<p>Hey guys, I have been searching and searching and can't find a good interest rate on private loans. I have a co-signer but they do not have the best credit history (not bad, just average). I am taking out a HUGE chunk of money for next year and did not qualify for anything except $4500 stafford and a school based scholarship. </p>
<p>Any help is greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>look into myrichuncle. Interesting concept.</p>
<p>As a financial aid administrator, I would suggest avoiding myrichuncle...They are the primary reason for all of the investigations into unscrupilous behavior</p>
<p>^ I wonder how many of your students that you direct towards a FFEL student loan really understand how the program works and and the consequences of nonpayment, even though they attend a class before school attendence and after of school exit or graduation. </p>
<p>^ A few years ago, the FFEL program was on an adjustable rate program. Did you inform the students that its not only the rate that counted but the ability to pay variable that could reduce the ultimate interest paid. </p>
<p>The alternative program looks interesting and should be investigated by students who can understand the numbers better. </p>
<p>My research says that their program is legitimate and beneficial in the marketplace. We shall see more of the reduced interest rate PLUS and Stafford loans in the future because of the investigations into the standard loan program and providers.</p>
<p>Ever wonder why schools have a preferred lender. Ever wonder why, if the loans are supposedly uniform, why there are preferred lenders and why one college will have one set of lenders and another school, another set?</p>
<p>BTW, OP. No such thing as BEST for everyone. What will float your boat, will not float mine. </p>
<p>When you see the : a + b = c, you will see that it has 5 parts. </p>
<p>In the algorithm for interest, there are even more moving variables, all of which are or may be interdepedent on one another.</p>
<p>Well, the caliber of students I deal with is much different than most, as all of mine are working adults who are returning to school. Because of this fact, ALL of my students already understand that repaying a loan quicker equates to less overall interest paid. We also provide our students with an enormous amount of information regarding Stafford Loans and encourage ALL to borrow only what they really need to borrow, in order to reduce their repayment difficulties once they graduate. </p>
<p>In regards to preferred lenders, with the exception of a minority of unscrupulous administrators, these are lenders whom the institution has an EFT agreement with, which means faster processing time. Also, for the vast majority of schools who use preferred or recommended lender lists, the lenders are chosen from the 3000+ qualified lenders because of their quality of service towards students and schools. Our office is also qualite qualified to judge quality of service as we ourselves have student loans with various lenders. We know the heart-ache of calling the lender only to sit on hold for an hour and then reaching a foreign "representative" who can't understand what you are saying. We understand how some lenders deliberate process your payment slowly so that it becomes "late" and the student loses their repayment benefits. We continuously place our recommended lenders under a microscope...to ensure they deserve to be on our recommended list. And ALL of our lenders know they can and will be removed in a heartbeat should they no longer meet our high standards. In fact, our list has changed many times over the last several years. We also provide our students the ability to choose any other approved Title IV lender, and try to make that decision as painless as possible for them. Sometimes it does mean they will have to jump through a few hoops...such as completing a paper Master Promissory Note instead of an electronic one (because the lender won't accept the electronic version through our guarantee agency), or the additional time of having to wait around for a paper check instead of an EFT (because we don't have any agreement with the lender for EFT)...but our students have ALWAYS been able to use any approved Title IV lender. We never ever recommended one lender over another. Instead, we point to the repayment benefits and tell students that their decision needs to be based on how they plan to repay their loans. We point out that some benefits are principle reductions while others are interest rate reductions, and that if they are planning to quickly repay, they will want to choose a benefit which allows them the greatest savings in the shortest period of time. </p>
<p>And, in all honesty, most of our students start repaying their loans before they even graduate! Again, though, this is a benefit of having working adults as students....they are already prepared to repay their loans before the final papers are even signed.</p>