Beyond Federal Aid: The Complete Guide to Financing College for Your Family

Webinar Transcription

2025-04-29 – Paying for College 101: The Complete Guide to Covering College Costs

Lydia: Great.

Hello everyone. Welcome to, “Paying for College 101, the Complete Guide to Covering College Costs,” sponsored by College Ave. My name is Lydia Hollon and I will be your moderator tonight. I’m a senior advisor at CollegeAdvisor, and we’ve been with the company for about three years now. And in addition to advising students, I’m the proud co-captain of our essay review team and a graduate of New York University.

To orient everyone with a webinar timing for tonight, we’re going to start off with a presentation, then answer your questions in a live q and a, and on the sidebar you can download our slides and start submitting questions in the q and a tab. We’ll also be recording the session so that you can review the webinar again later.

So now let’s meet our presenter. All right. Good evening

Kat: everybody. My name’s Kat Delgrosso. Uh, I work at College Ave Student Loans, which is, uh, out of Wilmington, Delaware. And we, um, offer student loan, private student loans as a means to cover the gap between your cost of attendance and other financial aid that you have.

Um, I’ve been in the field for, um, in the financial aid field for over 30 years. Um, I’ve worked at a couple of college campuses, including Syracuse University and University of Rochester. Um, in addition to that, I’ve worked, um, at the college board for over, for about, about seven years, and I’ve worked in student loans for, um.

A long time, the rest. Um, and, um, I have been with College Ave for six and a half years, um, but I was in student loans before that as well. So, um, I’ve been, I’ve been around and hopefully, um, have some information tonight that will help you with, with your financial aid questions, um, as you’re kind of preparing to head off to college, maybe this coming fall.

Um, some of you may be a, um, not senior, not be a parent of, or a senior in college in high school. Um, so I think what we’ll do is we’re gonna, um, do a quick poll and figure out who, who was on the call tonight and, um, what grade that you’re in in high school so that we can get a sense as to who’s here. So, um, Lydia, I’m gonna go ahead and.

Head out to that first poll for us.

Lydia: Okay, great. So those of you joining us, you should be able to see that poll now. And while I give you all an opportunity to answer that first question of what grade are you in, uh, I’m just curious for you, Kat, what is the biggest misconception that you think people have about paying for college?

Kat: Um, the biggest misconception, um, is probably that it’s just about the tuition and like eating and sleeping, um, on campus. Um, but the reality is there are some additional pieces that are kind of part of. What you need to afford while you’re there, such as, you know, some of the stuff I’ll be talking about tonight, but things like books and getting there, like the physical transportation of getting there, um, and getting back home again, and some of those little extras of, you know, personal expenses and, and people not budgeting for those things.

So, um, that’s, that’s hopefully I, I think that’s one of the top ones anyway, so

Lydia: good to know. I definitely wish I could’ve thought about those things a little bit more when I was a student as well. Um, so looking at our responses here, we have 2% in ninth grade, 5% in 10, 52% in 11th grade, 33% in 12th, and 8% in that.

Right. Got one more poll for you all before we jump into the presentation. So this one is, have you already chosen where to attend college and Kat? I’m curious, how has the college financial aid process changed do you think, in the past few years? Or, you know, for me, or for you since we were last in college?

Um, how, how significantly has it changed? I know when I’ve worked with parents, sometimes they’re shocked with how different colleges now compared to when they were in school. I. So how different colleges or applying for college? You said the, the college

Kat: financial aid piece. The pe Yeah. Um, well, a lot has changed and just in the last year and a half, well, I guess basically just in the application process itself, so if anyone on the call has, um, any siblings who were already in college.

Um, the process was a lot different like a couple years ago, and then there was a revised application for, you know, federal student aid and that kind of was a little bit of a, a bump, if you will. There were some, some, uh, some issues in terms of the application being okay, like viable to process on time and that sort of thing.

So it made a lot of delays and everything. So if you have older siblings who were in school, um, you know, a lot changed last year with that financial aid process, but. It’s smoothing out for this year. Hopefully. So,

Lydia: yeah, that’s good. Yeah, I know there’s been a lot of changes in the past few years. Yeah. Um, so looking at those answers, you have 39% have already chosen where they’re attending college.

38%. So, you know, but they kind of have an idea. 21% say they have not decided at all, and 3% are in that other category. Okay. Alright. So.

Kat: Alright, thank you so much. Um, so I thought it might be helpful to give a little bit of background, um, in terms of how families are currently paying for college. And this is based on a study, um, that college a did. Um, it’s, you know, just kind of asking undergrad students, um, who were attending four year institutions, how they were currently paying for school.

So this is very recent, this is in February. Um, and so merit aid, merit aid is basically, um, you know, aid that is based on either talent, academic based, talent based, um, that sort of thing. And, um, 53%. So the highest number on this chart is coming from merit aid. So that’s helpful. Um. The other thing that is, um, helpful to know too is that’s all free money.

That’s, so that’s money that you definitely wanna be able to qualify for is some sort of grant, even a need-based grant or the merit aid, because that’s all free money that you don’t have to pay back. Um, the second category, and I won’t go through everything on this chart, but the second category, um, the students really were using their federal student loans, which I’ll talk about tonight, and then you can kind of see as it gradually goes down, savings or end income are next.

Um, you know, parent savings and income. Next private student loans. We’re also showing up, um, kind of in the top half of how people are paying for college. So we’ll talk about some of these items here next. Okay, so first I’ll talk about the types of aid and then I’m gonna talk about how you can maybe build a game plan for affording college.

Um, there’s a lot of, so, or excuse me, there’s a lot of 11th graders and 12th graders on this call. I’m glad to see that we’ve got, uh, I think seven, seven people it was, who are in the freshman, sophomore category. So you’re, you’re planning nice and early, um, but for 11th and 12th graders, um, and your fam, the family members on the call, or, um, whoever’s on the call.

I’ve got 8% others, so could be some high school counselors on here too. Um, you know, hopefully this will be good advice to give some, give, give a game plan for moving forward. Um, talk about a little bit about the aid process and how to maybe reduce your stress level in terms of some tips on that. And then, um, also what to know about student loans as well.

So financial aid is, um, basically money that is going to reduce the cost of attending college. Um, your total cost minus financial aid equals kind of what’s left over. So what is your cost gonna be after? You can obtain some types of financial aid that I’m gonna talk about, which will include things like the grants and the loans that I was mentioning on, um, on that.

Survey study. Um, so total cost minus financial aid. That’s pretty much what’s, what’s the gap? What’s, uh, what’s the leftover amount that you’re looking to pay, um, to have to pay. Um, and what you can do is of certainly compare college costs from one college to the other, but I wouldn’t do it at the be at when you see a sticker price.

I would do it after your financial aid has been calculated and received, um, when you’re kind of in that senior year of high school and you’re heading off, uh, getting ready to head off to college in the coming fall, um, you know, apply to the schools that you think are a good fit academically, socially, emotionally, um, you know, and, and maybe you don’t know if it’s a good fit financially, but if you don’t apply, you won’t know, um, how, how that financial aid is gonna play out.

Um, and what you wanna be able to do is to have. Financial aid available before you can make your final decision as to where to go to college. So, um, and what, what the, in terms of the second bullet of quote unquote, your cost will be. So, um, yeah, so that’s, that’s advice there. You know, comparing your college costs, you wanna make sure you’ve got that financial aid in hand so that you can make a good comparison, um, realistic comparison.

And some of financial aid is not based on need. So, um, for those folks on the call tonight who maybe think that you’re not gonna be eligible for need-based aid, um, this call is still for you because, um, there’s all sorts of, um, types of things out there, and I’m gonna talk about those here. So the main, uh, four categories of financial aid are, are as follows.

You’ve got grants and scholarships, which I mentioned are free money. Um. In that survey study that was like, you know, 53% of how that group of students was paying for college was coming from grants and scholarships. And that’s, that’s the kind of financial aid you really wanna get ’cause you don’t have to pay it back.

Um, there may be some academic components to keeping it while you’re at college, you know, certain GPA that’s required in some cases, it, it’s not based on a GPA, um, per se. So it, it’ll be, those will be questions that you’ll wanna ask when you get to that point. Um, for those of you who are seniors in high school here, um, the 33 of you, um.

You know, we’re kind of getting close to the May 1st deadline in terms of, um, applying or, and choosing where you want to enroll for the fall if you’re at a college, if you’re looking at colleges that do have that deadline. So I know you guys are right on top of it. Um, so you, you’re probably, um, able to do part of this presentation because you, you, you folks have already kind of been seeing some of the stuff I’m gonna be talking about.

Um, besides the free money though, there are also some other things, um, work study where you could work on campus and earn a paycheck. Um, and I would say that on average students who do work on campus to try to earn some money towards their cost will, um, work anywhere from, I’m gonna say between 10 and 15 hours a week on average.

It may, um, vary based on the, um. The jobs that are available or how much you wanna work based on your academic program. You know, you wanna be careful that you don’t overdo the number of hours that you’re putting in because you also need, you know, you’re there to get your degree and you wanna be able to have enough time to, um, get your, you know, your academic coursework, um, done.

So, um, but I would say in general, from my history, you know, 10 to 15 hours a week probably on average. Uh, and then finally, loans would be another category of financial aid. And, um, that could be either student loans or parent loans or, uh, loans for other people who wanna borrow on the student’s behalf. So I’m gonna talk about those tonight as well.

So, where does the money come from? Um, so there are really four main categories that, um, that provide the funding. So one is that you are hoping for the college and or the university to provide some, some of the funding to you. And those are typically in the form of the, the, the, the grants and the scholarships that I mentioned back here.

Um, they will also be providing you with work study. A lot of times that’s federal money, but sometimes it’s not. Sometimes it’s money directly from the college or the university as well. Um, the federal government also is a source of money, of the money that you would receive in financial aid, and that would be things like a federal Pell grant or, um.

There are a couple of other grants that are, um, that are federal in nature. Um, one is the, in addition to Pell, there is something called SEOG, which stands for Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant. There’s also a teach grant if you’re looking to be a teacher. So there’s are things that you, um, would want to, you’re hoping to see when you’re looking at your financial aid award.

Um, in addition to that, there, some of the work study money is coming from the federal government and, um, the, uh, some of the loans are coming from the federal government. The third source of funding comes from the, the state that you live in. So if you, um, regardless of what state you live in, there is, um, there is a state grant program in your state.

It used to be that there was a, a whole one holdout, but now like all of the states have some sort of a state grant program, some of them also have, um, slim scholarship programs and, um. Those would be more like based on academic as opposed to need. And then some of them also offer loan programs. But, um, in general, there really are grants and scholarships that are coming from the states, and the dollar amounts vary by state.

Uh, sometimes they let you be, let you be, let’s say, um, you live in the state of New York and you are, um, applying to the New York State Grant program. You know, you’ll wanna check to see, okay, well what if I wanna go to school over the border in New Jersey or Pennsylvania? Can I take that New York State grant over the line, the the state line and go to college in New Jersey or Pennsylvania?

And so some of them allow you to cross state lines and go to a college outside of your state and take the money with you, and some of them don’t. So, um, it’s, it’s, that’s definitely something to put on your list to check out. Um, lastly, the money is gonna come from outside sources, which would be things like, um, most, I mean, one of the, one of them that’s prevalent is like, um, if you get tuition benefits from your, from your family’s, um, employer.

So let’s say, um, your parent works at X, Y, z, you know, company and they offer a tuition, um, program where you could get at least a small chunk of, you know, gr um, tuition assistance from the employers. Also, you can get, uh, outside scholarships from all sorts of sources on College Ave. Uh, where I work at College Ave uh, student loans.

We have, um, some scholarships on our website. We have some scholarship resources in our articles that you can look up. So if you’re on our website, you can go to resources that it’s fairly easy to navigate. You can go to resources and then look up some of the articles and search for the scholarship. Um.

Pieces. There are, um, there’s, I know there’s some, some articles in there that have some of the companies where you can look for outside scholarships, um, and college A ourselves. We offer a couple of scholarships on our website. Right now, we have one for $5,000 that, um, you can apply for through June 30th, and then we have one every month for a thousand dollars every month of all year round.

We do that all the time, so you can come back and apply over and over again each month if you want to, but, you know, there’s, so, there’s lots of resources for scholarships, so please try to get some additional funding, even if it’s $250 or $500 or a thousand dollars if you got a couple of those that, that could really put a dent in like some of your costs through for books or personal expenses or things like that.

So. Definitely try those. Um, okay. So building a game plan. Um, so I, as I said, I worked in financial aid myself, so I’ve worked on the campuses, uh, a couple of campuses where I’ve spoken to families, you know, a lot over my career. Um, and one of the things, um, that I know can, uh, trip people up sometimes is, um, just looking at the cost for the entire year and not just one term, because this really is a, um, you know, it’s a, it’s really a multi-year decision that you’re making in terms of where the student is looking to enroll.

And so it’s not just like, okay, I know we can get through the fall semester, but I don’t know how we’re gonna pay for the spring semester. So that is sort of problematic because you wanna make sure that you’re planning for, um. Not just term by term, you wanna kind of have a plan as to how you’re gonna pay for the whole year.

But then also think of it as, okay, well after, after the first year, now what, then what are we gonna do? You know, like, are you prepared to, if you have to borrow, um, or, you know, kind of figure out what is a comfortable do number in terms of how much you as a family are looking to borrow so that you can, you know, kind of make the right decision now before the student actually enters into that school.

Um, the worst thing that, that, um, sometimes is if families get in and the student, I mean, the student is in there and after a couple of years they, they just can’t afford to. Make it work between all the things I’ve already been talking about tonight. Um, you know, we don’t want the student to have to leave that school if they really like it there.

Um, you know, just because of money, you know, you wanna be able to make sure that, okay, all the stuff that I’m able to receive this, this is a good game plan for a four year or five year multi-year degree if the student is looking to go beyond into the graduate or professional market, uh, or, um, education, you know, and beyond.

So that is one major thing. Um, the second thing is planning ahead before the bill arrives. So for those of you folks who are, um, seniors in high school, or families of seniors in high school, so this the, so right now, you know, you’re kind of looking for the fall semester. Or the fall quarter. Some schools do, um, semesters, quarters, trimesters, whatnot.

But for the fall, you’re looking to go. Um, the bill’s probably gonna arrive sometime in June or so, uh, maybe July. The schools will be able to tell you, um, when their bills go out. But basically you wanna plan ahead now a little bit to figure out, okay, well let’s go ahead and it’s almost May 1st. So if you are a senior in, uh, high school right now, or a family of, you know, now’s the time to kind of try out different, if you need any kind of gap financing, now’s the time to try to figure out, well, what, what I’m shopping around, see what’s best for us so that you’re not scrambling later on when the bill is due in July or August, probably like July or August would be the due dates normally.

Um, you’ll probably get the bills in June or July. Um, I. So planning ahead now before the bill arrives. Now for those of you who are 11th graders and younger, you’re not getting a bill now, so that’s good news for you this short term here. But a year from now for you juniors, you know, this is, this is all gonna pertain to you at that time.

Um, direct costs versus indirect. So here’s what that means. Basically, direct costs are things that are billed directly from the college or university. So you may be, um, so obviously tuition, so you’re paying for, that’s kind of the, a lot of times that’s the biggest chunk of what you’re being billed for.

Um, so the school is actually billing you for that in add directly. So you can kind of think of it as, as use the word directly in there. They’re billing you directly for that. Um, similarly there are fees that sometimes that you have to pay as well. I’ll give you an example. Um, things like, um, um, like, um.

Uh, some sort of a campus fee or, um, it’s usually like a one-time. Sometimes they’re per semester fees or maybe once a year fees. Another one is like health insurance. That’s another type of fee. If you’re already covered under, uh, health insurance of uh, a family member, then you’ll wanna make sure that you’re not being charged for that at the school because you don’t wanna be double charged.

You’re already being charged by your employer. You don’t wanna be charged by, um, the college as well. So, um, those types of things though are directly charged to the family on a bill. Um, similarly would be things like if you’re living on campus, you’re the cost of living in the dorm or campus housing will be charged directly on your bill.

And, um, lastly, um, if you have a meal plan directly from the college, they’ll be charging you that directly as well. So I keep using the word directly ’cause that’s kind of the easiest way to think about it. Um, indirect cost. So the other on the other hand, are things like. You know, um, I gotta go buy toothpaste and those are personal expenses that I have, but obviously I’m not being charged by the, the, the school I wanna go buy.

I wanna go have a pizza this Friday night with some friends. Um, but I’m not getting it through my meal plan. So those are indirect costs. Another one would be books and, um, transportation, like getting to and from school, um, if you know, that type of thing. Those are things that you’re just not charged on your bill.

And I, when we were doing the poll at the beginning here, I was saying to Lydia, um, you know that sometimes people, um, families don’t always realize just how much some of the indirect costs can add up. And so you’ll wanna be careful to kind of budget for those. Uh, they are, luckily they are included in the total cost of attendance.

That way when they, the school is figuring out how much financial aid to give you. They’re taking that into account, um, when they’re figuring out your total eligibility for financial aid. But, um, we wanna make sure that, you know, kind of, okay, some of this stuff’s gonna trickle in throughout the year and I wanna be ready for it.

So make sure you’re ready for that. And your game plan, uh, work study, um, how does that work with your bill? So, normally work study is, is just like, it’s a paycheck that you get. Um, di the student gets directly, so the family, the, the parents don’t get it. The, uh, legal guardians don’t get it. It’s directly to the student who’s been working for on the job.

And so it doesn’t ever show up on your bill. So the student receives a paycheck and then. The student does with it, whatever you’ve arranged for them to do with it. Um, however you’ve arranged, um, to, to do something with it. So it’s either gonna go directly towards their personal expenses, like my examples of toothpaste and pizzas on a Friday night or something like that.

Um, maybe you’re saving it towards books. Maybe you’re, you know, you’ve got it earmarked, but definitely kind of plan on that ’cause it’s not gonna be deducted from your bill. Um, and that really, that often tripped families up sometimes ’cause it’s like part of your financial aid, but it doesn’t actually get like, subtracted from, you know, I owe the college $5,000.

How come I don’t see my work study on here? Decreasing it even more. It doesn’t work that way, um, because the student’s getting paid directly. So you’ll wanna, you know, kind of figure out how you want to use that money towards your other. Indirect expenses really. Um, okay. And then taking advantage of everything available to you.

So financial aid can be lots of things, as I mentioned on prior slides, lots of different things, um, loans included. And so, you know, take advantage of everything that’s offered to you if you, if it sounds reasonable, um, in terms of, um, you know, figure, especially the loans you want. You know, a lot of times, uh, families don’t necessarily think of loans as financial aid, but sometimes those are the, they’re not a bad deal if, um, like if you take, you know, the federal student loan, it’s actually a pretty good deal overall.

So, um, taking advantage of at least the student loan, um, as in addition to all the free money and the work study, um, might actually be not a bad thing to do. So, um, and again, that’s the federal student loan for. Students directly. So I’ll be talking about those two. Um, okay, so talking with an, so again, on the financial game plan here, um, I would recommend talking with an aca, well first of all, it’s gonna be part of your, you know, getting into college and meeting with some of the folks as you’re going, you know, leading up towards registering for classes and getting ready for that first fall term.

Um, you’re gonna wanna talk with the academic advisor who’s assigned to you, obviously. So make sure that you kind of make that person important in your, the student’s life because, um, the goal is to graduate on time. It’s actually very expensive to, uh, you know, go another semester. So the more that you can finish within your allotted original timeframe, um, the cheaper it will be.

Because if you need to take on an extra semester or an extra year, then you’re definitely gonna be. Overpaying, then you, you know, if you could have finished in the allotted original time, let’s call it a four year degree, or a two year degree, or whatever it is you’re looking for, um, because otherwise you might be taking out more loans that you really didn’t need to take if you could have finished on time.

So try hard to do that by working directly with the academic advisor. That’s actually a, I think one of the best pieces of advice of the night because, um, a lot of students end up taking extra time or a lot of students overtime have been taking extra, um, time to get, get through and um, you know, it’s just more expensive that way.

So, um, monthly payment plan, so usually the college or university will offer a monthly payment plan, but, um, so let’s say for example, you’re going from, you know, the fall and the spring, uh, next year for, um. You know, 25, 26 year, and, um, the monthly payment plans will allow you to take, okay, let’s say I owe, you know, $5,000 for the year after my financial aid goes through.

Um, I don’t wanna pay the, you know, half in the fall and half in the spring. So if I could divide this up somehow, usually what they’ll do is offer, um, you know, like a shorter payment plan, eight, nine months, 10 months, maybe just to divide it into even monthly payments for a relatively small fee. And when I say relatively small, probably 50 bucks or less or something for the fee.

And, um, it’ll vary by school, of course, but that’s a great way to do it if you can afford the gap, the amount that you’re being asked to pay during that one academic year. Sometimes you can’t afford to pay it all in one year, and that usually means that you need, um. Loans to cover and get you past a four, let’s say a two year, four year, five year degree, so that you can pay it off over time.

But you can, you can, um, you don’t have to kind of cram it into one year to try to pay it all. ’cause it’s, sometimes it’s just not feasible between your income, your assets, and, um, yeah. But you know, you kind of sometimes need something that’s gonna extend beyond the college years. So, um, monthly payment plans, you can check out, you could do a combination of things so you could pay, you know, I could, I know I can afford, I.

2000 for the year, and I can do that in a monthly payment plan. And then maybe I need to borrow the rest or something like that through one of a, one of the private loans or the parent loans of some sort. So, um, you can do a combination of things in my bullet, in my second and third bullets on these, on this slide.

Um, housing and food. So I would recommend, uh, usually as a first year student, the student is typically required to live on campus unless they’re commuting from their, like a fam family home. Um. So, um, I would say, let’s say you’re living on campus and, um, you’ll probably, you know, you would have a meal plan to co, you know, be able to eat on campus and that sort of thing.

When a student is, becomes either a sophomore or definitely like a junior or senior, sometimes they can, um, obtain like campus housing, that’s more apartment living. Either it’s owned by the college or maybe it’s external, you know, in the town or the city, um, where you’re paying a landlord. Sometimes it’s cheaper to live in, in an off-campus housing, um, where you have roommates and, and you can kind of reduce the amount that you’re paying for, um, for rent and that sort of thing.

So, uh, that’s one tip. And then the second thing would be if you’re doing that, you’re also, um, able to do like grocery shopping and split it with, um, your, your friends as well. So. Um, so I would, um, say that those are really important, but again, for first year students, it’s, it’s usually you have to be on campus typically.

Um, but not always. So those are questions that you would wanna ask the colleges. Um, what are my options? Um, also this is a multi-year decision, which I did mention before. So just make sure you’re kind of planning to move into year two and year three and year four without, um, you know, uh, without some sort of a game plan together as a family.

Alright, so navigating the aid process with a little less stress. Um, so you do have to apply every year, so I wanna make sure you knew that. Um, so if you, for those of you who are seniors, uh, or families of family, members of seniors, you’ve already applied for financial aid, uh, um, most likely. Um, if you haven’t, then you’ll definitely wanna do that.

Um, but you do have to apply every year. So the applications, unfortunately don’t roll over from one year to the next. Um, I know that’s a question I got used to get and have gotten over my whole career. Um, unfortunately, we are not at a place where they want you to apply once and it’s good enough for the 4, 4, 4 or five years or two years or whatever.

So that’s gonna be a, that’s definitely gonna be a thing. Um, we have to apply every year. There will be deadlines. I know that sound, that’s not rocket science, but there will be deadlines and I definitely want you to kind of make sure that you are tracking what those deadlines. Are. So for those of you who are seniors in high school now, um, you’ve already applied most likely and or if you haven’t, just make at this point, because we’re so close to the May 1st, um, which is one of the, it’s really kind of like the decision deadline day for, um, many four year colleges and universities, two year colleges.

You, um. Schools, you can typically apply right up closer to the term starting, so you have a little bit more time if you’re a senior in high school right now. For those, those types of schools. Um, for those of you who are juniors, sophomores and freshmen, um, just make sure that you make, have some sort of a system when you’re applying for admission and next year for you juniors, um, and beyond.

For you younger folks on here, um, you do need to make sure that you’re hitting those financial aid deadlines because sometimes they will run out of certain funding and you wanna make sure that you, you are, um, you know, for every different school there could be a different deadline. So, um, you just maybe wanna have a tracking mechanism.

Maybe it’s just a simple spreadsheet or writing it on paper. Good old fashioned paper if you, you know, you just need to know, okay, I wanna apply to these five, you know, schools. I. I need to make sure that I’m hitting the deadlines for these. The other thing that is a big deal on this topic is, um, well, I mean it all is kind of ’cause you wanna get as most free money as you can.

So the colleges and universities free money through the needs, you know, like the grants and scholarships, that’s a big one. The second big one though, are state grants because the state, some of them have really early deadlines, some of them do not, but the ear, some of them do. And um, it’s like before your, you know, like I know there are some that even have like March before this.

Um, first year, like March of your senior year, you know, and beyond could be deadlines for the upcoming fall. So, um, definitely don’t miss those state deadlines as well. So anyway, that’s just my plea to say, um, have some sort of system to make sure that you know, which college needs what and when do they need it.

Um, the other thing is, has to do with special circumstances. So let’s say, um, you, so first of all, let me say that when you apply for financial aid, it is actually looking at, um, kind of old data. Um, the good news is it’s based on completed tax data. The bad news is it’s from like the prior year. So for example, the people who are applying for 25, 26, um, are looking at, you know, 2024, um, tax return data, which some of that could be, um, old by the time you get to the completed year.

It’s actually prior, prior year, sorry. Um, so it’s old data. So if you’ve like lost a job between, um, if a family member, if a parent has lost a job since that, um, prior, prior year, um, tax data, then um, that’s a big one. But also maybe you had. Um, some sort of a, a one-time occurrence of something on your tax return that year.

Maybe you cashed in from retirement, some, some money, or maybe you, um, you know, I don’t know, received, um, an inheritance or maybe you had a business and you had a good year or something like that. So I’m just saying like if there’s anything that’s an anomaly from, um, the tax year that’s being used for the applications and it doesn’t match what your current status is of your income that you’re going through day to day, um, and you will for the 25, 26 year, you definitely, um, will want to talk with the financial aid office, um, and find out if they can allow you to do, they will allow you to appeal, um, using your.

You know, your special circumstances, um, as part of the appeal. So, um, those could also be things like medical expenses that are not covered by insurance and things like that. So, um, um, another one is, uh, secondary education fee costs. Like if your siblings, or if you’re going, if you have, um, high school, uh, tuition that you’re paying, that may be something that schools can take into account.

So anything that’s sort of an anomaly that you want them to make sure that they know about, they’ll, they will have a process for doing that. So they’ll, they’ll want you to tell them that. Um, and then applying for outside scholarships, anytime, those are things like I mentioned earlier, you can look on the, you know, look for like our scholarship that we have on our websites.

Um, there’s some other, um, places where you can do major sort searches for outside scholarships. Things like, uh, places like the college board, college board.org. They have scholarships that they have a. A database where they can get you there. Fastweb is another one. Um, you can also look locally in your backyard, you know, maybe, you know where the student works.

Maybe there’s a scholarship that they offer, maybe where the parents work, as I mentioned earlier, um, the Elks Club, you know, Walmart, places that are right in your backyard. They may have a scholarship. I know I saw a sign on Dunkin’ Donuts, uh, door not too long ago. Um, they have a scholarship for students, so it’s, they’re everywhere.

You just have to look, um, and start applying maybe kind of early for the upcoming year, but apply and apply often. Um, okay, so in terms of, um, so this was from that same, um, that same survey I mentioned earlier. So, um, this was, um. Uh, based on undergraduate students who are already in college, they’re giving advice to high schoolers as to the best places to find scholarships.

And the biggest one was, um, you know, those awarded through the college or university directly, but then online they’ve done, they had done searches, like some of those sources I just mentioned, um, looking online, applying, some of them don’t require ser um, excuse me, essays. So it, it may be quick applications and you can, you know, maybe pump through a bunch of ’em and then hopefully end up, um, winning some of them.

So that is, uh, that’s the second largest. And then beyond that would be like high school counselors and financial aid offices and such. Um, definitely your local community, you know, right in your backyard, think of it that way. Um, and then educational loans. So the types of educational loans are either federal.

Which means that the Department of Education, um, gives out the money to, to the students directly, and also they have a parent loan as well. Um, there are also, um, private loans which are offered through lending, um, lenders like, uh, college Ave, um, or banks, uh, where you do banking. Um, and so the private loans are, uh, here’s the difference.

So federal loans are typically a fixed, well, they always, they always are a fixed rate every year for one year. So basically you borrow the federal loan and then, um, it’s the same interest rate for that loan that year. Um, and then there’s a fee associated with it. So they kind of take the, the, um, a fee right off the top.

Um, they do charge a fee, origination fee they call it. So those are federal loans. And then the private loans, which come from other entities like. College, um, are loans that, um, most of the time don’t have origination fees. There may be a few exceptions out there, but most of them like don’t have origination fees, and they typically will offer you fixed end or variable rates.

So you can choose from those things, um, based on whatever’s best for you. When you go to apply, um, they, um, either way you slice it, they’re all gonna, you know, they all are part of a, your credit score, like over time. So they show up on your credit report. Um, for, for, um, whether it’s a federal loan or a private loan.

The, um, sometimes the private educational loans will allow someone other than a parent to apply. So, for example, a grandma or an aunt or an uncle or, you know, that type of thing. Um, a sibling who’s maybe older and willing to apply on the student’s behalf. So sometimes there’s private loans like through lenders like College Ave do have that, some that available as well.

And then last, the last type are other, and those are things that come from, let’s say, um, like if the parent wanted to borrow a home equity loan against their home, you know, certainly you could look into doing that and see if that’s the best option for you. Um, keeping ’em in mind, of course, that you’re borrowing against your home.

Um, the, you know, the top two bullets are really focused on, or three bullets are based on, those are educational loans. So that’s, it’s, um, it’s not using like your house as collateral essentially. So, um. Other types of loans also might include institutional loans from the college themselves, but those are usually a little bit limited in nature.

Um, but sometimes like international students who don’t have access to federal loans. So unfortunately international students are not able to apply for federal loans. Um, you have to be a US citizen or a permanent resident in order to apply for federal financial aid. Um, so you can’t get access to the federal loans, but you could get access if you’re an international student to the private loans or possibly an, um, another, another type of loan that’s, that’s offered by the college or university to which you’re applying.

So that is something you could ask as well. Um, so those are the, those are the types of educational loans, and then these are the dollar amounts that kind of, I tried to throw it into a small of a snapshot as I could, but for the federal student loans, they are driven by each year that you are in, um, your undergraduate levels.

So it’s 5,500 the first year, 6,500 when you’re, um, considered a second year student, 7,500. When you’re considered a third year and 7,500 when you’re considered a fourth year, if you need, if your, your program is five years, it’s, um, 7,500 again for the fifth year, there is a maximum aggregate limit that you can take out.

And, um, that is 30. Um, I’m gonna misquote here. 30,500 for, I might be, might have just been off just a hair on that. I’m blanking for some reason. Um, but there is an aggregate limit, so you can’t go above that. So if you are kind of taking longer to get through your undergraduate level work, you, you, you’ll run out of the federal direct student loan money.

Um, ’cause they only allow so much. Now they are talking about changing that, but we won’t know that for, um, uh. Uh, I don’t know, a month or two. Uh, it’s coming down the pike. There may be some changes to these, um, to this chart, but I don’t know that yet. It’s, it’s, it’s, um, part of the congressional, um, process.

So we will see, um, the federal direct parent loans are just that. It’s the parent actually borrowing on behalf of the student and, um, you would be able to borrow cost of attendance. That’s what COA means. Sorry, that for the acronym there. COA minus other financial aid. Private educational loans like, um, you know, through College Ave where I work.

Um, again, same thing. Cost of attendance minus other financial aid. And, you know, the private education loans I spoke about, and that could be a number of lenders including college app. So, um. The federal direct parent loans do have a fixed interest rate in this current year, but it’s gonna change. It’s a 9.08% fixed rate, um, with a 4.228% origination fee.

Um, but for this upcoming year, it will change come July 1st. So I don’t know what that rate will be until mid-May. So I couldn’t, can’t tell you that right now, but right now it’s 9.08 for the federal loan with a a 4.228% origination fee. The private loans will have fixed or variable rates, uh, with usually a 0% origination fee depending on the lender.

And then, um, rounding third here basically. And then we, we’ll take some questions here. Um, how much, um, just know before you borrow, like, um, how much should you borrow? Like if you don’t really need, even though you can borrow, does it mean you need to borrow all of it? Um, I would try to limit, you know, certainly if you don’t think you’re gonna need that last portion and you’re sort of thinking, okay, I don’t think I’m gonna need that extra thousand dollars, I, I think I’m only gonna need, you know, 4,500 as a freshman instead of the 5,500 as the a freshman for that direct student loan or whatnot.

Um, just don’t over borrow it because it’s, it’s just money that you do have to pay back. Um, and then the current interest rate just, you know, kind of realize that, like I said, with the federal student loans and the federal parent loans, those are fixed rates for that academic year. And then when you apply again the next year.

It’ll be based on what the rate is for the next year and so on. Um, with the, um, private loans, again, you’ll be offered either a fixed end or a variable rate to choose from. And so just kind of know what you’re getting into in terms of, you know, whether, if you’ve got a fixed rate, obviously that’ll be the rate for that loan, and then next year you’ll apply again maybe, and the, and you’ll have a different rate.

So just sort of understanding that this is a yearly process and, um, so are the, uh, you know, the interest rates that you’re gonna receive. Uh, the origination fees are deducted from the loan itself. So if, if the lend, if you’re being charged an origination fee, just know that that comes off the top of the loan.

Um, so the amount that you’ll net towards the bill will be the total amount, minus the fee. So, um. That al also trips families up sometimes because you’re actually netting, you know, less than what you’re applying for in some cases. Unless you’re applying for a loan with an a 0% origination fee, you know, then obviously that won’t happen ’cause you’ll net a hundred percent of what you applied for, um, which is great.

So that is something to keep in mind. And then making sure that you understand how long you have to repay the loan. And that is, um, kind of a whole separate presentation because federal loans have, uh, there’s lots of different things. Um, with the private loans. We also, you know, private loan lenders also offer typically a choice for you in terms of how long you have to repay it.

So, um, for us, you can choose what you, how long you repay it. Um, and for federal there are some things, some other provisions as well that allow you to repay, um, in different. Number of years. So that’s my short story on that. Um. And then there are, um, discounts and rewards sometimes that are offered on some of the educational loans.

So, um, keep an eye out for those things, like in, um, interest rate reductions. If you, you know, for certain things like take, you know, having the payments out of your checking or savings account every month, you typically get a discount for that. Sometimes there’s some rewards that are offered, um, cash back or graduation rewards or things like that.

Then also co-signer release. Sometimes if you do have a, if there is a co-signer on, um, like a private loan, you can sometimes apply to get them off of their, uh, get the co-signer off of there eventually. So that may be something you keep an eye out for. And then, um, does anyone have a, do, do whoever you’re borrowing through, do they have a prepayment penalty?

Like what if I. Win the lottery and I wanna pay this thing off. Am I gonna get charged extra for paying it off early? So that’s called a prepayment penalty, excuse me, prepayment penalty. And, um, a lot of folks don’t, don’t penalize you for that, but just, you wanna make sure you kind of understand that if you pay off the loan early.

And then deferment and forbearance options are typically available on any of the loan programs in general, um, as well as loan forgiveness options. If for, um, if something were to happen unfortunately to, um, you know, in, in terms of death or disability, um, you know, you kind of wanna just know that a lot of honestly, the deferment, forbearance and loan forgiveness are typically on most programs, whether they’re federal or private.

There’s something out there available. I can, I’m sort of generalizing there, but it’s, most programs would have that. So that’s, um, helpful to know. And that was, um, it for the prepared slides. Um, I am gonna say though, a reminder that to, if you would like to apply for the $5,000 scholarship that we have, um, this sweepstakes is open through June 30th, um, of 2025, and that’s the QR code there to enter that it, there is no essay required.

Um, so every now and then we’ll do, um, kind of a big scholarship like that or some other fun sweepstakes and giveaways. You know, you might see some other things on our, um, website that, um, you know, you might win a laptop or, um, you know, right now, I know we recently just had one with an AA ring and um, headphones and all these fun stuff.

Um, and then don’t forget, every month we do the $1,000 a month on top of that so you can enter this one and the $1,000 a month one. Also, there’s nothing preventing you from being able to enter everything we have, so. Um, and so Lydia, thank you. I know I went maybe a little longer than I was going to on the slides, but, um, what are we, we have any questions

Lydia: or?

Yes, we do. Um, so the first question that we have is, what are the pros and cons of a fixed rate versus variable rate loan with a cosigner?

Kat: Okay, so the fair, the fixed rates, um, the pro, the pro of a fixed rate is that you already know what you’re gonna be paying, um, for the life of the loan, for the interest rate itself.

So, um, if I, if I get an interest rate of 6.5% on a, a private loan, let’s say, um, then I know that during the life of the loan that interest rate’s not gonna move. It’s just, it’s not gonna go up or down. The only con would be if the rates end up going way down sometime. Let’s say you have a, I don’t know, let’s say you chose a 10 year repayment term for it or something.

If the rates happen to be really low during any of that, you won’t get to take advantage of that. ’cause that loan is gonna be in a fixed rate scenario. Um, however, there are ways to refinance loans. Uh, we, you know, like private educational lenders have refinance loans. The federal government has a consolidation loan for federal loans.

So there are ways to kind of, I guess, take on a, you know, kind of take advantage of an, of a low rate environment some other day. So, um, the thing is, is that right now the variable rate, the, the interest rate, um. Picture is kind of, landscape has kind of been kind of high. And so if you were to go buy a car today or to buy a house today, um, the, the interest rates are much higher than they were two years ago.

So picking a variable rate today might be higher than it was for sure, two years ago. And so it’s, it’s just a, you know, I am not a person, I’m not a financial advisor, so I won’t give you advice ’cause I don’t want you to do anything you know, that you aren’t happy with later. But, um, fixed at least says that you’re good to go for a while.

And variable is good when the rates are low and not so good when the rates are high. So, but you can always refinance later if you need to.

Lydia: Yeah. Another question we have is student loans usually get a bad wrap and many people advise against them. Can you highlight what the positives are of student loans and how they can be used properly to fund your education?

Kat: Yes. Um, so, and that’s kind of why I had the financial game plan slides in there because I think making good decisions on the front end before you head into college, um, will only help you on the back end when you have to face looking at the loans. Um, so I mean, in terms of student loans sometimes, uh, well, one thing for sure is like a, a student who’s looking to become a doctor or a lawyer.

Um, you know, Katie, you’re on the call tonight. You’re an a pre-med student, right? There is an example, um, I don’t know if you took any loans, don’t need to, but like a lot of those programs over time are expensive. So you almost, in a way, you kind of, you’re looking at that as well, I have to do this. I’m investing in myself to become.

In that example, a doctor or a lawyer or something like that. But even as an undergraduate student, you’re still investing in yourself and it’s a lifelong investment. It’s not like, um, it’s not like I’m going to buy a car and in five years from now I’m gonna get rid of the car and I’m gonna buy another car.

Like in this case, you’re borrowing for something that you’re actually gonna have. Your brain is gonna have what you learn for the duration of your life. And so it is a much, it’s a very good long-term investment. However, you don’t wanna over borrow. So what I would use as guidance is ask the college that you’re applying to, what is your average?

You don’t have to physically ask them. I mean, you can look it up on their website, you can just, you know, Google it, and you, you can find this pretty quickly. Um, you know, what is their average loan indebtedness of a, of, um, of an undergraduate degree. And then if most students are taking out, you know, anywhere, you know, it’s something that sounds reasonable to you, like in the, around the $30,000 range total, that’s not a bad investment.

That’s actually the four year. Um, if you look up college boards data, that’s actually the, pretty much the average of a four year degree for public and private colleges, um, is around the 28,000 to $32,000 range. That’s actually a very healthy amount, I think because you’re, again, you’re investing in, in your whole life.

If you’re having to take out, the student is having to take out a much larger sum and the parents are having to take out a much larger sum. Um. You know, you wanna kind of stop yourself on the front end to say, are we willing and are we willing, we’re able to do it, but are we willing to do this? Is it a good investment?

Is a good ROI or return on investment at the end, um, to take out so much money. You know, it’s different when it’s a grad professional degree. ’cause that’s, that’s a different path. Um, you know, in terms of like med school, law school, that type of thing. But for an undergraduate degree, be careful that you don’t, you know, kind of overdo it.

Um,

Lydia: so another question that we have is, what if my parents do not qualify for loans as co-signers and the federal student loans and aid don’t fully cover cost of attendance. So there are other options in that situation.

Kat: Yeah. So, um, so if the parent, okay, so if you. Technically apply for the federal parent loan, the federal parent loan.

If you’re denied that, if the parent is denied that, um, there is some additional money that the student can get for towards their education. It’s not a lot, but it’s, um, $4,000 for freshmen and sophomores and $5,000 for juniors and seniors if the federal parent loan is denied. But again, keep in mind, that’s now on the student.

So now that becomes the student’s in their social security number to pay it back, um, if that happens. And then they, there is another, um, uh, appeal process they offer called an endorser for the plus loan, um, where they can kind of get, you know, maybe someone other than the parent to endorse it. Um, so that’s an option.

But, um, I don’t know the percentage of how many of those get approved. I don’t know that off the top of my head at all without researching. Um, as far as private loans go, if the parent is not able to apply as a co-signer, is there someone else, like a grandparent, an aunt or an uncle, um, who might be willing to apply?

You know, in the short term, the students typically will need a co-signer if they’re coming right out of high school because you don’t have a credit history that’s long enough for banks and lenders to take on the risk, quite frankly. So usually they’ll look for a cosigner in the, you know, like the first couple of years coming right out of high school while you’re earning a, kind of building up a credit history through your student loans and through maybe a credit card or a, um, you know, a credit builder kind of card.

So, um, I. In, in terms of a student applying on their own for the private loans. Um, usually when you come right outta high school, you usually can’t without a co-signer. So it becomes a little difficult I realize. But that’s where you can make a wise decision maybe about where you go and where you, where you’re attending and maybe your first two years you could kind of go somewhere that might be like a community college where it might be cheaper or to a college where is it is cheaper and you can transfer to another college for your latter two years.

That’s an option as well. Um, you know, you, that comes with some caveats, but that’s something to consider as well. Outside scholarships keep applying ’cause that’s gonna be free money that you’re able to just tack on and just not have to borrow as much anyway. So keep keep trying those.

Lydia: Um, and then another question we have is how accurate are the net price calculators?

Kat: Accurate. Are they? Well, okay, that’s gonna depend. Um, some of them have, so there’s a, um, there are some that are much more, um, robust and so it depends. Each college has their own net price calculator and sometimes they’ll use the, the technology that’s given to them, you know, by the federal government.

That’s sort of, it’s easy to, to use, but it’s, it may not be kind of accurate in term, especially if the college has a lot of money to spend because like if they are, if they have a lot of their own, um, you know, like free money to give you the calculators that are kind of, uh, I don’t know, a little bit, um, a little bit more beefed up, if you will, um, are giving a little bit more accurate information.

And so I think my best advice, um, would be to at least try them. But I would maybe try out a few on different college’s websites, and if you’re getting like, maybe kind of look at the answers and figure out, okay, this one is way off from this one. How can that possibly be? And then you can always ask the, the college, the financial aid office, like, um, you know, is this how, tell me about your net price calculator and should I be relying on it?

Because in some cases, like some of the outliers of the answers that you’re gonna get, um, may, may be assigned to you that Okay. I don’t know if this is really spot on here. So, um, you know, they, they do what they can, they’re required to, to put it out there for it’s families to see and use. Um, but I will say some of them are more, um, robust than other ones, unfortunately.

Okay. Mm-hmm.

Lydia: Okay. Well I think that concludes our webinar for tonight. Thank you so much Kat, for all of your amazing information that you shared. I know. Sure. I wish that I had this much knowledge about financial aid when I was going through the process, so I’m sure that everyone at home learned a lot as well.

Um, and I wanna thank you to everyone who joined us tonight for just being so engaged and having so many great questions for us to answer. All right. Thanks for joining us. Yeah, thank you so much. Appreciate