<p>“I don’t intend to ask my parents to pay for college. I wanted to take out student loans and pay for it myself as an adult.”</p>
<p>Were your parents going to cosign those loans? And do they qualify to cosign those loans? You cannot get private loans on your own unless you are credit worthy (have a good paying job, a good credit rating, etc). You will be limited to the loans the school will give you. In general, Federal loans are limited to $5500 for freshman. It is possible they will loan an extra thousand or so in Perkins loans (that’s up to the school) but it won’t be enough to go away to school, if that’s what you’re planning. The people who take out big loans are people whose parents take out PLUS loans or who take out private loans and their parents cosign. The parents have to be credit-worthy for this.</p>