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How Often Can You Refinance Student Loans?
Updated On September 15, 2022
Editorial Note: This content is based solely on the author's opinions and is not provided, approved, endorsed or reviewed by any financial institution or partner.
You may be wondering: "How often can you refinance student loans?" It's an important question to ask if you are considering student loan refinancing. The short answer is there is no limit to how often you can refinance your student loans.
In this guide, you will learn everything you need to know about how often to refinance your student loans:
- Can you refinance more than once?
- Does student loan refinancing affect my credit score?
- Should you refinance your student loans again?
- How to refinance your student loans again
Can you refinance more than once?
If you refinanced your student loans, you may assume that you can only refinance once. However, that’s not true. You can refinance as often as you would like or whenever you can get a lower interest rate or lower student loan payment. Since there are no origination, application or prepayment fees, it is advantageous to refinance whenever you can get a lower interest rate or student loan payment.
When you refinance your student loans, you combine your existing federal student loans, private student loans or both and exchange them for a new, single student loan with a lower interest rate. The new student loan comes from a private lender and has one interest rate, one monthly payment and one student loan servicer. Each time you refinance with a lower interest rate, you could save more money.
For example, let’s assume that you have $60,000 of student loans at a 7% interest rate and a 10-year repayment term. If you refinance those student loans and receive a 4% interest rate and 10-year repayment term, you would lower your monthly student loan payment by $89 and save $10,702 total.
If you refinance your student loans again at a 3% interest rate, you would save an additional $28 each month and $3,373 total.
You can use this student loan refinancing calculator to determine how much you can save.
Does student loan refinancing affect my credit score?
There is no limit to how often you can refinance student loans. However, it's important to understand how student loan refinancing can affect your credit.
Student loan refinancing has a minimal impact on your credit score. You can check your new interest rate for free in about two minutes with no impact to your credit score. This is called a soft credit check. When you apply for student loan refinancing, the lender will do a hard credit check. This is the same hard credit check when you apply for a loan such as a mortgage or auto loan.
If you have a good credit history, you likely won’t have any impact to your credit score. You can apply to multiple lenders within a short time period such as a week, and it will only count as one credit inquiry. Your credit score may be reduced temporarily when you add a new credit account. However, if you pay your student loan ontime, your credit score won’t really be impacted and may improve over time as you pay off debt.
Why should you refinance your student loans again?
There are many reasons why you should refinance your student loans again:
- Get a lower interest rate
- Change your loan terms
- Change lenders and student loan servicers
- Release a co-signer
Get a lower interest rate
Most borrowers refinance again to get a lower interest rate, which helps them save even more money.
Change your loan terms
When you refinance your student loans again, you can choose new loan terms. That means you can select a fixed interest rate or variable interest rate. You can also select a new student loan repayment term that can provide your more or less time to pay off student loans.
Change lenders and student loan servicers
Another reason that borrowers choose to refinance their student loans again is to change their lender or student loan servicer. When you refinance again, you may find better customer service with a new lender.
Release a co-signer
If you refinanced student loans with a co-signer, you can refinance again to release a co-signer. Many lenders now offer a co-signer release, which allows your co-signer to be released from financial responsibility for your student loans.
How to refinance your student loans again
To refinance your student loans again, you will need to have a good credit score in the mid 600’s or higher, stable and recurring income, and a low debt-to-income ratio. You can also apply with a co-signer who fits this profile to help you get approved and even receive a lower interest rate.
If you want to know how to refinance your student loans again, there are several steps:
Compare lenders
Most borrowers who refinance again choose the lenders who approves them for the lowest interest rate. When you refinance again, the goal typically is to save the most money. You can also evaluate other loan terms, including fixed and variable interest rates as well as loan repayment terms.
Get Interest Rate Estimates
Here’s a great part about student loan refinancing. Before applying, lenders allow you to check your new interest rate for free with no impact to your credit score. These are interest rate estimates based on some basic information that you submit, and you can pre-qualify online in less than two minutes.
Choose a lender and select loan terms
You don’t have to refinance your student loans with your current lender. Once you choose the best lender for you, you can select new loan terms. One benefit of refinancing student loans again is you can change your loan terms. You can choose a fixed interest rate or variable interest rate. You also can select a new student loan repayment term, which typically ranges from 5-20 years.
A fixed interest rate means you will always have the same interest rate for the remainder of your repayment period. A variable interest rate means that your interest rate can change during your repayment period. Typically, variable interest rates are lower than fixed interest rates and may be the best choice if you plan to pay off your student loan fast.
If you want to pay off your student loans faster, you can choose a repayment term closer to 5 years. While your monthly payment may be higher, you can save more money on interest and pay off student loans faster. If you want a longer student loan repayment term, your monthly payment may be lower, but you will owe more total interest.
Apply
You can apply online for student loan refinancing, and it takes approximately 10-15 minutes to complete the application.
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