Tag Archives: college
Guide to Private Student Loan Consolidation
Borrowing may be your only option to pay for your college education if you are not eligible for grants and don’t qualify for scholarships. The process of acquiring these loans can be simple enough that you allow the repayment period to begin before you calculate what that monthly amount might be. If your starting salary is less than you anticipated, you may need to consider private student loan consolidation to put your loan into a more manageable format.
Private Student Education Loans
Private education loan consolidation means private loans cannot be comingled with Federal education loans. If you borrowed money with a private education loan, you will need a private education loan consolidation. By doing this you will reset the terms of the loan which may reduce your monthly payments. Usually the interest is not reduced. But if your credit score has improved since you originally applied for the first loan, you may qualify for a reduced interest rate. This may be the case now that you have graduated and gotten a job in your chose profession. You may now be a doctor making a good income and if you’ve been paying your bills on time your scores may have improved 100 points or more, which would definitely qualify you for a better credit score and lower interest rate.
Check with your existing bank to see if your current loans can be consolidated into a lower interest rate loan before you take it to another bank. They may be willing to help you rather than lose your business. If they are not helpful, shop around and find another lender who is willing to give you a private education loan consolidation. When shopping for a private student loan consolidation check to see if the loan is fixed or variable. What are the fees, origination fees, etc? And are there prepayment penalties? You should be able to pay an extra amount that is applied to your balance after collection costs; late charges outstanding interest and principal have been deducted from the payment. Any additional money left is considered prepayment and will be applied to the loan balance. There should be no extra fees associated with prepayment in the original loan. You will have to determine if the private student loan consolidation has fees of this nature.
Private education loan Consolidation Lenders
The Higher Education Act of 1965, The Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 and the amended Truth in Lending Act banned fees or penalties for early repayment of private education loans. The competitive institution did not charge prepayment penalties to keep the playing field even for all private lenders. Prepayment can provide a significant savings for the student. The total interest paid can be reduced by the extra payments being applied to the balance first and then the interest, ultimately saving thousands of dollars over the lifetime of a private student loan consolidation.
An EdSucceed Private student loan Consolidation through cuStudentLoans.org will provide loan consolidation for undergraduate students with debt of $7500 to $100,000 and graduate degree recipients with debt of up to $150,000 a 15-year loan. They have a 1.00% origination fee and a variable rate based on prime plus 1.5% to prime plus 4%. Your rate is based on credit and whether or not you select ACH payments. If you have a cosigner, you can release them after the first 12 year of on-time payments if other credit criteria are satisfied.
The student loan Network offers private college loan consolidation for a minimum of $10,000 to a maximum of $300,000. The repayment term ranges from 20-year for $40,000 or less to 30-year for above $40,000. The interest rate is based on 3-month LIBOR plus 5% to 3-month LIBOR plus 8.5%. The origination fee is also a range of 1% to 5%. There are no prepayment penalties and the cosigner is released after 4 years of timely payments and is based on the primary borrower’s credit improving.
Wells Fargo offers private education loan consolidation. They will consolidate a minimum of $5000 and up to $40,000 or up to $100,000 depending on the borrower’s credit. A 15-year term is provided with a variable rate. The interest ranges from prime plus 1% to prime plus 5.75%. The base rate is 3.25%. There is no origination fee associated with this loan. The rate is reduced.5% for automatic debit payments and the rate is reduced further for making 48 payments on time consecutively.
Currently, both Chase and Next Student have temporarily suspended their private student loan consolidation programs. Private student loan consolidations that are variable rate should be compared to a home equity loan with a fixed rate. If the comparison makes a home equity loan more attractive, and you own a home with enough equity in it to finance such a maneuver, this may be a better option than a variable rate loan.
Private Student College Loans And Federal College Loans
The primary difference in private student loan consolidation and federal loan consolidation is private loan rates are higher than federal loans even in consolidation. Federal loans and private loans cannot be mixed into the same consolidation loan. A loan that mixes several loans together often reduces the rate of one or two of the loans and reduces the payment giving the borrower more years to pay. This cannot be done when the loans come from different sources. Guaranteed Student education loans or federal loans with much lower interest rates cannot be mixed with private non-guaranteed loans with much higher interest rates in a private education loan consolidation.
The Consequences Of Default
Private college loan consolidation is there to provide more manageable debt repayments, preventing default or reducing incidences of default. Defaulting on a student loan could result in the IRS offsetting or keeping your federal or state tax refunds and wage garnishments. If you are a federal employee, they can offset 15% of your pay to repay Education loans. You may have to pay additional collection costs, legal action may be taken against you and the credit bureaus will be notified and your credit rating will suffer. Bankruptcy is no longer an option. Student education loans cannot be included in a bankruptcy filing. The only option for reducing payments of a private education loan is a private college loan consolidation. Your total loan term may be extended, lessening your monthly payments.
A Students Guide to Health Insurance
As a young student the last thing on your mind must be health insurance. Its time we change that. Do you know how many students drop out of college to start working due to some unexpected medical condition which costs them their entire savings? Quite a few. So its time you sit up and take notice. With the host of affordable student health insurance plans available this is not a difficult task.
Why do you need health insurance? Student life is characterized by large tuition fee and other educational costs and so their reluctance to “waste” money on health insurance is understandable. Majority of the college students arent even aware of the various college student health insurance plans that are available nowadays. People dont have accidents only after a certain age. You as a student are as much prone to an accident as anybody else walking on the street. You may feel health insurance is hard on your already tight budget but its high time you realise that low cost student health insurance is now not just a random term but very much a reality. So go for it now if you havent already.
what are your options? If you are under the age of 23 then you will probably be covered under your parents medical insurance. But if you are 23 and above or for some reason you are not covered under your parents health insurance then you should definitely go for one of the college student health insurance plans. Check out your colleges medical insurance facilities and see whether they suit your needs. However plans provided by colleges tend to be a little on the expensive side. Customized health insurance plans developed by certain hospitals have made it possible to get affordable student health insurance. These plans incorporate all the requirements that you might have from your health insurance plan. Go to your nearest medical facility and find out the services offered by them in this regard. These tend to be cheap and the premiums to be paid are minimum. Check online quotes and zero in on one of the perfect college student health insurance plans.
Benefits of getting a student health insurance Besides the obvious advantage of a health insurance which is coverage of unexpected medical expenditures, students health insurance also provides an added sense of security to students. If you are out of action due to some unforeseen medical emergency then good college student health insurance plans will provide for the best possible care thus ensuring speedy recovery. A speedy recovery means you will miss less of course work and you will not have to worry about the high costs of surgery, treatments etc. Once you are hale and hearty again you dont have to worry about paying huge bills. All this will be taken care of. The key is to find the plan that suits you best. You have to not only look for the most affordable student health insurance plan but also one that suits your requirements. This involves a little clever searching. Go around, ask your friends and family about the various health insurance plans that they have bought, search through the internet. Devote time and you will surely get the best plan.