How long do investments, etc have to be off your record to receive the max in financial aid? I am 24.?

Question

I am considering going back to school, and have saved money to try to buy a house someday. How long do I have to have those investments out of my name in order to receive my max in financial aid to go back to school? Also, do you get financial aid for a master's degree or just a bachelors? I am considering going from business to teaching, so it is a completely different field. Any advice would be great!! Thanks!

Answer 1

Yes, you can get some types of financial aid for a Masters degree. Keep in mind that "financial aid" and "student aid" are just blanket terms that describe loans, grants, scholarships, student employment, tuition remission, etc.

Federal GRANT aid like Pell and SEOG is almost exclusively reserved for undergraduates -- specifically, *first-time* undergraduates. (That is, if you already have a Bachelor's degree, you won't be eligible to receive grant aid for a second Bachelor's degree -- even if you never got grant aid the first time. This will hold true even if you will be pursuing a new degree in a completely different field.)

When it comes to federal financial aid, as a graduate student you shouldn't expect much more than loans and possibly work-study. (Luckily, at the very least, loan limits for graduate students are significantly higher than those for undegrrads.)

Now, your school or a private organization might offer you some scholarship funding, but this will vary widely depending on where you apply. Speaking very generally, institutional scholarships for graduate students are harder to come by than those for undergrads. Visit some college's websites -- noting the differences between the types/amounts of graduate and undergraduate financial aid -- and you'll see what I mean.

As far as your investments go... There isn't any single, specific "record" that your school will request to see whether you have investments (things like credit reports have nothing to do with investments). Keep in mind that investment income DOES appear on your income tax returns, which your Financial Aid Office has every right to request from you (in fact, some offices request tax returns from every aid applicant). Once they have these forms, it's not hard to look at a student's investment income and and extrapolate how much $$ they have invested. If the amount "investment income" seems higher than you admitted to on your FAFSA, or if the numbers seems way "off," the FA office can ask you to explain the data. And there's nothing stopping them from asking them from tax returns dating back more than 1 year.

In general it's not a good idea to "shelter" income; just tell the truth and save yourself the heartache of being denied financial aid completely and investigated for Financial Aid fraud. Truthfully, at the graduate level, you might even find that you were hiding these assets for nothing. Case in point: even wealthy students can obtain Stafford Loan funding -- Unsubsidized Stafford Loans are *not* need-based. As long as you show *some* financial need, you will likely receive some amount of *Subsidized* Stafford Loan funding.
http://www.finaid.org/loans/studentloan.phtml

Answer 2

http://www.daylon.com/scholarship/

that might help.