I graduated in 2008 with $30,000 in student loan debt. Today, 10 years later, I am student loan DEBT FREE!! That is $862.56 per month that I get to keep! Student Loans |
- I graduated in 2008 with $30,000 in student loan debt. Today, 10 years later, I am student loan DEBT FREE!! That is $862.56 per month that I get to keep!
- TIP: Rate matching when refinancing with Private Lenders: SoFi, ELFi, & Laurel Road
- Advice for taking on crazy amount of loans
- Loan Consolidation Advice
- I paid almost double my student loans this month, is there a way to get that money back?
- Help!
- How do I change the way I pay my loans?
- University of Minnesota Coding Bootcamp. Seems like private lenders are the only options. Not sure how to compare interest rates etc.
- Refinance my federal loans?
- Navient question: Deferral form says you must be a 'Direct Loan Borrower' to defer while in school half time, how do I check?
- Maxed student loans but I need more college.
- Likelihood of a future where 529 Plans can be used to Pay Student Loans
- Parents suddenly leaving me on my own for school.
- NOT A PROMO - just found this startup interesting...
- Feel like I'm falling into a deep pit of despair and student loans
- [Request] Help figuring out how to get unf-cked by Nelnet.
- Need help with my first payments
- Should I refinance?
- Find best place to refinance parent plus loans from Navient
- Mortgage Debt Calculations on IBR - 0.5% of Total, or Actual Monthly Payment?
- Are student loans subject to federal withholding?
- F-d myself by filing a joint tax return. Now, my income based payment is 3x as much!
- Student Loan recently transferred to Navient and Navient has yet to report to credit bureaus.
- i need advice regarding old student loans
| Posted: 07 May 2018 07:21 AM PDT |
| TIP: Rate matching when refinancing with Private Lenders: SoFi, ELFi, & Laurel Road Posted: 07 May 2018 04:57 AM PDT Hi all, I wanted to share that some private lenders are actually willing to "beat" competitor's refinancing rates. When I refinanced my student loans back in Oct of 2017, the 3 lenders I approached, SoFi, ELFi, & Laurel Road, were all willing to try to beat each other's rates. Some background info: At the time, I owed ~$233k, income ~$140k, and credit score 720+. I also had a mortgage payment of $2600/month. My student loans were all federal with varying interest rates of 5.41%, 6.41%, 6.8%, & 7.9%. I was on an autopay program that lowered my interest rates by 0.25%, making the lowest rate 5.16%. During my initial student refinancing rate check (soft credit pull only), I only looked at 15 or 20 year rates to keep my minimum payments lower. I didn't want to put myself in a situation where I would potentially not be able to make the full monthly payment if an emergency came up. Laurel Road came back the lowest for me at 5.95% based on a 20 year loan. I didn't like the idea of refinancing only a part of my loans and having to deal with paying multiple lenders since the 5.8% rate offered by Laurel Road was still higher than my lowest loan rate at 5.16%. I messaged Laurel Road asking them if they would be willing to "beat" my lowest rate so that I could refinance my entire loan with them. To my surprise, they said that if I submitted a copy of my student loan obligation statement showing proof of my interest rate, they would see what they could do. I did so, and they actually gave me a new rate of 5.13% for 20 years! Excited, I attempted to research other private lenders who would potentially be willing to do the same. I don't remember where I read it, but I came across one post where someone said SoFi would consider rate matching as well. I contacted them and they told me they would need the actual approval disclosure from Laurel Road in order to consider rate matching. I went ahead and submitted a full blown application to Laurel Road, SoFi, and at the last minute, decided on ELFi as well on a whim. Laurel Road approved my application within 2-3 days, but ELFi took 2 weeks & SoFi took about 3 weeks. However, once I had received approval from ELFi, I went ahead and sent a message to ask if they would beat Laurel Road's offer. They also asked for the approval disclosure and one of their managers was able to get approval for a rate of 5.08%. I sent that to Laurel Road and they gave me a new rate of 5.05%. I sent that one back to ELFi, who then adjusted their rate to 5.03%. I sent that back to Laurel Road again, but this time they said they wouldn't be able to beat it. Laurel Road and ELFi's interest rates didn't include the additional 0.25% discount if I signed up for autopay, effectively lowering it to 4.8% and 4.78%. Since SoFi took forever, I only sent my initial disclosure from Laurel Road with the 5.13% rate and they came back with a rate of 4.99%, where they already included the autopay discount. I didn't bother asking them to rate match again because I was annoyed with how slow they were and the fact that they included the autopay discount in their rates to make them look more appealing, but really, just came off stingy. In the end, I went ahead and refinanced with Laurel Road despite them not being able to beat ELFi since my overall experience with them was much better. They were quick, and always responded to my emails within a day. ELFi usually took about 3 days to respond. I appreciated how fast Laurel Road's customer service was and figured it was worth the 0.02% difference. For those of you looking to refinance with private lenders, I would wholeheartedly recommend trying this. I don't think this is something most of realize is a possibility. Especially if you have loans with varying interest rates like I did and want to see if they'd be willing to cut you a lower rate so that you will refinance you entire loans with them. I initially didn't think this would be likely when I first messaged Laurel Road, but I figured it wouldn't hurt. I'm glad I did. I recently considered refinancing my loans again and asked Earnest if they rate match and they said they don't do it. I got lucky that the 3 lenders I originally applied to all do it. In retrospect, the rate didn't go down much after the initial 5.13% I got from Laurel Road, so if you're lazy you could probably call it quits after the first two successful rate matches. I just figured since I was already doing it, I would commit to it until one beat them all out. Plus, I was curious to just how low these companies were willing to go. Anyways, sorry for the long post. I hope some of you find this helpful. Good luck and feel free to ask me if you have any questions about my experience! TL:DR Ask private lenders if they're willing to rate match your current lowest rates if you have loans with multiple rates when the initial rate offered is not lower than ALL your current rates. Also ask lenders to if they would consider rate matching a competitor's rates. You may get lucky! SoFi, ELFi, & Laurel Road all do. I lowered mine from 5.16%-7.65% to 4.8%. [link] [comments]  |
| Advice for taking on crazy amount of loans Posted: 07 May 2018 04:51 PM PDT I also posted this in r/personalfinance. But I'd like the opinions from this thread as well to see if people have been in my situation and regretted the decision they made. I have been accepted to one of the U.S.'s best graduate schools. I plan on getting two master's degrees in Social Work and Public Administration, with the goal of working in nonprofit administration. That's like, my dream. This year, I received no funding from scholarships and my family is not in the position to help me. Every cent of this (besides what I earn from work) will be loans, and this year it's estimated to be somewhere around $55k to $60k alone. It's a three-year joint dual master's degree program, and if I go through with it /and/ graduate on time, I'll have earned myself a total of $200k in student loans (in addition to the 23k I have from undergrad). This is obviously my worst nightmare. I know exactly what I want to do, and it's gonna cost me my firstborn son to do it. I applied to other schools, and they didn't give me funding either. Social work is usually a pretty broke department, so despite my being a "highly qualified student" in the words of my admissions counselor, I'm shit-out-of-luck. My only hope is to earn scholarships along the way and drop down to in-state tuition after living in the state for a year, but that takes off maybe $20k off of my final amount in loans. The other problem is that I have no idea how much MSW/MPAs earn, but I know MSWs hardly make anything, while MPAs certainly don't earn 200k/year. I'm thinking since I want to work in the nonprofit arena anyway, I could pursue the public service loan forgiveness and work towards that for ten years. But I'm not sure if this is feasible. Please tell me if I'm seeing reason or if I'm insane. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 10:16 PM PDT I recently graduated from college where I had to take out a total of 6 loans with sallie mae. In an attempt to consolidate my loans I was informed that they do not offer that service. If I was 18 again I would tell myself to actually research all the options instead of procrastinating and choosing the first thing, but that's not the point. Anyway, I was hoping to get some advice on other options for consolidating my loans. Any recommended 3rd parties? Banks? Any advice is appreciated! [link] [comments]  |
| I paid almost double my student loans this month, is there a way to get that money back? Posted: 07 May 2018 10:02 PM PDT So I go in and individually pay my loans, I like to pay extra on certain loans when I can so I always do it myself instead of auto pay. I've also heard that navient will screw you over sometimes with auto pay so my anxiety doesn't let me do that. I went into my account at about 11:50 p.m. and I freaked out because it said that I was late and owed almost $300. I hurried up and paid it because I didn't know what else to do and then after thinking for a second I realized I do not have a late payment, whatever time zone the website is on is different than my own so it says that I was late but in reality it was not. I send an email to Navien right away but is there anyway I can get that off my record? Is there also way to get that extra $141 back since I made the payment on time? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 05:11 PM PDT My gf just got a joke of a financial aid package and I need some help. She submitted early, made straight A's on prerequisites and graduated with honors for her first bachelors. She is going back for nursing school. Anyway, they offered a horrible package even though her financial need is high. They are only covering about 40% of the tuition with federal loans. It took them 3 months to offer this...totally ridiculous. To make matters worse her mother defrauded her last year and hurt her credit badly. What the hell can she do? She has an appointment with financial aid tomorrow. Any ideas? [link] [comments]  |
| How do I change the way I pay my loans? Posted: 07 May 2018 07:56 PM PDT I have 3 student loans through NelNet. I have been paying one sum of money toward all balances. I heard you can pay off one loan, then move to the next one. Does anyone know how to go about changing it over to this type of payment? I would just pay Group A, but I don't want it to show that I owe on B and C (loans 2 and 3). Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 03:53 PM PDT So far I've applied for a Wellsfargo loan and they are offering 8%. I dont know how to utilize my resources and find all the other possible options. Any suggestions? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 07:17 PM PDT So I'm a bit of a noob here but I figure I'd look into this and try to save some money if I can. I have 9 loans that I pay with one bill, once/mo under a service. 2 of my larger loans have interest rates of 6.8%. Some others have rates as low as 3.4%. The weighted average (idk if this helps) is around 4.92%. Would it be wise to look into refinancing? This is unfamiliar territory with me, so I could use a 2nd opinion if possible. Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 05:29 PM PDT My loan types, as far as I can tell, are Signature Student. I can't see on the site anywhere that specifically states 'Type'. Also, is that true? I deferred before when I went back to school half time (associates) and now going back for bachelors a few years later am trying to defer again. [link] [comments]  |
| Maxed student loans but I need more college. Posted: 07 May 2018 03:56 PM PDT I've Maxed my student loans but I still need more school to complete my degree. I have the cash to pay for school (about 25k), if I pay down my loans will this open my up to burrowing it back or no? [link] [comments]  |
| Likelihood of a future where 529 Plans can be used to Pay Student Loans Posted: 07 May 2018 03:30 PM PDT It is not currently possible to pay off student loans using money in a 529 account. Student loan payments are not considered "qualified educational expenses". There is a bill languishing in the House that would change this. I know this is a long shot, but I'm wondering what people think is the likelihood that this bill could pass in the future? It has pretty a broad list of cosponsors. If I knew it had a decent chance it would definitely affect how much $$$ I put away in my 529. [link] [comments]  |
| Parents suddenly leaving me on my own for school. Posted: 07 May 2018 03:14 PM PDT So recent circumstances have led my father to tell me that I will be receiving no more financial support from him. I'm just finishing up my freshman year and both semesters were payed for with Parent-Plus loans received through FAFSA, I've already enrolled in classes for the fall semester, and will need to pay for those classes somehow before the drop date. My school is telling me I need to go through a "verification" process for the FAFSA that I submitted for the next fall semester, but if he stays steadfast and refuses to help me, I won't get any of the money from it. My financial aid office told me that my only option without him would be a private loan, but I'm worried it's too late for me to take one out for fall. Will I have to drop my classes in the fall semester? Will the debt from the first two semesters be placed on my shoulders already? I don't know where to go, who to talk to, what to do. I'm feeling so lost and helpless. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| NOT A PROMO - just found this startup interesting... Posted: 07 May 2018 01:51 PM PDT Came across this startup Chipper that I thought people on here might appreciate. Chipper rounds up your daily transactions and transfers the difference towards your loan balance (sort of like Acorns for student loans). Something I've come to realize is that minimum payments just aren't enough when it comes to combating accruing interest. This should help provide that extra boost that can make all the difference :) [link] [comments]  |
| Feel like I'm falling into a deep pit of despair and student loans Posted: 07 May 2018 01:37 PM PDT Hey Reddit friends. I have been a long time lurker here and have finally decided to ask you all for advice regarding my suffocating student loans and how to live with this horrible feeling of hopelessness. A little background. I grew up in a small town in Pennsylvania with parents who have never seemed to figure out how to responsibly budget and finance. Needless to say, there was not even a penny saved towards my education and any money meant for that while growing up was spent well before I could even access this account. My older sister, who is brilliant and has always done exceedingly well in school, implored me to gtfo of our small town and get a better education out of state like she did. Younger me didn't want anything to do with PA, yet here I am stuck back here again. I have struggled with untreated ADHD most of my life, of which my parents chose to ignore 22 years of for fear of me needing to be put on a stimulant. Thankfully I just made it through school however I was never in a good place to participate in extracurricular activities or relevant internships, enjoy my college experience, or even apply to scholarships. I feel like my time in school was complete scrambled chaos - cramming a bunch of info that I never remembered and relying on test/class curves to pass. Like most graduating with a bachelor's degree nowadays, finding a job that utilizes my degree and skills without the classic "5-10 years of experience" is so futile. I got a degree in geology, and am currently working a contract position using my mapping and gis skills. I get paid decently and for that I am grateful despite the obvious lack of job security. My monthly loan payments are astronomical and, depending on the fluctuating interest rate, have been anywhere from $1100 USD to $1500 USD. Excuse my language, but I am honestly fucking scared and upset to say the least. I am roughly $100,000 USD in student debt, not including the interest rates on all of these loans. I have nobody to help me with these payments (my parents often say they'll help but end up not having the funds to and my cosigner is my grudge holding bouguie family member). All I really want is to go back to school now that I am being treated for ADHD and can actually read and understand things clearly without panicking and breaking down. Sorry for the sob story, here are my questions and advice areas I would love to hear from this wonderful community. First and foremost, how tf have you all dealt with this crushing feeling? I have tried a number of things and my only somewhat helpful solution has been to meditate and seek the help of a therapist. Secondly, what are some ways you cut back on certain expenses to save money? I moved back in with the parents to save money last September and it has been really wearing down my mental health. So I just found a cheap apartment I am moving into next month and any budget advice/measly but hearty meals are greatly accepted. Would going for a master's be a dumb idea? A couple more things about my finances. I have a car loan (no other way around it sadly as my 23 yr old car finally pooped out) which has a monthly payment of $261.00/month. I have a gym membership to planet fitness that is ~$21/month that I am not willing to cancel as my entire family is obese and I have no will to exercise without a gym. Anytime I want to see a therapist or my psych to renew my prescription I have to pay $50 each, which I have kind of stopped seeing the therapist to save money. I make $20/hour and time and a half if they offer overtime. My apartment will be ~$750/month with utilities. Please folks, I could really use any small or large bit of advice. I am feeling really hopeless and drained. TL;DR: Life sucks I have lots of debt. How do I be happy and budget for this? [link] [comments]  |
| [Request] Help figuring out how to get unf-cked by Nelnet. Posted: 07 May 2018 01:30 PM PDT I have been paying off 2 loan groups (a total of four loans) since 2010. In this time I have been paid ahead and set up with their autopay so I could benefit from the ".25% off of interest and finish my loans faster". As far as I can tell I neither got the interest reduction nor finished my loans faster. Their site reads "Your amount due is subject to change for reasons including but not limited to adding, removing, or changing an alternate payment amount, cancelling auto debit, the addition of a deferment or forbearance that covers the debit date, or the addition of new loans to your Nelnet account" and this seems to have been happening for the life of the loan. With my other student loans, for example, every extra penny I have goes to principal. I have a payment for that loan of, let's say $90 a month. I can break down that $90 however I see fit, and pay more, dictating where the money goes. If one is owed $30 and the other $60, I can pay $100 in any number of ways. I can go 30/70 or 35/65, etc. Usually I split it to the higher interest loan. Nelnet does not allow this. In fact, up until February this year, they didn't do anything like this. They'd pay on the assumed interest and not even pay the principal. That is to say if I owed around $100 for each group ($20 interest, $80 principal), they could dictate that the $210 I set up with autopay could go $150 to one group and $60 to the other. They can change my payment amount, my amount due, even cancel auto-pay altogether without any notice. She wouldn't answer questions as to why this is or how to change it. As of February they dictate that all excess funds will go toward the higher interest loan, but still interest first (based on past interest and not adjusted for you being ahead). The only time I missed a payment was because they adjusted these auto-payments at will and rendered one group payment too low. I'm honestly fucking furious right now. I get fined even though I'm on auto-pay for more than what is due! I just tried to get an explanation on this and how to cancel and they said I can't even specify manually where the money can go. I asked explicitly if I could cancel auto-pay and pay one loan off manually one month and they said in no uncertain terms that excess would be redistributed how they see fit and would not be credited to the group I paid it toward. How is this legal? ANd how the fuck can I stop paying them so much in interest if they are able to decide where my money goes? I'd be done paying right now, yet they're on me for 29 more months. "That's not that long" is what the rep told me, which is rubbing salt in the wound since for the amounts they've wrung out of me I genuinely would be done by now if it was allocated how I intended it. I even called and checked with them initially and this was not told to me. The other lender I pay told me that every extra cent pays down principal, NelNet did not say that they'd fuck with my payments, and made it seem that autopay was the best option for fast, efficient repayment. [link] [comments]  |
| Need help with my first payments Posted: 07 May 2018 12:45 PM PDT Hey Redditors, I just graduated in December, and my grace period for my student loans is about up. So, I'm seeking some general advice from the place known for usually great advice, Reddit. Should I defer for a bit longer? Does that take a toll other than accumulated interest on me? Should I consolidate or aim to do income based repayment? Some context, I live in NYC and make ~34k/year before taxes. So my money is a little limited, at least until I get a raise or better paying job. Thoughts? Advice? Admonishment? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 May 2018 11:45 AM PDT Hey guys, I am currently working on paying off around 33K across 5 student loans. The info on these loans is as follows:
All of these loans are variable rate loans and I am looking to refinance to lower my interest rates (and possibly my monthly payments). I have checked my rate with SoFi and LendKey so far and the best rates I have seen so far is 7 years @ 5.59% which would lower my monthly payment by about $100 but will add on 5 years to Loan #1 or 5 years @ 5.26% which will slightly increase my monthly payment (which I could handle) but again would add 3 more years to loan #1. My question is would it be beneficial to go ahead and refinance even though the length of my loan will increase in the long run? Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Find best place to refinance parent plus loans from Navient Posted: 07 May 2018 10:21 AM PDT Hello, I am looking to refinance my parent plus student loans (from NAVIENT). I have $60ish k in loans to refinance that I inherited in a divorce from ex wife's kid (entirely different issue, but they are mine now). The payment is about $750 a month starting this month. I want to reduce the interest rate because it is high (8-9%). I realize if I go private I will loose the benefits of: Deferrence (doesnt matter I used it all up) Low income repayment (currently and dont see in future that will be helpful) Forgiveness of the loan after x years for working in certain fields, I am not in that field that would apply. Those are the main benefits I would have and none of them really apply. Where is the best place to go to find the best rates to refinance so I dont get screwed. I have pretty good credit, a good job, and all that. I have some money I can put to reduce the balance but I want to reduce the interest rate and the monthly payment. I know one option available is to extend the loan period to reduce the monthly payment (but increasing overall interest paid). I am good with money/budgets/etc, I just want the interest lowered and want to find a good company to go through that is reliable and wont screw me over on interest or anything else. Your help is appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
| Mortgage Debt Calculations on IBR - 0.5% of Total, or Actual Monthly Payment? Posted: 07 May 2018 10:03 AM PDT My wife and I both have a very large amount of grad school debt that is on IBR. We're in the process of shopping around for mortgages. We've saved enough over the past 5 years for a 20% down payment. We just got of the phone with CHASE. For their debt calculations, they can only look at 0.5% of our total outstanding student loan debt, which ends up being muchhh higher than our actual payments on IBR. This has a considerable impact on our borrowing ability. Is this standard operating procedure for all lenders? Has anyone else had any luck convincing a lender to look at the actual monthly IBR payments, rather than .5% of outstanding student loan debt? [link] [comments]  |
| Are student loans subject to federal withholding? Posted: 07 May 2018 09:57 AM PDT Will I be taxed on my student loans or will I receive the full amount? I'm trying to figure out how much I need to borrow [link] [comments]  |
| F-d myself by filing a joint tax return. Now, my income based payment is 3x as much! Posted: 07 May 2018 09:51 AM PDT |
| Student Loan recently transferred to Navient and Navient has yet to report to credit bureaus. Posted: 07 May 2018 07:42 AM PDT I have had a student loan since 2008 ($15k at 9.25% currently) originally through Chase. During the life of the loan the loan servicer has been passed from Chase to AES (american education services) and now its with Navient. I have also kept a close eye on my credit and credit score using credit karma regularly. Everything ran as expected until Navient. Credit karma says that Chase/AES loan is gone and I no longer have debt with them. However, Navient has not reported that they now have my loan. My credit benefitted signifigantly (745ish to 775ish). I have an account with Navient they do have my loan and I already have autopayment setup and everything is smooth as butter with them at the moment. Should I just ignore that they are not reporting and enjoy my current credit score. Or should I encourage them to do the right thing and report it. Is there anything that could bite me in the ass later down the road? TL;DR Navient is my new loan servicer for my primary loan, they are not reporting my debt to my benefit of my credit score, what should I do? [link] [comments]  |
| i need advice regarding old student loans Posted: 07 May 2018 07:38 AM PDT in the early 2,000's i went to school 9/11 happend and i eventually dropped out. didnt hold a steady job till 2013 to present. a couple months ago i started getting garnished to the tune of $250 a month. i just inherited a large sum of money and want to wipe out my debt. i go to the FSA site see loan amount's. i also see deleted amounts wich i assume are from money they took from my tax returns,but garnishments to pay my loans are nowhere to be seen and i have no idea who to contact as the most recent date on the consolidated loans is 2008. any help or guidance would be appreciated. [link] [comments]  |
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