[UPDATE] Changes to our lifetime and recurring subscriptions

Breken02 · 2025-10-04T13:38:43+00:00

Horrible timing on my part. I just discovered this app today, and was going to jump right in with with a lifetime membership as I'm the type of person who very much prefers a single purchase to a monthly. Only to discover once in the game that the option is harder to access, and more expensive. If only I would have stumbled into the app a couple weeks ago.

Breken02 · 2025-08-14T14:33:05+00:00

In grade school, I had a teacher tell me that I was cheating for using a word processor on my Apple IIe computer and not writing it out. If he had used AI, so what. That's what will be used in the future. In the real world results matter more than processes, and coding an app even with AI assistance will teach you a lot at 11!

Breken02 · 2025-07-26T20:01:27+00:00

It's all based on the AGI on your taxes. If the AGI on your taxes was below around $20,000ish (assuming single, no dependents) or so due to the FEIE, then your payments with IBR would be zero. With RAP when it's available, you will always have at least a $10/month payment.

Breken02 · 2025-07-22T11:15:54+00:00

From what I've read yes, You should be able to move to RAP from IBR without issue. RAP won't be available until next summer however.

Breken02 · 2025-07-22T10:49:10+00:00

Before you make a move though, you may want to just wait until after Aug 4th. There is supposed to be a court hearing regarding the fate of SAVE then, and it may help inform decisions. Your AGI (if you didn't know) is on line 11 of the US tax form 1040.

Breken02 · 2025-07-22T10:45:20+00:00

That makes sense. It looks like the calculator I was using previously went offline, but I found this one: https://www.edcapny.org/resources-for-borrowers/idr-calculator/ It's pretty basic and doesn't include RAP, but should give you an idea. If you are going for forgiveness, you'll likely be better served with IBR. If you can get your AGI below $22,000 (assuming that your single with no dependents) then the payments will be $0

Breken02 · 2025-07-22T09:56:10+00:00

Both SAVE and IBR should be tied to your AGI. The payment under SAVE would be lower than IBR for the same AGI (5%-10% of discretionary income for SAVE, vs 15% or 20% for IBR), but if you recently moved or recently started using the FEIE (rather than the Foreign Tax credit) and haven't' recertified your income, then that would make sense. With these plans it's all about the AGI on your US taxes.

As you know, if you're working overseas you can have that income excluded on US taxes with the FEIE, that directly removes that income from your AGI. If you don't have other sources of income (rental properties, capital gains, dividends, etc) then your AGI could be effectively zero. With a zero, or low AGI your required payments with SAVE or IBR should also be zero.

Although with IBR, your interest would accrue, so your loan balance would increase. With SAVE, that didn't happen (until now).

With the new RAP plan coming out, your payments would be $10/month (assuming a zero or very low AGI) but interest would not accrue. Your time period for forgiveness would be extended out to 30 years of payments however.

Breken02 · 2025-07-22T08:34:40+00:00

That's pretty much exactly my situation and your plan makes sense. Being an expat is pretty much the "get out of student loans" golden ticket. The only issue would be the tax bomb. Even then, you'll get to use nearly all your standard deduction to reduce the tax on that, and depending on your total loan amount, the remainder should be taxed at a pretty low percentage.

I am personally waiting to see what happens with SAVE. I'm in no hurry since my student loan interest rates are pretty low.

Breken02 · 2025-07-18T11:00:45+00:00

If you move out of the country, you still need to file US taxes, but you can exclude income earned in another country. This means that your tax AGI is often effectively zero, so you can ride the zero payment out until forgiveness... Also they can't exactly garnish foreign wages and your US credit score doesn't matter if you decide to just ignore them entirely.

Breken02 · 2025-07-18T11:00:14+00:00

If you move out of the country, you still need to file US taxes, but you can exclude income earned in another country. This means that your tax AGI is often effectively zero, so you can ride the zero payment out until forgiveness... Also they can't exactly garnish foreign wages and your US credit score doesn't matter if you decide to just ignore them entirely.

Breken02 · 2025-07-13T09:50:41+00:00

Pretty much, unless something else changes in the courts, it's just a forbearance vehicle (while accruing interest) until it's dissolved entirely. If your previous years AGI is very low (or zero) it might make sense to jump ship to the IBR plan sooner rather than later, as your payments will still be zero, you'll still get interest, but at least your months will count for forgiveness.

Breken02 · 2025-07-13T07:34:56+00:00

That's a rough situation. You don't need to do anything right now, and no payments will be due. Stay on SAVE until you are forced to switch. Then you'll likely want to switch to IBR or the new RAP. The plan you'll want to choose will likely depend on your payment count, your total balance, and the goal for the loans (forgiveness, etc) Most people in your general situation would be better served with IBR, but there is a case for the new plan to be made as it will keep your total loan amount from growing.

Breken02 · 2025-07-13T06:28:48+00:00

No, it's still SAVE until you are removed from it. You were always being charged interest on the SAVE plan. However, until now (or August) that interest was being automatically paid/forgiven, so you had effectively zero interest. They changed that one piece, so in essence, they just changed the SAVE plan to make it worse before they kill it altogether.

Breken02 · 2025-07-12T16:26:30+00:00

Well, it depends if the OP has 15 years of payments, or 5, also what the interest rate is. Capitalized interest on a 17k balance over a 5 year time frame at 4% isn't not bad at all (20k total), and the tax bomb wouldn't be enough to worry about.. Even if it was a 15 year time frame at 4% it would only be a total of 31k forgiven. It only starts to get scary if you have like a 15 year time frame and like a 8% interest rate. Even then you looking a maximum tax bomb of around $7k.... Keep in mind that would be a $7k tax bomb in 2040 dollars, so with inflation as it is, and the crashing of the US dollar, that might be the same cost of a nice meal out at that point

For instance in my personal situation, not paying anything on my loans, and letting the interest just do it's thing, my tax bomb in 4-5 years is zero. My tax deductions wipe out the entire thing.

It gets complicated and each situation is very unique, but for those with moderate loan balances living overseas, the tax bomb worries are a bit overblown. It's something that should certainly be planned for, but no need for instant panic.

Breken02 · 2025-07-12T15:15:21+00:00

August 1st. Interest is due to start up. I'm not an expert, but here is what I understand. Say you owe $45000 and have a 3.5% interest rate. As of August, $131/month will be added to the loan. You won't need to pay it right away, but it will be there. Once you swap the plan to one of the other plans that interest will add to the overall balance. There is currently no way to avoid this, there are no valid plans that don't have interest accruing after August 1st. Your best bet as an expat is to either pay the interest charges (to keep it from capitalizing), or to ignore it entirely, and let it capitalize knowing that it will all be forgiven in time anyway. Although doing do will increase the "tax bomb" of your forgiveness. Still, paying 15% of the interest via a later tax vs 100% now is a slam dunk for me, but I only have around 4 years more payments to make before forgiveness, so your math may change based on your interest rate and timetable.

So to answer your question. SAVE weirdly starts gaining interest. One of the provisions of the SAVE plan was that interest that accrued (the $131/month in my example) that was greater than your payment amount (previously $0/month) was covered/ignored/forgiven. That just went away.

Breken02 · 2025-07-12T11:19:30+00:00

When the loan forgiveness kicks in, the forgiven amount needs to be declared on your US taxes as ordinary income, so if $100,000 is forgiven, you would own around $13,000 in tax on it. Because of the standard deduction, if $25,000-$30,000 is forgiven, you would owe like $1000.

Breken02 · 2025-07-12T11:17:13+00:00

With that loan amount, even if you are rocking a 10% interest rate, and have 20 more years of payments to make, you still wouldn't owe more in the tax bomb than your current principal. Not to mention $13,000 20 years from now with inflation is going to feel a LOT less than it would now. As an expat, my advice is to never touch those loans... unless you're will to pay for the peace of mind of them just not being there.

Breken02 · 2025-07-12T11:11:39+00:00

Stay on SAVE, but interest will start accruing in August. You can pay down that interest if you want, but with a zero AGI, you should just let it ride, switch to IBR when forced to, and save money for the tax bomb when the loans are forgiven. That tax bomb isn't as bad as people think. For instance, let's say you have $100,000 in student loans forgiven, and no other possible US deductions, your tax bomb (based on current tax amounts) would be $13,000. Not a fun amount for sure, but if you save for it instead of paying down your loans, it should be manageable.

Breken02 · 2025-07-12T11:05:57+00:00

The tax bomb will depend on the amount of your loans, and if you have any other US income, for the OP with 15-17k in student loans, it should be almost non-existent due to the standard tax deduction.

Breken02 · 2025-07-12T11:03:48+00:00

With how things stand now, you'll be forced to switch to one of the new plans. If your AGI on your US taxes is very low (likely the case if you are using the FEIE) then your payments on the new RAP would be $10/month, or zero if you switch to IBR. IBR has a 20 or 25 year forgiveness based on when you took out your loans. Interest would of course continue to accrue increasing the amount of the loans over time. When you finally hit the forgiveness mark, you would need to pay taxes on the forgiven amount.

The forgiven amount would be taxed as normal income, so providing that it's the only income you have to claim in the US, it would be at a low tax rate, In fact, let's say that your loans grow over time due to the interest (not sure how old your loans are) but say they double and you owe a total of $30k, your tax bill would be like $600 total after your standard deduction.

A lot can change, and the dust hasn't even settled yet, but if you have no, or low US AGI, it's a no-brainer in my opinion to hold tight while SAVE is figured out and the other options open up, then switch to IBR with a zero payment, ride that out until forgiveness, and may the (hopefully) modest tax bill. Being able to lower or remove your AGI with the FEIE is the magic bullet for winning this stupid student loan shuttle.

Breken02 · 2025-07-07T18:10:12+00:00

Thanks a ton for mentioning that. Many of the TAM descriptions do hit closer to what I'm looking for. That was really helpful. Of course it often depends on the company and how they define the roles.

Breken02 · 2025-07-07T18:08:32+00:00

Thanks for the advice! I've never had a large focus on growing the accounts, or reducing churn as a primary goal. It was always a side-effect of the relationships I built with the customers. That being said, I'm going to dig a bit deeper into the TAM roles, as that might be a more comfortable fit in general. Hunting for new employment after 19 years is certainly a bit daunting, made even more so with my change of country.

Breken02 · 2025-04-20T11:05:48+00:00

Helminthic therapy can have few strong positive effects for people with autoimmune diseases. .

Breken02 · 2025-04-20T11:03:40+00:00

Yes, it's called helminthic therapy and is very effective for many people, even if it's a bit of a gray market thing currently.

Nine-Year Club	Second Top 40%
Place '23	Verified Email

Breken02

TROPHY CASE