It is very difficult for both the parents and the students to finance their education in United States. To pay for the college in US is even harder for international students. About two-third population of students enroll at private four-year US schools receive some type of loans. US students can obtain loans guaranteed by the government such as Stafford loans, Perkins loans etc. However international students cannot avail these federal student loans. Fortunately, international students can receive private student loans with the same terms and conditions as for the US students.

Before you plan to study in US, you should evaluate how much money you or your family can provide towards your education as more dollars you can pay directly means less you have to borrow in the form of any financial assistance.

Some international students can finance their US education with the help of their family or some loans. But generally, most of the international students also need to finance at least a portion of their education with some type of loans.

An international student also requires a co-signer who must be a US citizen or permanent resident (Green card holder). As the loans are credit-based therefore the co-signer must have good credit history, good employment history and must have lived in the US for the past two years. Every student may not have a family member, friend or other US citizen or permanent resident to act as a co-signer. In this situation a student can opt for private student loans on the same basis as US students and can fund the college.

All the loan funds are paid directly to the student, not to the school. Due to this one can also spend the funds on meeting other living expenses. However, student needs to make sure that they use funds with responsibility as they have to repay it. A student must spend the loan money for tuition, room and board, health insurance and books first as except these things everything is not at all necessary.

An international student loan can be repaid while you are in school or you can start repaying it six months after you finish school.  You can have loan repayment term up to 20 years and there is a monthly payment to make.

 Interest rates are variable, based on the LIBOR plus a margin in case of international student loans. The interest ranges from 3.5% to 7.75%, and will be set based on the credit history of your co-signer and the repayment plan. So, the better your co-signer is, the better will be your interest rate.

An international student can also apply online or by phone. Once you receive a response about your conditional approval for the loan then you need to sign a promissory note along with the proof of enrollment and immigration status to receive your funds.

No application fee is charged for applying for an international student loan. If you receive a loan then an origination fee is charged which is not taken out directly from your pocket but added to the loan amount.