About to consolidate with UHEAA -- advice?

[voter01]

I am currently planning to consolidate my student loans with UHEAA. I posted a question about their reporting practices over in the Credit forum, but thought I would link to it here in case any of you would like to chime in:

 

http://creditboards.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=71696

 

Thanks!

[snowpuppy]

I would say shop around some more. I got 5% up front principal reduction from Keybank last spring. Chase was offering 5% cash back also at the time. This is for 36 ontime payments. There is a poster here who did the math and the up front principal reduction is the better deal in the long run.

 

I got an additional 1/4% reduction for direct debit. If you don't make the payments during the incentive period, the banks remove their incentive.

[wokscott]

Key Bank has the worst product I've ever seen! Interest rate sucks, loan fees and no 5% principal reduction.

http://www.keybank.com/templates/t-ps2.jhtml?nodeID=H-1.39.b

[voter01]

Key Bank has the worst product I've ever seen!  Interest rate sucks, loan fees and no 5% principal reduction.

http://www.keybank.com/templates/t-ps2.jhtml?nodeID=H-1.39.b

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I see what you are saying, however, in my case, it would be a federal loan consolidation, not a private one (you link to the private terms). The federal one does have the 5%:

http://www.keybank.com/templates/t-ps2.jhtml?nodeID=H-1.39.a

[wokscott]

Oh that makes sense, I thought it was for federal loans. Here's a link to a good calculator from Nelnet that compares a 1% interest rate reduction and a 3.33% principle reduction.

http://www.consolidation.nelnet.net/Apps/CalcConsolComp.asp

Edited January 13, 2005 by wokscott