Keep in mind that it is each college’s determination of what “full need” means. It is very likely that, if accepted, a meets full need college will expect you to pay more that 8-12K
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The Americans who I know who where in a similar situation have needed to either attend in-state public universities with merit aid, or start off in community college for two years and then transfer to an in-state public university. I do understand that when your only income comes from rental properties, you cannot both sell the rental properties and maintain the income. I also understand that moderately high asset low income parents cannot afford to lose their assets, since they will have no way to ever get those assets back. However, financial aid in the US does not seem to understand this, at least in my experience. I also know some farmers and some small business owners who have been in a similar situation, and have needed to attend in-state public universities or community college.
You could apply, and if accepted see whether you get an affordable option. You could also look for universities in the US that give very good merit based aid. However, there is a very significant risk that you might be accepted to multiple universities in the US and find that none of them are affordable, even for schools that claim to meet full need.
I think that there is a very real possibility that there will simply be nothing in the US that is affordable.
If you are close to being the #1 student in your country, then one wild thought is that you could apply for the Lester B Pearson scholarship at the University of Toronto. You need to get your high school to sponsor you to even apply, and winning this scholarship is on a level of difficulty similar to getting accepted to Harvard. However it is a very good scholarship at a very good university for those few international students who are selected.
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OP, you have gotten a lot of good advice, and if you are accepted but the FA is too low, you can reach out to the FA office to explain your situation.
With that said, as a thought experiment, if one family had $500,000 in cash and received dividends or interest from it, how would the university look at that family’s ability to pay? If another family took that $500,000 and bought real estate, how is it different?
But in the first case, if the asset is in a retirement account, it will be considered differently, and if you are in a place without retirement accounts, it’s easy to see why you would see these as interchangeable.
Everyone has unique situations.
In some countries, it is next to impossible to borrow against real estate so the only way to monetize it is to sell it.
I think you’re going to have to see what FA you are offered byvthe institutions that accept you and go from there.
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In the case where assets are high enough such that it can be estimated from the formula that the student won’t receive any aid (SAI > college cost), but income is well below $60K, would there be any reason to file FAFSA, assuming the targeted college does not require it for merit aid (US resident)?
I keep reading that “filing the FAFSA is easy and fast”, keep getting emails from colleges offering FAFSA filing grants (!), but in our case it isn’t at all easy or fast, given the types of assets involved, so I’d rather not go through it unless it would have a downside.
OP is an international, so FAFSA is irrelevant. If you’re asking a different question about your own situation, starting a new thread is a better option vs hijacking another user’s
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