<p>Say you take out Federal Loans during college for your four undergraduate years, and plan to go to graduate school the academic year after you graduate, and then take out Federal Loans for graduates.</p>
<p>Would you have to pay back the undergraduate loans while in graduate school? Before graduate school? After graduate school?</p>
<p>While you’re in school, you don’t pay back loans. </p>
<p>However, if you plan on borrowing for grad school (grad/law/business/med/whatever), keep in mind that those loans will likely be big loans, therefore your undergrad loans shouldn’t also be big. You can “run out” of borrowing power, and then you won’t be able to borrow enough to complete your grad program.</p>
<p>Also, keep in mind that for every $50k that you borrow, you’ll have a payment of $575 a month (about the cost of 2 car payments). You’ll need to have a salary of about $70k per year to comfortably make that monthly payment. Obviously, the higher that amount is, the more you’d have to earn to pay it back.</p>
<p>The 2 federal student loans, Stafford and Perkins, have grace periods after you finish college or drop below half time before they go into repayment. (6 months for Stafford, 9 for Perkins). If you are out of school for longer than the grace periods before you start grad school then they will go into repayment. Once you are back in school you can ask for them to be deferred again. If you go straight to grad school then they should not go into repayment.</p>
<p>Your eligibility amount for loans will increase once you are in Grad school. The Aggregate Stafford loan limit for dependent students is $31,000 while for Grad students it is $138,500 (including the loans taken as an undergrad). Not that I would advocate anyone taking $138K+ in loans.</p>
<p>Also keep in mind that if your loans are unsubsidized and you are not paying the interest as you go, it will continue to accumulate while you are in grad school.</p>
<p>Thank you very much for your help!</p>