Yes, you can use your 529 for off-campus room and board and, assuming you have money in your 529, you should! And you should do it right to save money and hassle. There are a few elements to doing it right. The right amount: Off-campus room and board are Qualified Higher Education Expenses (aka “OK to spend your 529 on”)…
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If your financial aid award includes work-study, you should understand what it is. Work study falls under the self-help column of financial aid, meaning it’s not free money. The work-study portion of your aid package is your earnings from a qualifying on- or off-campus job. You get work-study funds by finding a job and working during the school year. Work-study…
It’s tax time, which means it’s time to claim education tax credits you may be eligible for. Unfortunately, a lot of tax software programs don’t provide good instructions for doing so, so it’s a good idea to pull up the instructions for Form 8863 and review them before filing. The American Opportunity Tax Credit is the more valuable of the two credits,…
529 college savings accounts have loads of well-publicized benefits: tax-free growth and distributions for qualified expenses, state tax benefits for contributions, gifting pages, and much more. But the unsung benefit of 529s is their preferential treatment in financial aid formulas. How is that? First, the new simplified FAFSA only has you report the student’s 529 balance as an asset, not…