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finder.com’s rating: 4.4 / 5.0
★★★★★
Starting at 2.94%
APR
670
Min. Credit Score
Product Name | Advantage Education Loan Refinance Loan |
---|---|
Minimum Loan Amount | $7,500 |
APR | Starting at 2.94% |
Interest Rate Type | Fixed |
Minimum Loan Term | 10 years |
Maximum Loan Term | 20 years |
Requirements | Credit score of 670 or higher, debt-to-income ratio of 38% or lower, US citizen or permanent resident and live in an eligible state |
Review by
Anna Serio is a trusted lending expert and certified Commercial Loan Officer who's published more than 1,000 articles on Finder to help Americans strengthen their financial literacy. A former editor of a newspaper in Beirut, Anna writes about personal, student, business and car loans. Today, digital publications like Business Insider, CNBC and the Simple Dollar feature her professional commentary, and she earned an Expert Contributor in Finance badge from review site Best Company in 2020.
Refinancing through Advantage Education Loan could make all the difference if you’re just starting your career and can’t afford your private student loan payments, thanks to its graduated repayment option. Its rates are relatively low — the highest fixed rate is at least two points lower than what many private lenders offer.
You’ll have to live in the right state to qualify, however. And higher loan amounts come with harsher credit requirements. Though you have the option of applying with a cosigner to help you qualify.
Not sure Advantage Education Loan is right for you? Compare other refinancing options below.
To qualify for student loan refinancing through Advantage Education Loan, you must:
You can apply with a cosigner to help you meet the credit and DTI requirements. Keep in mind that the more you want to borrow, the stricter Advantage Education Loan’s credit requirements are — you might need a much higher credit score to refinance $250,000. You’ll also need to be a resident of an eligible state, regardless of where your cosigner lives.
Advantage Education Loan is the loan program for state-based nonprofit lender Kentucky Higher Education Student Loan Corporation (KHESLC). It’s a direct lender that also handles repayments, meaning that your information stays with one company. You can refinance both federal and private student loans with Advantage Education Loan, and parents can also consolidate parent loans and personal student debt.
Borrowers must have at least $7,500 in student debt to qualify. While there’s technically no limit to how much you can borrow, you’ll face tougher credit and DTI requirements with larger amounts. Debts over $300,000 are subject to approval.
While Advantage Education Loan allows borrowers to refinance federal student loans, it warns that borrowers stand to lose certain perks and benefits that only federal loans offer. These include income-based repayment plans, forgiveness programs and multiple deferment and forbearance options.
Think carefully about what you’re giving up and consider your future before you refinance federal loans with a private lender.
Since Advantage Education Loan doesn’t charge any fees for applying, repaying early or making late repayments, your main cost is interest. Most private lenders offer fixed and variable rates, but Advantage Education Loan only offers fixed rates.
Fixed rates are a safer option. They stay the same while you repay your loan, making it easy to budget for your loan repayments. If you qualify, you’ll get a rate from 2.94%. Advantage Education Loan considers factors like how long you need to pay off your loan and your general creditworthiness to determine your rate. The lowest rates tend to go to borrowers who choose shorter terms and have excellent credit.
It does. All borrowers can qualify for a 0.25% rate discount by signing up for autopay. Kentucky residents who want to refinance an Advantage Education Loan student loan can also qualify for rates as low as 3.99%.
Advantage Education Loan offers two repayment options: standard repayment and graduated repayment. With standard repayment, you’ll make the same fixed repayments until your loan is paid off.
With graduated repayment, your repayments start low and increase by 10% every two years. This option works best for borrowers just starting a career, and can expect their pay to increase over time. It’s less expensive in the short term and can help you avoid defaulting if you have a low-income job. However, this repayment option often has longer loan terms making it more expensive than the standard repayment plan.
Regardless of which plan you choose, Advantage Education Loan requires all borrowers to make minimum monthly payments of $50.
On top of its repayment plans, Advantage Education Loan also offers forbearance for economic hardship or during military deployment, when you won’t have to make any repayments.
While forbearance might help you out of a pinch, it can actually increase your debt in the long run. That’s because once you start making full repayments again, Advantage Education Loan capitalizes your interest. This means it tacks on any interest that added up while you were in forbearance to the amount you were paying off — your principal. You’ll be on the hook for more money and also end up paying more in interest, since interest is a percentage of your loan’s principal.
There really isn’t much online about Advantage Education Loan. We weren’t able to find any customer reviews on forums, TrustPilot or the Better Business Bureau (BBB) site.
Advantage Education Loan might not have a BBB page, but KHESLC does. It’s not accredited by the bureau, but it gets an A+ rating based on factors like advertising practices and how it handles customer complaints. As of August 2018, it has no reviews but it does have four customer complaints, most involving billing errors.
One borrower claimed that KHESLC was harassing them for repayments at work, which the company denied. Another said KHESLC mistakenly reported her repayments as late, which was hurting her credit score. But to its benefit, KHESLC has resolved all complaints.
You can complete your Advantage Education Loan application entirely online, though you must use a desktop computer or laptop. You also have to use either Chrome, Safari or Firefox to access the application.
Before you begin, make sure you meet its eligibility requirements and have the following documents on hand:
When you’re ready to start your application, follow these steps:
Advantage Education Loan disburses the funds directly to your lender. It doesn’t give a timeframe for how long the application takes, though it does prioritize its other student loans over refinancing. If you have any questions during the application process, you can reach customer service by calling 800-988-6333.
KHESLC is a semi-private corporation that was created as part of a larger 1978 push to give Kentucky residents greater access to higher education. It’s independent from the State of Kentucky, but run by an executive board appointed by local officials. Its mission is to provide resources like financial aid and educational materials to help Kentucky residents pay for undergraduate, graduate and professional school.
That’s why Advantage Education Loan offers lower rates for Kentucky residents. However, Advantage Education Loans is working to serve all 50 states in the near future.
To find another lender or learn more about how it all works, check out our guide to student loan refinancing.
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We rate student loan providers on a scale of 1 to 5 stars based on factors like transparency, costs and customer experience. We don’t take into account elements like eligibility criteria, state availability or payment frequency — we save that for our reviews.
Image source: Shutterstock and advantageeducationloan.com