Since about November, and even before, The Girl has been working on her applications for all things college: scholarship, housing, FAFSA, etc.
For the FAFSA stuff, she had everything ready to go and even submitted with the notice that her parents 2012 taxes were "in process" of being filed. Well, she and I have been asking Genius Golfer to do this via Turbo Tax since January 31. And considering we haven't made any money for 18 months, I figured this would be a piece of cake. We've been asking probably weekly, and he just brushes us off saying, he'll "get to it when I get to it."
But he procrastinated until last night. Because today is tax day across the nation. The paperwork wasn't due until today, so he felt no rush. Apparently he stayed up last night working on this and filed it electronically. Just now, this morning, pre-seven o'clock, The Girl checked her email and discovered a notice from the FAFSA folks who were notifying her that she only qualified for a loan, no grant at all, and that the expected parental support for her collegiate experience was estimated to be $38,000.
I am sure that if we had submitted our taxes on February 1, her chances of getting the full Pell grant would have added up to $5,000 or so for her schooling this fall. Now, because she is getting in at the very last, legal minute on the taxes being filed and thus finishing her FAFSA application, she gets diddly squat.
And this Pell grant qualification has been the only bright spot in our unemployment situation for me. I kept telling myself, "Well, at least it is good timing to not have an income because it will help her with the FAFSA. Now that isn't even true anymore.
Gut punch even before the day is officially started. Lame way to begin the week.
