Wednesday, May 25, 2005

Time to save on Student Loans

I am lucky I do not have any student loans nor does my husband. We both went to 4 yr state schools and my folks paid for most of it. I know my brother and sister went to private college and I know they have loans. Interest rates are rising and now is the time to consolidate those student loans. Good luck!

Former college students and their parents currently have what may be one of the best opportunities to save money on student loans.

At the center of this opportunity is anticipation that the interest rate that applies to consolidation loans – a fixed-rate loan that replaces the variable rates of the existing student loans – is set to rise this summer. To help you decide how to act, financial adviser Ray Martin visits The Early Show.

Under a federally subsidized program, every July the Department of Education sets a fixed rate that applies to consolidation loans for the following 12 months. The fixed rate is tied to an index of the 91-day Treasury Bill rate at the end of May each year. That rate is approximately 2.85 percent, which is over 1.75 percentage points higher than it was last year. This means that the fixed rate that applies to loans consolidated after June 2005 could be approximately 5 to 6 percent, versus 3.37 percent for Stafford Loans and 4.17 percent for PLUS Loans consolidated before July 2005.
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