Can I avoid student loans and go to college for free, if I file my FAFSA?

This is a question I see frequently.
It is important that you file your Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), which is necessary to get access to federal grants, work-study, and Federal Direct Student Loans.
In 2019 almost one in four families, with college bound students, didn’t bother applying for federal, need-based aid.

Their excuses were:

Probably won’t qualify.
It looked too complicated.
Didn’t have the necessary information.
Missed the deadline.
FAFSA? What’s a FAFSA?

Of those who filed, three out of four, received federal need-based aid.

The Cost of College

Here are the 2019 College Board Average, Annual Cost of Attendance numbers:

Private Colleges=$53,980 Public Colleges=$26,590

Cost of attendance is the “published” price. If your family does their homework, you won’t be paying that price, but that is the starting point for preparing a four-year financial plan.
I am going to use public colleges for my example.
If you plan well, and are lucky, you’ll earn your degree in four years. (Five years is the average these days.)
If we assume 3% inflation, the total average cost of attendance at a public college is going to be $111,243 for four years.
That is a boatload of money.

Figuring Out the FAFSA

Assuming you meet the basic eligibility criteria for federal need-based student aid, here’s how the government decides how much money you’ll get.

Your eligibility will depend on:

Expected Family Contribution (EFC) (We’ll get to this in a minute.)
Year in school
Enrollment status
Cost of Attendance (COA) at the school you will be attending. (This includes: tuition and fees, room and board, books and supplies, transportation, and personal expenses)
The financial aid office at your college will then figure out how much need-based financial aid you are eligible to receive.

Here is the formula:

Cost of Attendance (COA) − Expected Family Contribution (EFC) = Financial Need

Now, it is time to explain the Expected Family Contribution (EFC).

Your EFC is a “magic” number that the college financial aid staff will use to determine how much financial aid you would receive if you were to attend their school. The information you report on your FAFSA is the input used to calculate your EFC.

Your EFC is not the amount of money your family will have to pay for college. It also is not the amount of federal student need-based aid you will receive. It is just a number, created by a government bureaucrat, to be used by your school to calculate how much financial aid you are eligible to receive.

Your family’s income, assets, and benefits are all considered in the formula. Also factored in are your family size and the number of family members who will be attending college during the year.

Those are the basics of federal, need-based financial aid.

The FAFSA also serves as a portal that can give you access to merit-based financial aid, including state scholarship money, and some institutional scholarships.