I too am trying to figure out the best way to go about refinancing my student loans. I have
$16000 private loan (Discover SL) at 3.0% fixed
$27000 in various federal loans (10 total loans ranging from 1.73% to 6.8%, principals from $209-$6780)
for a total of $43k :-(
I'm not sure I can get a lower rate than 3% on the Discover loan.
As I understand it, if you consolidate your federal loans through the government you basically lump all your federal loans into one and get an interest rate that's a weighted average of all your previous federal loans. I'm not sure if having the "additional protections" available through the government is worth it to me or not. My wife and I make a combined $91k per year (pretax) but we also want to buy a house ASAP, and what if one of us loses our job? She's a brand new employee at a company that was just acquired. They claim there won't be staff cuts but you know how that often goes.
So anyway, if I apply for a refi through SoFi, should I apply for a loan just for the federal loans? Or would I possibly be able to get a lower rate by refinancing all $43k at once?
Also, if I were to consolidate the federal loans through the government, wouldn't the interest dollars accrue faster even with the weighted interest rate, since the principal would be $23k as opposed to 10 smaller principal amounts?
Finally, does anyone have experience with CUStudentLoans, the credit union based refi program?