Accepting financial aid to pay for college can help you attend school with little or no cash. But unfortunately, many college students graduate owing thousands of dollars to their lender. Being unable to afford student loan payments can hurt your credit score and result in constant calls from student loan collectors. Instead of risking credit damage, learn techniques for dealing with these collectors.
Difficulty: Moderately Challenging
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Renegotiate your monthly payment to stay current and avoid credit damage. Explain your financial circumstances and ask your student loan lender for a reduced monthly payment or interest rate if you can’t afford the current payment.
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See if you qualify for forbearance or deferment to stop paying on the loan temporarily.
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Nobody with any sense applies for auto loans, credit cards, mortgages or any other type of financing unless they think they stand a reasonable chance of being approved. It’s generally fine to apply for the same sort of loan multiple times within a short period if you’re shopping around for the best rate, but too many applications for different forms of borrowing or over a longer time can drive down your credit score, according to FICO, the people behind the most widely used scoring systems.
So there you are, expecting to be approved at the advertised rate, and you’re either turned down or offered a more expensive loan. What a blow. Until recently, you had two choices: to shrug and move on, or to get hold of a copy of your credit report to see what went wrong.
Loan decisions explained
Now things have changed. Whenever you’re turned down for a loan or offered a rate that’s higher than the norm, the prospective lender must, by law, tell you why.
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- Proposing to reduce some of the mortgage interest deduction tax breaks for homeowners is like telling the local diner to take apple pie off the menu. It just isnt received well by a public that considers owning your own home an integral part of the American dream.
Yet, last week the Senates Gang of Six, three Republicans and three Democrats included mortgage interest deduction changes in their proposal for a $4 trillion reduction in debt over 10 years. And conservative Sen. Tom Coburn , a member of the Gang, included it in his own blueprint for a $9 trillion cut by eliminating up to $1 trillion in various tax breaks and loopholes.
Figuring take-home pay on a yearly salary requires determining the correct percentages for a given income level, then deducting these percentages from the yearly income amount. Some deductions are mandatory like federal, state, Social Security and Medicare taxes. Tax rates change depending on the income level a person receives in a year.
Difficulty: Moderately Easy
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Determine the gross salary amount. The gross amount will be the amount the employer is paying the employee before any taxes or other deductions are taken out.
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Determine the annual pre-tax deduction for a retirement account and/or health insurance.
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— Admin @ 2:09 pm — 
July 25, 2011