should i take out a maintenance loan if i don’t need to

sophia1803

i know that may sound like a ridiculous question but please read on.
i’m due to start uni this september 2020
i was very fortunately offered a £10,000 bursary for each of my years of study (totalling at £30,000 across the 3 years). So i initially decided i would use this for my living costs so i’ve only applied for the tuition fee loan not the maintenance loan. However i wondered whether it’d be wise to now also apply for the maintenance loan also, due to my household income it’s estimated i’ll be entitled to the highest maintenance loan of approximately £9,000. Although i do not need the extra loan i thought it may be wise since it’s unlikely i’ll pay most of it back so could put it in a savings account and use it for future as i believe student loans are the most affordable loans? Would this be a wise financial decision? I’m so undecided as i don’t want to get myself into unnecessary debt but it may be worthwhile if i don’t end up paying it all back. any information and advice will be greatly appreciated, thanks
(i understand this may be seen as cheating the system so please no hate im only considering this)

silvercar

If you don’t think you will be a high earner it makes sense.

At worst you could use it towards a deposit to buy your first property.

fred246

No easy answer. I think you need to either borrow nothing or borrow the maximum. My work colleague paid for his children and is now wishing he had given them the £60k in cash. Mine have borrowed the maximum and have plenty in the bank but I worry they will have 'debt' for 30 years. I sat down with my kids and we agreed that the cash would help them buy a nice house in a good area with good schools and that was more important than having a bit of extra money taken off by the government each month.

JayRitchie

Basically, if you are borrowing for the tuition fees anyway for almost all people it would make sense to take out the maintenance loans and bank them for the future.

sophia1803

thank you all for your input advice, there is obviously an element of risk involved. I've tried to use loan repayment calculators to work out how much I'd end up paying back but they didn't really make much sense to me. the average salary for my course is around 27,000 after 6 months of graduating and 35,500 after 3 years of graduating. so I would likely start to pay it back as soon as I get employed. still not too sure what to do but if I did decide to get it I'd definitely put it in a savings account towards a property.

jackieblack

The amount you’ll be repaying every month - 9% of earnings above the threshold (currently about £26500?) - will be the same whether you take the maintenance loan as well as the tuition fee loan or not, so if you’re taking the tuition fee loan you may as well also take the maintenance loan.

JayRitchie

sophia1803 said:

thank you all for your input advice, there is obviously an element of risk involved. I've tried to use loan repayment calculators to work out how much I'd end up paying back but they didn't really make much sense to me. the average salary for my course is around 27,000 after 6 months of graduating and 35,500 after 3 years of graduating. so I would likely start to pay it back as soon as I get employed. still not too sure what to do but if I did decide to get it I'd definitely put it in a savings account towards a property.

What is the course? 

sophia1803

JayRitchie said:

sophia1803 said:

thank you all for your input advice, there is obviously an element of risk involved. I've tried to use loan repayment calculators to work out how much I'd end up paying back but they didn't really make much sense to me. the average salary for my course is around 27,000 after 6 months of graduating and 35,500 after 3 years of graduating. so I would likely start to pay it back as soon as I get employed. still not too sure what to do but if I did decide to get it I'd definitely put it in a savings account towards a property.

What is the course? 

real estate (accredited by the royal institute of chartered surveyors)

JayRitchie

sophia1803 said:

JayRitchie said:

sophia1803 said:

thank you all for your input advice, there is obviously an element of risk involved. I've tried to use loan repayment calculators to work out how much I'd end up paying back but they didn't really make much sense to me. the average salary for my course is around 27,000 after 6 months of graduating and 35,500 after 3 years of graduating. so I would likely start to pay it back as soon as I get employed. still not too sure what to do but if I did decide to get it I'd definitely put it in a savings account towards a property.

What is the course? 

real estate (accredited by the royal institute of chartered surveyors)

Ah, cool. Wide range of possible salaries there! I thought you would say something healthcare related which would be far easier to quantify.