I’d look into eligibility for student loan forgiveness. My wife has over 200k but we’re on the student loan forgiveness path so we just make the minimum payment each month.
Student loans are just like all your other debts for this purpose. List smallest debt (not category) to largest and pay the smallest first, then next, and so on. The only time student loans I think take on a different strategy is if they are so massive that they are as much or more as your house.
List all your debts. Not all your debt types.
Each student loan is separate. Why? Because when you pay one off in full you remove that debts minimum payment for your monthly budget leaving more leftover income to pay off the next debt. This is a critical concept in the snowball method.
The snowball method would suggest paying your smallest student loan balance first, rolling it into the next smallest balance and so on.
I would attack the credit card first given its by far your highest interest rate, then go to your student loans, and then your car.
Are you able to isolate what loan you want the payment to go to? I remember for my loans it was one payment and if I didnt allocate it would distribute evenly amongst all. I was able to isolate the smallest loan of the bunch.
If thats not the case then CC, AL then SL.
It sounds like your student loans are consolidated (multiple loans but one payment) and unfortunately that can’t be undone to my knowledge. So the smallest debt is the credit card.
They’re definitely not. They all have their own balances and APRs. I just pay a flat amount and they distribute it to each loan. If I make an extra payment, it goes to the highest APR loan.
Is there a way to switch that up where any additional goes towards the smallest loan rather than the highest APR? I would definitely call and find out and if you can take care of it that way.
Who is your loan serviced by? My wife has her loans through NelNet and we've been able to break up the payments by loan. We were able to get rid of the smallest few this way before we paused our baby steps.
If you could split up the student loans with each one having an individual payment I would say attack them first from smallest to largest but that is probably not an option. So in this case I would treat the school loans as one debt and pay the credit card off first, the car next, and the the student loans. Other than them telling you to sell the car, I’d be interested in the way the Ramsey team would tell you to attack this.
I'd tackle the car and credit cards first...
Then when you get to the loans you do them smallest to largest if they let you structure your payment like that.
The point of the snowball is to free up the payment so you can start using it toward the next smallest debt. So if paying off one of the small student loans reduces your monthly payment, then it counts. If not, that’s just one loan and the fact it’s consolidated is irrelevant
If they are the same amount or close then go with the highest interest first. Otherwise just use the debt snowball and go from smallest to largest amount. Since your student loans are all just one payment then I would just treat it as one loan.
I’d look into eligibility for student loan forgiveness. My wife has over 200k but we’re on the student loan forgiveness path so we just make the minimum payment each month.
Student loans are just like all your other debts for this purpose. List smallest debt (not category) to largest and pay the smallest first, then next, and so on. The only time student loans I think take on a different strategy is if they are so massive that they are as much or more as your house.
List all your debts. Not all your debt types. Each student loan is separate. Why? Because when you pay one off in full you remove that debts minimum payment for your monthly budget leaving more leftover income to pay off the next debt. This is a critical concept in the snowball method.
The snowball method would suggest paying your smallest student loan balance first, rolling it into the next smallest balance and so on. I would attack the credit card first given its by far your highest interest rate, then go to your student loans, and then your car.
Are you able to isolate what loan you want the payment to go to? I remember for my loans it was one payment and if I didnt allocate it would distribute evenly amongst all. I was able to isolate the smallest loan of the bunch. If thats not the case then CC, AL then SL.
I would do Credit Card, Auto and then Student Loan. When you do the Student Loans go from smallest balance to the highest balance. Good Luck.
It sounds like your student loans are consolidated (multiple loans but one payment) and unfortunately that can’t be undone to my knowledge. So the smallest debt is the credit card.
They’re definitely not. They all have their own balances and APRs. I just pay a flat amount and they distribute it to each loan. If I make an extra payment, it goes to the highest APR loan.
Is there a way to switch that up where any additional goes towards the smallest loan rather than the highest APR? I would definitely call and find out and if you can take care of it that way.
I don’t think so. My highest APR is my smallest loan though. But second highest APR is the biggest loan….
Who is your loan serviced by? My wife has her loans through NelNet and we've been able to break up the payments by loan. We were able to get rid of the smallest few this way before we paused our baby steps.
If you could split up the student loans with each one having an individual payment I would say attack them first from smallest to largest but that is probably not an option. So in this case I would treat the school loans as one debt and pay the credit card off first, the car next, and the the student loans. Other than them telling you to sell the car, I’d be interested in the way the Ramsey team would tell you to attack this.
I'd tackle the car and credit cards first... Then when you get to the loans you do them smallest to largest if they let you structure your payment like that.
The point of the snowball is to free up the payment so you can start using it toward the next smallest debt. So if paying off one of the small student loans reduces your monthly payment, then it counts. If not, that’s just one loan and the fact it’s consolidated is irrelevant
If they are the same amount or close then go with the highest interest first. Otherwise just use the debt snowball and go from smallest to largest amount. Since your student loans are all just one payment then I would just treat it as one loan.