<p>@dancer1502:
Firstly (and most importantly) best of luck to you and you are right, I’m sure you are going to be happy wherever you wind up.</p>
<p>About the home equity component: I know of at least several schools that look at this, and Brandeis is not unique. As to why, I can only conjecture, but I believe it’s to prevent people from “shielding” their assets in home equity in order to qualify for financial aid. Someone (and I’m certain that you didn’t do this) could take all their money, put it into real estate and then claim they had “nothing” when it came to qualifying for FA.</p>
<p>In other contexts people do this all the time. In some states (notably Florida), when you declare bankruptcy, your primary residence (regardless of its worth) is off-limits to your creditors. So you can go to Florida with ten million dollars, buy the most expensive house you can find, declare bankruptcy and keep living in your mansion and your creditors can’t touch it.</p>