3 FAFSA secrets to help you get the most financial aid #Finance

when it comes to FAFSA a lot of families ask me what can I do to get the most financial aid what can I do when it comes to FAFSA to get the most money from these universities in today’s CashNews.co I want to give you three specific actions that your family can do to increase the

chances of you receiving financial aid now make sure you hit subscribe because every single week we release a new strategy to help your family work towards a Debt-free degree with your student hey there my name is Jocelyn Pearson founder of the scholarship system and

Debt-free degree lab where we redefine paying for college to help families build strong financial Futures rather than ones buried in student Loan Debt now we primarily help students get scholarships for college but a big part of

getting that Debt-free degree is also focusing on financial aid how can we maximize that Debt-free money that we can get access to so FAFSA which stands for the free application for federal student aid it is a very important step up in this process this application

is how Federal entities and state entities and even the universities use your family’s financial information to make decisions on those financial aid packages so there are schools where even if you are not eligible for money through the government because of this form’s results they

won’t even give you money if you don’t do the form so it is used by many different people to make a lot of important decisions especially ones that will impact how much your student has to borrow or how much you as a family are going to pay now I have an entire FAFSA playlist so you

definitely want to check that out we will link to it in the description and also like I mentioned if your student is going through the FAFSA process that means they also need to be doing scholarships so at this point not only do we want to maximize money from the school but we also should be

working on scholarships so if you’re interested in learning where to find legitimate scholarships I have a free training it’s my six steps to securing scholarships I’ll link to that in the description as well or you can find it somewhere on the screen here but open that up for

after this CashNews.co the first secret is to apply early now that said before I even get into why October 1st is when FAFSA opens so starting your students senior year in high school that October we need to submit FAFSA I’ve had families October 1st like within hours messaging me freaking

out because the website’s bogged down and all the stuff panicking because they don’t get it submitted by the end of October 1st I’m not saying it has to be on October 1st okay in fact actually I would recommend waiting maybe a week two weeks even three weeks but ideally if we

can’t have FAFSA done by the end of October then that is fantastic now there are a few reasons why we want to submit it early first and foremost different schools different states have different deadlines so the rule of thumb used to be with the tax deadline that was the deadline for FAFSA

but actually some institutions have requirements for FAFSA to be submitted well before that I mean even December of your students senior year so I’ve seen students miss out on a lot of money with major universities and I’m talking like 40 000 a year in money because they missed that

school’s specific deadline so that said if we can do it early we don’t even have to worry about it right but I I would recommend looking into each University that your student is going to apply to and just confirm what their deadline is that you know you at least meet that deadline this

also depending on the state can give them access to more money because some of the money is based on a first come first serve status so the sooner they get in line the chances of them receiving money are higher if they wait until spring of their senior year and they wait for the financial aid

packages to be coming out that money is already awarded out so we do not want to wait until then that said there are states whereverse come first serve and one once the money’s gone it is gone so we don’t want to have that happen to us another reason we want to submit early is because

it gives us time to make Corrections in Spring that’s when we’ll get our financial aid packages usually and figure out what what we can pay and commit to a school but the earlier we get FAFSA the earlier we can get that estimate and start looking into scholarships for example or start

comparing schools and seeing which ones are reasonable which ones are just totally out of range so again the earlier the better in this case because it just can have give us more time to make decisions it can also give us more time to make Corrections so maybe after it’s submitted you realize

oh my gosh our tax information wasn’t submitted correctly or we fudged this number or whatever it is it just gives you more time more leniency there to get the numbers in and still be considered normal with the process of the school deciding how much Aid your student will receive so that said

again we want to submit it as early as possible starting October of your student’s senior year and we want to make sure that it doesn’t have to be right away but we do want to make sure that for sure by the end of that month if we can get it done that’ll be better now secret

number two goes off of a common myth that I have to always address with families and that is oh we make too much money people told us not even to submit FAFSA and that is why secret number two is even if you don’t think you’ll qualify always fill out FAFSA The Only Exception I would say

I’ve seen here is some students are afraid to if maybe there’s kind of immigration issues but if your family if you’re U.S citizens there is no reason not to do this like I mentioned earlier this gives students access to federal funds to State funds but also there are institutions

that use this to decide what they will offer the student from their own funds so a lot of universities most universities will not even consider your student for any kind of Institution money without the FAFSA form so again you have to submit FAFSA it’s just non-negotiable with our families in

the scholarship system and Debt for degree lab they know they always want to submit this even if we don’t think we’re going to get anything now that said believe it or not there are families that make multiple six figures that do receive something even if it is Federal

Loans those are typically the best Loan terms that a student will receive so even if it’s Debt money that we’re getting through the government it’s still going to be better off typically than private Loans for

example so again we always always want to submit this now if you’re unsure about the difference between scholarships like I mentioned earlier that free training you want to check out in the description or financial aid or government Loans I have a CashNews.co where I go into

scholarships and financial aid what’s the difference so we will link to that CashNews.co in the description as well you can check that out after this CashNews.co just make sure you understand the different terminology and the different kinds of funds that your student can actually pursue for

college now the last Point here with making sure that you submit a FAFSA form is that some universities give something called a gap scholarship this is where the amount that FAFSA says that you can afford the difference between that and the bill they’ll match so they will give your student

some sort of Aid package that covers that gap for your family so again there’s no way to even calculate that if you’re you’re a student and you if you haven’t filled out FAFSA Okay the third and final secret is to apply each year now stick with me because I’m going to

have multiple reasons why so don’t assume okay we know that click off when it comes to applying each year I’m talking about starting senior year October again but every year that your student is going to college thereafter here’s the reason why this has to be done the FAFSA form

requires prior prior tax year information and it asks your current banking information your Assets all these different questions when your student is in college that can change lot for example covid we saw overnight people lose their Income or just Financial

situations change drastically very quickly and so this is a a very extreme example of how family situations can definitely change year to year also by doing it annually every single year you and your student will have an opportunity to appeal for more money so for example if the numbers that are

submitted to FAFSA say that you can afford way more than you truly can in some instances you may be able to show proof that that is not the truth that is not the case anymore and they can adjust the financial aid package so this is why we have to make sure that we’re doing this every single

year your financial situation changes so they might be able to get more money the following year even if they didn’t get anything the previous year the other thing that’s interesting is when they’re submitting FAFSA it’s based off of the other students enrolling right so

maybe if your student is going to a lower Income area school you see your numbers make it seem like you all make more than most of the students or maybe they go to a very well-off school and now you’re at the lower end of what a student is what a student’s family is

earning compared to other students every year that comparison that student body and the demographics and the the numbers change as well so again even if yours haven’t changed that much maybe the school’s student body has changed so again these are different reasons and just

understanding how it works is so important to understanding the importance of submitting this every single year now again going off of this we want to make sure we’re watching the deadlines every year they can change each school has their own so we always want to make sure that we watch the

deadlines to submit and also to appeal if that is something that you think your family can do all right so that said while I want to be careful not spending too much time diving in a specific scenarios right now comment below do you have have a unique situation are you curious about it comment

below and we can comment back with some resources some CashNews.cos maybe even help you out with some answers here so comment below if you have questions about any of these but that said again submitting FAFSA it is such a critical part of the college process it can drastically reduce what your

family has to pay or at the very least it can get your student much better terms when it comes to borrowing and ones that parents don’t have to co-sign so that’s a big tip as well so that said hopefully you all will listen to me and submit FAFSA and use these three secrets to really

maximize that Aid again make sure you hit subscribe so you don’t miss out on any other strategies we release for working towards that Debt-free degree and make sure you check out all the amazing resources I mentioned they are all Linked In the description I’ll see you

in the next CashNews.co