tyno
War Eagle's friend
I want to talk about SoFi and how it helped me, but first let me stand on my soap-box about student loans in general for a little bit.
We can use this thread to discuss student loans, your experiences, your solutions, problems, etc., and see if we can generate any assistance for members in the meantime...
Most of us will incur some form of student loan debt in our lives. Whether it be ours, our spouses, or our kids...it's basically inevitable and unfortunately, it's an epidemic. It seems obvious that the amount of total student loan debt only gets higher every year, as colleges continue to raise tuition and making it impossible for students not to take out loans with hefty interest rates. As a student, it's honestly the last thing that you need to worry about...but then as an adult, it consumes your life. And there's very little being done about it. Sure, Obama's "loan forgiveness" plan is out there, but not everyone qualifies and the word "forgiveness" should be used very, very lightly. Most of this plan centers around public service careers and income based payment plans, requiring you to work the same career for around 10 years (while still paying off your loans) and then if all the criteria is met, the remaining balance will be forgiven. IBR plans center around your income, requiring you to pay 10-15% of your discretionary income for 20-25 years...while these plans may help smaller income individuals, they continue under the false assumption that students who went to school longer, or have a Masters or Doctorate degrees, or essentially make a large amount of money can afford to pay off their much heftier debt, since, you know...they're so rich. No matter how much money you make, the relation to the amount of debt is still mostly the same.
Along with the sheer amount of debt that most students pile up, just by trying to better themselves by getting an education, high interest rates are the silent killer when it comes to student loans. Students are able to borrow and are given nice grace periods before having to pay it all back. Assuming that most students have a job by the time their grace period is up, loan companies offer ridiculously low payment plans that are impossible not to take given most people's current income (or lack thereof) at that time. Meanwhile, most times the majority of the monthly payment is applied to interest, leaving the lesser half applied to the principal, which in turn will gain no ground on paying off the total balance and earn so much extra interest, that the total amount almost nearly doubles, especially with rates in the 6%-8% range. It's nauseating. I'm sure no one needs a math lesson...but take a $100,000 loan at 6.8% on a 20 yr payment plan and your monthly payment is nearly $760 and your total interest paid is somewhere around $83,200. Sure, cutting your payment period in half will certainly cut that total interest paid in half as well, but that's if you can afford an extra $400 for your monthly payment.
So maybe I'm not the smartest guy out there and maybe I've gone about all of this the wrong way, but it seems to me that nothing short of winning the lottery or dying (if you don't have a co-signer) will assist you in covering this massive debt. I'm in no way asking for free hand-outs by any means...I do understand the concept of borrowing and paying back money, but I couldn't imagine having to pay back this amount on a single salary or on a budget. I'm married, own a house, 2 cars, 2 kids, and 2 dogs....but I'm not exactly pumping money back into the economy because our loan payment eats up a good portion of our dual income. My wife has a Masters degree PA-C and I have a Bachelors degree MIS. Luckily, I was able to pay off what I owed within about 5-6 years after graduating. My wife's Master's degree student loan debt is a different story....the balance rivals that of our mortgage, so something had to be done. Researching for answers got me nowhere but frustrated with the aforementioned "forgiveness plans", so I just decided to bite the bullet and start buying more lottery tickets. Hey, at least that helps Pennsylvania's elderly!
Enter SoFi. Junk mail in my physical USPS mailbox. Mail that I had no business opening, but did. SoFi is a student loan consolidation company founded by Stanford graduates with a vision to help students with loan debt from their Alma mater. SoFi is alumni funded student loans and allows for many different options when consolidating. I liked their basic idea, I liked their options, and I liked the fact that this was a small upstart company that understood what I was going through. There are a ton of consolidation companies out there, but this one stood out to me.
The initial application process was quick and easy. Based on our info, we were presented with 3 plans: 2 fixed rates (5yr and 10yr plan) and a variable rate which I was not considering at all. I ran some numbers and decided to go with the 5 year plan. It ended up lowering my rate by 1.5% and allowed me to rid ourselves of this debt in a mere 5 years. Of course, our monthly payment is high, but after running the finances, affordable when looking long term. The big number was the $60,000 that we would save in interest by going this route. $60,0000. I'm not sure about you, but to me, that's a lot of cash. So at the end of the day, the overall process took about a month to straighten out, which was longer than I would've liked, but everything went smoothly, just took awhile for some reason. My decision was final...bear down for 5 years and completely rid ourselves of our student loan debt. I'd rather "budget" for 5 years, than 20.
So here's my shameless plug for SoFi. I'm not going to list everything that they offer. That is for you to checkout if you're interested.
http://www.sofi.com
But they do offer a referral program along with their consolidation. Every invite gets you and the person you referred $100 if and when they decide to sign up.
Here's my referral link: https://www.sofi.com/refer/4/34175
We can use this thread to discuss student loans, your experiences, your solutions, problems, etc., and see if we can generate any assistance for members in the meantime...
Most of us will incur some form of student loan debt in our lives. Whether it be ours, our spouses, or our kids...it's basically inevitable and unfortunately, it's an epidemic. It seems obvious that the amount of total student loan debt only gets higher every year, as colleges continue to raise tuition and making it impossible for students not to take out loans with hefty interest rates. As a student, it's honestly the last thing that you need to worry about...but then as an adult, it consumes your life. And there's very little being done about it. Sure, Obama's "loan forgiveness" plan is out there, but not everyone qualifies and the word "forgiveness" should be used very, very lightly. Most of this plan centers around public service careers and income based payment plans, requiring you to work the same career for around 10 years (while still paying off your loans) and then if all the criteria is met, the remaining balance will be forgiven. IBR plans center around your income, requiring you to pay 10-15% of your discretionary income for 20-25 years...while these plans may help smaller income individuals, they continue under the false assumption that students who went to school longer, or have a Masters or Doctorate degrees, or essentially make a large amount of money can afford to pay off their much heftier debt, since, you know...they're so rich. No matter how much money you make, the relation to the amount of debt is still mostly the same.
Along with the sheer amount of debt that most students pile up, just by trying to better themselves by getting an education, high interest rates are the silent killer when it comes to student loans. Students are able to borrow and are given nice grace periods before having to pay it all back. Assuming that most students have a job by the time their grace period is up, loan companies offer ridiculously low payment plans that are impossible not to take given most people's current income (or lack thereof) at that time. Meanwhile, most times the majority of the monthly payment is applied to interest, leaving the lesser half applied to the principal, which in turn will gain no ground on paying off the total balance and earn so much extra interest, that the total amount almost nearly doubles, especially with rates in the 6%-8% range. It's nauseating. I'm sure no one needs a math lesson...but take a $100,000 loan at 6.8% on a 20 yr payment plan and your monthly payment is nearly $760 and your total interest paid is somewhere around $83,200. Sure, cutting your payment period in half will certainly cut that total interest paid in half as well, but that's if you can afford an extra $400 for your monthly payment.
So maybe I'm not the smartest guy out there and maybe I've gone about all of this the wrong way, but it seems to me that nothing short of winning the lottery or dying (if you don't have a co-signer) will assist you in covering this massive debt. I'm in no way asking for free hand-outs by any means...I do understand the concept of borrowing and paying back money, but I couldn't imagine having to pay back this amount on a single salary or on a budget. I'm married, own a house, 2 cars, 2 kids, and 2 dogs....but I'm not exactly pumping money back into the economy because our loan payment eats up a good portion of our dual income. My wife has a Masters degree PA-C and I have a Bachelors degree MIS. Luckily, I was able to pay off what I owed within about 5-6 years after graduating. My wife's Master's degree student loan debt is a different story....the balance rivals that of our mortgage, so something had to be done. Researching for answers got me nowhere but frustrated with the aforementioned "forgiveness plans", so I just decided to bite the bullet and start buying more lottery tickets. Hey, at least that helps Pennsylvania's elderly!
Enter SoFi. Junk mail in my physical USPS mailbox. Mail that I had no business opening, but did. SoFi is a student loan consolidation company founded by Stanford graduates with a vision to help students with loan debt from their Alma mater. SoFi is alumni funded student loans and allows for many different options when consolidating. I liked their basic idea, I liked their options, and I liked the fact that this was a small upstart company that understood what I was going through. There are a ton of consolidation companies out there, but this one stood out to me.
The initial application process was quick and easy. Based on our info, we were presented with 3 plans: 2 fixed rates (5yr and 10yr plan) and a variable rate which I was not considering at all. I ran some numbers and decided to go with the 5 year plan. It ended up lowering my rate by 1.5% and allowed me to rid ourselves of this debt in a mere 5 years. Of course, our monthly payment is high, but after running the finances, affordable when looking long term. The big number was the $60,000 that we would save in interest by going this route. $60,0000. I'm not sure about you, but to me, that's a lot of cash. So at the end of the day, the overall process took about a month to straighten out, which was longer than I would've liked, but everything went smoothly, just took awhile for some reason. My decision was final...bear down for 5 years and completely rid ourselves of our student loan debt. I'd rather "budget" for 5 years, than 20.
So here's my shameless plug for SoFi. I'm not going to list everything that they offer. That is for you to checkout if you're interested.
http://www.sofi.com
But they do offer a referral program along with their consolidation. Every invite gets you and the person you referred $100 if and when they decide to sign up.
Here's my referral link: https://www.sofi.com/refer/4/34175
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