Unable to get student loans. Need advice on what to do..

[BTR1208]

I am 20 years old, been financially independent from my parents since I was 17. Because of that I have had to work A LOT during undergrad. Last year I made about 36k working full time. I have about 6k in savings. I do not have a car payment (paid it off) and am extremely responsible with my money. Because of my income last year I am not even eligible for enough financial aid (grants, stafford) to cover tuition.

Even though I have worked full time the past 3 years I now have to work part time because I am getting into my tougher classes. I have a 3.8 GPA so far and want to keep it their or raise it. The job I am working 20 hrs a week covers my apartment; then I have another job I plan to work 5-10 hrs a week for living expenses. I really would like to be able to get private loans but i just can not get approved.

I asked my parents and even grandparents to cosign for me but I have better credit than all of them. My dad's business went down with the economy and they pretty much lost everything including credit and all savings. That is when I became financially independent and I am glad I did. It has forced me to grow up and be much more responsible.

My FICO is 691. I applied for a Sallie Mae loan but got denied. Tried my grandparents as a cosigner but got denied still. I think I will be able to get through this year but next year I am definitely going to have to be able to get approved for private loans. I do not know how I am expected to pay for some tuition plus all of my living expenses while pursuing a medical degree and working as much as I can.

Has anyone been in a similar situation that can shed some light or give me some advice? I hear about all of these people that do not have to work while going through school and can just focus on school.. I have no problem working my 20hr a week job as it is flexible but anything else just about kills me. Plus I feel like I am just scraping by and do not want to drain my savings.

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[DrMidlife]

Income level and credit rating have nothing at all to do with federal loans. You are eligible for Staffords and GradPlus regardless of your income level.

Whatever info source you are using, drop it. You need to complete a FAFSA and work with your school's financial aid office to get yourself funded. You will get loans.

Only free money sources (grants & scholarships) and institutional sources (school-sponsored scholarships & loans) take your income into consideration.

GradPlus will take your credit rating into consideration. These are federal loans but handled differently from Stafford. I don't think a 691 is going to be a problem.

Best of luck to you.

 

[BTR1208]

Income level and credit rating have nothing at all to do with federal loans. You are eligible for Staffords and GradPlus regardless of your income level.

Whatever info source you are using, drop it. You need to complete a FAFSA and work with your school's financial aid office to get yourself funded. You will get loans.

Only free money sources (grants & scholarships) and institutional sources (school-sponsored scholarships & loans) take your income into consideration.

GradPlus will take your credit rating into consideration. These are federal loans but handled differently from Stafford. I don't think a 691 is going to be a problem.

Best of luck to you.

I am still undergrad so grad plus is not an option.

I am getting some money from FAFSA (Frank Obannon Grant, dtafford and perkins) but the total is less than my tuition.

 

[DrMidlife]

Sorry, thought you were talking about med school. I still think you should talk to your school's financial aid office.

 

[BTR1208]

Sorry, thought you were talking about med school. I still think you should talk to your school's financial aid office.

Will do. Are they able to sometimes help get more aid?

 

[dpmd]

Will do. Are they able to sometimes help get more aid?

They will put together a financial aid package that takes your income into account (the flaw being that you aren't going to be able to make as much once you start school). If you then go to them and tell them you can't afford the amount they expect you to pay they will tell you your options. One thing that may affect you is they will consider you a dependent even though you have been supporting yourself, in that case they will also have some expectation of financial support from your parents-unless their financial status is really bad. I ran into that issue in undergrad where I maxed out on allowable stafford loans and my parents had to get a PLUS loan. Not sure if your parents would be willing to do this (the nice thing is that if they are denied the PLUS loan, then you can get more stafford loans), but you can always do what I did which was create an IOU to my parents in the amount of the PLUS loan (they ended up refusing to take the money when I later tried to repay them, although I did pay for a vacation house rental they stayed at with us so it sort of worked out). The important thing is to go talk to the financial aid office instead of stressing about it (one of the worst times in my life was sitting in my dorm room counting a bunch of change I had and crying because I knew it wasn't going to be enough to make tuition).