SoFi Student Loan Refinancing
SoFi provides student loan refinancing services to people with a better credit score. Re-financing can help you save thousands of dollars in interest payments on your student loans by refinancing them with a new SoFi loan that has much better terms.
The good news is that SoFi can refinance both Federal and private student loans. Most other lenders only refinance Federal student loans.
On this page, I am reviewing SoFi’s student loan refinance product specifically. If you’re not sure about applying with them, you can also check out my student loan refinancing review to learn more about the refinancing process in general.
SoFi Student Loan Refinance Eligibility Requirements
Unemployment Protection and the SoFi Career Advisory Group
SoFi, which stands for Social Finance, is a social finance company that offers students loans, refinancing services, and career services. The company is a financial services platform that encompasses a debt fund, a student loan lender, a company selling insurance to the unemployed, and a career service … all intertwined through data and technology.
SOFI began as a platform for students to finance their education with loans from alumni and other crowdfunded ventures. Since then, it’s been quickly expanding to customers seeking affordable and flexible financing in their career.
The company began as an employee-owned financial services company, but saw a growing demand for refinancing services. It took on an employee-oriented funding model to meet the demands of its institutional and consumer clients.
Broadly speaking, the difficulty with entrepreneurship is having access to money. At that stage of a business, it is very difficult to make money unless you are already profitable. And if that is the case, there is no reason to take on a loan. SoFi aims to solve this problem. It’s a platform available to a wide variety of income levels that helps employees start or grow their business, build their wealth, and achieve their goals.
SoFi’s Other Education Loan Products
SoFi offers loans specifically for people who want to pursue a liberal arts degree, which is a four-year undergraduate degree in a major such as the arts, humanities, or social sciences. SoFi liberal arts loans have low variable rates and a ten-year repayment term. But if you’d like to pay off your loan faster, you also have the option to prepay with no prepayment penalty.
Though liberal arts degrees aren’t for everyone, this new loan option from SoFi certainly is a viable long-term option for borrowers with a passion for the arts, humanities, or social sciences. And regardless of whether you’re interested in a liberal arts degree or not, SoFi’s flexible repayment options open up the loan market to borrowers who may not have been eligible for a traditional education loan.
Medical Resident and Fellow Student Refinancing
If you are a resident physician or fellow, loan refinancing is especially important to consider, since refinancing may make sense even if you don’t plan to borrow more.
Most medical residents expect to gain experience and an advanced education before becoming a practicing physician. In many cases, this can lead to increased leverage and risk. So considering refinancing while still in training may make a lot of sense.
For your refinance loan, SoFi offers borrowers with both federal and private student loans plans with unique terms and a comprehensive application process and customer support team.
Whether you got your first loan from a bank, a financial institution or another lending source, Choice Loan Funding (CLF) can help you put all of your federal and private student loans together into one easy to manage, convenient monthly payment plan. Many borrowers are surprised to discover how much they can save with their refinance loan with CLF, especially when it comes to paying off a Home Equity Line of Credit or other non-student loan debt.
Finally, refinancing with CLF can increase your financial security by saving on interest and helping you to stay on track with your student loan repayment schedule.
Parent Loans
Parents are key to paying for college, and often their assistance makes a huge difference in the amount and terms of a student loan. Fortunately, parents may be able to provide even more assistance if they take out a loan as a cosigner.
The CommonBond Parent Loan is a prime example of a student loan that is cosigned by a parent. We took a look at this specific loan, and here’s what we found.
Parent Plus Refinancing
Parent Plus Loans have been a resourceful way for parents or guardians to help out their eligible children or grandchildren when it comes to funding higher education.
Consider the following about the Parents Plus Refinance program from SoFi:
- No minimum credit score requirement
- No origination fee
- Fixed interest rate
- Flexibility for most borrowers
SoFi offers flexible terms to fit diverse circumstances. Your SoFi representative can answer any questions about parent plus loan refinancing. If you’re interested in refinancing your Parent Plus loans with SoFi today, get in touch with our team of experts for a free consultation and rates.
Other SoFi Loan Programs
SoFi offers a number of different student loan refinance and consolidation options, each with its own eligibility requirements.
SoFi²² Personal Loan Personal loans allow you to consolidate other loans such as those from family, credit card, or other bank/student loans. You have up to four years to pay back the loans.
SoFi²² Education Refinance Loan This one is different from the other two programs since it is actually a private loan with variable interest rates that are based on the credit ratings of both the borrower and cosigner. You have ten years to pay your loans back. This is a good option if you aren’t a dependent student.
SoFi²² Debt Consolidation Loan This loan consolidates all your student and credit card debt and allows you up to ten years to pay it back. The great thing about this one is that it doesn’t require a cosigner, so older family members can take out their own loan.
SoFi Mortgages
SoFi is a very different kind of mortgage broker. But does that make it a better alternative to the big banks and brokers? And how does SoFi stack up in terms of service and quality over the long term?
To answer these questions, we’ll take a look SoFi and weigh it against the others head-to-head on what matters most to consumers.
SoFi Personal Loans
SoFi is a personal loan marketplace that connects people with quality investors for loan funding. SoFi loans are available to borrowers at various price points, which means you can pick the lending option that best meets your budget.
SoFi loans are similar to other loans in that they have a repayment period with scheduled interest payments, but there are a few key differences. The most significant of these is that SoFi personal loans, by default, include deferment. Deferment means that you can stop making interest payments whenever you fall on hard times. Although it is not likely that this will happen, it’s at least something that a traditional lender won’t offer you.
SoFi Non-Lending Programs
A few months ago, I wrote an article called SoFi Review – Best Student Loans and Personal Loans. After that post, I realized SoFi is about more than just student loans.
Entrepreneur Program
It is essential to have a mentor or someone you can talk to without inhibitions. The funding situation for most small businesses is not very smooth and guaranteed. Those businesses which aim at business funding need to keep higher chances of checks as they have the higher lending limits. It is not difficult for any company to attain a loan. US Small Business Administration loans are specifically offered to serve the needs of several small businesses.
Typically, such loans are for two startup businesses which helps in short term funding and opens the door to more business funding. Searching for a business loan can be a difficult task. There are a couple of agencies that deal with business funding and can aid you in getting business funding easily.
SoFi Wealth Management
SoFi Life Insurance
There are lots of life insurance options out there. And when we were searching for life insurance for our own family, we quickly realized how complicated they all were.
There were so many questions we had to answer to determine the right insurance policy for us. Where would we use the insurance? What would we do if something happened to us? And if something did happen, would the surviving spouse be left with the burden of paying off a lease or mortgage when the death benefit is not enough?
These are questions that we’re glad we weren’t part of the decision-making process for. But for a lot of people, it’s something they have to consider because of the financial consequences of having the wrong insurance in place.
Then we found SoFi, or Social Finance. SoFi is a company that merges modern technology with old-school finance and insurance. They wouldn’t be categorized as a bank or insurance company, but they might be described as a tech startup that is trying to optimize the life insurance process.
SoFi Pros & Cons
SoFi Pros
When you think about online lending, you’re probably thinking about the “big boys” — Lending Club, Prosper, and SoFi.
Prosper stands out from its competitors because it is truly an online-only business. It doesn’t rely on brick and mortar branches to attract borrowers. Lending Club, on the other hand, has revamped its brand by beefing up its marketing strategy to include TV, print, and radio advertisements, and is gradually moving into the brick and mortar world. But SoFi has stayed pure to the online space. It markets itself as the web’s most prestigious finance company, and at the heart of this image is the idea that SoFi has no branch offices, no well-worn sales teams, and no junky products.
SoFi’s lending model and strategy is quite different from that of its competitors. It has a slightly less profitable business model, and it charges a tad higher interest rates. But what it does, it does extraordinarily well. That’s why it’s still playing David to Lending Club and Prosper’s Goliath.
SoFi Cons
Although SoFi has many outstanding features, it’s not perfect and anyone looking to take out a loan or refinance one should be aware of the negative aspects. Here is my SoFi review to help you decide if SoFi is the right lender for you.
If you want a big loan, invite others to co-sign for you. SoFi will only factor in the age of the primary borrower. According to SoFi, co-signers are not responsible for paying your loan. However, this could change in the future.
Also, note that people in the military service and living abroad cannot apply through SoFi.
It’s not easy to get approved with SoFi even if you meet all the qualifications. You must complete a financial questionnaire, which is important before they approve or deny your loan because they are going to check your credit score and will contact your bank and employers.
You can manage some loans through your computer, but SoFi can only be managed on your computer or a mobile phone.
The late fees are relatively high and if you don’t keep up with your payment you could lose your loan.
If you only have good credit, you may still have difficulty getting approved for refinancing. Be aware your credit is only one of the factors they consider.
Is SoFi the Right Financial Platform for You?
SoFi is an online loan service that also provides mortgages. They offer competitive rates, flexible payment options, and solid customer service. But like many other financial services, there is more to the story.
SoFi has dozens of user reviews. As might be expected, a wide margin of the reviews are negative while a majority are positive.
Some of the negative reviews are from people who didn’t have a very good experience with the company and others that are frustrated with for-profit colleges.
SoFi is a financial services company, and I feel that they do a very good job delivering financial services. But they are not an educational service. The company does NOT educate people on financial topics.
Although I do understand that SoFi is often a matter of debate, I’m comfortable with the company’s performance in most areas. They have an A+ rating with the BBB and an A- with the FICC (Financial Industry Consumer Council). They are, so far, among the better companies in their industry.