<p>Note that the total cost of attendance for Fordham is $63,400 PER YEAR. Over four years, this is a total cost of $253,600 assuming tuition stays the same and you are not awarded need or merit aid.</p>
<p>As I said in my previous post, you may only borrow $27,000 on your own for ALL FOUR YEARS, broken down into the 5500/6500/7500/7500 increments. This is obviously a drop in the bucket for Fordham cost of attendance.</p>
<p>If you need to borrow more, one route is the federal Parent Plus loans, which your parents borrow for you. Your parents will need to apply and be approved for these loans, which would cover the remaining COA. Even if they are approved, Plus loans can be an enormous financial burden on your parents: [The</a> Parent Loan Trap - Students - The Chronicle of Higher Education](<a href=“The Parent Loan Trap”>The Parent Loan Trap) One particularly noteworthy quote:</p>
<p>“You do have some parents who are borrowing $100,000 or more for their children’s college education who are getting in completely over their heads. Those parents are going to default, and their lives are going to be ruined, because they were allowed to borrow far more than is rational.”</p>
<p>Your parents may wisely decide that this is not financially feasible for them.</p>
<p>If your parents are denied for Parent Plus loans, you may receive a small amount of additional federal loan aid; however, you only get a maximum of (I believe) $44,000 for ALL FOUR YEARS of college. Again, this is nowhere near sufficient.</p>
<p>The final option is private loans. For these you will need a co-signer-- your parents. There are a whole host of issues with private loans, which you can read about here: [Six</a> Things to Know About Private Student Loans | Fox Business](<a href=“http://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/2012/08/02/6-things-to-know-about-private-student-loans/]Six”>http://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/2012/08/02/6-things-to-know-about-private-student-loans/)</p>
<p>But the bottom line is this: it’s not about whether you CAN take out that much money, it’s whether you SHOULD take out that much money. $250,000 is a ridiculous amount of debt. Look at the numbers from this student loan calculator:</p>
<p>Loan balance: 253,000
Loan term: 20 years
Interest rate: 6.8 percent</p>
<p>Monthly payment: 1,931.24
Total interest cost: 210,499.76
MINIMUM annual salary to handle these payments: 289,687.00</p>
<p>You are proposing taking on $2000 monthly payments for the next 20 years. Do you think that you will be able to earn $290k right out of college to pay for these?</p>
<p>Find a more reasonable financial choice. Start here: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html</a></p>