College Graduates Have Four Weeks to Save Thousands; NextStudent Reminds Graduates They Can Save Even More Money If They Consolidate Student Loans During Their Grace Period.Business Editors/Education Writers PHOENIX--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 9, 2003 Recent college graduates who consolidate their student loans in the next few weeks -- during their grace period -- can lock in fixed interest rates as low as 2.875 (a) percent. Once student loans go into repayment, the interest rates for the federal student loan consolidation In the United States both the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP) and the Federal Direct Student Loan Program (FDLP) include consolidation loans that allow students to consolidate Stafford Loans, PLUS Loans, and Federal Perkins Loans into one single debt. program increase to 3.5 percent. Even though the interest rates on the federal consolidation program are at historical all-time lows, more than 50 percent of all students eligible for the program don't take advantage of student loan consolidation, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. the U.S. Department of Education's FY 2004 President's Budget Loan Volumes. For the most recent college graduates, students who received their diplomas in May, the grace period (the six-month period between graduation and the beginning of loan repayment) on their student loans will end in November, and by the holidays their first payments will be due. "The first student loan payment could be up to 60 percent lower, and the entire loan balance could be thousands less, if graduates would consolidate their student loans within the grace period and take advantage of the additional .6 percent savings," said Mary Jo Lambert, senior vice president of education lending for NextStudent, a national student loan company. For example, at NextStudent, the average borrower indebtedness is $30,000. When borrowers with this amount of indebtedness consolidate their student loans during their grace periods at the current interest rate and take advantage of an additional .25 percent interest rate reduction with the auto-debit payment option, the additional savings would be $3,164.30 (b) over the life of the loan. "We aren't sure why over half of all borrowers don't consolidate. Based on talking to Noun 1. talking to - a lengthy rebuke; "a good lecture was my father's idea of discipline"; "the teacher gave him a talking to" lecture, speech rebuke, reprehension, reprimand, reproof, reproval - an act or expression of criticism and censure; "he had to people who have consolidated, we think that misconceptions Misconceptions is an American sitcom television series for The WB Network for the 2005-2006 season that never aired. It features Jane Leeves, formerly of Frasier, and French Stewart, formerly of 3rd Rock From the Sun. are rampant because 'student loan consolidation' sounds very close to 'debt consolidation,'" said Lambert. "Some graduates thought they had to be in trouble financially, many expressed they thought it would be a hassle or time consuming, others just thought it might be a scam (SCSI Configured AutoMatically) A subset of Plug and Play that allows SCSI IDs to be changed by software rather than by flipping switches or changing jumpers. Both the SCSI host adapter and peripheral must support SCAM. See SCSI. . We think that awareness levels about the consolidation program are low, and we consistently educate students and parents that student loan consolidation is provided by the federal government to help manage and lower their payments and avoid default." In fact, qualifying for federal loan consolidation is a simple and quick process with a long list of benefits -- including greatly lowering your monthly payment, making it easier to manage student loan debt and saving thousands of dollars, all with no fees or pre-payment penalties. The federal student loan consolidation program was originally authorized au·thor·ize tr.v. au·thor·ized, au·thor·iz·ing, au·thor·iz·es 1. To grant authority or power to. 2. To give permission for; sanction: by the Consolidated Omnibus omnibus: see bus. Reconciliation Act of 1985 (COBRA cobra, name for African and Asian snakes of the family Elapidae that are equipped with inflatable neck hoods. The family also includes the African mambas, the Asian kraits, the New World coral snakes and a large number of Australian snakes. ), and reauthorized in 1986 under the Higher Education Act The Higher Education Act may refer to an Act of either the Congress of the United States or of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
in full Uniform Resource Locator Address of a resource on the Internet. The resource can be any type of file stored on a server, such as a Web page, a text file, a graphics file, or an application program. , it may be necessary to copy and paste To copy files from one location to another or to copy text and images from one document to another. All modern operating systems and applications have a copy and paste capability that is typically selected from an Edit menu. See cut and paste and Win Copy between windows. this hyperlink A predefined linkage between one object and another. See hypertext. hyperlink - anchor into your Internet browser's URL address field. Also, this web address contains a double slash between the words "elibraryII" and "Main." This symbol may not appear properly in some systems.) For more information on federal student loan consolidation, consumers may visit www.nextstudent.com, or call toll free at 1-800-799-7349. About NextStudent NextStudent is dedicated to helping students and their families find affordable ways to pay for college. NextStudent has a portfolio of education lending products and services, including an online scholarship search engine, low-cost federal student loans, parent loans, private loans, consolidation programs and college savings plans. (a) The consolidated rate is based on the weighted average of the interest rates of the loans being consolidated rounded up to the nearest 1/8th percent or 8.25 percent rate cap -- whichever is less. (b) The example used assumes a 20-year repayment term with total payments of $38,592.92. (If the borrower misses the grace period, they would pay $41,757.22 over the life of the loan.) |
|
||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion