I was recently accepted into pharmacy school. I posted this here since I noticed not many people view the Financial Aid forum, and its kind of an odd situation.
I currently have a balance of $2000 (Stafford) from my undergraduate years (my only loan taken from college). I will not have to attend college next semester since my pre-reqs are done, and I would prefer to use the gap between the end of the Fall semester and the start of pharmacy school to pay off this $2000 loan and the majority of the remainder of my car's balance.
Heres the question:
If I do not attend school in the spring semester and cannot pay off the $2000 until mid-March (worst case scenario), will this affect my Stafford loan for pharmacy school in the upcoming Fall IF I file it at the earliest possible date? Should I wait until I pay it off before I do the FAFSA?
http://studentaid.ed.gov/PORTALSWebApp/students/english/studentloans.jsp
Carrying a $2000 balance from undergrad will not affect your eligibility for loans in Pharmacy school.
Stafford/Federal Direct loans have a lifetime aggregate limit of some half a million dollars.
When you get into Pharmacy school, youre gonna borrow at least 20k per year. 8500 will be Federal Direct subsidized, some 14 k more will be Federal Direct unsubsidized, and then the rest will be Grad PLUS unsubsidized.
Federal Direct/Staffords (Direct = Stafford) have a 6.8% apr.
PLUS loans are unsubsidized and have a 7.9% apr.
The maximum amount of all loans you can take is determined by your "total cost of attendance" set by your school.
"The COA includes tuition and fees; on-campus room and board (or a housing and food allowance for off-campus students); and allowances for books, supplies, transportation, loan fees, and, if applicable"
If your school gives you an
annual Budget of 40k (tuition + fee + room&board +books + leisure) = Total cost of education,
then you can take out an annual maximum of 40k in student loans.
8.5k Direct subsidized, 15k Direct unsubsidized, 16.5 PLUS, for example.
If your school gives you an annual Budget of 60k as its "Total cost of Education" your loans would look like: 8.5k + 15k + 27.5k
you are not obligated to take out the maximum allowable amount of loans. If you want to lead the high life (play now pay later), then take it all out
by all means.
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2000$ is actually extremely good for undergrad. Bachelor degrees leave with 20k of undergrad loans on average. A lucky few (like yourself) leave with little to no undergrad debt. An even luckier few leave with 40, 50, 60 k or more in debt from undergrad ALONE; and to put the icing on the cake, all that debt is UNSUBSIDIZED at 7.9%. Before you know it, you'll owe 10k alone in capitalized interest (interest compounded and added onto the principle).
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For graduate debt, thats a whole other story.
average of 20-30k debt PER YEAR consisting of 8.5k subsidized, 15k unsubsidized, and the remainder PLUS, and if you want more debt, you can always take out PRIVATE loans from CITI, CHASE, WAKOVIA, BANK OF AMERICA, etc etc.
When you enroll at least half-time, all federal loans are put on
deferment. That means they wont hound you to pay your bills, until 6-9 months AFTER you graduate. the 6-9 months is called the grace period.
Basically, dont worry about that 2k.
Carrying previous debt will not affect your "chances" of receiving future loans. Federal student loans are
guaranteed so long as you submit a FAFSA.
They are not awarded based on credit score, or debt-to-income ratio, or any of that. As long as you submit your fafsa, you will receive federal loans every year.
Unlike in undergrad, you will no longer receive federal pell grant, state grants, and the like. As a graduate-level student you will finance your education solely on LOANS.
Once your pharmacy school is through with you, that 2k will be less than a drop in the bucket.
Best of luck,
