Home Lee asked:
My wife and I are both due to graduate from college in about a year and a half. Will we be able to consolidate our student loans into one loan or will we have to each consolidate individually?
My wife and I are both due to graduate from college in about a year and a half. Will we be able to consolidate our student loans into one loan or will we have to each consolidate individually?
Contact your loan company. They are the ones who can answer that for you.
Left by Billie Dee on April 6th, 2010
Consolidation loans often reduce the size of the monthly payment by extending the term of the loan beyond the 10-year repayment plan that is standard with federal loans. Depending on the loan amount, the term of the loan can be extended from 12 to 30 years. (10 years for less than $7,500; 12 years for $7,500 to $10,000; 15 years for $10,000 to $20,000; 20 years for $20,000 to $40,000; 25 years for $40,000 to $60,000; and 30 years for $60,000 and above.) The reduced monthly payment may make the loan easier to repay for some borrowers. However, by extending the term of a loan the total amount of interest paid is increased.
–house.blogspot.com/2008/03/loan-consolidation.html
In certain circumstances (for example, when one or more of the loans was being repaid in less than 10 years because of minimum payment requirements), a consolidation loan may decrease the monthly payment without extending the overall loan term beyond 10 years. In effect, the shorter-term loan is being extended to 10 years. The total amount of interest paid will increase unless you continue to make the same monthly payment as before, in which case the total amount of interest paid will decrease. The interest rate on consolidation loans is the weighted average of the interest rates on the loans being consolidated, rounded up to the nearest 1/8 of a percent and capped at 8.25%.
Left by Gauri on April 7th, 2010
I am glad you asked and that this question is still open. You guys probably have a lot of student debt between you, huh. As of August 1st president obama has started a wipe your debt program called IBR i suggest you look it up. I will sum it up for you. If you dedicate the next ten years of your life to any public service occupation…. health..law…education…police.. whatever… your monthly payments are GONE… have a few kids….read up on it… by the way… 50% of marriages fail.. do you really wanna go through the mess of dividiing it back up later on???
Left by Gerald on April 10th, 2010
If you are thinking for consolidating federal loans together, you cannot anymore. As of 7/1/06 or 7/1/07, I am not positive on the date, but the government pull the plug on that program. If you are asking about private loans you will need to contact your lenders to see if you can. You can consolidate individually, must lenders are not offering it right now but Direct Loans (loans direct from the government) is still offering federal consolidation loans. The link is below.
Left by TomM on April 10th, 2010
No, Effective July, 1 2006 a married couple may no longer obtain a Federal Consolidation Loan as joint borrowers. Why not you ask? When married students consolidated their loans together, each spouse became responsible for the full amount of the loan, and the loans could not be separated if the couple got divorced. To avoid such problems, Congress decided to repeal this provision as part of the Higher Education Reconciliation Act of 2005.
Left by Whitley on April 11th, 2010