Part 1: Timing and Income Last week the Department of Education announced that this year’s FAFSA will come out in December, not October. We now have some additional information about FAFSA Simplification and what’s in store, so let’s dig in! December? Yes, this year the FAFSA will be released in December, not October. That’s to accommodate the myriad changes that…
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CSS PROFILE
Next fall’s FAFSA should look different from this year’s, with FAFSA Simplification in the pipeline, and the coming changes could impact your eligibility for financial aid. FAFSA Simplification will have different impacts on different families depending on situations, so it’s important to understand what’s coming and how it’s likely to affect your EFC (besides changing it to SAI). Some of…
I get a common question from families applying for college: “I applied to the college but how do I apply for scholarships?” The answer to that is actually pretty simple: If you filed the FAFSA, you have applied for need-based aid. And your application to the college is the application for most merit scholarships. Most institutional awards– that is to…
Once you’ve filed the FAFSA, your work may not be done. That’s because there’s another financial aid form, the CSS Profile. The Profile is used by about 400 private colleges to allocate their own financial aid dollars. The FAFSA and the Profile have a lot of similarities, but also some key differences. Like the FAFSA, the Profile uses parent income…
One of the most baffling questions about the FAFSA is “When?” As in, “When do my assets count?” Or “When does my income count?” Or “When can I claim a tax credit?” This year’s FAFSA and CSS Profile use 2021’s income. Assets are counted at their value on the date you file. So when you file the FAFSA or Profile,…