<p>My financial aid counselor says I shouldn't, but as an art major, perhaps I will be shooting in the dark. This is coming from a private art college, which has given me a "half-ride" in financial aid. I have accepted subsidized, unsubsidized and Parent PLUS loans, and after 2-3 years the total will be $30,000. </p>
<p>I am asking for your experience. What is the average comfortable monthly payment for a debt as large as 30k? In 10 years? In 20 years?! </p>
<p>I am thinking about what I will do after graduation. Alongside job hunting, I am considering traveling to Europe or getting a Masters, so how possible are these wishes? To what degree might this debt limit my future freedom?</p>
<p>You should. What kind of counselor is that? My personal rule: Don’t go to debt more than 75% of the annual salary of your first entry level professional job. That’s for all of your undergrad years. If you attend grad school a portion of your debt’s interest will be accrued. You end up owning more than what you think.</p>
<p>Yes. 30K after interest on the lifetime of the loan will turn into a 50k. Would you buy a BMW with a 30-35k per year job? You can take out that kind of money and live at your parents’ house and hope and pray to find a job. Then spend the next 3-5 years paying every cent you make towards your loans. Whatever you do, don’t take out more money to go to grad school and rack up even more debt. It likely won’t pay off.</p>
<p>Go fool with the student loan calculator at the college board site.
$30,000 , assuming the lowest rates, would be $325/month for ten years.
That may not sound like a lot, but it is. As an art major, your starting salary will probably be fairly low. $30,000/year would be a fair guess, which, after the usual deductions is probably around 2,700/month. A decent apartment could be $1,000, car payments $400, loans $325, leaving only about $200/month for everything else - food, clothing, utilities, entertainment, etc.
Grad school is, indeed, likely to bring a lot more debt.</p>
<p>I don’t know how much that works out to be monthly but I think I had about 15k in debt and over 15 years I’m paying it back at $120 a month. My interest rate is under 2 percent though so I’m not quite sure what they are currently…</p>
<p>30k a year salary isn’t going to be close to 2700 take home… that’s only 2500 a month pre-tax… so probably about 2kish post tax… not counting any 401k deductions or insurance deductions or anything like that… but if your housing is 1k of that, that leaves 1k left over for loans, food, whatever other bills you have… </p>
<p>it will just depend on what job you get and what the salary is to find out if your loan is affordable for you.</p>
<p>Thank you, nemon, for suggesting the calculator. </p>
<p>I suppose I should have only asked if ANYONE had faced $30k in college debt. It feels possible to me as well as scary. It is not as high as 60k, but as a prospective art major, it is hard to tell.</p>
<p>undead, it just really will depend on a bunch of factors. I have one art major friend who couldn’t find a job at all and decided to go back to school for physical therapy. I have another one who found a job at a magazine as their designer and loves it. I think he gets paid pretty well because he just bought a house on his own. Another friend who went to art school has a job in new york city and I think he makes about 80k or year or so.</p>