<p>Call them what you like, loans = debt and debt can sink a new graduate and severly restrict his or her choices. For this reason, we will try to get by without them, even though that means the end of the lifestyle we now enjoy. We've saved and saved, but we're still well short of what an education at a $50000 a year institution will cost --with another college student coming up soon. The only "aid" we've been offered is loans (except for a full tuition scholarship at a state institution our daughter never planned to go to). IF we have to take out debt, we'll eschew the "aid" from the college for a home equity loan which at least will be deductible. Our daughter will have to work during school and in the summers, but we don't want her to have a mountain of debt after college.</p>
<p>what exactly is the difference between subsidized and unsubsidized loans?</p>
<p>Subsidized: interest covered while attending college</p>
<p>Unsubsidized: interest from day #1 is borrowers responsibility</p>
<p>I can see the subsidized loans as aid, but beyond that no. This one reason I wonder about all the ranting about families who spend on luxury cars and fancy vacations and then receive financial aid. Chances are most of their "aid" will be loans, and their education will end up costing them more in the long run. I'm glad we were able to save.</p>
<p>I don't know; try being a 18-year old with no property, no job, no assets for collateral, and walk into a bank to borrow $5000 to be paid back over decades--starting 4 years from when you get the money.</p>
<p>Yes, they have to be paid back, it's self-help. However, college loans create financial options and make a college education affordable to people who otherwise could not finance it on their own. That counts for something.</p>
<p>hoedown,</p>
<p>Subsidized loans are great. I have no qualms with that. But borrowing privately isn't an option for many people. Even when it is, it comes back to bite them in the proverbial posterior. I would read "Strapped: How America's 20- and 30-Somethings Can't Get Ahead."</p>
<p>personally, hell no, but technically, need-based loans are financial aid.</p>
<p>If it means the different between going to college or not going to college using the federal education loans isn't that bad - there are loan limits students can not get in too deep - there are repayment plans to help them get themselves set up financially , deferment and forbearance options to delay payments if necessary AND the new thing now is lenders are offering all kinds of incentive programs like interest rate reductions if you make ontime payments or cash back on your princpal balance. </p>
<p>Stafford, PLUS and consolidation loans are all considered part of the federal programs and IF you have to use them it they are there but like everything else you have to use them wisely and know what you are getting yourself into!</p>