How can i file as in independent on the FAFSA but under 21 years old?

Question

How can i file as in independent on the FAFSA but under 21 years old?

Answer 1

Hi, I did this about ten years ago, but I remember getting help from my financial aid advisor.  A friend of mine did this last year and I remember him needing the tax information from at least one of his parents.

You might want to check with your school's financial aid department.

  

Answer 2

http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/FOTWWebApp/fotw0...

Go to this website, and if you answer yes to any of these questions then you are considered independent. If you answer no to all of them, sorry, but you will still be considered dependent and have to put down your parents information.  

Answer 3

You can not.

The definition of "independence" for federal financial aid purposes has NOTHING to do with the dictionary definition of independent. This term "independence" is defined by federal law.

You are ONLY independent IF you can answer "yes" to one or more of the following questions:

Were you born before January 1, 1985?

Are you married, as of today?

Do you (PERSONALLY) provide more than 50 percent of the financial support for a child of your own?

Do you (PERSONALLY) provide more than 50 percent of the financial support for a non-child dependent who lives in your home?

Are you an orphan, or have you been declared a ward of the court?

Are you (or were you) an active duty member of the US military?

Those are the ONLY criteria that define independence as that term is used for financial aid.

I know that the dictionary definition of independence is about whether your parents give you money, or whether you live with them, or whether you talk to them, or whether you know where they live, or whether they claim you as a dependent on their income tax return, or whether they're going to help pay for school, or whether your boyfriend supports you and they don't, or whether....you get it...

None of these things have anything to do with the way independence is defined by the federal government when they're classifying you for financial aid. If your parents moved to Timbuktu and lived in a hut with no running water, and had their faces changed specifically so you wouldn't recognize them, you would still be a dependent student unless you were 23, married, an orphan, a military veteran, or someone who personally supported a child or another dependent.

That's the law.

The person who just told you that they got it changed is not telling you the truth, or they're leaving out an important fact about their personal circumstances.

You can not file as an independent on the FAFSA if you can't answer "yes" to one of those questions.

I know this isn't what you wanted to hear, but I hope what you wanted to hear was the truth, and not just something that sounded good.