How Honest Financial Advisors Should Disclose Their Fees

U.S. citizens are eligible for U.S. federal student aid regardless of where they live. This means that expats can qualify for federal student loans. But there are a few complications and opportunities when borrowing and repaying federal student loans for expats. Here's what you need to know if you're a U.S. citizen living abroad and you're hoping to take out federal student loans for yourself or for your children.

You have graduated college and are getting ready to start paying off your student loans.You are getting the check ready to start the process of paying off your student debt when it hits you that you don’t actually know who owns your student loans or how much you owe exactly?What to do?The first step to becoming financially free is figuring out the exact amount of debt you are carrying so you can work towards paying it off.And since student loans are a debt that affect lives greatly, it is important to know who owns those loans and how much you owe.How you do that is the topic of this post.

You are ready to go back to school and so you go to apply for a student loan with the best rate.The problem?Someone already took out student loans in your name and now you, the real you, cannot take out any more money for school.Education is expensive enough when you take out loans on your own! And now you have to deal with a mess somebody made when you were not looking?Unfortunately, student loan identity theft is a real problem that happens and continues to happen. It's hard to prevent because so much personal information about you is already "out there".Let's talk about what you can do to prevent this from happening in the first place and what you can do if you find out someone took out student loans in your name.

If you've recently graduated college and started full-time employment, you will start entering the repayment phase of your student loans. Even though payments on many student loans were paused during the Covid-19 pandemic, it is wise to make sure that you are ready for when student loan payments unpause.Hopefully you were able to minimize your use of student loans for living expenses while you were in college. Now it's time to take a look at how to handle your living expenses as you start to repay your student loans.The good news is that there are plenty of options to fit your student loan payments into your ongoing budget. The important part is to make sure that you are proactive and reasonable about how you will handle your basic living expenses during your student loan repayment.

There are a variety of programs that can provide non-profit student loan forgiveness for individuals working for a 501(c)(3) or other nonprofit organization.By participating in these programs, eligible borrowers can have their student loans forgiven or significantly reduced after meeting specific requirements. However, the onus is always on the borrower to make sure they find, apply, and maintain eligibility for these programs.Here’s what you need to know about the different ways to get nonprofit student loan forgiveness.

Two weeks ago, I was chatting with a reader who was researching low cost index funds. I was so excited because he wanted to learn about expense ratios, commissions, fees, and more. Although I talk about finance all the time, it's still rare to have someone interested for long periods of time.After chatting for a bit, I got around to asking him what made him so interested in the topic. He seemed like he was doing well enough. He definitely had some investable funds, was on his way to retirement, and everything seemed good.He told me - "I feel like my advisor isn't steering me in the right path based on what I read online on sites like yours." I asked him to elaborate a little bit for me.He said - "My advisor consistently talks about how he's the top performer in North Carolina. However, everywhere I read online says to invest with low cost Vanguard funds. When I mention that to him, he changes the subject or diverts to other topics. It makes me feel off..."Beyond the fact that you shouldn't feel this way with a financial advisor, I firmly believe that your financial advisor should be very transparent with costs for you. When this reader shared his portfolio with me, I was so sad...

Savvy investors are always looking for ways to reduce their tax burdens. Although no one can completely avoid taxes, harnessing the power of tax-loss harvesting is one smart way to save.No one buys an investment with the expectation that it will lose money. But tax-loss harvesting provides a unique opportunity to benefit from downturns when they occur. Through tax-loss harvesting, you can use losing investments to offset your realized capital gains and/or some of your ordinary taxable income. Keep reading to learn all about how it works!

If you’re a recent college graduate with limited cash flow, paying off student loans can feel like an insurmountable task. It’s easy to feel trapped, as you feel the pressure to pay off your student loans as quickly as possible.But while eliminating your student loans is an admirable goal, some sacrifices aren't worth it. For example, if you’re considering using your 401(k) to pay off your student loans, you may want to reconsider.In this article, we cover the various 401(k) taxes and penalties, and present some alternative ways to eliminate your student loans.

The average student graduates college with over $30,600 in debt. If you went to a 4-year nursing program (or its equivalent), you have probably accumulated around this amount as well.Tack on grad school costs in case you want to advance your nursing career and you could be looking at around $60,000 in student loan debt.Even if you do get a well-paying job as most nurses tend to get once they are out of school, a $60,000 loan hanging over your head is still stressful considering that paying back student loans will not be the only responsibility you have after you graduate.If you are a nurse or healthcare worker who would really like those pesky student loans gone for good, this post is for you. In today’s post, we will provide you with some great resources that will help you get most if not all of your loans forgiven.This guide is specific to nurses, but you might also find this guide helpful: 80 Ways To Get Student Loan Forgiveness. Let's dive in!

It should be a simple question - does the government profit off of student loans? But depending on who you ask, the federal government either earned a profit or lost money on federal student loans prior to the pandemic. The answer depends on political and accounting perspectives. During the pandemic, however, the payment pause and interest waiver has caused the federal government to lose money on federal student loans, regardless of the method used to calculate the subsidy rates. By forgoing nearly $5 billion a month in interest, the federal student loan program swung from a profit to a loss even in the most optimistic of projections. Let’s take a tour of how the federal government’s budget calculates the subsidy rates for various federal programs. But, before we do this, let’s review the concept of net present value accounting.