Student Loan Consolidation Rates - Helpful Tips

Student loan consolidation has many benefits. Before you sign up on the dotted line, you should know how to get the best student loan rates. If you are tired of too many bills and monthly due dates, it may be time to find the best student consolidation loan you qualify for.

The most obvious way to get the best student consolidation loan rates, is by having great credit. It’s easy to get great student consolidation loan rates with a FICO score over 660. But, there are several ways to get the best student consolidation loan rates.

Know Your Credit Before Shopping For Student Consolidation Loan Rates

By doing a simple Google or Yahoo search on FICO and credit scores to find the information you need to check out your credit score. This really should be your first step to getting the best student consolidation loan rates. With knowledge, you will get the best student loan consolidation rates for your financial situation.

Student consolidation loan rates can vary from person to person. The student consolidation loan rates offered will be based on your financial situation and FICO score. With a FICO score under 600, you will have a tough time getting a good student consolidation loan rate.

Refinancing And Home Equity Loans Used For Student Loan Consolidation

With a home equity loan, you can get the best student consolidation loan rates possible with good credit. Secured by your home, a student consolidation loan can help get rid of your high credit card rates and loans. You will have less bills to pay, with the best student consolidation loan rates to lower your interest on several loans.

Refinancing your home mortgage may be an option to get the best student loan consolidation rates.

The important thing to remember with home equity loans and refinancing, is to be logical and don’t let your emotions get the best of you. You may get the best student consolidation loan rates available, but you still have to pay back the loan over time.

It’s best to take the time to sit down and research all your options that are available to you to get the best loan and interest rate.

Resources Online For Getting The Best Student Loan Consolidation Rates

With today’s Internet resources, you have an advantage when looking for the best student loan consolidation rates online. Take time to get educated on the process of getting the best student consolidation loan rates, and you can save yourself thousands of dollars on the student consolidation loan rates available, with just a few clicks of the mouse.

The idea is to combine all your current debts that you owe into one large debt with the lowest interest rate possible. Instead of making monthly payments on several high interest loans ranging from 12% to 28%, you can make one payment each month to one company.

Today’s career minded students can get help with the burden of having several student loans. You can focus on your career, instead of losing sleep over paying several monthly loan payments. Student loan consolidation can be the solution with many advantages. With today’s Internet technology, you can get a student loan consolidation quickly and easily.

By Dean Shainin

Student Loan Consolidation - Is It Right For You?

You can benefit from student loan consolidation, but there are things you should consider. It’s a good idea to start looking into how you can consolidate your student loans before the 6 month grace period ends. Big monthly student loan payments can be very stressful when starting a new job. When the bills are out of control and you’re stressing out about how to keep track of when payments are due, it might be time to consider a student loan consolidation as an option.

When Should I Consolidate My Student Loans?

There has never been a better time than now to take advantage of the lowest interest rates in recent history. You can get the best deals for consolidating your loans and to lower those monthly loan payments. Student loan consolidation can save you hundreds of dollars on repaying your student loan with a lower interest rate.

What Is Student Loan Consolidation?

When a student first applied for loans from several different government agencies and loan providers, they each gave a different interest rate and term for paying back the loans. The idea of student loan consolidation is to take all the different loans and put them into one simple and easy convenient loan. You then only make one monthly loan payment each month over time. This saves you both time and money by having a lower interest rate and less checks to write every single month.

3 Benefits Of Getting A Student Loan Consolidation

1. Lower Interest Rate. Student loan consolidation can save you thousands of dollars.You may be using credit cards with 12% to 28% interest trying to keep up with your bills. This can cost you thousands of dollars when you pay the minimum monthly payments on high interest credit card debt. Having a student loan consolidation may be your best option if you can get lower interest rates when consolidating your student loans.

2. New Interest Rates. With a new student loan consolidation, you may be able to get a much better interest rate. Interest rates are now at an all time low. You may have been paying on debt you built up from several years ago, at high interest rates. Things change over time in the financial industry.

3. Relieve Stress. With a student loan consolidation you don’t have to worry about several monthly loan payments and due dates. This in itself, can make a student loan consolidation worth your while. You can focus on your new career, instead of those nagging loan payments every month.

Student Loan Consolidation Online And Internet Services To Help You

Now you can get a student loan consolidation online quickly and easily. The Internet makes research and finding good consolidation loan programs as easy as a few clicks of your computer mouse. You can get done in a day, what used to take several weeks. You can learn everything you need to know from information sites that provide the latest news, resources, tools and data in regards to student loan consolidation.

This empowers you to get the best deal on student loan consolidation. With a few clicks of the mouse, you can get loan quotes and compare loan companies that are competing for your business.

By Dean Shainin

Getting Private Student Loans For 2007

If you are considering options to federal aid for funding your education, one of them is likely to be private student loans. This option provides an additional source of funding for those who are looking for a supplement to federal aid and will enable them to purse their dreams of higher education.

Private student loans have their own advantages. To illustrate, applicants can get loans for more than $20,000 and this usually takes only a few minutes to approve. Another good point, unlike federal aid, is that there are no application deadlines. This means anyone can apply at any time by simply approaching one of the accredited education institution. Furthermore, private aid is awarded on creditworthiness. and not on need-based criteria.

Usually, the interest rate of student loans are fixed and borrowers need not worry about fluctuating rates that would increase the interest payments. Besides this, private college loans offer affordable repayment options comparable to federal student loans.

However, there is a difference between the repayment period for private and federal student loan. The maximum repayment terms for a private loan is currently fixed at 15 years, which is much lesser than the 30 years limit for federal student aid.

On the other hand, private student loan holders forego other vital benefits given by federal loan. To illustrate, if a federal student loan holder becomes disabled or deceased, the loans are forgiven making repayment unnecessary. Private loan holders' heirs would have to repay the loans in full from the deceased's estate. Even the disabled and unemployed are still liable for their debt. This is different from federal loan where the federal government provides an alternative to the hardship of unaffordable loan repayment by writing off the entire loan.

As we have seen above, private student loans are only valuable when filling the gap between total college expenses and a borrower's awarded financial aid. To use private student loans as a substitution to federal aid, rather than a supplement is short-sighted on the part of the borrower. Hence, it is advisable to consider the pros and cons of a private student loan before you make the correct decision.

College Finance: money for nothing

If you've earned a high school diploma and you're ready to take the prestigious leap for a higher education, be prepared for sticker shock. The costs of a college degree can be astronomical. But with the right combination of scholarships, college student loans and work-study programs, you can make the leap without landing yourself in heavy debt.

Plan A: Money for nothing. Here are two proven sources of money, which can help you cover costs without costing a dime:

• Scholarships. There are an enormous range of scholarships, which are financial grants given to students for academic, athletic or artistic merit. There is also a wide range of unusual scholarships based on virtually everything from where you live to where your ancestors lived. Start searching for the scholarship that matches your profile.

• Financial aid based on lower income. Other alternatives exist beyond scholarships and students loans. Based on your income, you may also be able to receive financial aid from the government or an individual school.

Plan B: Interest rates and elbow grease. You can also borrow funds or work off the cost of college in the following ways:

• Federal and private loans. One of the most popular ways to finance college is through a student loan. There are government, as well as private, loans. Federal student loans include Stafford Loans for students and PLUS Loans for parents. These tend to be the most cost-effective. Private student loans are also very competitive and involve much less paperwork.
• Work study and career-specific financing. Many colleges offer work-study programs, the equivalent of washing dishes in a restaurant to pay for your dinner. Specific trades-such as nursing or the military-offer co-op programs, in which you work for a participating company while you're going to school.

If you're like most students, you'll opt for a combination of the above options. Used wisely, they can help forward your education without pushing you backwards into serious debt. And the long-term rewards-intellectual growth and enhanced earning power-will be worth every penny.

10 Things to Know About Mortgages

I became a first-time homeowner two years ago, and in the process I learned a lot about mortgages -- many things surprisingly interesting or unexpected. Here are 10 things that you may not know about mortgages.

1. You can buy a house with a down payment of as little as 0%. That's right, no down payment at all; 100% financed via a mortgage. You may even find a government agency that will help with your closing costs. These options aren't available to everyone, but first-time homeowners and/or homebuyers of limited means may be able to find good deals here and there.

2. Adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) come in many varieties. You might think of an ARM as a mortgage with an interest rate that goes up or down each year. Some ARMs do work that way, but consider this: If you're pretty sure you'll be staying in your home for just five or six years, you can get something called a "5-1" ARM, where the rate is fixed for the first five years, after which it fluctuates each year. Whereas 30-year fixed mortgage rates can be as low as around 5.5% these days, 5-1 ARMs are in the 4.5% range. That 5-1 ARM might save you $100 per month, or $1,200 per year. There are 7-1 ARMs, 10-1 ARMs, and many other related beasts as well.

3. Adjustable rate mortgages are generally limited in how much they can adjust each year. Naive renter that I was, I always assumed that ARMs were especially risky, because if interest rates skyrocket over one or two years, your mortgage rate will also skyrocket. Fortunately, I learned that ARMs typically have caps on how much rates can increase each year. (Still, over the long run, they can increase a lot.)

4. Small changes in interest rates can make a big difference. Imagine that you recently got a 30-year fixed mortgage on a $200,000 house at 6.5% with a 20% down payment. That results in a monthly mortgage payment of roughly $1,011. You might not think it's worth refinancing now, with rates around 5.625%, but think again. The same mortgage at that interest rate results in monthly payments of about $921. The difference per month? $90, or $1,080 per year. If closing costs on the refinancing will be $2,000, just divide that by $90 to see how many months it will take before you break even: 22. So if you're planning to live in your home for at least two years, refinancing may well be worth it.

5. Mortgage brokers can be very useful for many people. My uncle is actually a mortgage broker, but I'd never really discussed mortgages with him until I began house-hunting. A good mortgage broker will advise you on what kinds of mortgages would best suit you, and will find you the best rate and deal that he or she can, searching through the loan products of many lenders. Of course, just as with many professions, there are conflicts of interest in the mortgage broker biz that can result in you getting ripped off. One way to avoid that is to read up on the topic and to seek out ethical mortgage brokers. The Mortgage Professor's website is a good place to learn more.

6. Not everyone needs a mortgage broker. Mortgage brokers tend to be most useful when you've got some financial issues, such as a poor credit history. If you've got a pristine credit report and plan to put at least 20% down on your new home, you may be able to just walk into a few local banks and ask for their best rates.

7. You might find even more attractive mortgage rates from your local credit union. For example, at the time of this writing, my local bank is offering 30-year fixed-rate mortgages for 5.625% (with no points). But a credit union to which I belong sports 5.375% rates for the same thing. If you don't belong to a credit union, you may be able to join one through a family member, your workplace, or an association to which you belong.

8. Some websites will crunch many helpful numbers for you. Using mortgage payment calculator you can learn exactly how much of each mortgage payment will go toward the principal of the loan vs. interest. (This might be useful to know, since the interest portions are deductible on your tax return.)

9. Paying points on your mortgage may or may not be smart. Points are an extra fee you pay (or don't) when you close on your mortgage. They're expressed as a percentage of the loan -- so on a $200,000 loan, two points would be $4,000. By paying points upfront, you can often get a lower interest rate. This is a sensible thing to do if you're pretty sure you'll be sticking with that home and mortgage for many years. If you're planning to only be there a while, skip the points.

10. The world of mortgages isn't a static one. Here's an intriguing, relatively new option -- portable mortgages. In 2003, E*Trade (NYSE: ET) introduced mortgages that you can take with you, transferring them from one house to another if you move. You pay a small premium in interest rates for the privilege, but given that most people these days don't stay put for 30 or even 15 years, this option could well be worth it. I won't be surprised if additional lenders begin offering portable mortgages soon.

There's much more to learn about mortgage options. Wachovia (NYSE: WB), for example, is offering a mortgage designed for teachers. Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) introduced blended-rate mortgages last year, featuring advantages of both fixed-rate mortgages and ARMs. Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) offers multifamily mortgages. Lots of lenders offer interest-only loans and other extreme mortages.

I hope you found at least some of the above tidbits interesting.

By Selena Maranjian

Households Refinance Their Mortgages

Home mortgage and home equity credit is the cheapest form of consumer credit available (except parents). Why? Over the period from 2000 through January 2003, the average effective rate on 30-year fixed rate home mortgages has ranged from 7.52 percent (average: 2000) to 6.12 percent in January 2003. Second, interest payment may be tax-deductible expenditures. Third, as inflation raises the market value of the home, the size of the available loan rises, thus providing a hedge against inflation. Finally, since the homeowner and lender already have a relationship, transaction costs are typically less than applying for a loan elsewhere. As these advantages prompt more homeowners to shift more of their borrowing to some form of mortgage or home equity product, other lenders are increasingly left with the market for non-homeowners, which may involve a higher cost and credit risk. This has some interesting implications for non-mortgage lenders in the coming years, and also explains why so many companies that formerly did not do home equity lending (e.g., Household International; MBNA) have entered that market.

Not only is mortgage credit less costly than other forms of credit available to consumers, but its cost has been declining in recent years. Over the period shown in the table below, average effective interest rates on residential mortgages fell 7.52 percent to 6.12 percent. Refinancing a home mortgage allows borrowers to take on additional debt, as well as lower their interest costs. In the first quarter of 2002, 61 percent of Freddie Mac-owned loans that were refinanced resulted in new mortgage loans at least five percent higher than the original amount borrowed. In a very real sense, homeowners own a "bank"-that is, their home. The home provides collateral for the loan that can be obtained with minimal effort, since the lender and homeowner have already established a satisfactory relationship. Furthermore, the interest expense is tax-deductible. On top of that, the value of homes has grown by more than 7 percent just in this past year.