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How will you pay for dental school?
Started by JacquesVallee
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I went to a private school and was curious what the 4 year expected cost of attendance is now for a new D1 that is married and with a young kid. I can't believe it's $815k when you factor accrued interest and living expenses. That is absolutely insane. For a single student with a roommate, total cost is estimated at $750k....still financial suicide. If you're not receiving a scholarship from HPSP or NHC or have parents paying 100% of your education, how are students realistically expected to pay this back?
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JacquesVallee
Full Member
they wouldn't be able to. I have to imagine banks will realize this too and deny them loans.
Do you believe that many students who get accepted to very expensive private OOS schools will be forced to rescind their acceptances because banks won't give them loans?
JacquesVallee
Full Member
Yes. I think there will be a mad dash at the end. I could be wrong, but I have to imagine the private lenders will do the math and see they can't loan out this kind of money. The risk is too much.
affiemative...
Decline their acceptances... likely. Banks can also work with universities so we'll see with financial aid packages. Some banks are already advertising private loans for graduate education. Again, things can change...
Example (no compensation for sharing this)
www.sofi.com
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Graduate Student Loans
SoFi makes it fast and easy to pay for grad school so you can focus on what matters the most: your degree.
Most private lenders have a short time-frame for loan approvals. Generally, a borrower can't apply 6-months in advance of the start date of classes so that D1 financing is in place. This will shrink the time window and might lead to chaos for private schools trying to fill their classes.Decline their acceptances... likely. Banks can also work with universities so we'll see with financial aid packages. Some banks are already advertising private loans for graduate education. Again, things can change...
Example (no compensation for sharing this)
Graduate Student Loans
SoFi makes it fast and easy to pay for grad school so you can focus on what matters the most: your degree.
You've changed your position, haven't you? If I recall correctly, you felt that private lenders were going to fill the void.
JacquesVallee
Full Member
Hmmm I don't remember my specific thoughts on whether or not private lenders would fill the gap. I very well may have said I thought they would though. I feel like generally I was mostly agnostic on it. My views did change in that I initially thought students wouldn't take out private loans for USC, but after meeting pre dents, holy cow I realized they would. Recently, my views have changed on private lender given the lack of answer from the schools and honestly just really thinking who in their right mind would lend 500k for a job that pays 120k. I think private lenders likely won't cover the gap. Schools are legit just telling students they're on their own, not a good sign for them. On the other hand, I still believe students would take the money no matter what.
Ultimately, all of my views are just speculation. We won't fully know until late Spring/early Summer. Should be interesting to see what happens.
What do you think will happen?
I would strongly urge anyone who is even remotely interested in medicine to choose that over dentistry.
Man.. I don't think I would choose dentistry if I were entering D1 married with a young kid. Unless, of course, your spouse makes 6 figures. Otherwise, if you don't get into a cheap school you will be screwed.
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JacquesVallee
Full Member
Agreed, sadly. From a financial POV, dentistry clearly is not worth it even at average state school costs today.
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deleted1228209
Are private lenders really going to fill the gaps for med students, though? With residency requirements, it will be 7-10 years until their loans are paid back. Especially with the interest rates, those loans could be 800k by the time you're an attending.
Med school tuition is usually significantly cheaper and the earning potential is significantly higher.
Dentistry is cooked. I don’t recommend this profession any more. Sure, some will crush it and have a great ROI. Most dentists these days, not so much…
Big Hoss
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deleted1228209
I just don't know if it makes sense from a private lender's perspective to give out 100k + in loans only for them to be paid back a decade later. Plus, I believe interest will compound in residency, so if it balloons to 800k, you're looking at almost 13k a month in repayment for another decade.
Med school is cheaper and the ROI is much better. I'm not so concerned about the lending process, rather what happens when you are out working in the field. Also, what about dental specialties? Well in most cases you get yourself in an even deeper mountain of debt compared to medicine, because at least in medicine all residents are getting paid and don't have tuition. Not the case with most dental residencies.
Yep exactly, seems foolish to choose dentistry over medicine at this point.
I wish someone would have told me this before I got into it, I thought the "autonomy" and "business" aspects of dentistry would be a positive aspect to this career. Nope, it just makes it even more expensive to join, less profitable, more stressful, and higher risk. Sure, there's higher income potential as an owner in dentistry compared to an employee in dentistry, but that income potential of a dental owner pales in comparison to how much further ahead financially you would be if you just went to med school.
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deleted1228209
The lending process is going to be a lot more important going forward. It would be a real shame if students didn't get covered by lenders to go to med school despite the process to get even a single acceptance.
I don't know why you think that will be a problem for medicine but not for dentistry. Med school costs less and doctors get paid more. Private lenders aren't idiots, and they will know this.
If anything, this will make things more difficult for dental students to get loans and not the other way around.
JacquesVallee
Full Member
@michaeljj2021 ROI for your average state med school graduate in significantly better than your average state dental school graduate. Med school costs a lot less and doctors make a lot more.
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deleted1228209
I actually think it will be a significant problem in both cases. I don't see lenders giving away 100k + in loans only to have them be repaid 5-10 years later. I think med students borrow on the whole 5 billion a year in total. That's 30-50 billion in debt on their balance sheets. Add all the other professional students in too and you can see why private lenders never really got into the med/dental/law loan business, and probably why they won't anytime soon.
Maybe some predent who didn’t follow our advice can document their nightmarish journey for us so we can see how it all plays out.
Big Hoss
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deleted1228209
I agree actually, but med school isn't really a great alternative. A 200k private loan compounding grows to 600k after 8 years of no payments at 15% interest. The minimum payments on that are over half of an attending internist's salary for 10 years.
JacquesVallee
Full Member
Yeah, going to a private med school and taking out 200k on top of 200k of federal is a bad idea, sure. However, my state med school costs about 200k overall. Very little, if any, private loans would need to be taken out. Add to that their significantly higher income and it's a better financial gig by far.
Don't let this quibbling over which career is better distract you from the fact that you absolutely should NOT take out private loans for dentistry. 200k is hard enough to pay back with federal loans. I can't imagine tacking on private loans on top of that.
Private loans typically don't compound while in-school nor in residency. Interest does capitalize at two points; 1. at the end of the in-school period, and 2. at the end of residency. Also, I don't think rates will be at 15%, maybe half that.
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Are you sure they don't compound while in school or residency?
How do you know that they do not compound in school or res?
i found out some interesting news last week
the american dental association is working on compiling a list of private lenders that have more knowledge about the dental profession and are willing to work with dental students
don't know how extensive the vetting will be, but at least it's a start to help predents make a little more sense of the situation
i also learned that the california dental association is working on something similar
please don't take this as me saying these BBB limits are ok, nor am i saying whether it's worth it or not to take $x amount of private loans to become a dentite
just passing on what i heard recently...
the american dental association is working on compiling a list of private lenders that have more knowledge about the dental profession and are willing to work with dental students
don't know how extensive the vetting will be, but at least it's a start to help predents make a little more sense of the situation
i also learned that the california dental association is working on something similar
please don't take this as me saying these BBB limits are ok, nor am i saying whether it's worth it or not to take $x amount of private loans to become a dentite
just passing on what i heard recently...
JacquesVallee
Full Member
Intriguing. Will be interesting to see how much they're willing to cover.
JacquesVallee
Full Member
I'm sure discussing lowering costs of dental school isn't on the docket. Instead, it'll all be about finding private loan servicers to foot the extraordinary bills of students.
my guess is that they will only be trying to get the administration to raise the limit
i doubt that finding servicers is anything the trump administration is concerned with
I don’t think they’ll raise the cap. The whole point was to lessen the burden being dumped on the taxpayer. All these schools are going to have to learn to stand on their own. If they can’t, I guess they’ll have to shut their doors.
Big Hoss
JacquesVallee
Full Member
Let's hope they fail to raise the limit. Dental schools should either be affordable or close down. 200k, while still too high in my opinion, isn't a horrible limit.
Where was the ADA over the last 15-20 years? It’s not like issues regarding the cost of a dental education sprung up overnight. They were asleep at the wheel, and I would just as soon leave the profession before I ever pay ADA membership dues again. They have done absolutely nothing to protect dentistry.
Big Hoss
I think it’s more involved than simply saying “just go to your state medical school, it’s a better ROI”
Medical school is more competitive to get into. A lot of people go into dentistry because they couldn’t get into med school at all, let alone the cheap state medical school. Others didn’t want to spend all that time pursuing education. Part of what attracted me to dentistry was that you could do four additional years of school, be in your mid twenties, and make a good income working much fewer hours than a medical resident, for example. Some people have the personality for success in dentistry, which I would argue is different than the personality needed for success in medicine.
We don’t even have to get into my own success as an associate dentist and how I make more than my partner who is a physician. I know you guys are sick of hearing about that, but there are still valid reasons for someone wanting to pursue dentistry.
The problem is the cost. Which I whole-heartedly believe is a big problem, and I hope these predatory schools are forced to shut down. I hope pre-dents don’t blindly take on too much debt.
But it’s more complicated than “just go into medicine.” I came out ahead going into dentistry, and for someone who is looking and saying ok medicine isn’t an option for me for whatever reason, it’s worth it for them to consider dentistry. Just be mindful of the debt.
Medical school is more competitive to get into. A lot of people go into dentistry because they couldn’t get into med school at all, let alone the cheap state medical school. Others didn’t want to spend all that time pursuing education. Part of what attracted me to dentistry was that you could do four additional years of school, be in your mid twenties, and make a good income working much fewer hours than a medical resident, for example. Some people have the personality for success in dentistry, which I would argue is different than the personality needed for success in medicine.
We don’t even have to get into my own success as an associate dentist and how I make more than my partner who is a physician. I know you guys are sick of hearing about that, but there are still valid reasons for someone wanting to pursue dentistry.
The problem is the cost. Which I whole-heartedly believe is a big problem, and I hope these predatory schools are forced to shut down. I hope pre-dents don’t blindly take on too much debt.
But it’s more complicated than “just go into medicine.” I came out ahead going into dentistry, and for someone who is looking and saying ok medicine isn’t an option for me for whatever reason, it’s worth it for them to consider dentistry. Just be mindful of the debt.
I'm familiar with the industry.
Bear in mind that borrowers need to qualify on an annual basis. As their debt-to-income and credit scores presumably drop from the previous year's loan amount, for both the student borrower and their co-signer, there's likely an increase in the denial rate. Think about the scenario where a rising D3 gets denied.
Dental schools need to have $$$kin in the game. Private lenders will require some school to guarantee a certain % of loan amounts/year with an escrow account established for future defaults...at least that would be one of my risk mitigation strategies.
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Small comment... with rare exceptions, dental schools aren't going to contribute without their home universities doing so.
I am waiting for the ADA task force on dental school tuition (whatever it is called) to report out since convening last year...? ADEA had a report in 2013.
P.S. these concerns also apply to vet school students. Many of those schools run their own student clinics, and there is a similar draw for running one's business or specializing. Tuition may not be as big, but they have big problems too.
We also just posted an article about an American doing medical school in Spain. If anyone knows a similar student who went overseas for dental school, I'm all ears.
ADDED links
I am waiting for the ADA task force on dental school tuition (whatever it is called) to report out since convening last year...? ADEA had a report in 2013.
Dental medicine’s Kenneth Chance appointed to American Dental Association National Task Force on Lowering Dental School Tuition | CWRU Newsroom | Case Western Reserve University
Earlier this spring, Kenneth Chance, dean of Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine, was appointed by American Dental Association (...
case.edu
P.S. these concerns also apply to vet school students. Many of those schools run their own student clinics, and there is a similar draw for running one's business or specializing. Tuition may not be as big, but they have big problems too.
We also just posted an article about an American doing medical school in Spain. If anyone knows a similar student who went overseas for dental school, I'm all ears.
ADDED links
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