Archive for July 2012

If you have any kind of question about Federal Student Aid, then you need to check out the new website  from the U.S. Department of Education. The web addy is  www.studentaid.ed.gov . It has all kinds of information about what kinds of loans are available, how to get them and  it also has infromation about what to do if you find out you can’t make your payments.

If you would like to make a donation toward the operating expenses of the StudentLoanList, please click on the DONATE  button. Any and all donations are greatly appreciated. While our operating expenses are minimal, they do add up over time. Thank you.

Here is how $100,ooo of student loan debt is affecting one woman registered on the StudentLoanList: 

Having over 100K in student loan debt means I have to pay around 600/month in student loans (and that’s with my federal loans being on the income based repayment while my private loans don’t offer that).  This means that I can’t afford to live somewhere on my own.  I currently live with family.  I also have one vehicle with over 100,000 miles on it that I’m trying to take care of, but if it ever dies, I won’t be able to afford the payment for a new vehicle unless I stop buying food.  I drive about 40 miles a day for work so that’s always a concern for me.

If I didn’t have to worry about student loan debt, I would be able to relax a little and actually enjoy life a little instead of having every last penny going to bills and barely surviving.  I’m not materialistic and don’t want for a lot of things, but it would be nice to be able to afford to travel, or go out to dinner with friends, or just know that I can afford to actually start a savings for the future.

I know that there are people out there that believe if you took out the debt, you should have to pay it back.  I also know that many of us who have so much debt incurred it to pay for school, assist with their cost of living while attending classes, and maybe also help pay for a spouse’s schooling in hopes of getting a high paying job after they graduated when the reality is that most people don’t ever make that huge income they were “sure to get”.  The schools really push you into feeling like the debt you’re taking out will pay off right away.  They make it easy for you to take out more than you need and dangle dreams of making close to six figures a year in front of you once you graduate so that you’ll pour everything you have and all of your future into attaining a degree.  They tell stories of the person who graduated and landed the great paying job to motivate and entice you.  Who wouldn’t want that, right?

The American Dream laid out by colleges is that you go to school, get a degree, and make tons of money after you graduate.  The reality is that you go to school, incur a lot of debt because of it, and, for most of us, make a modest amount of money that doesn’t include enough to afford rent, food, gas, a car payment, insurance, AND the 600-1000 dollars per month for your student loan debt on top of it.  Student loan debt really limits your life for at least your next 30 years and what you can contribute to society.  If we weren’t paying off student loans, then more of our money would be going into other parts of the economy including small local businesses.  We could live and be part of life instead of merely surviving it.

If you would like to make a donation toward the operating expenses of the StudentLoanList, please click on the  DONATE button. Any and all donations are greatly appreciated. While our operating expenses are minimal, they do add up over time. Thank you.

Student loans have become a “normal”  way to pay for education. Students who walk into schools without funds are quickly shown the way to the financial aid office. Young people are getting loans for tens of thousands of dollars quickly and easily. Imagine this person at a car lot – they wouldn’t be able to qualify for a loan to purchase  a used car, but yet they easily obtain financing for schooling with large  amounts of unsecured debt. After graduation they hope to get good paying jobs, but it doesn’t always happen. Graduates end up living back with their parents and begin life in a much different manner than their parents.  Dreams of starting a business are set aside as young graduates struggle to just make ends meet.  This is the reality for many young people today.

If you would like to read more about how student debt affects individuals, read more in the “Student Stories” section of the blog.

If you would like to make a donation toward the operating expenses of the StudentLoanList, please click on the  DONATE button. Any and all donations are greatly appreciated. While our operating expenses are minimal, they do add up over time. Thank you.