How much was/is YOUR student loan

[inception7]

...and how many years did it take/will take to pay back?

I'm at a point in my life where I will soon be taking student loan for my studies, but the idea of taking a "huge" amount of money frightens me!

Share your experience!

 

[Ryan_m_b]

Well I can only talk about the UK but my loans were on the order of 6k per year (for three years). I can't tell you how long it will take me to pay it off as I haven't started yet however I would say that if you really want to study a particular subject and pursue a career in it then the money shouldn't be a factor.

It is something you should think long and hard about though, my 18k total debt would not be true of a UK student going to uni now, with increasing fees debt could rise to 36k in total.

 

[inception7]

I hear that in the States the figures climb quite quickly. Some people speak of having loans in the amount of 50-100k! Either I misread or this is very absurd...

 

[Ryan_m_b]

I hear that in the States the figures climb quite quickly. Some people speak of having loans in the amount of 50-100k! Either I misread or this is very absurd...

Well I don't know too much about the American system but $50k is roughly £30k. The price in the UK reflects the amount the government is willing to pay, it was only ~5 years ago that uni was free. Then the government introduced "top-up" fees, the idea of these were that the government would no longer pay all of the costs but would pay most, leaving the student to pay ~£3k. This is what I had to pay in addition to another £3k for accommodation.

In light of the budget cuts the amount the government is willing to pay is far less, instead of paying most of the amount the government is going to pay ~50% meaning either the uni has to front the rest (which they won't as they have had their budget cut also) or the student has to pay up to £9k. That's not accounting the money for accommodation and for living.

 

[MissSilvy]

None. Government grants and scholarships for women in STEM majors pays all of my tuition and most of my housing. I work to make up the difference but I'm graduating scot free!

 

[MartinJH]

I'm hoping to start Uni next year, if Fridays meeting goes well. The thought of having c.18k debts slightly worries me but I know the education i'll be receiving will be almost priceless considering what prospects I could potentially have after education. Its a small fortune to finally get some decent tutoring.

 

[jrjack]

Well, my wife's undergrad loans (Belmont music business degree) total over $70k, and now we are paying cash for her law school and my undergrad (right now at a CC). The loans are set up at about $700/mo for 10yrs.

 

[dlgoff]

I can understand your worries about the loans. Especially with the job prospect situation (here in the US). That's why I am glad to be poor since my daughters pell and state grants etc is keeping her out of this situation. I've know students with >$100k loans. I wonder if it's worth it considering they may be repaying for the rest of their lives. But that's just me; being poor and all.

 

[inception7]

I can understand your worries about the loans. Especially with the job prospect situation (here in the US). That's why I am glad to be poor since my daughters pell and state grants etc is keeping her out of this situation. I've know students with >$100k loans. I wonder if it's worth it considering they may be repaying for the rest of their lives. But that's just me; being poor and all.

Well I'm from Canada and am looking forward to study in the US. I may change my mind depending on how much financial aid I receive (I'm hoping for much of it to be scholarship).

Otherwise I'll stick to my Canadian education which isn't so bad and costs WAY less.

On a sidenote:How many years does it take to pay an average of 50-100k loan?

 

[Ryan_m_b]

This only helps those of an English persuasion, other British nationals should check their regional policies, but here is a link from directgov (the government's official website) outlining http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/EducationAndLearning/UniversityAndHigherEducation/StudentFinance/RepayingStudentLoansCoursesStartingFrom1998/DG_10034867 .

 

[Farmergregor]

$0 is my projected Debt for when I graduate.

In total it will cost me ~$30k for my degree from a large state university (3 years --> 9 semesters). The Georgia state government has a program called HOPE that covers all tuition cost. Basically I just have to foot the bill for food, a place to live, and books.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

$0 is my projected Debt for when I graduate.

In total it will cost me ~$30k for my degree from a large state university (3 years --> 9 semesters)

Thanks to the latest increases in pricing in the UK I struggle to see how anyone can work their way through university, conservatively they would have to earn £15k a year (9k for annual course fee, 3k for rent, 3k for living). With the current job market I'd be surprised if someone could earn that from working part-time.

 

[eri]

After 11 years of college (private 4-year school for BA, state universities for MS, PhD) I have about 40k in loans. Got a ton of scholarships for the private school, but had to take out a small loan most years in grad school to cover fees (tuition waiver but neither school had large stipends, so not enough to save for 1.5k in fees every semester). My postdoc pays upwards of 50k, so while I'll be hacking away at it for a while, I'm not that concerned. My sister (BA and MA in arts field) has easily twice what I've got in loans and no good employment prospects.

 

[Choppy]

After 11 years of university (BSc, MSc, PhD), I finished with enough money to get married and together with my wife, put down a small down payment on a house. I used a student line of credit to buy a car for the last year or so of my PhD, because the terms for paying that back were a lot better than what other financing companies were willing to offer. So technically, I had about 4k of student debt, but I paid that off within a year.

 

[inception7]

After 11 years of university (BSc, MSc, PhD), I finished with enough money to get married and together with my wife, put down a small down payment on a house. I used a student line of credit to buy a car for the last year or so of my PhD, because the terms for paying that back were a lot better than what other financing companies were willing to offer. So technically, I had about 4k of student debt, but I paid that off within a year.

Surely you mean 40k instead of 4k? But maybe in "your time" things were different financially, unless you graduated recently. Having married and succcesfully completed a PhD, with a down payment on a house and getting a car, 4k (4000$) seems...so trivial. Maybe I misunderstood something.

 

[Thermalne]

I'll finish my undergraduate degree with around 30k in loans. (American) Although, I'm hoping to get graduate school payed through a fellowship or research assistantship.

 

[inception7]

I thought graduate schools pay you and not the other way around. I mostly read around these forums that for grad schools it's an investment they make in you.

 

[lisab]

I thought graduate schools pay you and not the other way around. I mostly read around these forums that for grad schools it's an investment they make in you.

Yes, it's true graduate students are usually paid, and in return they are expected to teach (usually labs) or be a TA or do research.

 

[Jack21222]

My student loan debt will be $13,500 in federally subsidized loans. However, I will have taken out several thousand dollars in home equity loans as well... on the order of 6,000 dollars or so.

So, if you want to count that, my degree will have put me about $20,000 in debt.

 

[fluidistic]

...and how many years did it take/will take to pay back?

I'm at a point in my life where I will soon be taking student loan for my studies, but the idea of taking a "huge" amount of money frightens me!

Share your experience!

0. Education is free in Argentina. Ok they are private universities but their level is a joke compared to state's ones so one would go there for a painless bought degree.
I still have to pay for books, pencils, etc. But nothing to fall into debts.

 

[Choppy]

Surely you mean 40k instead of 4k? But maybe in "your time" things were different financially, unless you graduated recently. Having married and succcesfully completed a PhD, with a down payment on a house and getting a car, 4k (4000$) seems...so trivial. Maybe I misunderstood something.

I mean only $4k. I spent $12k on the car, some of which came out of my pocket, and I paid down part of the loan while I was still in school. I was awarded my PhD in 2005, so it wasn't that long ago.

 

[Chunkysalsa]

The sad part is that if you go to school you hope to pretty poor or pretty rich. The rich don't care about loans because they have the money out of pocket.

The poor, like me, get a bunch of federal assistance. My first year of college my mother was unemployed and made $0 dollars the whole year. Take that plus a scholarship that pays around 70-75% and I was getting huge refund checks in the mail. Add a part time job and my bank account exploded with money. I also go to a pretty cheap school.

Of course now my mother has a decent job so the pell grants have been decreased by alot. Still I now have enough in my back account to pay anything.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

I mean only $4k. I spent $12k on the car, some of which came out of my pocket, and I paid down part of the loan while I was still in school. I was awarded my PhD in 2005, so it wasn't that long ago.

You managed all that as well as getting a loan on a house? The average age for that in England is approaching middle age!

 

[jtbell]

For several years leading up to 2008 it was ridiculously easy to get a home mortgage in the US. Then people began defaulting on those mortgages en masse, which got us all into the Great Recession.

(not saying that Choppy falls into that group, of course...)

 

[Stephen Tashi]

Prospective USA borrowers should consider that the normal consumer protections and rights for loans do not apply to student loans. If you go bankrupt, you still owe the full amount of student loans. Collectors can seize your assets or garnish your wages.

A recent book about student loans warns of their pitfalls. www.amazon.com/Student-Loan-Scam-Oppressive-History/dp/0807042293[/URL] I don't claim to know if all his points are valid. However, I find the student loan bureacracy almost impossible to deal with. I've made payments on student loans for a friend. I designated the payment for a loan that was at 6.8%. Instead of appying it to that loan, they split it up and applied the payment to several loans, including paying off one that was at 4.5%. To communicate with them by email, you must establish a login with a password. To be listed as a payer of loans for someone else the other person must set you up with a different login and password. My payer login stopped working, so I emailed them with my email-login and got a reply that my email-login wasn't valid. It's just a big mess.

 

[QuarkCharmer]

The VA covers my school for 3 years, I'm just starting my third year of four with 17 months of funding remaining. This includes a living stipend, and there is extra cash that I save for when my 17 months runs out. I'm hoping for no debt, but I might have to take a few thousand in stafford loans towards the end to cover living expenses mostly. I'm really counting on tuition waiver and stipend for grad school. That's my motivation for living frugal, having no life, and studying so hard now.

 

[inception7]

I wonder how people entering medical school cope with the huge amount of money they borrow. I'm glad that I'm not pursuing a medical degree!

(Although if that is one's passion then I'm not against it, that person should go for it. Like someone said...money shouldn't be an issue in investing for your future)

 

[n1person]

Usually medical doctors have high salaries (both starting and median), so I usually don't hear of many people who successfully get a medical degree that have issues with loans.

 

[dlgoff]

Usually medical doctors have high salaries..

Tell me about it. I should remember this the next time I have to see one. Maybe it will make it less painless.

 

[Choppy]

You managed all that as well as getting a loan on a house? The average age for that in England is approaching middle age!

It's probably worth noting that I'm Canadian and we weren't subject to the same extremes of the housing boom/crunch cycle as the Americans.

I worked a part-time job, in addition to my TA position while I was a PhD student. The down side was that it required me to be out until 4:00am on weekends, which in hindsight had a significant impact on my work (lower course marks, and longer completion time than my peers). The up sides were that it allowed me to establish some savings as a student and gave me a bit of a break from the grad student life.

When I finished my PhD, my soon-to-be wife had already been working for a year. I had a full time, permanent position as soon as I graduated, and this qualified us for a mortgage. Together we each were able to put in about $5k towards a down payment on a house.

 

[khemist]

I have about 18k in loans, with 2 years to go.

One of my friends will have over 200k after she finishes graduate school.

 

[inception7]

I have about 18k in loans, with 2 years to go.

One of my friends will have over 200k after she finishes graduate school.

What an incredible amount of money! What is she graduating in?

 

[Immanuel Can]

My loan for the fall is about $2k subsidized. Hopefully after the end of this coming fall semester I'll be on a full ride financial aid/scholarship package :D.

 

[turbo]

...and how many years did it take/will take to pay back?

I'm at a point in my life where I will soon be taking student loan for my studies, but the idea of taking a "huge" amount of money frightens me!

Share your experience!

Can you find work and perhaps get help from your family to help pay for college?

I couldn't get loans back in the '60s/'70s because my father "earned too much money" making just a little over minimum wage and taking all the overtime he was offered. I had been a caretaker at the local cemetery all through my teens and had saved almost all of that money for college. At 17, I got a job with a road-construction company - flagging mostly, and I ate my sandwiches while I was working so I could work through my lunch-breaks and earn extra money greasing heavy equipment while the operators were taking their breaks. At 18 and after, I took full-time summer vacation-replacement jobs at local wood-products mills every summer and took all the overtime that was offered to me. All through college, I bought, refurbished and sold guitars and amplifiers, and played frat parties on the weekends. As a result, with a little help from my parents, I was able to go through college with NO loans and got out with no debt. It was a lot of work, but well worth the effort.

I was accepted to some pretty nice colleges (some that I never even applied to), but opted for a state land-grant college to keep tuition, housing, and travel costs to a minimum. That affordability combined with a lot of jobs and self-employment got me through.

 

[inception7]

Can you find work and perhaps get help from your family to help pay for college?

I couldn't get loans back in the '60s/'70s because my father "earned too much money" making just a little over minimum wage and taking all the overtime he was offered. I had been a caretaker at the local cemetery all through my teens and had saved almost all of that money for college. At 17, I got a job with a road-construction company - flagging mostly, and I ate my sandwiches while I was working so I could work through my lunch-breaks and earn extra money greasing heavy equipment while the operators were taking their breaks. At 18 and after, I took full-time summer vacation-replacement jobs at local wood-products mills every summer and took all the overtime that was offered to me. All through college, I bought, refurbished and sold guitars and amplifiers, and played frat parties on the weekends. As a result, with a little help from my parents, I was able to go through college with NO loans and got out with no debt. It was a lot of work, but well worth the effort.

I was accepted to some pretty nice colleges (some that I never even applied to), but opted for a state land-grant college to keep tuition, housing, and travel costs to a minimum. That affordability combined with a lot of jobs and self-employment got me through.

Well...how would you consider working part-time while doing your degree in Physics/Engineering/Math (I'm still undecided)?

I read that it's not recommended working while studying in university, because one misses out important opportunities such as researching (undergrad level) - which is so important for grad school application.

 

[Thermalne]

I thought graduate schools pay you and not the other way around. I mostly read around these forums that for grad schools it's an investment they make in you.

Research Assistantship is usually a professor or department paying you to do research. My current PI (Undergraduate) pays Masters and PhD students as a research assistantship and does not require teaching unless he has a really busy semester. (One semester out of his 20 years of being a professor at my uni.)

 

[dlgoff]

Research Assistantship is usually a professor or department paying you to do research. My current PI (Undergraduate) pays Masters and PhD students as a research assistantship and does not require teaching unless he has a really busy semester. (One semester out of his 20 years of being a professor at my uni.)

I was a TA for Physics I lab when I was an undergrad. Just lucky I guess. Later (senior year) I worked "special problems" at the Universities particle accelerator which was a great honor and being a TA got my foot in the door.

 

[Thermalne]

I was a TA for Physics I lab when I was an undergrad. Just lucky I guess. Later (senior year) I worked "special problems" at the Universities particle accelerator which was a great honor and being a TA got my foot in the door.

This is one of those situations that depend greatly on the department. My department (Nuclear Engineering) is strongly rooted in payed Undergraduate Research Positions for a huge number of students. Also, most students in graduate school for the department are payed as Research Assistants or in the case they can't get a professor to pick them up for it (Very terminal Masters/MBA program) they get an teaching assistantship for a lab course.

 

[MissSilvy]

Well...how would you consider working part-time while doing your degree in Physics/Engineering/Math (I'm still undecided)?

I read that it's not recommended working while studying in university, because one misses out important opportunities such as researching (undergrad level) - which is so important for grad school application.

First of all, it IS possible but it depends on time management (something most students, including ones in physics, suck at) and the type of work.

I make $12/hour working in our engineerings and science library. I basically get paid to do homework and check out books, but most of the time I just study. I also work at the physics instruments machine shop and an electronics lab, both things that I can come in when I please AND have machining, CAD, fabrication, and electronics experience to put on my resume. I don't trust people who think that they have SO much work that they can't even be bothered to wash dishes, much less get a small on-campus job. Poor time management or way too much work.

 

[turbo]

Well...how would you consider working part-time while doing your degree in Physics/Engineering/Math (I'm still undecided)?

I read that it's not recommended working while studying in university, because one misses out important opportunities such as researching (undergrad level) - which is so important for grad school application.

At the time, I was in Engineering, heading for a Chemical Engineering degree with emphasis on Pulp and Paper processes. After a couple of years, I changed my major(s), but those first 2 years were pretty brutal. Still, the part-time nature of my self-employment left me enough time to get everything done. People would bring me guitars so that I could repair them or set them up properly, but they had to agree that I would complete the work on my schedule before I would take that kind of job. I could play for frat parties on Friday and Saturday nights and still have both of my weekend days and Sunday evening for studying, so it all worked out. I certainly wouldn't have taken a job with a schedule, like flipping burgers. Plus, I could make a lot more money buying, repairing, and selling amps and guitars. I loved it when I could pick up a nice old tube amp for chump-change just because it needed a cap-job or better tubes, and sounded crappy.

 

[khemist]

What an incredible amount of money! What is she graduating in?

She is working in graduate school for optometry.