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Management and repayment student loans It can be a painful, decades-long process, forcing some borrowers to put off major milestones, such as buying a home or a new car, for years. Sometimes forever.
While data still shows that, on average, college graduates make more money than non-graduates, some students question whether the potential benefits Worth the cost and trouble.
In a recent report,wall street journalspoke with a handful of borrowers who successfully paid off their student debt within ten years. Their story is their own—everyone who borrows money is different. Borrower full face different situationshave access to different resources, and have different priorities and ambitions. One size does not fit all.
With that disclaimer in mind, here’s a collection of stories and strategies from those who managed to pay off their loans, in the hope of providing some perspective and advice to potential borrowers. Some of the tools they used no longer exist.
In Arizona, a 35-year-old woman named Lauren Braley managed to pay off approximately $125,000 in student loans in seven years.
But Braley isn’t putting her life on hold, either. She and her husband bought a house and had a baby — major expenses — but she took advantage of falling interest rates during the pandemic to refinance her federal student loans, lowering the interest on them from around 6% to just under 3%. She said she refinanced two more times, ultimately saving herself $55,000 in student loan interest.
Brealey was originally a physical therapist but changed careers. She posted her practice on LinkedIn and started receiving messages from other physical therapists asking her for advice. She took that and turned it into a side hustle. Bray used money from her part-time job to pay off the remaining debt and had her school loans forgiven in December.
In Denver, 31-year-old Christopher Villarreal managed to pay back about $46,000 over nine years.
He told the Post that he grew up poor and went to college as a way to try to escape poverty. He graduated in 2016, but after graduation he worked as a retail manager, earning only $13 an hour. His monthly payments aren’t even large enough to cover the full amount of interest accruing each month, which means he can conscientiously pay what he can afford each month and still not be forgiven a large chunk of debt.
he told wall street journal He felt like he was “drowned” in debt.
After years of working to make ends meet, Villarreal was hired to work for a ski resort company. He started a side job doing security checks for live events and put as much as he could into savings every month — sometimes as much as $2,000 a month.
Villareal had joined a repayment plan that stopped accruing interest, a key factor in being able to actually repay the loan. However, earlier this year, President Donald Trump announced that he planned to allow these loans to accrue interest again.
Villarreal knew this day was coming and the debt would have to be repaid before it started growing again under the Trump administration.
In New York City, 28-year-old teacher NiaChloe Bowman paid off her loans in just two years, largely because she entered college with a plan.
When she looked for schools, she prioritized institutions that offered financial aid programs that could help her reduce debt while she was in school. While in school, she worked on campus and at a restaurant, and paid off $2,000 in debt before graduating.
She knew early on that she didn’t want to have debt hanging around her neck, so she prioritized paying it off as soon as possible.
“Debt and oppression are two things that hold us back as black and brown people,” Bowman told the newspaper. “I don’t want that to be my narrative.”
Her first job paid $70,000, plus a $10,000 signing bonus, which she paid $500 a month during the pandemic payment moratorium, which reduced her debt.
When she paid off her college debt, she visited Niagara Falls, a place her mother had always wanted to visit. Her mother passed away in 2019, so she went to honor her and celebrate her victory.