I will be nearly 100k in debt after my first year.........

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adrummingdog

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Just got my financial aid statement/"award" from the school, total budget for the year is 97k....
This is absolutely absurd and I'm scared, I'll owe nearly half a million dollars by the end of this. AZCOM why you doin this to me fam

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For real tho it's not like this is a surprise... AZCOM is known to have a high COL.

This is why it's always recommended to take cost into account when picking a school.
 
this is insane. i hope you are a budding orthopod. medicine stops making sense at these debt levels
Don’t forget that if you look at an income based repayment calculator assuming your payment’s gonna be 15% of discretionary income (most are gonna be 10% now, I think), the max you’re going to pay as a resident at $50k is maybe ~$260/month (assuming you start paying in residency bc your program qualifies you for PSLF or something) and the max you’re going to pay as an attending making ~$200k is around ~$1500/month. Doesn’t matter how much debt you take out if your loans are federal because there are controls on how much your payments are per month (assuming you use repaye, I guess). It is never going to be unaffordable.

What stops making sense at those debt levels is taking them out if the loans are private. You better be one heck of an applicant who cured cancer, or have a super rich family who can bail you out if things get rough, if you’re going to have fixed monthly payments IMO.
 
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Don’t forget that if you look at an income based repayment calculator assuming your payment’s gonna be 15% of discretionary income (most are gonna be 10% now, I think), the max you’re going to pay as a resident at $50k is maybe ~$260/month (assuming you start paying in residency bc your program qualifies you for PSLF or something) and the max you’re going to pay as an attending making ~$200k is around ~$1500/month. Doesn’t matter how much debt you take out if your loans are federal because there are controls on how much your payments are per month (assuming you use repaye, I guess). It is never going to be unaffordable.

What stops making sense at those debt levels is taking them out if the loans are private. You better be one heck of an applicant who cured cancer, or have a super rich family who can bail you out if things get rough, if you’re going to have fixed monthly payments IMO.

being able to make the monthly payment =/= being able to afford something. you are talking about a lifetime of indentured servitude to this debt

No Ortho here lol. General Surgery hopeful 🙏

you really do need to start exploring loan assistance options. if you owe 500k, you're looking at multiple years worth of attending salary to pay this off
 
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While it sucks you’re typically ok if your student loans are within 2x your earnings as attending… and they wonder why more people don’t do primary care

When all is said and done I’ll have over $500k
 
This is why it's always recommended to take cost into account when picking a school.
and if you only have one choice? haha

TUNCOM is gonna be at least 90k for me. The housing prices in Henderson are all crazy this season.
I was originally considering Pediatrics, but with my situation, I'm just gonna have to buckle down for rural FM. Hopefully I learn a couple of useful techniques from OMM and can charge for it :cyclops:

When all is said and done I’ll have over $500k
my cousin (IM Primary Care) had over $500k from Einstein (though that's partly on her). She's working her tail off at a Geriatric center for loan repayment.
 

While it sucks you’re typically ok if your student loans are within 2x your earnings as attending… and they wonder why more people don’t do primary care

When all is said and done I’ll have over $500k

At this moment in time, primary care docs can make $300k-$400k a few years out if they work their butts off.

That may not be the case forever, but it is the case now.

Also, the vast majority of medical specialties, it doesn’t make sense to take the 2-3 years of training to specialize. For me to do that, I’ve have a utility cost of a million dollars in compensation. It might makes sense . . But the break even would be way more than ten years for most non-procedure heavy specialties, and who knows what insurance payments will be in 10 years.

I really think physician income is bound to be pushed down due to a host of factors. I’m not a doom and gloom kinda person, but I just think these are going to be the “good old days”.

PS: Income based repayment is STUPID. It is better than default, but the idea of being in payments the rest of your life is a bad plan. If you get into that much debt, you need to plan to pay it off in a few years, in a plan the doesn’t depend on the government.
 
I understand that the cost of living is high there, but do you need all 97k of it? My school awards around 90k and most don't need all of it. Admittedly it's a low cos of living area, but tuition is higher than average.
 
Don’t forget that if you look at an income based repayment calculator assuming your payment’s gonna be 15% of discretionary income (most are gonna be 10% now, I think), the max you’re going to pay as a resident at $50k is maybe ~$260/month (assuming you start paying in residency bc your program qualifies you for PSLF or something) and the max you’re going to pay as an attending making ~$200k is around ~$1500/month. Doesn’t matter how much debt you take out if your loans are federal because there are controls on how much your payments are per month (assuming you use repaye, I guess). It is never going to be unaffordable.

What stops making sense at those debt levels is taking them out if the loans are private. You better be one heck of an applicant who cured cancer, or have a super rich family who can bail you out if things get rough, if you’re going to have fixed monthly payments IMO.
Actually, if you file your taxes as a 4th year (which would show your net income as $0), your IBR would be based off that at least until PGY2.
 
Just got my financial aid statement/"award" from the school, total budget for the year is 97k....
This is absolutely absurd and I'm scared, I'll owe nearly half a million dollars by the end of this. AZCOM why you doin this to me fam
And you didn't know this when you applied or were accepted??????
 
There are way too many words in this discussion I don't understand...but yes I will be in fat debt.
 
Yes it can be paid back. The question is how long it'll take. Among my former classmates and co-workers the length of time is anywhere between 2 to 35 years.
35 years is insane. I figure my best bet is to live very frugally after residency and try to pay it off in like 3-4 years
 
being able to make the monthly payment =/= being able to afford something. you are talking about a lifetime of indentured servitude to this debt
Not a lifetime. Federal debt under repaye is forgiven after 25 years... which is a horribly long time to stay in debt, but it is better than the alternative to me.

My job before med school had a salary of $50k/year. There is no world in which by the time I turn 65, I will have financially been better off if I had stayed in that field. Even if I had to pay a full $1 mil to repay my med school debt, including interest, I’d still have higher lifetime net earnings as a physician.

Obviously, I’m actually hoping to match a higher paid field so I can pay my debt off in a few years instead of dragging it out for 25 (applying IR/DR), but considering how low-paid most jobs in this country are, there really aren’t many options where you’ll end up better off financially if you pass up med school - at any debt amount - for something else.
 
35 years is insane. I figure my best bet is to live very frugally after residency and try to pay it off in like 3-4 years

He's like 68 years old right now. His explanation was he had kids and weddings to pay for. Its possible he's just terrible with money.
 
I'm glad I didn't apply to any of the for profit DO schools. It made my app cycle more difficult, but I would have been double screwed if it was my only choice.
I know someone going to a for profit DO school...their loans have a 10% interest rate
All established for-profit DO schools qualify for federal loans. So if you have A’s from a 75k/year for profit school vs Goro’s 100k/year “non-profit” AZCOM... I might consider the for-profit
 
All established for-profit DO schools qualify for federal loans. So if you have A’s from a 75k/year for profit school vs Goro’s 100k/year “non-profit” AZCOM... I might consider the for-profit
All current for-profit schools in the U.S. are new schools that still currently require private loans.
 
Not too late to do the military thing.
Military is such a bad deal unless you like having little control over your life and you plan on living in a large city and making $140k as a pediatrician. Otherwise, it's better to go private practice in any other specialty (even FM) and work like a dog to pay off $400k in 2-3 years.
 
I know someone going to a for profit DO school...their loans have a 10% interest rate
I hate seeing 1/2nd years at nonprofit schools like ICOM and BCOM arguing they got better rates than federal loans when the norm is to have rates higher than or equal to federal loans. This is because they either had parents who cosigned ( lots of students do not have this luxury) or had very good credit (again not something all students have).
 
I hate seeing 1/2nd years at nonprofit schools like ICOM and BCOM arguing they got better rates than federal loans when the norm is to have rates higher than or equal to federal loans. This is because they either had parents who cosigned ( lots of students do not have this luxury) or had very good credit (again not something all students have).
Yeah until you can’t pay during residency and they send someone to take a baseball bat to your knees. The rate isn’t what makes federal loans preferable, it’s the repayment options
 
I hate seeing 1/2nd years at nonprofit schools like ICOM and BCOM arguing they got better rates than federal loans when the norm is to have rates higher than or equal to federal loans. This is because they either had parents who cosigned ( lots of students do not have this luxury) or had very good credit (again not something all students have).
BCOM is federal loans.
 
I'm always willing to give my numbers to people in case they are the type who are reassured by the fact that things could be worse. Between undergrad, masters program, and med school I owe $640,000. Thankfully due to COVID relief that number hasn't ballooned as much as it otherwise would have in my first year of residency, but it will certainly get higher before it gets lower. But we'll both pay it off one way or another.
 
this is insane. i hope you are a budding orthopod. medicine stops making sense at these debt levels
The absolute craziest thing is that average dental school number are now 4-500k.

absolutely doesn't make sense for your long term future. I think most pre-health students don't know anything about finances or budgeting and figure they will be a 'rich' doctor or do IBR and be okay.
 
The absolute craziest thing is that average dental school number are now 4-500k.

absolutely doesn't make sense for your long term future. I think most pre-health students don't know anything about finances or budgeting and figure they will be a 'rich' doctor or do IBR and be okay.

federal loans, presumably intended to help people, will ultimately trap them in servitude for life. I, for one, am surprised a government program backfired

I am curious how high these debt totals will go before the seats stop filling up
 
Maybe we'll get 10-15% inflation for the next five years and your debt will be inflated away.

I had a 75k loan the first year and will need 90k M2.
 
federal loans, presumably intended to help people, will ultimately trap them in servitude for life. I, for one, am surprised a government program backfired

I am curious how high these debt totals will go before the seats stop filling up
I don't think seats will stop filling to become a doctor. It's a job that many see as high respect, valued in many cultures, some parents see this as the only way, and debt in such magnitude is really just a number to some.
 
I don't think seats will stop filling to become a doctor. It's a job that many see as high respect, valued in many cultures, some parents see this as the only way, and debt in such magnitude is really just a number to some.

Also happens to be the view of every for-profit medical school and garbage HCA residency. they are manipulating students for profit. it should be illegal
 
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