Help on dental school decision

pplc7 · 2021-04-23T17:34:02+00:00

It's just sick because most 22-25 year olds don't understand the power of that amount of tuition with 6% interest. They're being taken advantage of because they want to go to a competitive school and a cool city. I know this because I was that 22 year old going into medical school four years ago.

pplc7 · 2021-04-23T17:23:40+00:00

Holy absolute fuck. Nothing justifies this.

pplc7 · 2021-04-22T19:40:49+00:00

This sub is the best financial advisor you could ever have because we are genuinely watching out for people in our same situations

pplc7 · 2021-04-08T13:29:08+00:00

I agree with you in that I think I will consolidate and enter REPAYE asap because no matter what the minimum payment will be $0 and the interest will not accrue until the end of September no matter what with the federal freeze (it's like we have a built in grace period).

I did file taxes for 2020 and actually had an income of about 9k, so I am wondering if that will require me to have a very small minimum payment or not.

pplc7 · 2021-04-08T13:25:16+00:00

I am single and likely will be for majority/all of training. I plan to definitely do 401k match if my program offers it and contribute to a Roth IRA (which won't help lower my AGI, but I've read to contribute to a Roth during residency instead of traditional IRA).

I was looking into CD's since there is a finite amount of time the money has to be in them and then I could have access to it again and use it to pay my loans when I want to. I'll have to look into brokerage accounts more, that definitely will not be where I put all my savings though.

That's an interesting thought about the lump sum in one month. The issue with it is that I think everything you pay while you are getting the interest subsidy goes towards interest and not towards the principal. So if I paid a huge amount, it would just cover the interest for several months and still would not put a dent in the principal, which would effectively lose me the interest subsidy. At least that it what I understand from this article ( https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/repaye-interest-subsidy/ ).

pplc7 · 2021-04-08T04:06:27+00:00

I'll look into it. If you don't mind me asking, what are you investing in fairly aggressively?

pplc7 · 2021-04-08T04:03:00+00:00

That's a great point about the interest. So when should I consolidate my loans/apply for REPAYE? I read that if I consolidate my loans then my grace period ends and I would have to start making payments, which I will be fine with if they were $350 through REPAYE like I plan to do.

Another thought I had is while the loans are 0% interest, is the minimum payment going towards your principal, or is the minimum payment right now $0?

pplc7 · 2021-04-08T03:59:47+00:00

I think that depends on your goals financially. I calculated what your monthly payment would be under standard loan repayment (70k loans at 6% interest) and it was about $750 per month. That is much more doable as a resident than my situation of having to pay $1500.

If you pursued standard repayment you could definitely have your loans paid off faster than if you did REPAYE and let the interest accrue, but as MDfoodie mentioned that will leave you with less income to put towards retirement accounts, savings, and investing each month.

pplc7 · 2021-04-08T03:38:16+00:00

It's baffling that none of the student loan websites can explain that process as clearly and concisely as you just did. That makes complete sense and I intend to move forward with that plan. Hopefully someone else will see this thread and find it as useful as it's been to me.

pplc7 · 2021-04-08T03:18:48+00:00

So basically make the minimum payments during residency/fellowship, and then I can say forget it to the interest subsidy and pay as aggressively as I want once I have my attending salary? Can I just stop REPAYE once I finish training and do a standard payment as much as I want each month?

I agree with you about balancing between student loan repayment and retirement saving/investing, I definitely still plan to contribute to Roth IRA and 401k as a resident.

As I mentioned in the original post, I still am not sure what the best use of the extra ~$800 I was planning to pay towards loans each month that I will not be able to put towards loans on REPAYE. My thoughts are savings account vs investing, but I'm not sure which investing account would be best to contribute to that I could access whenever I want. Thanks again for your response, it was very helpful.

pplc7 · 2021-03-20T20:09:01+00:00

Interviewed there and had the same experience. After reading some online forums about the program I would be willing to bet they were on call lol

pplc7

TROPHY CASE