Postponing payments - Apply for forbearance - salliemae

Postponing payments

Understanding forbearance

Forbearance can help you avoid delinquency and default if you're facing temporary financial difficulty.

Forbearance lets you suspend or reduce your payments under certain circumstances and for specified periods of up to one year at a time.

During forbearance, you will receive quarterly interest statements and have the option to pay the accrued interest. If you don't, any unpaid accrued interest will be capitalized.

Eligibility

For detailed information on your forbearance options, to see if you are eligible, and to apply, log in to your Manage Your Loans^SM account. Select Postpone Payments, learn if you're eligible, and apply for forbearance.

Forbearance results in higher loan costs overall. You may want to look into deferment or a different payment plan.

Postponing payments - Request deferment - salliemae

Postponing payments

Understanding deferment

Deferment lets you temporarily suspend making loan payments. You may be granted deferment on your loan for a variety of reasons.

Deferment can be authorized for

• economic hardship,
• unemployment,
• military deployment,
• enrollment in school,
• internship,
• national service, and
• similar situations.

You are responsible for paying your education debt even when granted deferment. Deferment is temporary and limited to specified time frames.

If you've already had one deferment, you may be eligible for the same type again. In other cases, you may have exceeded the time limit on a particular deferment and may no longer be eligible to apply for that same type.

Eligible loans

• Stafford loans
• Parent PLUS loans
• Graduate PLUS loans
• Federal consolidation loans

For subsidized Stafford loans, the federal government pays the interest during deferment. For unsubsidized loans (including unsubsidized Stafford, Graduate PLUS, and Parent PLUS), the interest accrues and is capitalized, and you are responsible for paying it.

Most private loan deferment eligibility is based on loan type.

Log in to Manage Your Loans^SM and select Postpone Payments to see if you're eligible and to apply for deferment.

Postponing payments - Reducing monthly costs - salliemae

Postponing payments

Reducing monthly costs

You may be having trouble balancing your income and expenses. How you handle daily life—and your student loans—makes a big difference.

See about smaller loan payments

You may find that you have several student loans to repay. Here are two simple ways to lower your monthly loan payments:

• If you consolidate those loans, you can pay off your original loans and get one with lower interest.
• Consider changing your payment plan to one that lowers your payments.

Be smart about credit and debt

• Live within your means and keep your debt level as low as possible.
• Be savvy with your credit card: Don't use it as a source of spending money. Pay in cash whenever you can.
• See our 10 rules of smart credit management.

Sallie Mae's be debt savvy materials are a wealth of solid money-saving advice.

Plan your new budget

Use College Answer^®’s Monthly Budget Calculator to get the facts about your bottom line.

Think of your budget as a personal spending plan. It's a great way to understand where your money goes and to make sure you don’t buy things you don’t really need.