politeperson: Thank you for the very good thoughts. You were right! I had done most of my analysis with FAFSA and other anecdotal comparisons. I reran my info with their NPC (didn’t realize it existed), which clearly takes into account my retirement assets (pretty much the majority of what we have now as we are living on non-retirement assets)…and sure enough, that brought the expected aid way down to the range they are in! So at least now I understand what was going on and why there was a disconnect.
For those that have recommended Purchase…I wholly agree! She had 6 schools to apply to…received acceptance to Pace early and felt she would want to go there more than Purchase and 2 others (in love with NYC), so she didn’t apply to those. Now it is down to Pace and Fordham and the liberal arts quality of Fordham is winning us over (albeit for more $). If I was doing it all over again, I would have pushed harder for Purchase…a great program and VERY economical (for our situation).
Will make our decision in the next 2 days and do our best to make it work.
Thanks to all again for the helpful comments and feedback.