I put the ‘dent’ in Student Loan.

I suppose if I am angling for a job in communications or media type stuff, I should probably do more writing. Everyone asks for “writing samples” and when I read that I think back to my days in the second and third grades when we were learning to print and write cursive, so I think about submitting “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” Then I think better of it.

I figure if I start using this space a little more productively, I might actually actively engage my intellectual capabilities instead of tying them up thinking about some of the idiotic things I normally do. (For instance: Why do people insist that adding turkey or other fixings to grilled cheese sandwiches still make it a grilled cheese? It’s a melt at that point, people!) Anyway, here goes:

I got a notice in the mail this week about my student loans. They have been bought/acquired sold for pennies on the dollar to ANOTHER company. In five years, my student loans have been with four different companies. Nice, right? Hooray for irresponsible banks? Anyway, when they notify you of these things, they usually send you an outstanding balance and a summary of what you’ve paid so far. Here are some fun figures for you: I’ve been paying down this loan for almost 5 years now (about 4.5, to be vaguely more specific); in that five years, I’ve paid nearly $12,000 to the companies who own my loan. This seems pretty good right? I know many of you (hi mom!) are shaking your head because you’re finance-y type people and have done this before…you know what’s coming next. So I was excited about paying my $12,000, until I read that REALLY, I’ve only paid about $2,000 toward paying off my loan, because the chunk of it paid interest. WHICH SUCKS. Again, I’m hearing a lot of “Duhs” in my head from many of you, to which I can only say SHOVE IT. I consolidated, I finagled and I worked to get a good interest rate (2.75!), and I’ve gotten reductions on that rate for doing automatic debit and whatnot, so it was very exciting to read that I’ll get a whole percentage point reduced if I continue to make on-time payments…for another three years. Yay. So basically, to break it down, what I’ve paid in the last five years in interest? Equates to the monthly floral budget for the guy who is the CEO of the bank who owns my loan. Sweeeet.

In case you’re wondering? This is the most exciting thing to happen to me all week.