Why did my SAI go up?

The short version

• The two forms look at different years. The 2027-28 FAFSA uses your 2025 taxes. The 2026-27 FAFSA used your 2024 taxes.
• The formula has lines in it. Cross one, and the SAI can move far more than your income did.
• Not every input comes from your tax return. Account balances, family size and rollovers can change an SAI even when the return looks the same.
• An aid office can't change the formula. It can, case by case and with proof, change the numbers that go into it for a special circumstance. It decides, and it can say no.

Compare your two years

Type in what you have, and this shows which lines moved. For the SAI and what you typed on the form, use each year's FAFSA Submission Summary. For tax numbers, use your own returns, because the form does not show what it imports from the IRS. No FAFSA last year? Use your 2024 return for the income lines.

Your income crossed the Pell line

For a dependent student, the rules first check your AGI (plus any foreign income exclusion) against the federal poverty guideline for your family size. If your AGI is above zero and at or under the line, the student qualifies for a maximum Pell Grant, and the SAI is capped: it is the calculated SAI or 0, whichever is less.

Over the line, the cap is gone and the calculated SAI stands. That is how a small raise can take an SAI from 0 or below to a positive number.

A parent counts as a single parent here if unmarried and filing as head of household or qualifying surviving spouse, or if the parent got the Earned Income Tax Credit. So a change in filing status can move your line, and so can a change in family size.

There is a second line for the minimum Pell Grant: 275% of the guideline, or 325% for a single parent. To get it, the SAI also has to be less than twice the maximum Pell Grant.

Your family size changed

When your tax data comes from the IRS, family size starts as the number of people claimed on the return. The form then asks if your family size is different. If you report a different number, that number is used.

A smaller number does two things. It lowers the Pell line in the table above. It also lowers the income protection allowance, the part of income the formula sets aside for living costs. On the 2027-28 FAFSA, that allowance is $46,590 for a family of four and $37,720 for a family of three, so one fewer person means $8,870 less set aside.

For a dependent student, family size includes:

• The student.
• The student's parents, but not a parent who has died or who is out of the household because of separation or divorce.
• Siblings who live with the parents, or apart because of college, and who get more than half their support from the parents through the aid year.
• Other people who live with the parents and get more than half their support from them through the aid year.

A second child in college does not lower the SAI. The form asks how many are in college, but that number is not used in the calculation. A school can take it into account as a special circumstance.

A number from your tax return moved

Once you give approval, your tax numbers move straight from the IRS to the form. You can't see or edit them there. Your aid office can. So the place to check them is your own return.

The formula starts with AGI (Form 1040, line 11), then adds tax-exempt interest, deductible payments to IRA and similar accounts, the untaxed part of IRA and pension money, and any foreign income exclusion.

Rollovers. A qualified rollover from one retirement account to another is not supposed to count as income. But the imported IRA and pension amounts include rollovers, and IRS data does not mark them. The formula only takes off the rollover amount typed into the form. If that amount was left blank, the rollover stays in your income. Because it is typed in and not imported, it is a number you can correct on the form. A school may ask for a signed statement to back it up.

One-time income. Money taken out of a retirement plan counts as income unless it was rolled over. The federal handbook's example of a one-time gain: the taxable part of a sale of virtual currency lands in AGI for that year.

Amended returns. The IRS sends only the original return, even if you amended it. The form has no sign that a return was amended, so the aid office may not know. Once it knows, it has to update the form.

Assets started to count

Some families don't report assets at all. A dependent student is exempt if one of these is true:

• The student qualifies for a maximum Pell Grant.
• The parents' AGI is under $60,000, they filed no Schedule A, B, D, E, F or H, and they filed no Schedule C or one showing no more than a $10,000 loss or gain.
• The student or a parent got a benefit from a means-tested federal program, such as SNAP or Medicaid, in the two calendar years the form asks about.

There is an exception for some parents who live outside the U.S. or don't file U.S. taxes. If none of the three is true anymore, assets come into the formula, even if they have not changed. Filing one of those schedules for the first time can be enough.

How they count. Assets are reported as of the day the form is signed, so the balance that day is the one that matters. Parents' assets include cash, savings, investments, a 529 for the student, and child support received in the last full calendar year. The formula takes 12% of them and adds that to available income, which is then assessed at 22% to 47%. So a parent's dollar counts at no more than about 5.64 cents (our math: 12% times 47%). For 2027-28, the asset protection allowance is $0 at every age. Student assets count at 20%.

What doesn't belong on the form. The home you live in, retirement plans, a family business with 100 or fewer full-time employees, a farm your family lives on, and a family-owned commercial fishing business. If one of these was entered, that is an error, and errors that change the SAI have to be corrected.

The parents who file changed

Not filing, then filing. When parents don't file a federal return for the tax year, the student is assigned an SAI of -1,500 and no formula runs. If they file for the next tax year, the rules above apply. That is one way an SAI goes from -1,500 to a positive number in a single year. Crossing the Pell line is another.

A different parent. If parents are divorced or never married and don't live together, the parent on the form is the one who gave more than half the student's financial support in the last 12 months. That may not be the parent the student lives with. If neither gave more than half, it is the parent with the greater income and assets. That parent's current spouse reports too. So a change in support, or a remarriage, can bring in a whole new set of numbers.

The student earned or saved more

The student's own income has an allowance: $12,220 on the 2027-28 FAFSA. What is left after that and the tax allowances counts at 50%. Student assets count at 20% with no allowance.

A custodial account (UGMA or UTMA) belongs to the student on the form. A 529 where the student is the beneficiary and a parent owns it is reported as a parent asset.

If your tax return really was the same

The same return doesn't mean the same inputs. Balances on signing day, child support, rollovers, updates to family size, benefits received and which parent files don't come from the return.

The yearly update to the tables is rarely the place to start. Between these two forms, the income protection allowance for a family of four went up from $44,880 to $46,590, and the student's went up from $11,770 to $12,220. The Pell lines went up too. If every line matches and the SAI still moved, the aid office can see the imported numbers and you can't.

Did your income drop since 2025?

The 2027-28 form looks at 2025. It can't see a layoff or a death in 2026. And it generally can't be updated for one, because the form is a snapshot of the family as of the day it was signed.