<p>Hi everyone,</p>
<p>My mother finished filing the FAFSA form for the 2010-2011 year today. The EFC is 1600ish and last year it was 6000ish. The major difference is because she is not putting in the back child support that my father owes her. Now while I am happy that I qualify for more aid, I am worried that she may not be able to get as much money through the PLUS loans. Will having the lower EFC on top of less income effect her chance of getting a PLUS loan for next year or the amount? I just didn't know if she would be better off putting in the amount she gets for full child support vs the less amount she gets to improve the chances of a PLUS loan. I was hoping to get loans under just my name next year, but the economy is still in the tanks and I don't know if the loans will be looking any better. Is getting private loans looking any better for next year?</p>
<p>Quick facts:
Cost of attendance for my school is around 17,500 dollars a year
Her full income + child support is 50,000 dollars a year
Past year she borrowed 12k for me and I used my max for student loans (forget the specific number). Got a earth shattering 900 dollars in aid from the college!</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>Gosh…is your mom really going to be able to afford borrowing $12k every year? </p>
<p>I’m guessing that she no longer receives child support for you, is that child support you mention above for other children? Will she be able to pay back her loans when she’s no longer receiving child support? </p>
<p>You should get more aid this year if your EFC went down that much. Now, you should qualify for some Pell money.</p>
<p>I’m planning on giving her the money for the loans once I graduate. She is not going to be the one paying for them in the long run. Though I do want to try and get loans in my name, so she is not solely responsible for them.</p>
<p>We qualified for something like 3,500 dollars in Pell grants.</p>
<p>How much do you think you’ll be earning when you graduate? What is your likely career?</p>
<p>From what you’re saying, it looks like you’ll be responsible for $27k in Staffords and about $48k in Plus Loans. You’ll owe about $75k. Do you have any idea of what your payments will be???</p>
<p>Your payments will be about $900 a month for ten LONG years. You have to earn over $100k per year to comfortably pay back that much.</p>
<p>Thank you for the insight mom2collegekids. </p>
<p>I am currently working on becoming a civil engineer. The average starting pay is around $50,000 a year. </p>
<p>The PLUS loan was originally was suppose to get me through this year and next year I am hoping to get my own loan. The problem is I do not know how the climate is looking for student loans. I am hearing from people it is good and not so good to get a loan right now. What have you heard about this? My current credit score is 712 according to Experian as well. I just finished paying off some past debts, so I am hoping it will go up more to help my chances of getting a student loan if that is possibile. As far as I understand it the loans under my name the monthly payments are calculated off the basis of my income right? If I can get my own loans it should go down from the 900 you listed I think.</p>
<p>This is the cost laid out by my school over the pass year [Tuition</a> Costs : Accounts Receivable : UMass Lowell](<a href=“http://www.uml.edu/admin/ar/tuition.html]Tuition”>http://www.uml.edu/admin/ar/tuition.html). My mother works for the state, so I go tution free. That saves me $1,450 right there and if they continue the fee rebate into next year there will be another $1,500. That is $3,000 off what I pay to go to that school right now.</p>
<p>After reading what you said, should I start seeing if I can get my own student loans and leave the EFC where it is at? That way I can get the money from the pell grant and anything the college offers me. I am going to try and take classes at a community college over the summer to finish my gen eds, so that way I don’t have to spend that much over here at university. Anything helps I guess.</p>
<p>If my father gets his fiances back together he could help me a lot for paying for school. He bought a house 2 years ago and it just ruined him. He is selling it and moving into his commercial/residential building to save money. That is $2,500 to $3,500 dollars right there a month. He said if he had anything left from selling the house he would put it towards college expenses for me as well next year.</p>
<p>If you have any other suggestions I’m all ears too.</p>
<p>As far as I understand it the loans under my name the monthly payments are calculated off the basis of my income right? If I can get my own loans it should go down from the 900 you listed I think.</p>
<p>No…you’re talking about private loans.</p>
<p>After reading what you said, should I start seeing if I can get my own student loans and leave the EFC where it is at?</p>
<p>Have you not been getting Stafford loans yourself?</p>
<p>I don’t understand what you’re saying about “leaving the EFC where it is at.”? You need your EFC to be low to get the most Pell. I don’t think your EFC affects Plus loans.</p>
<p>If your dad has any money left over, won’t it go to your mom for back child support?</p>
<p>I am going to try and take classes at a community college over the summer to finish my gen eds, so that way I don’t have to spend that much over here at university. Anything helps I guess.</p>
<p>Good idea!</p>
<p>Yup I’m doing stafford loans to the max. I was only able to do $5,500 this year even though I am a second year student. If I don’t get offered the max for a third year student I am going to make sure I can get it.</p>
<p>Do you think I would still be better off doing private loans verse my mother taking out plus loans? Though I do know that if she doesn’t qualify for the loan I can get more loans from the government, yet that still won’t cover everything. If that happend its a extra 5,000 since I would be a third year student next year.</p>
<p>I would have:
$7,500 from the regular fed loans
$5,000 from the other fed loans if my mother was denied
$3,300 from a pell grant.</p>
<p>That adds up to 15,800 right there. I should get something from the college as well. Anything left over from the additional aid I could potentially cover with a private loan or money I make over the summer. Sorry I totally forgot about the additional loans from a parent being denied a loan. I’m 100% sure my father wouldn’t qualify for one. He has AWFUL credit.</p>
<p>What I meant by the EFC is that, since my father is behind she only put the amount she recieved last year. As a result the EFC went from 6000 in 2009-2010 (with full child support entered) to 1600 this year. Last I knew what you put in the FAFSA form is the basis of which you could afford for a PLUS loan. With the lower amount of child support entered and less EFC I didn’t know if the chance of getting a PLUS loan would be gone or not. </p>
<p>When my father said that about giving me money from the house it was if he had anything left from paying my mother off and anything else. He owes her about 8,000 dollars right now.</p>