How does this work?

<p>So I'm a senior in HS now, and I'm most likely going to participate in a transfer program with my local community college, College of DuPage, and engineering at University of Illinois. I need to do this because I can't afford to go away for school right now, my parents can't contribute anything towards college for me for the next couple years. So CoD will be fine, I'll most likely be able to go there for free. But then once I transfer to U of IL, I'm going to need to take out loans. My parents recently filed for bankruptcy, so how is this going to work? Can I take out the loans under my name? My parents will MAYBE be able to contribute a little bit, but I'll probably need $30,000 each my junior and senior year. Paying it off would be fine, my parents would help once they can. But how do I take them out?</p>

<p>Sent from my ADR6300 using CC</p>

<p>Run the Net Price Calculator at the U of Illinois to see what aid you currently are eligible for. If you file the FAFSA you will be eligible for federal loans ($5,500 freshman year, $6,500 sophomore year, $7,500 junior year, and $7,500 senior year). If your FAFSA EFC is low enough, you may also qualify for a Pell Grant (maximum of $5,550 each year) federal work-study money, and various other state and federal grants and loans. As you see, this doesn’t come close to $30,000 each year. This means that you will probably need to get a job to cover some of your expenses, and you may need to consider working full-time and studying part-time in order to finish your degree.</p>

<p>If you can afford the CoD out of pocket, it would be possible to borrow the federal loans for your first two years of college, and to stash that money in the bank for later expenses. This requires tremendous discipline because the temptation will be there to use that money for every-day expenses, so don’t do that unless you know that you will be able to stash it and not touch it until you need it for tuition and fees.</p>

<p>You would need qualified co-signers to borrow more than 7500 per year for your jr and sr years.</p>

<p>If your parents have a bankruptcy, then they won’t qualify as co-signers. That means you won’t be able to borrow $30k per year for those 2 years.</p>