Lower Your Interest Rate

The other day I have received my first loan payment for my student loan that I have taken out. I ended up with about $17,000 in student loans. It’s a large number but when I think about what kind of loans other people have it doesn’t make me feel so bad. The original plan was that my family was going to help me pay for the student loans and I wouldn’t have to worry about them. What happened was that I needed a new car because my other car broke down and we switched responsibilities. My family paid for my car and I took on my student loan because the interest rate was much lower than I was going to get for the car.

My payments are about $200 a month which is not that bad. I will likely pay much more a month to get rid of the payment faster, but it still ends up being a lot in the end. Something really interesting I learned this week is that if you set up an automatic payment plan you can lower your interest rate. How cool is that? When you get your first payment you have an option of paying three ways. One, you can pay by check. Second, you can get e-mail reminders and pay online. Third, you can have automatic payment set up. Check out this link for LOWERING YOUR INTEREST RATE. It’s located on the right hand side and it says Lower Your Interest Rate. I have not yet don’t it so I don’t know how much my interest will go down but I will keep everyone informed.

There are many people who struggle with student loans these days especially in this economy. Something as small as a change in interest rate can help you make the payments each month. Many people don’t know that even if you file for bankruptcy you cannot get rid of your student loan. It is a government given loan and you cannot get rid of it until you pay it off. It’s a loan that sticks with you but many students would not be able to go to college without this loan.

I heard that the state is trying to take away they TAG grants for students. TAG is a government program where they give money to students in need. I know many students who get it and without it they would likely not be able to go to college. Next Tuesday the SGA of Berkeley is going to Trenton, NJ to try and fight against them taking away the loan. Too many students rely on this money. The government is bailing out companies where the CEO’s are going on vacations but yet students are struggling daily to make ends meet. I hope something can be done about it.