Please Help!! Need advice for private student loans!!

Paying for College
1

Hello,

I know it’s not ideal to get a private student loan from a bank or other source to pay for college but I have no other option. I attend an Ivy League and my Freshman Year I was able to pay for everything with scholarships and only had to pay for room and board. This year (my Sophomore) they are asking me to pay around 28k (not including room & board), my parents make in total about 85k a year and I have no way to get this money other than through a private loan.

Does anyone have suggestions about which source is the best? Or have any experience? I’m at loss for what to do.

2

I thought the Ivy League schools didn’t give scholarships, just need based aid.

Or did you have outside scholarships?

With $85,000 income I would think your parents would qualify for a good amount of need based aid.

Your parents would have to borrow the money, but that would end up almost $100,000 after three years.

Not a good idea with their income in my opinion.

You might have to transfer to a school that is more affordable, maybe closer to home.

3

I had outside scholarships and while I do have a little this year, it’s not enough to even make a dent in the payment. I think they considered my parent’s retirement as a part of paying for college (But even that’s not a lot and my parents can’t touch that money). I personally want to take out money, because ideally I would not like to transfer.

4

Well no bank is going to loan an 18 or 19 year old $30,000 a year without a cosigner.

Why don’t you have the outside scholarships this year? Did you know that you would not be able to afford this school after the first year?

Talk to the FA office. I ran net price calculator on Princeton site last year and we were estimated to pay less than $10k with a similar income.

Are your parents’ retirement savings in a qualified retirement account? If not then yes the they would be considered available assets. But they must be quite considerable to raise the EFC that much.

5

They are in a qualified retirement account (and they’re not that considerable). My parents are immigrants and don’t understand anything so I fill out the FAFSA and everything, but I think I might have included their retirement in the assets portion? I don’t know if that would have affected it.

6

Cereal, if you filled out the forms incorrectly then it’s quite probable that you are not getting aid you might qualify for.

Start with your financial aid office. Email them a snapshot of your family’s financial situation- Parent 1 income, Parent 2 income, total in bank accounts/investment accounts, details of the retirement accounts (IRA?).

Then breakdown your aid from last year- source of every dollar.

Ask them to help you figure out if you’re messed up the FAFSA and if so, will they review your aid for the upcoming year.

7

Yes, do what @blossom suggests, ask them to help you figure this out.

8

Does that $85000 a year income include the contributions your parents MADE to their pretax retirement accounts in 2015?

Is that $85 000 a year their income before or after taxes?

Are either of your parents self employed?

9

Something doesnt’ sound right.

Is the retirement money in an authentic retirement acct? If so, was it reported as such?

10

Check your financial aid forms VERY carefully. It sounds to me like you put your parent income in the student section.

11

^^

Right…or listed the parents’ income twice…once in parent area, and once in student area.

What is your FAFSA EFC (I think this is a CSS school, but wondering what FAFSA EFC is).

What is the equity in your parents’ home?

12

Equity in the parent home won’t show up on the FAFSA.

To,the OP…did you also have to do the Profile?

13

Oh I know.

I was wondering if the student has a low FAFSA EFC, but CSS Profile is using home equity as the reason for little aid.

14

Definitely talk to the financial aid office. They actually have an interest in keeping you in school, and they should be able to answer your questions. I’d be shocked if you really were expected to pay what, about $35k/year on an income of $85k unless you had a ton of funds in non-retirement assets.

Is there anyone else who could go over your forms with you? It’s so easy to make a mistake and double-count something, for example, or put it in the wrong box.