GradBetter offers free tools that compare financial aid awards and draft clear, effective appeal letters. Counselors can use the tools directly or simply invite families to compare awards, understand what drives appeals, and generate a strong starting draft.

Appealing is now common practice. About one-third of families appeal, and most succeed, with the majority of additional aid coming as free money.

Families can also sign up on their own or through their high school. 

Learn more here: https://www.gradbetter.com/awards

A recent report in Inside Higher Ed said something that wasn’t surprising to me: Many students and families are unprepared for the true cost of college.

It’s not uncommon for families to say, “Oh look, the state school will cost us $8,000 to $10,000 a year” and they think that’s all they will be paying. What colleges, financial aid offices and financial advisors need to emphasize to families is cost of attendance, which is a much more accurate measure of what they will be paying.

Cost of attendance (COA) is not just tuition and fees, but also books, housing (on- or off-campus), food, transportation and personal expenses. We have seen gas, food and housing prices go up and down over the decades, but the COA consistently rises. Even as colleges cut their tuition rates in the wake of the pandemic, they raised the cost of room and board and other fees.

According to the College Board, the average 2025-26 net cost of attendance for first-time, full-time, in-state students at public four-year colleges was estimated at $21,340. That’s just the average, so an individual’s COA could be lower or higher. And remember, you have to multiply that by four.

And if there’s another child headed to college, you have double all of those numbers again. It could amount to a house payment – or more – every month.

High schools prepare students academically for college – what classes to take and what grades they need. They don’t prepare students or families for the cost. Understanding the true cost of college two, three or even four years in advance gives a family time to prepare.

So many families are unprepared. They don’t know anything about financial aid forms even as they’re getting ready to fill out the FAFSA and/or CSS Profile. Then they get an award letter saying the financial aid award is not what they expected, and only then do they realize

how much they’ll be out of pocket. And, by the way, the college needs a tuition deposit in 30 days to hold the student’s spot.

Ask yourself: If your student’s tuition bill were due a month or two months from now,

what are your available resources and how could you pay it? This is why many students and families turn to loans and end up with unmanageable student debt, which now totals $1.78 trillion.

Planning for college is really no different from retirement planning. Consistency and compounding help you get to your retirement goals. The same is true of college funding. If you’re looking to fund a college degree to the tune of six figures and pay off a house – all while not running out of retirement resources – planning has to start early.

That ship may have sailed for you because your high school freshman or sophomore is just a few years away from college. There are still things you can do.

After cost of attendance, the next biggest thing families need to understand is the student aid index (SAI), or how much the family is expected to contribute to their child’s education. You want this number to be as low as it can possibly be. There are 163 ethical and legal ways to lower SAI, such as moving assets out of a student’s name. With a few years head start, a lot of these strategies can be implemented in order to maximize need-based grants.

Colleges are required by the Department of Education to post their average cost of attendance. Many families start looking for schools with the lowest COA, but it may be better to go after colleges with higher COAs that give more in need-based, merit-based and institutional grants.

Many private colleges, and you can find them listed on the internet, pledge to meet 100% of demonstrated need, which is COA minus SAI. Some will offer loan-free grants for any student, some set an income threshold, and some include work-study or loans. Many of these colleges tend to be selective, admitting less than 10% of applicants, but some are less so.

Another way to lower COA is to keep living expenses in check; for example, finding less expensive off-campus housing after the first year, teaching students how to spend and save an allowance, and having them be aware of their spending. So many kids use ApplePay or other digital payment systems without realizing that they’re spending $150 a month on Starbucks.

If this all sounds a bit like a game, that’s because it is. The earlier you learn the rules and practice, the better you’ll be at it and the more opportunities your student will have.

Brian Safdari, who founded College Planning Experts in 2004, is a Certified College Planning Specialist™. He and his team have assisted more than 7,500 students nationwide on their college journey using their exclusive My College Fit System and financial planning tools. For more information, call 818-201-4847 or visit collegeplanningexperts.com.