collageTo get all the important details you need on Should You Refinance or Consolidate to Simplify Repayment, How To Find Your Student Loan Balance, Checking Your Federal Student Loan Balance, Checking Your Private Student Loan Balances and lots more All you have to do is to please keep on reading this post from college learners. Always ensure you come back for all the latest information that you need with zero stress.
Federal Student Loans
How do I know how much I owe in student loans?
The first thing to know is that you can’t figure it out on your own. It’s one of the most common questions we get, and there’s no way to find out your exact debt without using an official tool or website. You’ll need to contact your loan provider directly or use a third-party service like Student Loan Hero.
You can also look at your credit report. If you’ve taken out federal loans or grants, they will be listed there. The total amount of your debt will be listed on your credit report as well as how much you paid off each month for the past 12 months (so if you made payments regularly, this number should be higher than what you actually owe). If you have private student loans, those will not be listed on your credit report but are still included in the total amount of debt owed.
How To Find Your Student Loan Balance
If you’ve taken out federal student loans to pay for school, you might have multiple loans that spanned across different years. You might have even more loans to look out for if you’ve also borrowed private student loans.
Unless you’ve consolidated or refinanced your loans, you might not be able to keep up with them all. Here’s why knowing your loan balance matters, and how to find it.
Checking Your Private Student Loan Balances
Each private student lender handles loans differently; there’s no national database for private loans. If you’re unsure where to start, use these tips:
- Reach out to your college or university. Your school’s financial aid office will have your original loan details and can let you know what company originated your loan.
- Contact your original lender. Your original lender might still be your current loan servicer, but that’s not always the case. Contact the originating lender to see if they can point you in the direction of who has your loans now. You might have to reach out to many servicers to find the most up-to-date one.
- Review your credit report. If you don’t know the original lender or where to find them, use AnnualCreditReport.com. This lets you pull credit reports from the three major credit bureaus: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. You’ll see details on your original loan servicer, giving you a starting point.
Should You Refinance or Consolidate to Simplify Repayment?
Staying on top of all your loans can be like a part-time job. You have to keep tabs on your borrowed amount, interest rate, due date and the minimum amount due every month.
To streamline your payments, you might want to think about consolidating or refinancing your loans.
Federal Loan Consolidation
A federal direct consolidation loan brings all your federal loans together into one easy-to-manage loan. Your interest rate is fixed and averaged out between all your loans, then rounded up to the nearest one eighth of a percentage point. This is only available for federal student loans; private student loans aren’t eligible.
You should consolidate if you:
- Have many different loan servicers
- Want to enroll in an income-driven repayment (IDR) plan or Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF), and you must consolidate certain loans to make them eligible
- Want to lower your payments. Repayment terms on consolidation loans stretch up to 30 years.
You should skip consolidation if you:
- Want to pay off your loans sooner
- Want a lower interest rate
- Have interest rate discounts or other repayment perks with your current lenders
- Are already on track for an IDR plan or PSLF; consolidation will restart your clock on these programs*
Private Student Loan Refinancing
Refinancing is similar to consolidation in that you bring all your loans into one manageable loan. But refinancing is only done with private lenders; the federal government doesn’t offer student loan refinancing. That means you’ll lose federal loan protections when you refinance federal loans into a private one.
You can refinance both private and federal student loans together. You’ll complete an application with a lender and detail all the current student loans you want to refinance. When you’re approved, you’ll start making one monthly payment on your new loan to your new lender.
You should refinance if you:
- Have good or excellent credit and can secure a lower interest rate than what you’re paying now.
- Have multiple loans with many different lenders, especially private loans.
- Can secure a lower monthly payment by stretching out your loan term.
You should avoid refinancing if you:
- Don’t have strong enough credit to get a lower interest rate.
- Have federal loans that are eligible for an IDR plan or you’re on track for PSLF.
- Want to keep federal protections and benefits, like deferment and forbearance, in case you experience financial hardship.
While consolidation and refinancing might simplify your payments, they’re not necessarily the best decision for everyone. Review your loans, including your interest rate, repayment terms, how much you pay every month, and how much you could save if you choose either of these options. If you’re not saving money or you could end up paying more over time, you may want to stay on your current repayment schedule for now.
Why It’s Important to Know How Much You Owe
It’s important to keep track of your student loan balance, especially if you’re responsible for multiple loans. If you lose track of just one due date, you could fall behind on loan payments. Payment history makes up 35% of your FICO score, and one missed or late payment can cause your credit score to drop.
Federal student loans come with loan limits, which depend on the year and the type of loan you borrow. For instance, first-year students are allowed to borrow up to $3,500 in federal direct subsidized loans. Third-year students can borrow up to $5,500 in subsidized loans.
If your subsidized loans don’t cover your costs, you might have to take out additional loans. These could be federal direct unsubsidized loans, federal PLUS loans or private student loans. Each year you need to borrow, you’ll take out at least one student loan—if not more.
When you borrowed your student loans, you agreed to repay that amount, plus interest, when you graduated or dropped below half-time enrollment. By the time you start repayment, your debt could’ve changed loan servicers (which is the company that collects your payments), making it even more confusing to find out how you can start payments. But finding out how much you owe and what companies manage your loans is a crucial step in tracking your loan repayment.
Checking Your Federal Student Loan Balances
If you borrowed money from the U.S. Department of Education, there are a few different ways you can check out your student loan balance.
1. Head to the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS)
The Department of Education runs the NSLDS. From here you can create a Federal Student Aid ID (FSA ID) or log in with your existing account.
The NSLDS will tell you:
- How much you’ve borrowed
- The type of loans you have (for example, whether it’s subsidized or unsubsidized)
- Each loan’s interest rate
- Payment status
- Your loan servicer (you could have more than one)
2. Contact Your School
Sometimes not all loans show up in the NSLDS. For example, loans that you didn’t take out yourself—like parent PLUS loans—would show up under your parent’s report. Along with that, not all loan entities report to the NSLDS frequently. This means you might not find all your loans, especially if you’ve recently borrowed.
If you want to make sure all your loans are accounted for, contact your school’s financial aid office. They’ll be able to look up your account information, including all loans processed under your name.
Keep in mind that while you might be able to get information about the lender who provided your loan when you were in school, there’s a chance your loan has changed hands since then. You can still contact the loan servicer on file, but you might have a little bit more digging to do if you find out your loan has moved to a different company’s portfolio.
Because of the complexity of student loans and the way they are administered, it can be difficult to determine exactly how much you owe. However, there are several ways to find out:
The best way is to contact your lender directly for an exact figure. This will require filling out a form with your personal information and requesting that they provide you with a statement of all outstanding balances. You can also request this information from them over the phone or via email if they have an online messaging service available.
Another option is to use the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) website, which allows borrowers to log in, see their balance and payment history, and make payments. You must create a login and password before being able to access this information; however, it is free to use so long as you don’t want additional services like address changes or loan consolidation services added on top of what’s already there.
Finally, if you’re not comfortable accessing your data via either method above then there may be other options available such as calling or visiting in person at one of their offices located throughout America’s 50 states plus Washington DC where staff members would be able to assist with any questions regarding individual accounts such as monthly payments owed
What Type of Loan Do I Have?
You must know what type of student loan you have in order to understand your options. You can use the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) to find out what federal loans you have. As of February 2020, the NSLDS site is found on the Department’s StudentAid.gov site. There is a large “Log In” button on the right side of the screen that you must use to see your account information (also known as your “dashboard.”). Once you enter your FSA ID, you will have access to a lot of information, including your student aid summary.
You must have a FSA ID to access your loan information. If you do not already have an FSA ID, you can create one by clicking on the “Create Account” button on the StudentAid.gov site. The Department has posted answers to frequently asked questions (FAQs) about the FSA ID system.
Once you access your loan “dashboard”, you will see an aid summary as well as more detailed information about each individual grant, loan, and aid overpayment. The Department says that the new dashboard will allow you to keep track of your remaining eligibility for Direct Subsidized Loans (Subsidized Usage Limit Applied – SULA) and Federal Pell Grants and Iraq and Afghanistan Service Grants (Lifetime Eligibility Used – LEU). You should also be able to track your progress toward repaying loans and track the number of qualifying payments made toward Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) if applicable. In addition, the aid summary will include information about your loan servicer and a link to the loan servicer’s website.
You can also call the Federal Student Aid Information Center, 1-800-4-FED-AID, TDD 1-800-730-8913. The Center’s counselors can help you figure out what types of loans you have.
Federal loan promissory notes and applications will state the name of the federal loan program (Stafford, PLUS, Perkins, FFEL, William D. Ford Direct Loan Program, etc.) at the top of your monthly bill, and loan contract.
Examples:
Federal Loans:
Federal Direct Loan Master Promissory Note (Subsidized and Unsubsidized)
There is no central data base similar for private student loan information. You should contact your lenders or loan holders to get more information about private loans. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has a private student loan ombudsman and an on-line student loan assistant tool. The Department of Education also has information about the differences between federal and private student loans.
Most private student loans will have a disclosure statement similar to the information that is included on mortgage loans and car loans. This is because most private loans are covered by the Truth in Lending Act while federal loans are not. Sample disclosures from the Federal Reserve Board:
Sample Application and Solicitation Disclosure
You can also get information about your student loans by checking your credit report. Be aware, however, that some loans, particularly older loans, may not appear on the credit report.
How to Check Student Loan Balance
It can be easy to lose track of all of your student loans and your total balance, especially when you’re busy in college. Many students receive multiple small loans per semester, which can be a mixture of federal student loans—such as Perkins, Stafford, and PLUS—and private student loans. While your school financial aid office may be able to help you find some basic facts and figures, there are other effective ways to find out your total student loan balance.
Finding Your Federal Student Loan Balances
You can always access student loan information through your My Federal Student Aid account, where you can find your federal student loan balances under the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS). This is the U.S. Department of Education’s central database for student aid, and it keeps track of all your federal student loans.3
You’ll need a Federal Student Aid ID username and password to log in to the site. The ID serves as your legal signature, and you can’t have someone—whether an employer, family member, or third party—create an account for you, nor can you create an account for someone else. The NSLDS stores information so you can quickly check it whenever you need to, and it will tell you which loans are subsidized or unsubsidized, which is important because it can determine how much you end up paying after graduation.
If your loans are subsidized, the U.S. Department of Education pays the interest while you’re enrolled in school; interest accrues during that time with unsubsidized loans. To qualify for a subsidized loan, you must be an undergraduate student who has demonstrated financial need. Unsubsidized loans are available to undergraduate, graduate, and professional degree students, and there are no financial qualifications in place.4
Note
On Aug. 24, 2022, President Joe Biden announced via Twitter the cancellation of $10,000 of federal student loan debt for eligible borrowers, and $20,000 for federal Pell Grant recipients.5
How NSLDS Knows Your Student Loan Balances
The NSLDS receives information for its database from a variety of sources, including guaranty agencies, loan servicers, and other government loan agencies. When you enroll in a college or university, the school also sends information, including any student loan debt you took on, to the NSLDS. It notes when you took out the loan, when it was disbursed, when your grace period ended, and when you paid it off.6
The NSLDS is useful because it gives a total picture of your federal loans at once, so you know right away how much federal debt you have. However, it doesn’t include any information about your private student loans.
Finding Your Private Student Loan Balances
Finding information about your private student loans can be a bit more difficult than getting your federal loan balances since private lenders sometimes sell their loans to other companies. If you’re not sure who your lender is for private student loans, call your school’s financial aid office for help or call your original lender if you know it.
If neither of those options works for you, you can figure out your private student loan lenders by reviewing your credit report. The report should show all of your current debts and accounts, including all student loans.
Note
You can safely get a free annual credit report from all three reporting agencies—Equifax, TransUnion, and Experian—at AnnualCreditReport.com.7
Why You Should Track Your Student Loans
While it might seem complicated, it is essential to keep track of your student loans and the amount of debt you owe, including knowing how much you borrowed and how much you owe once you add interest. This can be helpful while you are in college, and as you start your budgeting process after graduation. Many options exist for repayment plans, including the following:
- Standard plans: Payments are calculated to guarantee loans are paid off within 10–30 years.
- Graduated plans: These are designed to ensure loans will be repaid within a certain amount of time, but payments will increase gradually over time.
- Income-based: These repayment plans calculate your monthly payments based on how much you earn, with higher wages equaling higher payments.
Once you have a solid number to start with, you can begin to create a repayment plan to get rid of that debt as quickly as possible. You can develop a repayment plan that works for your salary and lifestyle and pays down the debt quickly to save you money over time. You can always contact your loan servicer to update your payment plan if your situation changes. This does not have a negative impact on your credit.
collage