<p>I plan to borrow to fund my education. The monthly payment for my student loans will be $390 a month. Is this an okay payment amount for a PhD student with a stipend of $25000?</p>
<p>One of the loans is through a family member, no interest. Should I ask for a longer repayment period so my monthly payment can be smaller, or is $400/month manageable?</p>
<p>Depends on where and how you intend to live. </p>
<p>I think you need a discover the fine art of budgeting.</p>
<p>Which part of your education are you paying for with loans? Your undergraduate education?</p>
<p>If so, why do you assume
a) that you will indeed pursue a Ph.D.
and
b) that you will have a stipend of $25000 as a Ph.D. student?</p>
<p>Ph.D. funding is designed to be just about exactly what it costs to live on. It also varies greatly by field of study, by institution, and even by individual faculty member within one department. To carve $400 out of that each month for loan service would be extremely challenging. You would probably need to live with several housemates in the least expensive part of town. Federal loans can be deferred while you are in grad school. You may need to to that - I certainly did!</p>
<p>It’s a dilemma. You will need to have the deferments whilst working on a terminal, but the loan amount will also escalate because of that deferment. And with a few for job searches, unexpected delays in getting well paid professional work and etc the amounts do tend to balloon. This is obviously not a concern with your family loan but it could be salient to your other loans if these are in the usual student loan paradigms. </p>
<p>Concerning 25,000 a year as a PhD stipend, as happymom notes that would seem to be very anomalous. The usual drill for terminal degree stipends is just enough to live on, and often at a very marginal standard. And it’s a common practice is to use the stipends as a reduction in tuition, which is a trick routinely used on out of state students. </p>
<p>So 400 a month as a grad student could be done, but it won’t leave any room for budgetary errors. </p>
<p>And dependent on the field for which your seeking a PhD it may be advisable to see what work your bachelors can get for you, and try to pay that loan amount down first. The field experience could be useful, for a number of reasons including that it may enhance the chances for admission to a terminal program. </p>
<p>And anyway, many who get terminals and lack some pragmatic experience find the competition very severe especially in academe. A look at all the “Chronicle” position postings for the adjuncts would confirm that…and people do migrate (literally) to these postings even though at times the adjunct pools can pay very, very poorly. Largely those are the lost souls with high ticket degrees and without some manner of relevant experience. And that can be a difficult struggle when the average academic posting requires at least 3-5 years experience and a terminal degree.</p>