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Although the media and financial institutions have been reporting about how crippling student loan debt is to modern American graduates, there are worse things in life.  Because of the economy, everything costs more, especially a college education.  Don’t get pressured into taking advice from questionable sources about paying off your student loan debt.  Unlike other things in life, there is always hope for paying off your student loan debt.

Averages And Interest Rates

In 2006, the average student loan debt of an American 4 year college graduate was $20,000.  The first payment on these loans is normally six months after graduation, whether you have a job or not.  This statistic is incredibly scary at first read.  It seems like you can’t win no matter how hard you try because of student loan debt.

However, when you born you owed some government somewhere a certain amount of money in future taxes.  It is next to impossible to get through modern American or European life without owing somebody a heck of a lot of money.  Have you ever looked at how much a house costs?  That will make your student loan look paltry in comparison.

Banks and other financial places that give any kind of loan will always initially charge you the highest possible interest rate they can.  It is only with the interest rate do they make any profit.  However, you don’t have to keep paying that high interest rate throughout the life of your student loan debts. 

You Are Not Hopeless

There are always things you can do to negotiate a lower interest rate.  This is even better when you have had a job for a while, as you can prove that you are a low-risk borrower.  But you can always contact a debt management specialist at any point of your life.  These are often non-profit organizations that will offer you money management classes as well as a consolidation loan.

A $20,000 student loan debt, believe it or not, isn’t that much.  You can conceivably pay it off in comfortable monthly installments in about five to seven years.  That’s a lot shorter than a mortgage.  You might be even rewarded with a refund if you are able to make more than your minimum payment per month.

But you have to learn how to manage your money.  That’s the difficult bit.  You can’t get a new car, furnish your apartment and order pizza every night when you have a student loan debt to pay back.  In learning how to live frugally now, you not only learn more than your college every taught you, but you get a great credit score for paying back a loan.

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Although you don’t need to go to confession to be eligible for student loan forgiveness programs, it doesn’t hurt to pray to any and all Gods and Goddesses known to man.  A good Goddess to pray to is the Roman Goddess Fortuna, who is where we get the words “fortune” and “fortunate” from.  She is responsible for the original Wheel of Fortune.  Federal student loan forgiveness programs are issued for exceptional circumstances, sop it doesn’t hurt to get help from high places.

Eligibility Requirements

Be sure your federal student loans are really really bad before you consider student loan forgiveness programs.  They won’t wave a magic wand and you can walk away scott-free.  No, you have to work for these babies.  And often, they will not pay the entire loan off, just part of it.  Here are the eligibility requirements in for federal student loan forgiveness programs.

You are eligible if you are doing a lengthy spot of volunteer work from only these three volunteer groups:

You are also eligible for federal student loan forgiveness programs if you are in the military, including the National Guard.  You are also eligible if you are a teacher in certain low-income areas (including the entire state of Mississippi).  You must contact the American Federation of Teachers for the most recent eligibility list.  It’s easier to just bite the bullet and pay the loans back, isn’t it?

Unusual Areas Of Forgiveness

For some reason only Fortuna knows, attending certain schools or getting certain loans can make you eligible for student loan forgiveness programs.  Since these programs change, you need to always check these out before committing to anything.  If you attended Baker University’s Colleges of Arts And Sciences in Kansas, you’re probably eligible.  No reason.

If you studies law enforcement, penology, parole and probation or law in Alaska under the benefit of the Michael Murphy Loan, you are also eligible … both of you. (That was a joke.)

If you word for the state of Maryland and make less than $40,000 before taxes per year, then you are also eligible. 

If you studied nursing, you also may be eleigable for partial repayment of your student loans, especially if you are with the National Health Service Corps.  You need to double check with the Nursing Education Loan Repayment Program.

All the rest of you, keep on praying.

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You probably think you have more than enough to worry about when you’re in college.  But you need to think about your student debt.  If you really don’t have the time to look into consolidating student loans now, have a trusted family member look into it.  There are advantages to working on paying back your debt now, instead of after you graduate.

Keep This In Mind

Before you go to consolidate student loans, remember one important thing.  You can’t consolidate federal and private loans together.  They are separate financial species (in a way) and need to be kept to their own kind.  If your potential loan consolidator says that you can consolidate federal and private loans together, move on.  They just showed you that they do not know what they are doing.

First Places To Look

If you have received all of your private student loans from the same creditor, than you can ask them about your options for paying them back. They may already have a program where you can consolidate your student loans. If they don’t, they should be able to recommend other financial institutions that they have worked with in the past about student loan consolidation.

For consolidating your federal loans, you really have to contact the state or federal program that you received the loans from.  Some federal loans for undergraduates can’t be consolidated.  If you are trying to find this information yourself, you don’t have to.  Your college’s financial aid office should be able to help you find all of the information you need.

Get Clicking

The next step in looking to consolidate your student loans is by looking online.  There is a dizzying mountain of websites offering student loan consolidations.  Take your time in picking a consolidation loan service.  Some things to look for are:

Other Things To Keep In Mind

The details and rules for consolidating your student loans while you are an undergraduate differs from financial institution to financial institution.  You need to have someone you trust read the fine print.  Try to keep in mind that filling out these applications is a great education for the real world.

Some consolidation loans are only for US citizens.  Some will only be for US citizens that have an employed parent as a co-signer.  Some will require that you give some private information to fill out the forms – this is normal.

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