Hello everyone,

I'm new to this forum, and I'm seeking insights on how to pay off student loans earlier. I currently owe 41k in student loans, and I've been paying roughly 400 dollars a month toward the debt. I've been using the Investopedia trick of double payments to pay off my loans earlier.

http://www.investopedia.com/university/ ... z2K55zCRrR

Things you should know before you give me advice:
1. I currently have no credit card or car loan debt
2. I'm 33 and I've just started saving for retirement
4. I usually throw in one extra payment on my student loans a year with my tax refund.

Thanks for your time.

So, here's what you do:

1. Earn money.
2. Use that money to pay back loan.
3. Repeat until loan is paid off.

What is your question? .

Make sure your extra payments are being applied to your highest interest loans (assuming you didn't consolidate.) If you are lucky and don't have them through Sallie, you can indicate which accounts to send extra payments to through the website. Through Sallie, you have to physically mail in the check to do that.

Beyond that, there are not any tricks. It's just a matter of making money and paying the loan.

I guess you could accrue even less interest by splitting up your payments to a weekly basis?

Can't hurt to ask if your employer does student loan help... particularly if you work for the government

I can't think of any faster ways.

You would probably spend more on stamps doing this than you would save.

Maybe he could set up an automatic debit from his bank or from his employer... or just pay online

I don’t remember all of the details right now, but I’m pretty sure that I’ve seen information saying that you can get your loans reduced by signing up for an automatic debit and making a certain number of payments on time. Also, if you spend some time working in certain professions (like teaching) you may be able to get some of your debt forgiven. Don’t know if either of those are options for you, but it might be worth looking into.

-Doug
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0.25% is the rate discount they give you for auto-debit. Loan forgiveness happens after 300 on-time payments if you sign up for IBR or 120 if you're a federal employee

Its hard to respond, beyond what others have mentioned, without knowing the rest of your budget.

At 33, you should be saving for retirement, how much are you saving? Are you maxing out, getting a match (if there is one), etc.

Regarding the loans, what are the interest rates?

And look at the rest of your budget, is there room to increase earnings, decrease expenses to free up more money to put towards killing your student loans?

Your comment makes sense. If these are subsidized loans, you might have such a low rate that it's worth paying other loans first (Mortgage? HELOC? Unsecured personal? Boat?)