Category: Loans

Federal student loan borrowers with dependents and moderate incomes stand to see their monthly bills drop sharply when the Repayment Assistance Plan takes effect on July 1, 2026. Created by Public Law 119-21, which was enacted on July 4, 2025, RAP ties payments to a borrower’s adjusted gross income through a progressive percentage schedule, cuts…

Families who borrowed federal Parent PLUS loans face a hard deadline: consolidate by June 30, 2026, or permanently lose access to every income-driven repayment plan. Starting July 1, new rules restrict Direct Consolidation Loans to a narrower set of repayment options, and fresh Parent PLUS borrowing will carry a 9.07% interest rate for the coming…

Federal student loan borrowers still enrolled in the SAVE plan face a hard deadline: starting July 1, servicers will begin sending notices directing them to pick a new repayment option. Those who fail to act within 90 days of receiving that notice will be automatically placed into the Standard Repayment Plan, which typically carries higher…

Homeowners sitting on record levels of home equity now face a borrowing environment that has shifted sharply in their favor. Average HELOC rates fell to 7.19 percent in May, reaching their lowest point in three years and making home equity lines of credit the cheapest major consumer borrowing option available. That rate drop lands against…

Millions of Americans who split online purchases into four interest-free payments now face a new reality: those small installment loans can raise or lower their credit scores. Affirm reports every Pay-in-4 loan to TransUnion and Experian, and FICO has built a scoring model that treats buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) payment history much like traditional credit. A single…

The clock is running out for parents with federal PLUS loans. Under a finalized Department of Education repayment rule, any Parent PLUS borrower who does not consolidate into a Direct Consolidation Loan before July 1, 2026, will permanently lose access to every income-driven repayment plan and to Public Service Loan Forgiveness. There is no grace…

If you are one of the roughly 8 million federal student loan borrowers still enrolled in the SAVE repayment plan, the clock is ticking. The U.S. Department of Education announced that loan servicers will begin sending transition notices on July 1, 2026, giving each borrower 90 days from the date of their individual notice to…

A parent who borrowed $50,000 in federal PLUS loans to help a child pay for college could soon face monthly payments north of $700 with no way to lower that bill based on household income. Legislation advancing through Congress would permanently strip Parent PLUS borrowers of access to every income-driven repayment plan after June 30,…

A borrower carrying $35,000 in federal student loans at 5.5% interest could see their monthly payment jump from roughly $150 under an income-driven plan to about $380 under Standard Repayment. That swing, more than $2,700 a year, is what’s at stake for the millions of people still enrolled in the SAVE repayment plan as the…

Four years ago, a homeowner could pull $50,000 from a home equity line of credit and pay less than $1,500 a year in interest. That era is over. As of late May 2026, the average HELOC rate has climbed to 7.41%, and fixed home equity loans average 8.05%, according to Bankrate’s latest national survey. On…