Call Me Maybe When Your School Loan Is Paid In Full
The increasing debt load of college graduates has affected young people’s lives in untold ways, from career choices to living arrangements. Now add another impact on a key part of young adult life: dating and marriage.
Rachel Bingham, an art teacher in Portland, Maine, learned this a few years back, when a guy broke it off after four months of a budding relationship. Among other reasons, he cited her $80,000 in student loan debt.
“He said it scared him,” she recalls, “that it really made him anxious. And he just did not want to take on my responsibility.”
No Money, Mo’ Problems
Buried In Debt, Young People Find Dreams Elusive
Many young adults feel they may never be able to own a home or raise a family.
College Grads Struggle To Gain Financial Footing
A Rutgers University survey finds just half of recent college graduates are working full time.
That made Bingham angry because she had never asked for his help. She says she has been very responsible, diligently making her loan payments.
“I was really floored at the time, because I just didn’t consider that as a reason for someone to not be with someone else,” she says. “I felt it was very shallow.”
Bingham is now engaged to a man who’s not scared off by her debt, but it turns out her ex-boyfriend was far from alone. The issue recently came up in a letter to an advice column at Nerve.com, a pop culture dating website. This time it was a woman wary of a serious relationship because her boyfriend has $150,000 in debt, mostly student loans.
Category: Student Loans
Subscribe
If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to receive more just like it.
