career development loans and debt

beckstar1982

hi, i have been to university to carry out my degree and masters degree, but to be honest the masters wasnt worth the paper it was written on, but in the next breath it only cost £950. so im thinking of doing a better masters in an area i want to work in at the cost of £7,500.

i was thinking of applying for a career development loan to fund this (approx £6,000), but i already have a loan outstanding of £12,000 that im currently paying back to RBS at the tune of £310 a month. I am up to date with my payments and have not defaulted.

I am not in a job that is particularly safe, (but whose is in this economic climate?) but it pays £1,000 a month. I dont have a house or any major rent payments.

I just wondered what anyone else would do in my situation and would appreciate anyones take on this. I just seem to be debting myself up to the eyeballs, but this is a masters I really want to do.

thanks in advance!

Oldernotwiser

What do you mean by a "better" Masters degree?

I can't see how you can possibly fund your existing loan whilst studying full time, much less carry on repaying this with the CDL on top afterwards, on a comparatively low salary. What is this Masters and how do you see it enhancing your career prospects?

beckstar1982

well the masters i have done is an MSc in Management but it was all re-hashed stuff from my degree, i didnt learn anything new from it, is all they did was push the pass mark up by 10%. I started my degree in international business studies but after my first year changed to business economics.

I really want to go into finance and investment/economics and finance. durham university do a masters in this which is a bit better than my masters in management from teesside university!

thanks for your info, i just needed to hear from someone else how ridiculous I am!

Oldernotwiser

beckstar1982 wrote: »

well the masters i have done is an MSc in Management but it was all re-hashed stuff from my degree, i didnt learn anything new from it, is all they did was push the pass mark up by 10%. I started my degree in international business studies but after my first year changed to business economics.

I really want to go into finance and investment/economics and finance. durham university do a masters in this which is a bit better than my masters in management from teesside university!

thanks for your info, i just needed to hear from someone else how ridiculous I am!

I didn't mean to imply that you are ridiculous and I can quite see that a Master's from Durham carries more kudos than one from Teeside. I just don't think it sounds financially viable when you already have this much debt.

beckstar1982

lol i know, but i think im ridiculous! the thing is, im 27 and by the time im 30 i should have all my debt paid off, but do you think that I will have been out of the game too long by then to apply for these masters? I think a degree from durham will enhance my cv somewhat and i will actually be able to sell myself to a prospective employer in an industry that i want to get into

I think now is the right time to be doing a masters in this field, and hopefully when im finished the economy will have recovered and they will be employing people back in to it.

Fire_Fox

I would not recommend increasing your total debt to £18000 to simply "enhance [your] CV somewhat". Why don't you try to pay off the current debt more quickly than your present payment schedule and/ or make some savings towards the masters degree? That way you will feel as if you are working towards your goal and if you do happen to be made redundant you will be ready for it. Fill in a Statement of Affairs (sticky on main DFW page) and post up on the Debt-free Wannabe board for comments. Also try the snowball calculator (same place) to see the effect of paying off your debt more quickly.