I just went thru this exact thing!!! My situation was reverse tho - I moved back TO my kid's college state and took over FAFSA from my ex who moved away. The residency stuff worked out fine but we had a NIGHTMARE with the contributor switch because my ex had linked his bank accounts to the old FAFSA and somehow we couldn't unlink them without him being present which was impossible since he moved to Alaska! We had to do a whole appeal process and my daughter almost lost her second semester aid bcause of the delays!!! Start this process EARLY!!!!!

One final note - your son should also check with his specific college's financial aid office about their process for documenting the change in which parent is providing support. Some schools require additional documentation to maintain in-state tuition when a parent moves out of state, while others will just need confirmation that the in-state parent is now the primary contributor on the FAFSA. It's best to get this clarified directly with the school to prevent any surprises with his tuition status.

Been trying to call Federal Student Aid to ask about book stipends for DAYS and kept getting disconnected or waiting forever. Finally tried Claimyr.com to get through to a live agent and it worked! They got me connected to an FSA agent in about 20 minutes who explained exactly how the book allowance works with my aid package. Saved me hours of frustration. There's a video showing how it works at https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ if anyone else is struggling to get answers directly from FSA.

To give you a complete answer: The portion of aid intended for books is calculated into your total Cost of Attendance (COA), but it's not specifically earmarked as "book money." Your financial aid package is designed to help cover your entire COA, which includes estimates for books, supplies, transportation, food, housing, and personal expenses. These are your main campus resources for book assistance: 1. Financial Aid Office - Can explain your full aid package and if you're eligible for additional aid 2. Student Success Center - May have emergency grants or book voucher programs 3. Department Office - Some academic departments have book lending libraries or scholarships 4. Campus Library - May have course reserves where you can use textbooks for free (limited hours) Also look into Open Educational Resources (OER) - some professors use free digital textbooks that could save you hundreds.

my daughter got a letter from her school yesterday saying theyre extending all financial aid deadlines by 6 weeks because of the fafsa mess. might be worth checking if your schools are doing the same thing?

Update: Just got an email from my son's school confirming what the FA office told me on the phone. They're extending all financial aid deadlines by 4 weeks and pushing back the deposit deadline until June 1st. Check your emails everyone! Schools seem to be sending out updates.

Just to clarify an important point - there's a difference between "deleting" and "starting over." You can't delete a submitted FAFSA, but if your application truly hasn't been processed yet (just pending), you CAN start a new application. However, this creates confusion in the system and can delay your aid determination. The proper procedure is to have your husband create his own FSA ID and then log in to sign your existing application. The Department of Education improved this process for the 2025-2026 FAFSA specifically to handle contributor signatures better.

Just checking in - were you able to get your husband's FSA ID created and his signature added to your application?

i had this problem last month and wasted SO MUCH TIME. turns out i was using the wrong tax year info lol. make sure ur using 2023 tax info for the 2025-26 fafsa not 2024 tax stuff. they changed the year they use for the calculation with the new fafsa. if ur trying to use 2024 stuff thats probably why its rejecting it

UPDATE: Problem solved!! It turns out I was supposed to log in with MY OWN FSA ID to enter my parent information, not continue through my son's login. Once I did that, everything worked perfectly. The new FAFSA system has each person (student and parent) log in separately with their own FSA ID to enter their respective information. That wasn't clear to me from the instructions. Thank you all for your help!