In your apartment expenses in a prior blog I didn't notice an amount for the security deposit which can be as much as 2 months rent. Did you miss that expense?
Forget the tax break. For the most part, if you make any money (or, likewise, get any real deduction), you make too much to take the deduction. If you are in a lower tax bracket, there isn't much benefit. This renders the student loan interest deduction rather useless. Regardless, it is generally not good advice to keep a loan for the tax break.
mmgarren - It's included in my apartment/moving expense savings I hope to build up. Around here, the security deposit is never more then one months rent, and sometimes it is half or even waived depending on credit.
MonkeyMama - I had a feeling you would know the answer to that question. :-D Thanks for confirming my thoughts!
When it comes to consolidating student loans, while it does offer the insurance of one payment, it may not be worth it if the interest rate goes up! Many banks will allow you to pay bills through automatically-generated checks (for free), so if you scheduled the payments once it would lead to no further worries about that... plus, the interest rate would stay lower. Good luck, whatever you decide!
Jerry
Student loans are awful. Be cautious when consolidating - while it can be good, there are pitfalls. Also, depending on who services your loan, you may qualify for additional breaks on the interest rate for on-time payments or auto pay. Personally, I'd weigh the student loan payment against your other goals and try to balance them to best suit your needs. For example, I wouldn't pre-pay the student loan instead of put $ aside for a car that I needed -because the car loan is going to have worse terms, no protection against default (you often have deferrment and forebearance options on a student loan) and no tax benefit. I'm sure whatever you decide will work out great!
July 4th, 2010 at 11:24 am 1278242668
July 4th, 2010 at 11:41 pm 1278286884
Forget the tax break. For the most part, if you make any money (or, likewise, get any real deduction), you make too much to take the deduction. If you are in a lower tax bracket, there isn't much benefit. This renders the student loan interest deduction rather useless. Regardless, it is generally not good advice to keep a loan for the tax break.
July 5th, 2010 at 02:35 am 1278297348
MonkeyMama - I had a feeling you would know the answer to that question. :-D Thanks for confirming my thoughts!
July 9th, 2010 at 09:13 am 1278666816
Jerry
July 27th, 2010 at 03:07 pm 1280243272