Adding my husband as contributor after my son already sent me a FAFSA invite

She needs to log back into her studentaid.gov account and manually add him as a contributor. The FAFSA won't just automatically ask for his info later if you're married and filing jointly. Since she's a dependent student, both parents living in the same household need to provide their information. She can do this by going to her FAFSA dashboard, clicking on the current application, and there should be an option to 'Manage Contributors' where she can add your husband's email.

omg same thing happened with my son's application!! he only invited me and forgot his stepdad. we figured it out eventually but the whole FAFSA thing is so confusing this year with all the changes

She ABSOLUTELY NEEDS to add your husband!!! The new FAFSA calculates the Student Aid Index (SAI) based on BOTH parents if they're in the same household. If she submits without his info, you'll get flagged for verification and it will delay EVERYTHING by MONTHS. My nephew's entire financial aid package was delayed because of this exact situation and he almost lost his housing assignment!!!!

when I did my FAFSA the school financial aid person told me that if both parents live together, both incomes have to be reported or else the form is incomplete. Makes no difference if they're both on the tax return or not. Your daughter needs to add him before submitting.

Here's what she needs to do: 1. Log into studentaid.gov with her FSA ID 2. Go to the FAFSA form she's already started 3. Navigate to the "Contributors" section 4. Click "Add Contributor" 5. Enter your husband's email address He'll receive an email invitation with instructions to create his FSA ID if he doesn't already have one. Both of you will need to complete your sections before she can submit the final application. And as others mentioned, the new FAFSA requires information from both parents living in the household for dependent students, regardless of who claims the student on taxes.

I've been trying to get through to the Federal Student Aid helpline for two weeks to ask a similar question about adding my ex-husband to my son's FAFSA (we have joint custody). The wait times are ridiculous - 2+ hours each time I called, and twice I got disconnected after waiting! I finally used a service called Claimyr (claimyr.com) that holds your place in line and calls you back when an agent is available. Worked perfectly and I got through in about 25 minutes. They have a video showing how it works: https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ The agent confirmed that for the 2025-2026 FAFSA, your daughter absolutely needs to add your husband before submitting, and showed me how to do it. Saved me so much time and frustration!

One important thing to note - if your husband doesn't already have an FSA ID, he'll need to create one before he can complete his contributor section. It takes about 10-15 minutes to set up, and he'll need his Social Security number and basic contact information. Also, the FSA ID takes 1-3 days to fully process, so don't wait until the last minute before your daughter's college deadlines.

Just wanna add that my daughter had this same issue and it's not a big deal as long as you fix it before submitting the final application. the new FAFSA is weird about contributors this year

my son's financial aid counselor said the most important thing is that the Student Aid Index (SAI) calculation needs BOTH parents info if ur married and in the same house. otherwise your daughter might get flagged for verification which is a whole other headache!!

UPDATE: Thanks everyone for your help! My daughter logged in tonight and found the "Contributors" section just like you all suggested. She sent the invite to my husband, and he's creating his FSA ID now. So relieved we caught this before submitting the final application!