Weekly Politics Discussion Megapost Student Loans |
- Weekly Politics Discussion Megapost
- I made my first major student loan payment of $2781 last month on $50k student loans since graduating in 2008!
- My short success story on how I paid off my student loans
- How to take out more student loans?
- Federal Pell Grant
- Did I do the right thing to pay a significant chunk on my student loans when forgiveness may be on the horizon?
- Income has increased..should I refinance?
- How do you consolidate Federal sub and unsub stanford loans into Direct for PSLF? Is it worth it?
- academic progress suspension appeal
- Looking for stories of people who have paid down student debt while on a tight budget!!!
- Question on Student Loans without Cosigner
- Parent PLUS loans question
- Parent Plus is asking to pay $622/ month, still already paying $200/ month on other loan. Advice?
- Took out $10,500 in loans for my first year in college, is this an ok start?
- Student loan showing as if I missed a payment on Credit Karma, but that is not the case on my actual loan website?
- 120k debt worth it?
- Advice on where to throw a little extra cash?
- Difference in interest rates?
- How to take out more student loans?
- Having trouble between choosing repaye, paye, or IBR? Unique ish circumstances
- Understanding formula
- Great Lakes- What is considered an excess payment?
- I’m getting denied for every student loan
- What are some alternatives to private loans?
- Figuring out my Navient Loan
| Weekly Politics Discussion Megapost Posted: 07 Aug 2019 01:11 PM PDT /r/StudentLoans is not /r/Politics, but student loans have a political component (especially this election season) and that deserves discussion! This is an automatic weekly post designed to host discussions about legislative proposals, candidate platforms, and other political topics relating to student loans. Posts and comments that fit these categories will be removed from other areas of the /r/StudentLoans community. Comments that only loosely relate to student loans should be taken to /r/politics or a similar sub and may be removed from here. Links to external websites or other subreddits must primarily relate to student loans. The rules of /r/StudentLoans still apply. Personal attacks, speculation about the motives or debt situation of other users, and unsolicited advice will be removed. This is also not a platform for specific political advocacy; this includes linking to petitions and soliciting campaign contributions. (This weekly aggregation post is an experiment. Please let the mods know your thoughts and if you have suggestions for improvement either by commenting here or via modmail.) [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 08:05 PM PDT I had to share because this is huge accomplishment for me. Backstory: I graduated college in 2008 with about $25k in student loan debt with a BS in Psychology. I really didn't know anything about finances and pretty much ignored paying it off. Mainly because I really didn't think I could afford to pay it off. My relationship with money has been fear based my whole life. My parents never taught me about saving or debt and any time my dad gave me money, he wouldn't say anything but would slide some money in my hand and walk away like it was a drug deal. That made me feel super uncomfortable about money. This fear-based mindset has held me back financially in a lot of other ways too. Through deferments, collections, and ignoring the debt, I obviously accrued a lot of interest over the past 11 years. I finally had a wake up call this summer that I needed to be an adult and pay off the debt. I've worked on my budget and I'm now dedicated to paying this off in under 3 years. I wanted to share this here because I don't have anyone else to celebrate this accomplishment with (which in my eyes is huge!) When I shared my accomplishment with my brother, he told me that I was focused on the wrong thing and that I should be saving money to buy a house and that you can buy a house with student loan debt and it's not that big of a deal. This is true, but I was really hurt that he couldn't have just celebrated with me in that moment but instead told me I was wrong for what I was doing. I think paying off this debt is a big deal and I'm already feeling more confident about my finances. This has been the one area, financially, that I've been afraid to look at and I'm over the moon that I almost paid off $3k in one month! I still have a long way to go but I know that I will reach my goal! Thanks for reading! :) [link] [comments]  |
| My short success story on how I paid off my student loans Posted: 07 Aug 2019 01:40 PM PDT I graduated in May 2018 with a BoS in Computer Science and $11,750 owed in subsidized student loans. After 14 months I paid off my student loans and I believe I only paid about $110 in interest, total. I took a lot of planning and calculating to get where I am. Throughout highschool I kept my grades up and scored a 27 on the ACT. With that I was award a full tuition scholarship . I grew up in a LCL were only my father has to work and I was "poor" enough to qualify for subsidized loans and the Pell Grant through fasfa. I worked as a waitress through school to pay for everything else( housing, car maintenance , gas, clothing, books, whatever I need). Right after I graduated, I received a job close to my parents. While the job I recieved was in my field, it didnt pay too much. I could have moved to a bigger city and objectively gotten paid more, but I decided to stay with my parents. Living at my parent's home and using the money that would have been spent on "rent" really helped me out. If I had to do it all over again, I'm not sure what I would change to this formula. Maybe I could have scored higher on the ACT. Maybe I could have moved far away from home. Maybe I should have bought a house by the university instead of paying the dorm fees. Maybe I could have kept my debt and stayed in school to pursue my Masters. Overall I am happy with the decision I have made. With the freedom from any student loans, I may go back for my Masters. Thanks for listening about my sucesss! [link] [comments]  |
| How to take out more student loans? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 06:16 PM PDT This year I realized that even when taking out my max federal subsidized and Unsubsidized student loans, I still need an extra 4k to cover my costs. So I was wondering what would be the best option to get more loans? Is it possible to ask for more federal loans or is my only option to find a private loan? Also please don't comment "dont take out student loans" because im already 100% committed to it. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 08:25 PM PDT I Still haven't recieved the Federal Pell Grant for this year. I did my FAFSA 2018 last year on October. I was wondering if they are still being distributed. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 08 Aug 2019 12:03 AM PDT Until two days ago, I had about 43K left to pay on my 80k loan from when I graduated in 2008. I made an 8k payment from the performance bonus I received from my former employer and today, after I saw that the payment cleared with the loan provider, I suddenly dawned on me that student loan forgiveness is possibility if Warren or Sanders are elected as president. It has always been my intention to pay the entire balance due to the lenders, and I feel pretty fortunate and proud of how far I have come in the last 10+ years. My first job was at the start of the economic recession and I was paid 28k/year in Manhattan, and as a result, I had on multiple occasions double digit credit card debt to manage on top of the student loans. Finding myself borrowing money from friends to eat taught me about humility and gratitude. I could never ask my family for money because of illness and death in the family which led to folks being out of work and facing the mounting medical bills on their own. Still, I dragged myself along and have paid down half of what I owe, I have no major savings and no property which burns a little, but my dedication to repay has served me well overall. Forgiveness at this stage would be life changing. It's possible that student loan forgiveness may never happen regardless of whoever becomes president, in which case I'll be relieved that at least I won't be owing interest on the 8k I just put down. But I can't help to feel like my tunnel vision to repay cost me a lot more considering I am on an unpaid professional sabbatical and expecting a baby soon. I could have added that 8k to the small emergency savings we have. Anyone experiencing similar internal battles? How are you dealing with it? [link] [comments]  |
| Income has increased..should I refinance? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 11:01 PM PDT Hi all I really need an advice here, I have 72k with average intrest rate of 6% in student loans and I am on pay as you earn and my income was around 95k/ year based on the family size I pay 350$ a month which is very low, recently my income has moved to 125k/year so when I recertify my payment will definitely go up and i might not be eligible due to the high income, should a refinance be aggresive kill that loan? ( and I want to) But my concern is losing the protection of federal student loans in case of a job loss, does SOFI or others provide any kind of protection in case of loss of employment? That's the only thing that keeps me awake at night. Thanks everyone [link] [comments]  |
| How do you consolidate Federal sub and unsub stanford loans into Direct for PSLF? Is it worth it? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 06:37 PM PDT I am certified for about half of my loans that were direct federal loans. But i habe 4 other loans that are just Federal sub Standford loans. Would it be worth consolidating them into a direct loans, or would this be not worth it since it would take 10 more yeara for these loans to be forgiven... Pros and cons? Thank [link] [comments]  |
| academic progress suspension appeal Posted: 07 Aug 2019 09:48 PM PDT hi so long story short i messed up my freshman year and took the summer to retake classes i failed at a local community college as well as take an extra class to get back on track for my academic plan. I'm on financial aid hold due to the 67% percent course completion rule and this rule alone and was told to file an appeal if my courses from the summer were going to put me over that and allow me to use loans and my aid. i have a total of 30 hours now with 18 completed. the summer classes i have taken and passed will submit grades Monday. they total out to 9 hours. so i'll have 39 total hours with 27 completed which going off of another colleges hour completion calculator does equate to higher than 67%. do you think my school will lift my appeal because of this once they receive my grades for proof of passing the courses? i was told to submit an appeal already to start the process as well as inform them why i fell behind which was mainly my own fault but expressed my steps to change it as well. a plan was written out by my advisor as well as mentioning the summer classes to be above the rule. are my odds to get appealed decent enough? or should i give up and try to transfer to a different school. I cant attend this one without the aid so this appeal is a make or break. i'd like to state my financial aid hold is for no other reason than the completion rule. its not due to gpa or anything else tldr. on aid hold for 67% completion rule. took summer classes to rectify this well beforehand. should have a higher percentage with completion of summer courses. does my appeal have a chance? [link] [comments]  |
| Looking for stories of people who have paid down student debt while on a tight budget!!! Posted: 07 Aug 2019 09:40 PM PDT Hi! Not sure if this is allowed in this group, but we are trying to capture stories of people who have paid down student debt while on a tight budget. We are working on an app that helps people pay down debt (with A LOT of the wealth and knowledge here). Our learning is that there is a huge differentiator when people just have money to work with (whether it's income or family), and we really want to tell the stories of people who made it work (either through cutting expenses, getting a side hustle, getting that salary bump, etc.). Thanks for your time! [link] [comments]  |
| Question on Student Loans without Cosigner Posted: 07 Aug 2019 09:31 PM PDT Okay so to make a long story short, my parents refused to fill out FAFSA for me this past year, and now I have no way to pay for college. They also will not help fund my tuition nor cosign a private loan. My household environment is quite rough, and has gotten worse in the past few years, and I know they are trying to get me to leave. (The previous year I used a mix of FAFSA loans, used up my personal college savings, and a little bit from my parents and I managed to get by. I thankfully go to a somewhat cheaper in-state, public university.) I was wondering if you guys knew the best/trustworthy places to get a private loan where I would not need a cosigner. Also, I should mention I do have a credit score, it's usually in the low/middle 700's when I check, so maybe that can work to my advantage? Is there anything I need to know about private loans in that learned-from-experience-type of way? I would only need this year and next year for undergrad. After that is med school, but I think FAFSA would consider me independent by then. I also was curious if I would be able to take enough out for not only tuition, but also living expenses. I currently am in suburbs near a big city where my university is located (I don't know how much private info this reddit allows), and commute via car. (The car is mine and I pay insurance myself, so I could keep that upon moving out.) So, I could either find a place in the city or nearby where I am now depending on what is cheaper. I already buy my own groceries/clothes/etc using my job, so I would only need enough for rent and probably like a bed and some basic things. How crazy would this be? I would be willing to have roommates or find a slightly scary but also super cheap studio apartment to lower costs. (Dorms are out of the picture since it's nearly the same cost as tuition for them at my school.) It would really be best to move out, my household has gotten to the point where I can't even study at home anymore. Any other suggestions are welcome, I really appreciate the advice and help! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 09:08 PM PDT I have an question regarding deferment on parent PLUS loans. I would have to take out 5.3k in PLUS loans per semester . I prefer to go on deferment and I know that I would still have to pay interest. I'm a bit lost on how this might work so if I go on deferment, how much would I be expected to pay per month compared to if I'm not on deferment? P.S. I do know the the PLUS parent loan would tech be in my parent's name but I still prefer to be the one responsible for it when I graduate which is why I would prefer deferment. [link] [comments]  |
| Parent Plus is asking to pay $622/ month, still already paying $200/ month on other loan. Advice? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 11:40 AM PDT I am in total 75k in debt. I graduated in December 2017 with a nursing degree and have been working for about a year and half now. I'm married and my wife is in grad school full time. I also plan on going back to school that will yield a higher income. I'm just coming out of forbearance for my parent plus loan and the best they can do is $622/month. I'm currently applying for IDR for my other loan but I'm unable to do IDR with the parent plus. Besides picking up extra shifts/working more, anything else I can do minimize payments or pay them off faster. Any advice is welcome! [link] [comments]  |
| Took out $10,500 in loans for my first year in college, is this an ok start? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 04:18 PM PDT For context, I'm going to an in-state Public college that costs around $24,000 for a year. I took out $5,500 in federal loans that I was offered through the FAFSA and a $5,000 loan through my university (5% interest). The rest I managed to get enough scholarships and aid to pay for. Hopefully for the future semesters my loan amount will either stay the same or decrease, as freshman are required to stay on campus and campus housing is very expensive here. It's just that I see so many student debt horror stories and I'm scared that that's the path I'm on. I'm majoring in civil engineering and that has an average starting pay of $50,000. Really all I'm looking for is reassurance. Maybe someone who is/was in a similar situation as me. I'm feeling kind of scared about my future. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 08:50 AM PDT I had a student loan that was mistakenly going into repayment at the beginning of this month. When I got the email 2 months ago I immediately contacted my loan servicer and they corrected the issue so it is back in deferment now (I am still in school). This morning I checked credit karma for a different reason and I see that for both TransUnion and Equifax it says that I missed a loan payment. Thinking that the loan servicer messed up I immediately checked my actual student loan account, and there is no report of a missing payment, and it is clearly stated everywhere that I am in deferment. I never received any alert emails about missing a payment or that the payment was coming up once I contacted them, just the email certifying that I was back in deferment. Should I try to dispute this with the credit bureaus ? Should I contact my loan servicer first? Cross posting to r/CRedit. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 07:21 PM PDT Is an Oxford Mech Eng degree worth this kind of debt? A plus factor is that it's a 4 year program where I get both my bachelor's and master's together, so I won't have to consider going to grad school in the future. However, I'm not sure if Mech Eng is necessarily a lucrative field or how an Oxford degree is looked upon in the US. On the other hand, I have a debt free undergard option at a much less prestigious university for a major in Computer Science (which is believe is much more lucrative than Mech Eng). However, I do plan on going to grad school. Hence, it'll take 5-6 years in total with about 80k debt (?). [link] [comments]  |
| Advice on where to throw a little extra cash? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 06:51 PM PDT I recently got a pretty good bonus at my job and I was thinking of using $500-$1000 of it to pay some extra on my loans this month. I have multiple federal subsidized/unsubsidized loans ranging from $2500 to about $5500. All of the interest rates are pretty much the same. Does anyone have any advice on the best way I should utilize the extra money I have? Should I pay extra on one loan? Should I pay extra towards all the loans/increase my monthly payment one time? Should I even throw extra at my loans or would it be better to save my money or put it towards something else since this extra bit is really just a drop in the bucket? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 06:38 PM PDT When I look at the repayment calculator on studentloans.gov and use my loan info it shows that my interest rate is 5.8% but when I look at my servicer (MOHELA) it's listed as 6.6%....why is this so? Why is there a difference? Thanks <3 [link] [comments]  |
| How to take out more student loans? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 06:00 PM PDT This year I realized that even when taking out my max federal subsidized and Unsubsidized student loans, I still need an extra 4k to cover my costs. So I was wondering what would be the best option to get more loans? Is it possible to ask for more federal loans or is my only option to find a private loan? Also please don't comment "dont take out student loans" because im already 100% commited to it. [link] [comments]  |
| Having trouble between choosing repaye, paye, or IBR? Unique ish circumstances Posted: 07 Aug 2019 05:59 PM PDT Hello! So I'm finishing up my doctorate after a masters with a good chunk of debt and I'm stuck between which plan to choose. The debt is ~230k While I will be getting married (ceremony) in April, we are likely not going to get a marriage license as we are both new doctors and have a lot of debt. I don't want my fiancée's income to make it harder for me as they are at about 120k income but contract work so a bunch of LLC and back paying taxes stuff that's too complicated for me. My income right now is 57k through an online job I have that is salary but the VA offered me a .8 position which would be 32 hours a week. While the position isn't technically listed as full time, it is over 30 hours. This would be on top of my online job and the income would be a gs11 but slightly reduced due to the .8 so I'm guessing 40k salary plus my online job salary of 57k. If I start working in the next 2 months, the income would be around 97k. This past year I worked my online job plus a full time residency at the VA which made 30k so I've been pulling in about 80k this past year but now I'm back down to only 57k due to residency ending. Trick is that the VA takes awhile to get onboarded and such so I'm guessing I won't start working until October. If they pull my income I'm worried they'll use my combined income which won't be what I'll be at now. Last year's taxes were about 67k in income (part of residency had started). I am also not 100% sure that a .8 position will qualify me for loan forgiveness as it isn't listed as full time but it is over 30 hours. The website said whichever is greater and I'm not too sure what that means. Based on this, I'm not sure what plan to choose. IBR will have a higher monthly payment unless I get approved for IBR for new borrowers but that wasn't an option at the final selection even though it mentioned it earlier in exit counseling as eligible. I also don't want to have to do 25 instead of 20 years and I'm hoping everything works out and is forgiven after 10 years if I stick with the VA. Repaye and Paye from what I understand, differs on if you're going to get married and if your income is going to change. If my income might go up to 97k and last year's income is 67k but right now I'm at 57k and might qualify for a job that has loan forgiveness soon, what should I choose? Any help is appreciated! I don't want to get slammed with a payment I can't afford right now [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 05:46 PM PDT Last year I started working for my city, which qualified me for the PSLF. I had been on 2 years of standard 10 year repay schedule. Since my new job, I had to apply for IDR (PAYE). My payments lowered from 700 to about 230. This year, it went up 50 bucks. My salary did not change much. Is there any way to understand the formula they use to calculate your IDR payments? I was expecting a small increase, but 50 bucks a month seems excessive. I will call Fedloans but wanted to inquire some info here first. I wasn't able to find anything else out there. Thanks [link] [comments]  |
| Great Lakes- What is considered an excess payment? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 05:35 PM PDT Last month I tried to make an excess payment on my account and apply 100% of it to my lowest balance loan just to get rid of it (it's like, $8). I had already made my required monthly payment (I'm on IDR). I made this excess payment a separate transaction from my required payment, but when I made it, it applied to all my loans instead of the one I specified. I'm really confused about what is considered excess. I understand that my regular payments will go to interest first, but is the excess anything I pay beyond what my minimum payment is? My regular monthly payment right now is only like $66. I usually pay more, but I've never allocated to a specific loan (I hate that it does a % and not a dollar amount). Do I need to make my excess payment in the same transaction as my regular payment? So for example, if my minimum payment due is $66, but I also want to pay the $8 loan off, do I just make a payment of $74 and tell it to apply 100% of my excess to the $8 loan? I assume my mistake was doing this in 2 separate payments rather than altogether. Thanks for any input. [link] [comments]  |
| I’m getting denied for every student loan Posted: 07 Aug 2019 03:36 PM PDT I went to Art school in 2016, after my first year I dropped to get my license in a trade, and planned to return afterwards. I'm got my financial aid through fafsa, got accepted into school, received my grants and scholarships, and now I'm unable to get approved for a student loan. I have no co-signers, and I'm not sure what to do or who to go through. I've been denied through 6 lenders as well as for a private loan through my bank. I need help, start date is coming fast and I'm sick over the thought that I might not be able to return. Is there anywhere that will approve a student without a co-signer? I'll take any and all advice available in order to return to school. [link] [comments]  |
| What are some alternatives to private loans? Posted: 07 Aug 2019 03:07 PM PDT I'm going to a private college in the fall that's out of state. While it's a really good college and the best route for my intended major, I still owe them roughly $3000. They gave me a really good scholarship and a bunch of grants because my family is poor (plus my parents have horrendous credit). I cannot take out any private loans myself because my credit is not established. My parents cannot co-sign because of a recent foreclosure (and an even worse credit history). Taking a year off is unrealistic and I've used all of my fafsa (loans and grants). Are there any other ways to acquire quick funding for tuition (and dorm/class stuff). I need to pay tuition by the 15th (at least part of it). Plus, in order to be successful, it's important to have all the tools necessary for each class. Edit: (addition information) I'm an Illinois resident if it helps. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2019 11:01 AM PDT Hello everyone! I am now in my repayment for my loans, I have about 30k debt in total(across 5 loans), I have chosen an 'income based' repayment (I make 16k per year salary - so my monthly payment will be around 300$). Is this the best repayment method Navient offers for someone in my situation? My second question is, when I repay my loans can I choose to put the money towards the interest or principal? Or is that already chosen? And regardless of wether I can/can't do that: which loan should I pay off first? Or divide my payments between loans equally? Here are my loans and interest rates: 6,700$ - 3.860% ________________________________ 4,560$ - 4.660% ________________________________ 2,437$ - 4.660% ________________________________ 8,678$ - 4.290% ________________________________ 8,250$ - 3.760% ________________________________ (30k Total) Any help would be appreciated! Even would be willing to paypal a few dollars to people for help! Thank you all♥️ [link] [comments]  |
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