<p>I remember how enormous my student loans seemed when I graduated. My first job paid $7500 a year, and I had something like $16,000 in student loans to pay off. Do they still give kids those little booklets with the monthly payment stubs? It was such a great feeling to rip that last stub out of the booklet and pay the loan off.</p>
<p>I was fortunate in that my student loans were not too big. (I can't remember the exact amount anymore.) I worked for a couple of years after college, before going back for a teaching certificate, and I was able to get them completely paid off in those two years, and save up enough for a year of post-bac education, thanks to living at home and being thrifty. (The post-bac. was at the in-state university, which made it much cheaper than my BA expenses.)</p>
<p>As an Illinois attorney, I have faced for years another encouragement to pay off student loans. In Illinois, an attorney can be disciplined or disbarred if he fails to pay student loans. Illinois Supreme Court Rule of Professional Conduct 8.4(a)(8).</p>
<p>My wife and I worked hard to pay off our student loans in about 4 years.</p>
<p>Politically I am a proud Liberal but I totally support the Court's ruling allowing the government to withhold SS payments in order to pay off a way past due student loan. I hope they charge the guy cumulative interest too. </p>
<p>I have little sympathy for dead beats and wish the federal government would be more active in going after these folks. If your a deadbeat lawyer, temporarily suspend the law licence. Same goes for doctors, engineers, dentists, etc. If you are not a licensed professional, get the drivers license suspended and passports too.</p>
<p>Me, too, ohio_mom. It took 10 years to pay off $22,500, 4 of it while living on $400/month in med school (my Air Force scholarship stipend) and the rest at a 2nd lieutenant's pay. But putting that last stub in the envelope with the check was indeed liberating!</p>
<p>I was able to get out of college and grad school with $2000 in loans, which I was given 10 years to pay off. Shows you how savvy I was about indebtedness and interest that I took the entire 10 years to make the payments!</p>
<p>We got my loans paid off fairly quickly but took the full 10 yrs. to pay of H's more substantial amount. Felt like the weight of the world taken off our shoulders!! (....but by then the kids were arriving and that monthly payment was soon eaten up by other pressing needs!)</p>
<p>The bank that held my original loan went bankrupt, and didn't record a bunch of the payments. I fought with New York State for almost a dozen years before we got it all settled (and it wasn't a heck of a lot to begin that.)</p>
<p>Finally paid mine off just a few years ago. Great thread idea. It is why I am so adamant about my kids trying to stay debt free if at all possible. My education was a long, drawn out process with lots of "changing my major" episodes.</p>
<p>When I married my husband, he was 24 and I was 27, and I was <em>shocked</em> when I realized he had $4000 in student loans--and he hadn't paid anything in 2 years. (He also hadn't done his income taxes in two years. "They owe me money, it's not a big deal.") </p>
<p>It took until he was 32 to get them paid off, mostly because it was set up to pay $32/month and we were also paying a mortgage at 14.25% interest (we were the only people who bought a house that year (1982), I think)... I remember paying the last $700 in one fell swoop when we had some extra money, because I just couldn't stand one more month of that stupid check.</p>
<p>Yes, I paid off my student loans with my own money on time without ever missing a payment. This was even though some of the time, I was a student and was unemployed.</p>
<p>we didn't have student loans- but we have had large credit card debt that resulted from periods of unemployment/ inadequate health insurance.
We have paid those bills off- but only because we were able to reduce /eliminate interest. If that wasn't possible, we would probably still be paying it off.
I wonder how much of James Lockharts $77,000 debt was interest.
I understand that education loans need to be paid back- but to take money from an elderly man who is already living on less than $900 a month?
You might as well take candy from a baby.</p>
<p>I am sure they still have the stubs- but for our PLUS loan, they lower the interest rate if they can automatically deduct it from your account.
Im sure they do the same for Stafford and Perkins.</p>
<p>I got my undergrad loans (5000) paid off in the full ten years. Our challenge was when H started med school, entirely financed with loans, when D was 1 year old. We were still paying that off when she was in hs (about 1400/month, some had 15% or more interest). Sadly, around then, his mom passed away, and what he inherited paid off the remainder--or we'd still be paying some of them.</p>
<p>Right now, the federal student loan default rate is hovering around 5%, according to the Dept. of Education. In 1990, the year with the highest percentage of defaults, 22.4 percent defaulted on their student loans!</p>
<p>DMD- bought in SoCal in 1983- $122k was $1764/monthly......I was young, I didn't know any better, every one said you'd better get into the housing market or you'll never get in, so we got in....but it hurt, my entire salary went to the mortgage! That same loan amount now is 1/3 to 1/2 the payment, depending on the terms of the loan!!!</p>
<p>I'm wondering why the government waits until social security to kick in to try to collect these loans. Why weren't wages garnisheed? Too much court expense perhaps?</p>
<p>It took my H and me until we were 45 years old to pay off college (for him- I should have checked his financial profile before I fell for him! He got a better deal with my scholarships :)!) and med school for us both.
It's one of the reasons I have wanted to pay for the best fit college education my kids can get, and possibly postgrad. That last bit will be a bone of contention between H and me, though!</p>
<p>I was one of the lucky ones. I only had $1200 worth of loans (which was a LOT at the time considering I earned $6800 a year at my first job). However, the were all government loans that were forgiven if you worked in a low income/high priority school district. It was a five year time to forgive the full loan, I believe. I never had to pay a nickel back. I went to grad school on full fellowship. Like I said...I was VERY lucky.</p>