UPDATED: Paid off my student loans last week!

[kittenponypony]

Started at around 100k in student loans after graduation in late 2014, and just paid them off last week, whew! I thought I would be feeling more relief but I think because they’ve been in automatic forbearance most of the year with Covid, it hasn’t quite hit me yet. And I managed to save my salary + 20k for retirement in that time as well. Now I’ll have an extra 1k a month! Any ideas how I should (Covid) celebrate?

UPDATE 1/ 8: I just saw on my Mint that paying them off made my credit score drop 40 points because now the average age of my credit is a year and nine months shorter. So stupid! Is there anything to do about this?

[sadlebred]

Congratulations!!!!

[Deleted]

Congratulations! That is an amazing accomplishment! I would probably take the amount of one payment and spend it on something special for myself. Then I would figure out what to do with the money Im not spending on student loans anymore.

[melmel48]

Wow!!!! I am really excited because I am finally below $10,000! I have been paying on them since March even though my payments were suspended because of COVID. I wanted to take advantage of the zero percent interest rate while I could.

Congrats to you!

[kittenponypony]

Dec 29, 2020 21:30:25 GMT -5 melmel48 said:

Wow!!!! I am really excited because I am finally below $10,000! I have been paying on them since March even though my payments were suspended because of COVID. I wanted to take advantage of the zero percent interest rate while I could.

Congrats to you!

Thank you! Honestly yeah that’s what I did, I took 10k from my emergency fund (which was too big, I was paying a 5.8% premium on that money sitting in a savings account doing nothing) and paid the rest them off in one fell swoop. You’re in the home stretch!

[sandandsea]

Congrats!!

[ellipses84]

Congrats! That’s a huge accomplishment in that amount of time!

[carmenere]

Congratulations!

[brooke77]

Congrats! I am HOPING to be done with mine in 2 years. I’d celebrate with my favorite takeout 😀

[seeyalater52]

Congratulations, that’s a huge accomplishment!

[sent]

Congrats!!! That has to be an amazing feeling.

[Susie]

Congrats!

H and I started with around $260k in SLs together after both of our law degrees, and we have about $91k left.  I fantasize about the day they're finally done... although we've paid off individual loans over the years, and I think the end will ultimately be kind of anticlimactic.  It's still a huge accomplishment!

[kittenponypony]

Dec 30, 2020 10:20:43 GMT -5 Susie said:

Congrats!

H and I started with around $260k in SLs together after both of our law degrees, and we have about $91k left.  I fantasize about the day they're finally done... although we've paid off individual loans over the years, and I think the end will ultimately be kind of anticlimactic.  It's still a huge accomplishment!

Thank you! I’ve been on (mostly lurked) this board for years now and I’ve been inspired by all your stories. Although this board used to be way more active, sadly. You guys even gave me job advice ~5 years ago when I was first starting out in my career (picking Job B, the highest paying of the three jobs I was choosing between, helped me prioritize and pay down my SLs faster). Interesting to go back and read that thread now and think about my ensuing life choices.

[dr.girlfriend]

That's amazing!!! Congratulations! If you like jewelry I would buy yourself a special piece of jewelry that costs about a typical monthly payment to celebrate. :-) Or donate a monthly payment to a charity that helps educate women?

help.rescue.org/donate/year-of-school?ms=gs_ppc_fy21_eoy_dmusa_nov&initialms=gs_ppc_fy21_eoy_dmusa_nov&gclid=CjwKCAiA57D_BRAZEiwAZcfCxZR-UM9nBiqRXznqGtDw7VS4Yy3BTpQ5R1rRIlvuaHUGgRPEWvJcdRoCLREQAvD_BwE

[flygirl]

Congrats! I was so happy to have mine gone

[simpsongal]

Mega congrats!!!!

Definitely celebrate - dinner out, splurge on something.

Dh wants to throw a party when mine are done ($160k, down to $27k after 12 yrs )

[melmel48]

Dec 29, 2020 21:45:13 GMT -5 kittenponypony said:

Dec 29, 2020 21:30:25 GMT -5 melmel48 said:

Wow!!!! I am really excited because I am finally below $10,000! I have been paying on them since March even though my payments were suspended because of COVID. I wanted to take advantage of the zero percent interest rate while I could.

Congrats to you!

Thank you! Honestly yeah that’s what I did, I took 10k from my emergency fund (which was too big, I was paying a 5.8% premium on that money sitting in a savings account doing nothing) and paid the rest them off in one fell swoop. You’re in the home stretch!

My friend was really cute. It is all I talked about for months... getting under $10,000. When I told him I paid the amount to get to $10,000, he sent me a venmo for $1.01 so I would be at $9,999. 

[macmars45]

Congrats!

[tcu2003]

Congrats!!!

[chpmnk1015]

way to go!!

[ohgillian]

This is huge. Congrats!

[trissie18]

Congrats! I am on track to pay mine off in March and I can't wait!

[dcn]

Congrats! I still remember how happy H and I were when ours were paid off! I want to say we took the payment and saved it toward vacations after that.

[kittenponypony]

Update in post

[ohgillian]

Dec 29, 2020 20:11:52 GMT -5 kittenponypony said:

Started at around 100k in student loans after graduation in late 2014, and just paid them off last week, whew! I thought I would be feeling more relief but I think because they’ve been in automatic forbearance most of the year with Covid, it hasn’t quite hit me yet. And I managed to save my salary + 20k for retirement in that time as well. Now I’ll have an extra 1k a month! Any ideas how I should (Covid) celebrate?

UPDATE 1/ 8: I just saw on my Mint that paying them off made my credit score drop 40 points because now the average age of my credit is a year and nine months shorter. So stupid! Is there anything to do about this?

Well that's super annoying. I guess if you have any account that's significantly newer than your average credit age, you could close it and that would push the average age up. But doing that also would mean you're using a greater % of your available credit unless you also increase the credit line on another account. Bottom line is probably that it's just annoying but there's nothing really to do and unless you're about to apply for a refi or something, there's probably no real harm done. Still stinks though!

[Susie]

Dec 29, 2020 20:11:52 GMT -5 kittenponypony said:

UPDATE 1/ 8: I just saw on my Mint that paying them off made my credit score drop 40 points because now the average age of my credit is a year and nine months shorter. So stupid! Is there anything to do about this?

Not that I know of, it's really annoying.  I recently paid off a car loan and my score dropped a little too.  It's 817 now, and that's good enough for anything I want to do.  I'm house hunting and there's nothing an 827 would get me that an 817 won't, in terms of qualification or rate.  Yes, credit score is important, but I just kind of live my financial life and my score is what it is.  I don't tend to make decisions with it in mind.