Student Loan Consolidation May Get you Up to 20 More Years to Pay Off your Student Loans
If you’re a former student or a college parent with any outstanding federal student loans, you may be able to get up to 20 more years to repay just by consolidating your eligible federal parent or student loans. With that longer repayment term, since you have more time to repay, the amount you have to pay each month will typically go down. You may be able to cut your monthly student loan payments by up to 42% — just by consolidating!
Cut Your Payments on Your Student Loans by up to 42%
Here’s an example of how you can lower your monthly student loan payments when you consolidate your federal college loans and take advantage of a longer repayment term: Estimated monthly payments on a ,000 student loan consolidation fixed at 7.25% and repaid over an extended term of 30 years are 2, versus estimated monthly payments of 9 on a ,000 Federal Stafford Loan issued at 7.22% and repaid over 10 years — that’s a 41.8% reduction in monthly payment amount. (Your actual payment reduction may vary and will depend on the terms of the parent or student loans you’re consolidating.)
Get More Time to Repay Your Student Loans
Federal PLUS parent loans and Stafford student loans are issued with standard repayment terms of 10 years. You may be able to get up to 30 years to repay these federal parent and student loans when you consolidate them into a student loan consolidation.
How long you get to repay will depend on the total outstanding balance of your education debt: If your outstanding education debt totals ,000 – ,999, you’ll have 20 years to pay back your student loan consolidation.? If your outstanding education debt totals ,000 – ,999, you’ll have 25 years. If you have ,000 or more in education debt when you consolidate your federal student loans, you’ll have 30 years to pay back your Federal student loan consolidation.
No Fees. No Credit Checks. No Prepayment Penalties.
Even though you can get more time to repay your federal parent and student loans by consolidating, there are no prepayment penalties on a Federal Consolidation Loan, so you won’t be assessed any additional fees for paying more than the minimum each month or for paying off your student loan consolidation early, should you choose to.
There are also no application fees, no processing fees, and no credit checks when you consolidate through the federal student loan consolidation program.
Replace Your Variable-Rate Student Loans With a Fixed-Rate Consolidation Loan
If you took out your Federal PLUS Loans or Stafford Loans prior to July 1, 2006, those loans are subject to variable interest rates that will adjust every year. So when interest rates rise, your monthly student loan payments may also go up. But you can put an end to rate increases and rising payments when you consolidate your parent or student loans.
The federal student loan consolidation program gives you the security of a fixed interest rate. By consolidating your federal
student loans, you’ll replace your variable-rate college loans with a fixed-rate consolidation loan, so you won’t have to worry about interest rates rising and leaving you guessing about your monthly payment amount.
Make Just One Payment for All Your Federal Student Loans
If you have multiple student loans in repayment and you’re dealing with the hassle of multiple bills, multiple due dates, and multiple monthly payments to multiple lenders, a Federal Consolidation Loan could help make your student loan repayment easier to manage.
With the federal student loan consolidation program, you can bundle all your eligible federal parent or student loans into one single consolidation loan with just one monthly bill, one lender, and one monthly payment that’s fixed for the life of your consolidation loan.
Consolidate Your Private Student Loans
If you have private student loans in addition to your federal student loans, you won’t be able to consolidate your private student loans under the federal student loan consolidation program. But you may be able to consolidate your private student loans separately with a Private Consolidation Loan, which offers the same convenience of a single consolidated loan for your private student loans.
Jeff Mictabor is an enthusiast on the topic of student loan issues in the news. He has been writing for the past 10 years for a variety of education publications. He now offers his writing services on a freelance basis.
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