fafsa question

http://www.finaid.org/fafsa/efc.phtml


Student Aid Report (SAR) and
Expected Family Contribution (EFC)

About four to six weeks after you submit the FAFSA (2-3 weeks for FAFSA on the Web), you will receive your Student Aid Report (SAR). The SAR summarizes the information you provided on the FAFSA, and indicates the Expected Family Contribution (EFC). (If there's an asterisk next to the EFC figure on the SAR, it means your FAFSA has been selected for verification.)

The EFC is the amount of money your family will be expected to contribute to your education. The EFC is subtracted from the school's Cost of Attendance (COA), also known as the "student budget", to arrive at your financial need: Financial Need = COA - EFC. The student budget includes tuition, fees, room and board, books and supplies, travel, and personal and incidental expenses.

The lower your EFC, the more financial aid you will get. The school will try to meet this need through a financial aid "package" that combines aid from federal, state, school, and private sources with loans and student employment.

You may find your EFC figure to be painfully high. This often occurs because the need analysis formulas are heavily weighted toward current income. In addition, the formulas consider your income and assets without taking many common forms of consumer debt into account, such as credit card balances and auto loans. Finally, student income and assets can add significantly to the EFC figure.

FinAid provides a few tips on legal ways you can reduce your EFC and thereby maximize your eligibility for financial aid.

If you do not receive your SAR, call the federal processor at 1-800-4-FED-AID or 1-319-337-5665. They will ask for your Social Security number and date of birth as verification, and will tell you whether your FAFSA has been processed. You can also write to the federal processor at

Federal Student Aid Programs
PO Box 4038
Washington, DC 52243-4038

Carefully review all of the information on the SAR to make sure it is correct. If there are any errors, call the school's financial aid administrator to ask how you should make corrections. The item numbers printed on the SAR correspond with the question numbers on the FAFSA form.

The federal processor will send a copy of your SAR to each of the schools you listed on the FAFSA. If you need additional copies of the SAR, call the federal processor and ask for a duplicate SAR.

Keep your copy of the SAR in the same folder that contains your copy of the FAFSA and the records you used to complete the FAFSA.

Hi cheech!
Must be fafsa day... just submitted son's renewal today.

Where are you getting your EFC from? Have you gotten info back from the school, or is this from the online filing information? When I filed online there was a line that said "EFC" with a number after it. If that's what you're referring to, that is not a dollar amount as I understand it, but more of a score which tells schools how much aid you qualify for based on your fafsa.

Not sure if that answers your question, but since I just looked at the same info I thought I'd throw it out there -

Thanks for the replies I filed fafsa and my efc came back 7996 so this isnt really a dollar amount? I guess I have to wait till the school sends me back our finacial aid letter to find out the final cost we have to pay is this correct?

that's correct - the actual dollar amounts will come from the school, and may include grants, loans, scholarships, etc in addition to your EFC.

Do you have to file for FASFA every year? Even if there was no aid given the previous year.

I would give my unscientific answer of "yes". You never know what may have changed - not just in your own situation, but in the school's as well. One thing that many people do not realize is that many (maybe all) colleges use the fafsa as a springboard for almost all types of financial aid awards, including the privately funded scholarships and grants. It can never hurt you to fill it out, so other than a few minutes of your time, what do you have to lose?

loan..........

You may qualify for additional student loan versus a parent loan

The difference is the payback start date. Parents pay now, students later

oh, and a p.s. to cheech... with all four of our kids so far, we've found the actual financial aid packages varied greatly from school to school. Everything from a full ride plus an extra $2000 at a $45,000 a year school to $12,000 per year at a $25,000 per year school - for the same kid with the same grades, same financial situation, everything. Schools have needs too, and if they "need" you as a student, the package will reflect that.

When parents tell me they couldn't "afford" to send their child to a particular school, I cringe... how could you know? Never applied, never allowed the school to make an offer - ahhhhhhhh! My kids have all gone to schools that are far more costly than anything we could "afford" and yet it's cost us less than it would have to keep them at home. You never know what the offer will look like - take a shot, and if it's not enough, oh well... what did you lose?

Oh, and by the way, it seems many high school guidance departments do a very poor job of explaining this to parents as well - I've heard stories from parents who tell me the counselor told them not to bother to fill out the fafsa because they "make too much" - huh? By who's standards? Has anyone been paying attention to the news stories about the Ivies giving more and more full scholarships to deserving students in an effort to attract a more diverse student body? And one thing they mean by "more diverse" is not rich!

Sorry, my personal soapbox... but I really want people to hear that ANYONE can afford to go to college SOMEWHERE. No, maybe not Harvard or Yale (unless you're diverse!) but there's a place out there for every student willing to work for it. We have five kids and are definitely DIVERSE and yet four of five have made it to college, three are getting master's degrees, number four is halfway done with his undergrad, and number five will graduate H.S. next year and find a place for himself in a college somewhere - not a miracle, just an average family of hardworking, determined kids.