Anyone else get these?

Email 1:

Quote :

"Know Your Options - Don’t Pay More! You’re eligible for a an even lower interest rate on your CFI Stafford Loan(s) made between July 1, 1998 and June 30, 2006 as long as you continue making your monthly payments on time. But, in the next few weeks, you may receive an email, call or letter from a federal loan program servicer about a Special Direct Consolidation Loan with the U.S. Department of Education. If you should decide to move your CFI Stafford Loan(s) into a Special Direct Consolidation Loan, however, you’ll miss out on the lower rate you can earn with CFI. That’s why CFI, your North Carolina nonprofit lender, wants you to carefully consider your choice. Not only might you lose a potentially lower rate, you would begin dealing with a servicer handling a large national pool of borrowers instead of working with CFI, which has helped you since the day your loan was made. Make sure you pay less – not more – on your education loans. "

An hour and sixteen minutes later, Email 2:

Quote :

"Save Money with Special Direct Consolidation Dear Brandon, For a limited time, you can consolidate eligible federal student loans and receive a lower interest rate that could save you hundreds of dollars. You'll receive a 0.25% reduction from the existing interest rate for each loan you consolidate. You may receive an additional 0.25% reduction if the loan is repaid through the Great Lakes automatic debit system (Auto Pay). After you consolidate, Great Lakes can help you with all aspects of your federal loans, saving you time and effort. Note: Loans in a deferment or forbearance status are eligible for this special opportunity and the status will automatically be continued on the new consolidation loan. "

What are these shenanigans?

1/19/2012 6:03:12 PM

I think it is funny that they send them at all, pffft... me? pay off my debt? never I am American I say

1/19/2012 6:05:00 PM

great lakes is basically a front for the dept of ed anyway?

1/19/2012 7:06:07 PM

so basically both emails are from the same company so they're attempting to herd you in to one side or the other and either way they win

brilliant, given the intelligence of today's average college student

1/19/2012 7:17:24 PM

The first email is from CFI/CFNC -- College Foundation of North Carolina. The second is from Great Lakes Higher Education. Both are student loans servicers.

On certain Stafford loans, CFNC give a huge discount on the interest rate for being a consistent payer and if you sign up for auto draft.

My Stafford loans started life at 6.8%. After awhile they were dropped to 5.8% for being a good payer. They've offered to knock another 1.5 percentage points off if I sign up for e-statements and auto-draft, bringing it down to 4.3%. This is a huge potential savings.


But if you consolidate CFNC loans with another loan servicer (Great Lakes), they'll only knock 0.25 percentage points off your loans. In my case that would bring me down to 5.55% from 5.8%.


I would much rather have a 4.3% interest rate than 5.55%.

1/19/2012 8:08:37 PM

^ I sortof figured this was the case... that they'll knock a quarter of a percent off, but they don't gradually lower your rate for making consistent payments.

1/19/2012 9:42:04 PM

i must be the only one who's excited about this...

just in case anyone didn't actually do any research on WHY they were suddenly getting these emails it's because Obama told Congress to do this:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/10/25/fact-sheet-help-americans-manage-student-loan-debt

basically instead of basing your payment amount heavily on what the loan is (stupid) you can now base your payment more on your actual income or IBR (income-based repayment). the screw is that you have to actually consolidate your old loans into a new federally controlled type of loan to be eligible for this. right now its capped at 15% of your monthly income and in 2014 it goes down to 10%.

with undergrad and law school my normal repayment would be ~1400/month and of course i would have to accept a soulsucking corporate job to keep that up
with IBR, it would be somewhere between 700-1000

do your own research and see if it would be best for you and don't just go "but this interest number is bigger than that number!". most people probably want to go by their monthly payment (and pay extra if you can!)

2/19/2012 8:04:22 PM

they should get rid of student loans

2/19/2012 8:06:24 PM

my loan was 2.360%. I paid $25 interest total.

2/19/2012 8:12:11 PM

They should get rid of the fed. Bill Stills 2012

I'm Krallum and I approved this message.

2/19/2012 8:26:37 PM