a business, other assets may come into the picture.
Many discussions of the CSS PROFILE do bring up the fact that there are schools that use these retirement account values. All info on the PROFILE is not used by all PROFILE schools. That it is requested is some indication that some schools may use that data. That it’s a FYI item only, doesn’t make sense in that the present value of ones vested Accrued pension benefit in employer plans is not requested—THAT info is definitely not taken into consideration.