I am not aware of Princeton claiming to be free tuition for families making under $200k. Net price using Princeton’s NPC is below. I entered $0 assets from both parent and student, so this is a lower estimate of price. Families with significant assets will pay more. I used an AGI = 85% of gross.
$300k Income – Net Price = $92k/year (sticker)
$250k Income – Net Price = $78k/year
$200k Income – Net Price = $55k/year
$150k Income – Net Price = $32k/year (similar to no tuition)
$100k Income – Net Price = $9k/year
A Google search mentions the following colleges making a $200k type claim – MIT, Penn, Harvard, and Emory. Harvard’s NPC is especially quick to use, so I’ll use Harvard as an example. With under $100k assets and no other kids in college, I get the following. If non-retirement/primary home assets are >$100k, parents are expected to contribute 5%. I expect >$100k assets is common for persons with $200k income. Students are expected to contribute 5% of assets above $5k. Another kid in college generally reduces cost by 20-25%, below these numbers.
Note that it is not a hard threshold, such as $199k gets big discount and $250k does not. Instead it’s a sliding scale, such that $250k income pays $19k/year more than $200k income, with assumptions above. I expect the others on the list work the same way.
$330k Income – Net Price = $91k/year, 28% of income (sticker)
$300k Income – Net Price = $75k/year, 25% of income
$250k Income – Net Price = $49k/year, 20% of income
$200k Income – Net Price = $30k/year, 15% of income (similar to no tuition)
$150k Income – Net Price = $16k/year, 11% of income
$100k Income – Net Price = $9k/year, 9% of income