<p>Hey, just looking for some advice... I've been accepted EA to Georgetown, Boston College (Honors Program), and Notre Dame (ND Scholar)</p>
<p>My parents were excited, but it was along the lines of "That's awesome, we're so proud of you, etc... But where are you really going to school?"</p>
<p>They are against taking out loans (esp. my dad), and think the cheaper the school, the better, and are encouraging University of Oregon. I'm not saying it's a bad school, it's just not the same level, and the rents don't get it.</p>
<p>Are student loans really the spawn of the Devil? I need some surefire way to convince 'em</p>
<p>How much in loans are we talking about? How does your state U compare to the private schools you're looking at in the majors and programs you're considering? Your parents might have a point. It's easy to write off mounds and mounds of loans when you're in high school and they seem far away, but think seriously about what it could mean to have debt weighing down on you when you graduate.</p>
<p>co-op/work-study. Although Oregon is nice and has the best college sports uniforms, G-Town, BC, and Notre Dame are above and beyond them academically. U get aid from any of them?</p>
<p>You can always talk to financial aid if you believe the aid package is unfair... or tell them that you got such-and-such scholarship at Oregon or whatever.</p>
<p>You need to sit down with your parents and run the financial aid calculators (start with the ones at FinAid</a>! Financial Aid, College Scholarships and Student Loans ), and you need to be really, truly, honest with each other about the money. Because, in the end, it IS going to be all about the money. If you don't get financial aid packages that bring your cost for attending one of these private schools into the range of your cost for attending your home-state public U, you really truly need to be prepared. We are just at the beginning of a gigantic world economic melt-down. Being on the hook for a bunch of college loans is not going to be where you want to be in 4 and a half years.</p>
<p>Have you (and/or your parents) spent any time at the Financial Aid Forum? You can reach it by clicking on "Financial Aid" under the heading "Top Forums" on the left-hand side of this screen.</p>
<p>happymom, we aren't in an economic meltdown, we're in a business cycle. By the time we're out of college, we will be making back the tuition with interest, because we will be in an expanding as opposed to contracting.</p>
<p>If those schools did not offer you any aid, then you are not going. </p>
<p>Get out a piece of paper and add up the cost to go to U of O for a year and</p>
<p>then add up the cost to go to BC or ND or GU. (Add in travel to get back and forth to</p>
<p>Oregon.) </p>
<p>As an example, my daughter was recently accepted to a LAC that costs $50,000 a year;</p>
<p>the aid was ridiculous and required over 35,000 in LOANS per year. This acceptance arrived after one to an instate public; with grants, my D will pay $3000 for room, board, and tuition per year. She can use her summer earnings to pay for books and clothes,
and of course I will contribute for incidentals. She will graduate debt free.</p>
<p>Loans are okay for grad school and maybe necessary, but my D will not be borrowing 140,000 for an undergraduate degree. That is true insanity.</p>
<p>Try to love U of O. When you have a nice disposable income in 5 years and no loan repayments, you will really love U of O.</p>
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Are student loans really the spawn of the Devil?
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<p>Loans up to a certain amount are OK - I would not want to see my kids go much over the max subsidized Stafford maximums (cumulative @ $23,000).</p>
<p>On the finaid site there is a loan calculator. When you enter your debt total and interest rate it will give you the monthly repayments for 10 years. If the debt you are thinking of taking on requires payments of several hundred to $1,000 to $2,000 a month, consider carefully about whether you want to make such a payment every month for 10 years. </p>
<p>Also remember to add any interest you are not paying as you go along. For instance borrowing $20k a year at 8% and not paying the interest as you go, the debt would have grown to $97,000 (loan of $80,000 plus $17,000 interest including interest on the interest) by graduation.The monthly repayment on $97k would be *@ $1,200 - every month - for 10 years. *</p>
<p>These payments start when you graduate and you will likely not be making enough from day 1 to comfortably pay them. The max cumulative subsidized Staffords of $23k (using an average interest rate of 6%) would be repayments of $255 a month for 10years. More than enough someone starting their working life. FinAid</a> | Calculators | Loan Calculator</p>
<p>To the OP...how much will your parents contribute annually towards your college education? That is an important figure for you to know. You will be waiting for a while to get financial aid figures from Georgetown and ND...my understanding is that they do not have a priority financial aid award for EA students. While you are waiting...talk to your parents about finances...and also run your finances through one of the finaid calculators using institutional methodology. While I would agree that the opportunities at Georgetown and ND (don't really know about BC) are great, the reality is that going into massive debt isn't worth it. You could go to Georgetown for grad school.</p>
<p>"happymom, we aren't in an economic meltdown, we're in a business cycle. By the time we're out of college, we will be making back the tuition with interest, because we will be in an expanding as opposed to contracting."</p>
<p>Maybe you're right. But for those of us who are old enough to have actually lived through previous, ordinary recessions, this one certainly looks and feels a LOT different. Plan your college experience and expenses as if it were 1929. Even if things get better relatively soon, you'll end up a lot better off financially.</p>