Posts tagged: non credit based student loans

Comprehending Your Situation With Non Credit Based Student Loans

When I first started to plan for college I knew that I would have to apply for a good amount of student loans so that I could afford the price of tuition, and the associated costs of living. This was mostly due to the fact that I didn’t really have any unique athletic, or academic talents that would allow me to get a scholarship, and because my parents didn’t have the cash to put towards my education. I ended up concluding that I would have to turn to an exorbitant amount of private student loan funding in combination with any aid I got from the government to pay for school. This plan of turning to private loans first before any federal aid I though was a smart idea, boy was I wrong!

My main issue revolved around my inability to get approved for a private student loan at all due to my bad credit. The only way around my bad credit was getting my parents to cosign, and because they weren’t willing to do so, I couldn’t get approved for any private loan funding. This worried me quite a bit, and I started to contemplate my ability to attend college at all. I intended on going to an expensive private university that cost over forty thousand dollars per year, and immediately knew that without the aid that would be provided via a private student loan funding I would not be able to attend any kind of university that cost that much.

After I had my panic attack, I gathered myself and began to regain focus. I reassessed my plans, and decided that it would be best to go to one of my backup schools, which would cost much less than the private university I was planning to attend. I would commute instead of living on-campus, and I would try and budget as closely as possible.

My primary issue was still getting the funding I would need to pay for my full tuition costs. In January I filled out a FAFSA application, to make myself eligible to receive federal aid, and I received my award letter in June. To my surprise, federal student loans are non credit based student loans that aren’t based off of your credit like private loans are. Because I was living in-state, and commuting, the federal student loans I received would easily pay for the costs of attending my backup school of choice. The point I tried to get across with this story is that you should never discount the kind of funding you can receive from federal, non credit based student loans, as these loans came to my rescue when I was in my darkest hour.