<p>Bedouin…are you saying that you again left out the decimal point? It would be most helpful to ALL if you included the decimal points in your posts…there is a HUGE dollar difference between $11.33 and $1133.</p>
<p>Just my humble opinion.</p>
<p>You mean:</p>
<p>I know that $2000 UNSUBSIDIZED STAFFORD LOAN amounts to about $11.00 a month</p>
<p>I apologize for my careless mistake, but this piling isn’t particularly necessary and I think it will be more productive if we can move on. :)</p>
<p>If you are taking an unsubsidized loan, you should really consider paying the interest off each month even if you can’t pay the principal. This will make the loan much easier to pay once you graduate, about equally as easy as the subsidized Stafford loan.</p>
<p>Hilarious! Poor Beduoin, what in the world are you typing on?! Thanks for the chuckle…</p>
<p>After reading all the reasons in this thread about taking out unsubsizied loans, it seems like if a subsizied loan is offered, it should be taken regardless if the money is needed or not.</p>
<p>Can anyone who qualifies for a subsidized loan not need it?</p>
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<p>Glad you got something about of it! 
I’m not used to using one of these netbooks connected to my cell phone; I usually use laptops and Computers (desktop) and the keyboard that the person from which I hath borrowed it from has a nonstandard keyboard so I have to hunt and peck like I just learned to type!! </p>
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<p>Well, you still have to pay it off.</p>
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<p>I’ve never heard of it. Besides, aren’t they disbursed at to the school directly? If you have need then you probably dont have enough money to take out a loan AND</p>
<p>^ Oh dear, Bedouin’s cell phone has cut her off mid-sentence! You’re not surfing while driving are you :)</p>
<p>Can anyone who qualifies for a subsidized loan not need it? </p>
<p>Absolutely! A subs loan is offered when there is unmet need. But that doesn’t mean the family has to accept it! My D was offered subs loans and would not have taken them if her darn stock fund hadn’t taken a hit. We simply decided to take the subs loan and let it recover for a year or two, which has worked out pretty well and only cost us the $34 loan origination fee.</p>
<p>Subsidized loans are dispersed to the schools…but if you have money left in your bursars account at the end of the year, you can get a refund. SO if there is excess loan money, it’s yours. DD’s school will refund excess monies at the end of each term if the student makes that request.</p>
<p>“A subs loan is offered when there is unmet need.”</p>
<p>Hmmm. I would have said that if there is unmet need, then there is need.</p>
<p>Tomato/tomatoe I guess! To me, the phrasing of your question implied that a family who has “unmet need”, a calculated figure based on certain assumptions, would not have the funds to meet that need without the subsidized loan. As we all know, COA is not the same as actual cost and EFC is even further removed from reality!</p>
<p>Yes, I see, but I’m used to it going the other way, that families tend to consider EFC too high, seldom too low! ;)</p>
<p>Cornell gave my S $7500 in subsidized loans that we don’t really need since we saved enough in his college account and planned to pay more than what they say our EFC is. But we will definitely take it since it is basically ‘free money for 4 1/2 years’. We won’t get to take the whole thing though because they will reduce it by the amount of his outside scholarships - which is fine. It’s still a good deal in my mind. And we will have the $$ growing in his college account ready to pay it off in 4 1/2 years. Life is good!</p>
<p>Unless you are independently wealthy, it’s really hard to know what the future holds. You may think you have enough to cover without loans assuming you keep working for the next four years, but what if you lose your job, or someone becomes seriously ill, or any number of other things happen? My opinion is that it’s much harder to take out a $20,000 loan in three years than a $5,000 each year starting now.</p>
<p>I tend to agree ReadyToRoll. It’s just that, being an unsubsidized loan, we might be paying interest on a loan we won’t use. </p>
<p>Thanks to all for the input.</p>