Guides · paying for college
It's the most common reason families skip the FAFSA — and federal data says the question itself is broken. At the exact same income, one school costs a family $4,478 a year and another costs $32,766. "Too much" doesn't exist without naming the school.
When federal researchers asked families why they never filed the FAFSA, the top reason was believing they wouldn't qualify — and of those families, 62% specifically assumed their income was too high (NCES). Roughly one in five students never applies for aid at all. Some of those families were right. Many were leaving real money on the table — and none of them could know which group they were in without looking at actual schools.
Here is what families earning $75,000–$110,000 actually paid, on average, at eight well-known schools — straight from federal College Scorecard reporting (July 2026 refresh). Not sticker prices, not calculator estimates: what aided families reported paying.
| School | Sticker / yr | $75–110k families paid |
|---|---|---|
| Princeton University | $84,040 | $4,478 |
| Harvard University | $85,540 | $9,941 |
| University of Michigan | $34,654 | $10,869 |
| University of Georgia | $27,993 | $16,942 |
| Rutgers–New Brunswick | $36,993 | $25,106 |
| University of Alabama | $33,382 | $25,658 |
| Penn State | $39,694 | $31,834 |
| New York University | $84,374 | $32,766 |
Public-school figures reflect in-state families. "Paid" is the average net price reported to the U.S. Department of Education for aided families in that income band — planning data, not an offer.
Read that table again as a $95k household: the school with the highest sticker price on the list — Princeton, at $84,040 — is the cheapest to actually attend, by a factor of seven against NYU. The endowed privates that look most impossible are often the most generous; the mid-priced schools that look reasonable often are exactly their sticker. Income alone predicts almost nothing.
The federal reporting groups every income above $110,000 into one band, and the spread stays just as wide: at that band, Michigan runs about $26,517, Princeton $36,094, Harvard $53,337, and NYU $66,876 a year. Families well above the band line often pay closer to full cost — but "often" is not "always," and the only way to know is per school. That's also why "we make too much, why bother filing" fails as logic even when it's true for need aid at one school on your list: it may be false at three others.
Merit aid frequently requires it. Plenty of schools won't put a merit scholarship on the table — money that has nothing to do with need — unless a FAFSA is on file.
State deadlines don't wait. State grant programs run their own clocks, some within weeks of the FAFSA opening in the fall, and they don't reopen because you changed your mind in spring.
Federal loans need it too. If any part of the plan involves federal student loans — or the Parent PLUS loan as a bridge — the FAFSA is the doorway, at any income.
Nobody can tell you whether you make "too much" — because that's a per-school number, not an income number. What a family can do in five minutes: look up the real figure for their income band at every school actually on their student's list, and file the FAFSA on schedule regardless, because it costs nothing and closing doors early costs plenty.
See the real number for your income at every school on your list.
College Compass runs your student's actual GPA, your income band, and your real high school against 5,498 colleges — admit odds with the math shown, real prices, and the season's deadlines. First three schools free, no account required to start.
Browse the data yourself: real costs by income at 200 schools →