College Planning & Financial Aid

Contributions to an Educational IRA must be completed by the due date of the return 4/15/XX , NOT including extensions.

No. The IRS does not allow a deduction for law school because they consider the costs of law school to qualify the student for a new profession.

Withdrawals from a regular IRA that are used for higher educational expenses at a post secondary school are not subject to the 10% penalty on early withdrawals that is reported on IRS Form 5329. Qualified expenses include tuition, books, fees, supplies and room and board if student is at least a half-time student.

www.fastweb.com/fastsearch/college is FastSearch website. dir.yahoo.com/education/higher_educationcolleges_and_universities is Yahoo's website.

www.collegeboard.org/sat/html/satform.html is SAT on line forms access) (www.act.org/aap/regist/index.html is ACT on line forms access) (www.collegeboard.com is the College Boards site with advice and explanations and SAT review questions.) (www.college.com includes free SAT and ACT practice tests) (www.number2.com includes free SAT practice tests)

Yes. If you are receiving any kind of financial aid from the university or college or government sources, you must report the scholarship to the financial aid office. Generally, the university or college will adjust your financial aid package to compensate.

The financial need analysis process for financial aid uses your family's income, assets and tax information from the most recent tax year. This is called the base year. It is used to evaluate your eligibility for need based financial aid during the upcoming academic year This is called the award year. Since the "base year" ends December 31st, you cannot submit a financial aid application until January 1. Your parents may earn a year-end bonus or realize huge capital losses from selling stocks before December 31st. Financial aid applications sent before January 1st will be rejected.

Yes. Most Financial Aid offices require that you apply for financial aid every year. If your financial circumstances change, Your financial aid may change and you may get more or less aid. After your first year you will receive a FAFSA Renewal Application which contains preprinted information from the previous year's FAFSA form. Your eligibility for financial aid may change significantly, especially if your parents work situation has changed or you have a different number of family members in college. Renewal of your financial aid package also depends on your continued satisfactory academic progress toward a degree, such as earning a minimum number of credits or achieving a minimum grade point average.

No. Parents will only be responsible for your educational loans if you are under 18 and they cosign your loan. In general you and you alone are responsible for repaying your educational loans. Parents are responsible for the Federal PLUS loans only. If your parents want to help pay off your education loans, you can have your billing statements sent to their address. Also, if your lender provides an electronic payment service where the monthly payments are automatically deducted from a bank account, your parents can agree to have the payments deducted from their account. Your parents are under no legal obligation to repay your loans. If they forget to pay the bill on time or decide to cancel the electronic payment agreement, you will be held responsible for the payments, not them.