IDR
Idaho Strategic Resources, Inc.
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I'm talking an extra $300 monthly and $10k "extra" in my account atm which won't make that big a difference either way against $275k loans but I still want input. I'm coming from a family income of $50k in 2010s so all this is very out of my league. I'm hearing Dept of Ed may be shut down and all my loans are from there (reconsolidated to an unsubsidized loan via Mohela which is in forbearance cause they're not processing IDR atm (I think? Maybe?) at 6.4%), PSLF may be gone soon for us and the stock market is either on sale or in complete free fall with no end in sight depending on the day. Oh also, idk where to seek a proper HYSA atm cause my pretty one that promised 4.75% once I hit 10k in it has dropped to 1.25% in the time it took to save that much. How are you guys handling this oh so wonderful and totally not stressful situation?

If you want PSLF, are looking at a repayment of $230K on 7 years of IDR (assuming you had 3 years of qualifying payments towards PSLF in residency).
If your salary increases over the next 7 years, or you get married to a working spouse, that number that you repay goes up.
I would privately refinance your loans later this year when rate cuts are expected. For you, the only benefit federal loans offer is it you get really sick then they can pause payments or forgiven them. But as a high earning physician you should be investing in LTDI anyways.

It impacted a lot of people - OG PSLFer here as well. But, to give credit where it is due, the PSLF waiver and IDR adjustment gave many of us missed time back. Not the grace period, that was never eligible, but many other periods of time that we lost during those early years.

This was never true. I have been in IDR for 10 years and I have like 12 loans

I'm talking an extra $300 monthly and $10k "extra" in my account atm which won't make that big a difference either way against $275k loans but I still want input. I'm coming from a family income of $50k in 2010s so all this is very out of my league. I'm hearing Dept of Ed may be shut down and all my loans are from there (reconsolidated to an unsubsidized loan via Mohela which is in forbearance cause they're not processing IDR atm (I think? Maybe?) at 6.4%), PSLF may be gone soon for us and the stock market is either on sale or in complete free fall with no end in sight depending on the day. Oh also, idk where to seek a proper HYSA atm cause my pretty one that promised 4.75% once I hit 10k in it has dropped to 1.25% in the time it took to save that much. How are you guys handling this oh so wonderful and totally not stressful situation?

If you want PSLF, are looking at a repayment of $230K on 7 years of IDR (assuming you had 3 years of qualifying payments towards PSLF in residency).
If your salary increases over the next 7 years, or you get married to a working spouse, that number that you repay goes up.
I would privately refinance your loans later this year when rate cuts are expected. For you, the only benefit federal loans offer is it you get really sick then they can pause payments or forgiven them. But as a high earning physician you should be investing in LTDI anyways.

It impacted a lot of people - OG PSLFer here as well. But, to give credit where it is due, the PSLF waiver and IDR adjustment gave many of us missed time back. Not the grace period, that was never eligible, but many other periods of time that we lost during those early years.

This was never true. I have been in IDR for 10 years and I have like 12 loans

My main thing is whether or not the years in residency and spent in limbo will count because I was placed into forbearance during SAVE plan processing so I never actually got onto the SAVE plan.
The delta between yearly IDR payments on residency versus attending salary is like $30-50K. Unless your have truly astronomical loans >$600K, riding on PSLF on purely 10 years of attending salary just doesn’t seem worth it.

Not accurate, you only had to do this if you did not have direct loans (FFEL loans). Direct loans are already eligible for various IDR (income driven repayment plans). Also FFEL loans are eligible for IBR, a type of IDR plan, without consolidation.

When you consolidate, it capitalizes your interest. This is a big downside if you have a lot of unpaid interest accumulated from med school. If you have all direct federal loans, you don’t need to capitalize to use IDR plans. IDR plans may also substantially change for everyone if the proposed changes to student loan plans go through with the current budget reconciliation. So that’s something to just think about if planning to continue an IDR plan after residency.

Can someone explain what has changed with PSLF— has anything changed with PSLF or IDR since 2025?

Grace periods don’t count and most new doctors entering residency had $0 in income the year before, but yes you would’ve had to last file separately to not have the spousal income count.
You can enter an IDR when you enter repayment. That’s not until Nov, so if you were planning on PSLF, you would lose months of eligibility. If you’re not, just cool your jets.

Just SAVE right? So there'd be no point in doing for another IDR?

Several problems:
1) Committing ourselves to employers that make us eligible towards PLSF payments (even if that means taking a pay cut from PP).
2) Losing out on the opportunity to re-finance privately for lower interest rates.
3) Making 10 years of payments only for an administration to come it and make it nearly impossible to get that final cancellation.
4) Cohort of folks currently in residency (at least PGY-1) have one of the highest interest rates on student loans. This means that more would be forgiven = more taxed at the end
5) We’ve also already lost 1 year of eligible PSLF payments because the SCOTUS blocked SAVE a year ago already, which now we will have to make up on attending salary.
With my high interest rate and just 2 years left in residency, what’s the point of PSLF? At this rate I don’t see the Trump administration putting a reasonable IDR plan in place that would count towards PSLF before I become an attending.
Part of me just says screw it, just refinance if and when interest rates on student loans get under 4.5% (currently I’m just shy of 6%). Assuming I qualify of course.