It's nice to see so many positive comments. I made a similar thread about dealing with $70k (and being in the relatively low income marketing/PR field) on Reddit a few months back and was greeted with a lot of:
"Your stupid fault."
"Should have done your research in choosing majors."
"You brought it on yourself."
I understand the opinions, but that didn't add much to the conversation, nor help me to understand if there was something I might have been missing out on.
Some notes on what I did figure out would be:
- Loan agents will downright lie. Always do the math yourself. I called SM to explain I needed my payment below $200 and we worked together to make it $185. A month later they my bill came in and my payment was $240. The story was that some of the many small loans weren't included in a new payment plan and blah blah blah...
- The advice to pursue income based repayment is great, but many private lenders (which you no doubt have at with over $100k in debt) will simply say no. Working with private loans is a world different than working with public loans.
- Find out if any of your loans have an interest rate more than twice that of other ones (mine surely do). Request a deferment or forebearance on any loans with an interest rate of 4%, and pay all that extra on your loans at 18%.
- Umm... there's no easy way out to give up work and create a company. Sorry. I looked and looked myself. You likely won't be able to afford starting a company, but you can try to supplement your income with contracting or small 'muse' projects if you have the motivation.
- Don't expect help from the government. The new 'student loan reform' helps them far more dramatically than it helps you: http://i.imgur.com/vJm22.jpg
I pay around $800 a month in student loans on a $2000 monthly income. So, 40% of all my money. Welcome to the good life.
"Your stupid fault." "Should have done your research in choosing majors." "You brought it on yourself."
I understand the opinions, but that didn't add much to the conversation, nor help me to understand if there was something I might have been missing out on.
Some notes on what I did figure out would be:
- Loan agents will downright lie. Always do the math yourself. I called SM to explain I needed my payment below $200 and we worked together to make it $185. A month later they my bill came in and my payment was $240. The story was that some of the many small loans weren't included in a new payment plan and blah blah blah...
- The advice to pursue income based repayment is great, but many private lenders (which you no doubt have at with over $100k in debt) will simply say no. Working with private loans is a world different than working with public loans.
- Find out if any of your loans have an interest rate more than twice that of other ones (mine surely do). Request a deferment or forebearance on any loans with an interest rate of 4%, and pay all that extra on your loans at 18%.
- Umm... there's no easy way out to give up work and create a company. Sorry. I looked and looked myself. You likely won't be able to afford starting a company, but you can try to supplement your income with contracting or small 'muse' projects if you have the motivation.
- Don't expect help from the government. The new 'student loan reform' helps them far more dramatically than it helps you: http://i.imgur.com/vJm22.jpg
I pay around $800 a month in student loans on a $2000 monthly income. So, 40% of all my money. Welcome to the good life.