should I even be going through the hassle of applying for aid?

@WalknOnEggShells

The amount of institutional aid given by a college is determined by THAT college.

With $100,000 income, there are places where this student would receive a HUGE amount of need based aid. For example, at Stanford, a student would pay 10% of their income to attend this $70,000 University. Same with palaces like Harvard and Yale.

It all depends on how generous the colleges can be with their need based aid.