# How much $ in student loans is TOO MUCH?



## elixare (Aug 26, 2010)

Yea 1$ is already too much. I'm allergic to all forms of personal debt, but especially personal financial debts (debt financed investment in a corporation I own though is a different story)....I intend to maximize my personal net worth as much as possible which implies never getting into negative net worth territory...

Luckily I actually incurred a net profit from my college experience so instead of walking away with debt, I instead walked away with a stash of $$$, which put me in a much better position financially than a good majority of my peers....


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## Aquarian (Jun 17, 2012)

The Umbraic Light said:


> I kick myself in the ass for passing up William and Mary for 2 years in community college every single day of my life. I hate the people who go there because I feel like 80% of them are just wasting time (I always cling to the adult students in my class because I know they are there for a reason). However, as much as I hate it, it really is cheaper and logical to go to community college for the first two years and then transfer. Hate to say it :angry: but it's true.


I spent two years as an undergrad at William and Mary in the late 1980s. Horrible, stultifying place. Maybe it's changed, but um ... my take is, oh hell yes save your money! I _wish_ I had spent those two years at a community college and banked the difference.

In a semi-similar vein, I once spent a year teaching at two different schools - one a non-prestigious state university and the other a private very expensive college. The students at the state school were amazing to work with. The ones at the private school were awful and that whole place was filled with a sort of suffocating energy. I can't imagine how it would feel to truly sane students to have to go into debt for the privilege of being immersed in that kind of toxicity.

And as for myself and debt - for me, ANY student debt was too much. I have an unholy fear of debt. It freaks me out and always has. How can one spend resources one doesn't actually have? It baffles me at some very basic levels. What can I say, I've apparently been an enneagram 6 my whole life...

Anyway, when I was in school. I had jobs, a merit scholarship and some partial help from my parents for undergrad, then got a full ride plus living stipend for my grad degrees (tuition paid/waived guaranteed with some teaching responsibilities in trade).

I am so SO wary of debt that I would not have completed any degrees had doing so required me to go into debt to attain them. This was in the late 80s/early 90s and then the mid-late 90s. I understand that the pressure to go into debt, which was already building to intensity when I was in school, is now nearly impossible to evade as costs rise and there is just the assumption that people will go into debt in order to get degree. So I know things are a lot worse now.

I do feel like it's well worth it to reduce debt as much as possible. So yeah, community college for the first two years makes a whole lot of sense to me, provided that the school is relatively good at the basics.


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## CosmicJalapeno (Sep 27, 2011)

Erm, well, considering how I think education should be a right not a privilege, I'd say anything above zero. Besides, formal education is just brainwashing.


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## PowerShell (Feb 3, 2013)

Debt makes sense if you get ROI from it. It's like buying a house with today's money and paying it back with tomorrow money. If you do it right you will come out ahead. Same thing goes for the current way it's set up to go to college.


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## angularvelocity (Jun 15, 2009)

Calculate how much you expect to earn with your job when you graduate. Figure out your monthly income after tax. 
Go to a loan calculator and play with the numbers.
Too much student loan debt is considered too much if it affects the lifestyle you want. You'll have the numbers to make that judgement.

My supervisor took $130,000 in loans and is paying $800 a month for 30 years. He makes $90,000 a year. He is fine. He has a house, two kids, a wife, etc.


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## Emerald Legend (Jul 13, 2010)

I'd say over 50k. 

I've got about 29k at the moment, and thinking of going back to school and stacking up another 18k...that is if I can't find jobs in between school and they let me borrow the whole thing. Having cold feet about this atm...

The thing is, I'm a cheap bastard, so I can probably be debt free in 3-5 years after stacking up that much loan once I get a well paying job.


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