FAFSA child support reporting when one child is over 18 - different amounts?
I'm filling out FAFSA for 2025-26 and completely confused about reporting child support for my two kids. My oldest will be a junior (20 years old) and youngest will be a freshman (18 years old). The court order specified child support until age 18, so my oldest hasn't received any since turning 18, but my youngest still gets it. Do I report ONLY the child support for my youngest on the FAFSA, or do I need to put the same amount for both somehow? The total annual amount is $9,600 but that's just for one child now. The instructions are so confusing about how to handle different amounts between siblings!
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Kingston Bellamy
You'll report the TOTAL amount of child support you received during the base tax year (2023) for ALL children in your household. FAFSA doesn't ask you to split it by child - just the total amount received. If your older child turned 18 during 2023 and payments stopped, you'd include whatever was received for them before the cutoff, plus whatever was received for the younger child for the entire year.
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Morita Montoya
•Thanks! So I shouldn't try to separate out which child got what? My older one turned 18 in April 2023, so payments for him stopped then, but continued for my younger one. I just add up everything received in 2023 regardless of which child it was for?
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Joy Olmedo
ur gonna need 2 add up ALL child support u got in 2023 for BOTH kids. doesnt matter if one stopped getting it mid-year. just the TOTAL amount for the base tax yr.
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Morita Montoya
•Got it - thank you! I thought I needed to allocate specific amounts to each child on their individual FAFSA forms.
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Isaiah Cross
Be super careful with this! I messed this up on my kids FAFSA last year and it totally screwed up their SAI calculation. I had to submit a correction and it delayed their financial aid packages by like 6 weeks. The financial aid officer told me it's one of the most common mistakes parents make.
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Morita Montoya
•Oh no! That's exactly what I'm worried about. Did you have to provide any documentation to prove the child support amounts when you made the correction?
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Kiara Greene
FAFSA doesn't distinguish between which child received the support. Report the TOTAL amount received in the tax year for ALL children. For the 2025-26 FAFSA, you'll report child support received during 2023. If your older child stopped receiving support in April 2023, include what they received from January-April, plus what your younger child received all year. Just the total. Also, remember that child support is reported in the parent section, not on each child's individual application.
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Morita Montoya
•Thank you! This makes so much more sense now. I get confused because we're completing separate FAFSA forms for each child, so I wasn't sure if I needed to divide the child support between them somehow.
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Evelyn Kelly
When I tried calling FSA about a similar situation last year they kept putting me on hold forever and I never got through! Ended up using Claimyr (claimyr.com) to get past the wait times. Their service connected me directly to an FSA agent who explained exactly how to handle the child support reporting. There's a video that shows how it works: https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ. Totally worth it to get a definitive answer straight from FSA!
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Paloma Clark
•I've tried calling FSA like 5 times about verification issues and NEVER got through. The wait times are INSANE!!! Might try this service if I can't figure out these dependent status questions. Thx for sharing!
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Heather Tyson
The FAFSA is asking for what you ACTUALLY RECEIVED in 2023, not what you're entitled to or what the court ordered. So if payments for your older kid stopped in April 2023, you'd include Jan-Apr for them, and the full year for your younger one. Add those together = your answer. I have 3 kids in various stages of college and had a similar situation. Just report the real numbers and you'll be fine.
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Morita Montoya
•Thanks for sharing your experience with multiple kids. It's helpful knowing others have navigated this successfully!
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Paloma Clark
OK but what happens if the parent who's PAYING the child support also fills out a FAFSA for a different child? Do they get to deduct those payments? Because my ex is trying to claim he should get some kind of reduction on his FAFSA for our son because he's paying child support to me for our daughter! The whole system is SO UNFAIR to divorced parents!!!!
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Kiara Greene
•Yes, the parent who PAYS child support can report those payments as a reduction on their FAFSA. The parent who RECEIVES child support has to report it as untaxed income. This is to prevent the same money from being counted twice in the SAI calculations.
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Morita Montoya
Thank you everyone for the helpful responses! Just to make sure I've got this 100% clear - for my 2025-26 FAFSA, I'll report the TOTAL child support received during 2023 tax year (Jan-Apr for older child + full year for younger child). I won't try to allocate different amounts to each child's separate FAFSA, since the child support question is in the parent section that applies to the whole household. Is that correct?
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Kingston Bellamy
•That's exactly right! You've got it. The parent section is identical for both of your children's FAFSAs, so the child support amount will be the same on both applications.
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Malik Robinson
Perfect! You've got it figured out now. Just to add one more tip - keep good records of those child support payments (bank statements, payment apps, etc.) in case you need to verify the amounts later. Some schools do request documentation during the verification process. Good luck with your kids' financial aid applications!
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