I need help with a tough financial aid question!?

Question

My parents are in the middle of a divorce. My mom and dad both had to file their taxes together this year. the problem is, my dad made $90,000 last year, and my mom made 20,000. Since then, he lost his job and isnt paying the proper amount of child support. so I NEED money for college. My mom barely makes anything and we are almost living in poverty. But our taxes do not reflect that. Is there a way we can exclude my dads money from last year because he doesnt live with us and isnt paying anything to us? I dont know what i'm going to do if I dont get money to help me pay for college. I am already 12,000 sunk into a college loan from a bank and it has a pretty high intrest rate and i need to pay that off as well. HELP! My parents dont know anything about this stuff and I am overwhelmed.

Answer 1

If you have not filed your fafsa yet, the answer to this is simple.  Your mother is "separated" and you do not have to include his info and assets on your fafsa even if they filed their taxes together.  You simply take his info out of the formula by not entering any of his info from the tax forms on the fafsa at all.  

This is easy with a little math.. example:  if he made 90,000 and your mom made 10,000 then you would report only her part of the AGI and her portion of the taxes (10%) becasue her income made up 10% of the total family income.

If you have already filed your fafsa, you need to contact your schools fin aid office and see if they can help you. Explain about your parents divorce and show them proof if possible.  they may or may not be able to help.

Answer 2

I kinda know what you're going through. my parents were in the middle of a divorce my senior year of high school while i was filling out my financial aid stuff.

I don't really know the technical or legal stuff. but i guess you will just have to give them the tax forms even if they are joined. but tax forms aren't the only thing they need. you still need to fill out FAFSA, and the FAFSA form address question such as "are your parents currently together or separated", "with whom do you reside"" etc... so they will kinda understand your situation through these questions.

also make sure to include a statement to your university's financial aid's office explaining in detail your situation. they usually ask and would want you to tell them if you have unusual family circumstances such as divorce,death in family, loss of job..etc.. you would probably make a stronger case if you actually talk to them in person.

I got some grants this way.

good luck! stay strong!

Answer 3

Yes, what you can do when you filed your application go and talk to the financial aid people and explain your situation. You can file a special condition which they called income change. I had a job before and I wasn't entitle to that much financial aid, but when I lost my job I applied for special condition of income change and next semester I got approved for more. Also try to talk to the manager always, some of the stuff in financial aid doesn’t know much.