Blog

If you have a graduate degree in a medical field, there's a good chance that along with a drawer full of scrubs and the ability to name every bone in the body, you're in possession of a significant student loan balance. 

Medical professionals have the highest average student debt load among individuals who earn graduate degrees: $161,772. And if you put your loans into forbearance during your residency, that number might be even higher. 

Paying off your student loans before you're retired may feel like a pipe dream. So what can you do about it?

In a perfect world, you'd be able to make your student loan payments on time every month. In fact, you'd pay extra. 

But in reality, all of us can find ourselves with less cash than we need to pay the bills. If you've been struggling for long enough that your student loans are in default, you're probably looking for a way to get back into compliance with the terms of your repayment plan. Student loan rehabilitation may be your answer.

If you're planning to go to medical school, you're probably also planning to take on signficant student loan debt. The question is, is the debt worth it?

There’s no question medical students are going further and further into debt. From 1992 to 2017, medical student debt went up a whopping 123.4% — rising from an average of $87,297 in 1992 to $195,000 in 2017. 

An article featured in USA Today shows why letting daily expenses get in the way of retirement savings is a big (and common) problem. The issue: the later you start saving, the harder it will be to comfortably retire —or to retire at all.

The piece, which cites research conducted by Comet, shows that over 40% of Gen Xers and Baby Boomers have not started saving retirement. 

Though student loan debt has now surpassed credit card debt, many Americans have the challenge of dealing with both.

The average college graduate now has more than $37,000 in outstanding student loan debt, and many people of those same people hold thousands of dollars in credit card debt as well.

When I was repaying my student loan debt, I made a lot of mistakes. Between making late payments and avoiding calling the loan provider when I was struggling, some of them seriously impacted my ability to get ahead on my loans and pay them down faster. It felt like a vicious cycle.

Most of these big mistakes are easy to avoid, and they can go a long way to making repayment easier and saving money in the process.