CommonBond Is Opening New Doors For Flexible Student Loan Refinancing (And Doing Some Good in the Process)

If you’re like a lot of graduates in this country, there’s a good chance your education came with a hefty helping of debt. Law school only helps to make those loan amounts skyrocket.

Student loans are unfortunately a common bond that many students and graduates share, and the debt can feel downright crippling at times. The good news is that it doesn’t have to be.

The folks at CommonBond are on a mission to ease the burdens of student loan debt.

Started in 2011 by business school students who were less than enchanted with the options available in the market, the team at CommonBond understands the student loan landscape and is striving to create better products and improve the overall student loan experience. The result is some truly great options that offer real flexibility for those struggling with student debt.

Why Refinance?

While student loans may be common, everyone’s financial situation is unique, and there’s no one-size-fits-all strategy for paying down debt. One of the reasons refinancing is so popular is that it offers flexibility in repayment while saving you money in the long run. And when it comes to both savings and flexibility, CommonBond offers some of the best in the business.

Since it launched nationally in 2013, CommonBond has refinanced over $2 billion in student loans, saving their members  on average $24,000 over the life of their loans.

When you isolate just the lawyers, the savings jump to $34,000 over the course of the average loan. Those kinds of numbers can have a real impact on your financial situation and ability to plan for your future.

New students have little flexibility when it comes to financing – generally you can choose between private loans, government loans (which aren’t cheap themselves), or some combination of the two.

These loans tend to carry high interest rates, because at that point in your life, you’re seen as a faceless, risky commodity.

Refinancing is a different ballgame. Once you’ve graduated and are working, you’re now viewed as an actual employed person, earning actual money, with an actual ability to repay your debt. Because of that, you’re able to secure better repayment terms for your debt.

Essentially, refinancing is a reward for your hard work and the fact that you’ve demonstrated reliability, and now you can have some say over how and when you repay your loans.

That flexibility is probably the second biggest draw of refinancing, after saving money. Some people want to pay off their loans as quickly as possible, paying the least amount of interest. For those people, CommonBond offers shorter repayment periods. If you’d rather have lower payments and manage your monthly budget, there are longer repayment  plans that might work better.

CommonBond has a range of options  to work with every financial situation, plus award-winning  customer service to help you figure out the best approach for your particular circumstances. There’s a simple application online, along with a wealth of tools and resources to help you decide whether refinancing makes sense and estimate what your future interest rate would be. Customer support features like live chat, email that they actually respond to, and a phone line for talking or texting provide a level of individual service that can be woefully lacking at some larger financial institutions.

CommonBond makes it easy to start thinking about refinancing and investigating your options, with no cost or impact on your credit. There’s every reason to consider it, especially if you’re staring down a pile of debt.

What Makes CommonBond Different

There are plenty of companies out there that will gladly refinance your loans, but CommonBond offers some unique products and services that make them stand out from the crowd. For starters, CommonBond is quite generous when it comes to borrower protections.

Everyone knows life can be unpredictable and your ability to make payments can fluctuate. CommonBond knows that, too. That’s why they allow you to pause your payments for up to 24 months if you’re facing job transitions, personal matters, or other circumstances that impact your financial situation.

You can think of it as someone always having your back during the refinancing process.

One of the biggest differences with CommonBond is that you might not have to wait until you graduate from law school to refinance your loans.

Remember that theory behind refinancing–that once you’ve graduated, you’ve showed proof of reliability? Well, CommonBond is taking that a step further, rolling out Prefi–a refinancing program for 3Ls who have accepted a job offer. Rates are locked in now, but payments don’t have to start until six months after graduation, and it’s estimated that the program can save the average customer an additional $16,000 over time. Remember that $34,000 we mentioned earlier? This extra $16,000 brings that total savings to more than $50,000. Funds for a post-bar exam trip, anyone?

A Side of Social Justice

It’s not often that we talk about repaying student loans and charitable giving in the same sentence, but CommonBond has combined the two since their inception in 2012.

The company has kept a social promise that for every loan they fund, they will fund an education for a child in need.

CommonBond has partnered with Pencils of Promise to help fund the education of children in need in rural Ghana, Guatemala, or Laos for every loan it funds. They’ve made over $1 million in contributions so far, and every year they sponsor a trip to Ghana for members and employees to see their efforts at work. While social giving may not be the top reason to pick a refinancing company, knowing that you’re helping to do some good in the world certainly doesn’t hurt when you’re considering how you want to deal with your student debt.

Sizable debt is an inevitable part of pursuing higher education for a lot of people. Flexible loan refinancing is one easy and simple way for attorneys to reduce their student debt and live the rest of their lives.

With CommonBond, you’ll find some of the best savings, flexibility, and customer service out there, and you can help do some good in the process too.