Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$) Forum

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Where do I go?

Stanford
27
69%
NYU
0
No votes
Penn
7
18%
Michigan
5
13%
 
Total votes: 39

bouncelikehydraulics

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Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by bouncelikehydraulics » Wed Apr 06, 2016 1:46 am

Hi all,

Thanks in advance for any insights. This forum has been very helpful thus far in educating me about the law school admissions process. My aspirations reside firmly within public interest law, specifically environmental law. I would love to work in environmental advocacy or within the federal government to that end, and I have multiple years of environmental policy experience, if that's relevant. I'm also interested in clerking. GPA is 3.72 and LSAT is 172. I'm from the Northeast, but I have some ties down south and out west as well. My options are listed below. Because of my firm dedication to public interest, I'm having trouble figuring out just how valuable scholarships are in relation to LRAP. I also anticipate being able to put about $50,000 in savings towards tuition as well the same amount from my parents, who although they can't really afford it, feel a cultural obligation to help out.

Stanford - $170,000 (I haven't received aid information yet, but at most, I'm guessing this will be reduced to $125,000). Stanford is kind of the dream. It has a great LRAP, is great for environmental work, and I like it's size and grading system. But that much debt after putting in a lot of savings and getting some help from my parents is a bit daunting.

NYU- $170,000. NYU is clearly great for public interest and has a strong core of environmental law professors and alumni. It also has a relatively generous LRAP. But at the same cost as Stanford, it doesn't seem completely worth it.

Penn - $95,000. With my contribution and with a 60k scholarship, Penn looks very appealing. I also happened to love the professors, city (Philly is so underrated), and students. It's LRAP isn't as good though, and it doesn't have a critical mass of students in public interest let alone environmental.

Michigan - $50,000. Similarly, with my contribution and with a 90k scholarship, Michigan, with its strong placement in government positions is appealing. I'm not that thrilled about the prospect of Ann Arbor given that I'd like to end up on the west coast or the northeast, but it seems like Michigan has national pull. I don't really know what to make of Michigan.

I have some other options, but I think I've narrowed it down to these schools. I don't have a strong geographic preference, and I am open to a relatively broad interpretation of environmental/climate/water. What do I do?? Thanks!
Last edited by bouncelikehydraulics on Wed Apr 06, 2016 2:05 am, edited 1 time in total.

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loomy78

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by loomy78 » Wed Apr 06, 2016 1:56 am

S or P depending how debt averse

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fliptrip

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by fliptrip » Wed Apr 06, 2016 10:55 am

This is Stanford all the way. Their LRAP is fundamentally different in that it allows you to actually service your debt as opposed to letting it sit and accrue massive interest. This is excellent option protection should you lose your PI itch a few years downstream.

bouncelikehydraulics

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by bouncelikehydraulics » Wed Apr 06, 2016 5:38 pm

fliptrip wrote:This is Stanford all the way. Their LRAP is fundamentally different in that it allows you to actually service your debt as opposed to letting it sit and accrue massive interest. This is excellent option protection should you lose your PI itch a few years downstream.
Do you mind explaining what that means in practical terms?

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WinterComing

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by WinterComing » Wed Apr 06, 2016 5:54 pm

bouncelikehydraulics wrote:
fliptrip wrote:This is Stanford all the way. Their LRAP is fundamentally different in that it allows you to actually service your debt as opposed to letting it sit and accrue massive interest. This is excellent option protection should you lose your PI itch a few years downstream.
Do you mind explaining what that means in practical terms?
I'm not Flip, but I can fill you in on the basics. There is a federal program called PSLF that forgives your loans after 10 years if you spend the full decade in a qualifying job that serves the public. Over those 10 years, you make only the minimum payments, which don't even cover the interest, which causes the principal on your loan to balloon. As long as you make it the 10 years, doesn't matter, because all the debt goes away in the end anyway. But if you don't make it 10 years, suddenly you're stuck owing more than you started out with.

Most schools have LRAPs that work with the federal PSLF program. Basically, the school makes those minimum payments for you so you don't have to worry about them. But if you leave your public interest job and no longer qualify for PSLF, the LRAP stops helping you and you then have to pay back the entire balance of your loans. You're in a worse financial situation than when you started.

By contrast, the LRAPs and Harvard, Yale, and Stanford don't just make the minimum payments for you, but actually pay back the loans for you. So if you leave the public interest for the private sector after five years, you're in a much better financial situation than when you started.

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Bearlyalive

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by Bearlyalive » Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:02 pm

bouncelikehydraulics wrote:
fliptrip wrote:This is Stanford all the way. Their LRAP is fundamentally different in that it allows you to actually service your debt as opposed to letting it sit and accrue massive interest. This is excellent option protection should you lose your PI itch a few years downstream.
Do you mind explaining what that means in practical terms?
At risk of being snaked by someone else, I'll give a brief description. NYU (and almost every other school minus YHS and Columbia) relies on the Federal PSLF program and IBR (income-based repayment) for their LRAP. On these programs, you make small payments towards your loans that are calculated based on your discretional income (which is what remains after taxes, pre-tax deductions, and minus 150% the poverty line). However, these payments aren't even close to paying the interest on a large loan, let alone touching the principle. So, if you're eligible for a school's LRAP, they cover the cost of those payments, but your debt actually grows. However, with the PSLF system, any debt remaining after 10 years gets forgiven by the federal government (tax free). People who start under these programs with ~250k debt might actually have more than 500k by the time it's forgiven; in some cases, it can get close to $1m. But if you leave a PSLF eligible job before making 120 qualifying payments you're stuck with that bill (that said, payments do not need to be consecutive, so you can come back and have previous payments count).

SLS's LRAP doesn't rely on PSLF, so they actually pay the loan rather than "kicking the can down the road". So you can have the flexibility of moving between PI and non-PI jobs without getting punished (other than taking over for making your debt payments).

There's some great threads in the legal employment forums with more details on the risks of some of these programs, and a new one that is particularly useful for pointing out the headaches of relying on PSLF.

ETA: snaked by Winter haha.

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by krads153 » Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:07 pm

The issue with relying on any school's LRAP is that the school can change it at any time...maybe S will decide to tie it to PLSF while you're still relying on its LRAP. I mean, c'mon, I'm pretty sure that's what a bunch of schools did a couple of years ago....
Last edited by krads153 on Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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fliptrip

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by fliptrip » Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:09 pm

Sure. Let's say you owe $100k and make $60k in your LRAP eligible job. Your monthly payment on that debt on a 10 year amortization is $1150. Your IBR/PAYE payment is $352.

Your first payment of $1,150 is divided between servicing your accrued interest (there's a concept called time value of money in that every day you spend owing money the person who lent it to you is losing the chance to use it somewhere else, so you have to compensate them for that. Normal folks call this interest.) and your principal (the nominal dollar amount you actually borrowed. Interest is calculated against our principal.)

So, out of your first $1,150 payment, $567 goes to interest and $583 goes to principal. When the second payment comes around, your principal balance will be lower by $583 and thus the amount of your payment that goes to interest goes down and the amount that goes to principal goes up. Do this 120 times and you'll owe nothing when you leave. As a matter of fact, once you get deep into your debt service, very nearly all of what you pay is going into interest. This is positive amortization and if you LRAP at Stanford, they make the full $1,150 payment for you and your principal balance actually goes down.

At a school that forces you into IBR/PAYE for LRAP, they will make your full IBR repayment at a $60k salary, but you full IBR payment is $352, which is less than the interest you owe in your first payment. Where does that remaining interest payment go? It doesn't disappear, it gets tacked onto your principal, so that not only is your principal balance not going down, but it is going up and since your principal has gone up, each month, the interest you pay on it goes up too. This is called negative amortization...you owe more over time.

Let's say after five years, you're done fighting for the people and take a non-LRAP eligible job. At SLS, you'll owe $58,394. At the IBR/PAYE school, you'll owe $115,283.

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somethingElse

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by somethingElse » Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:14 pm

^ Wouldn't Stanford technically not cover the entirety of one's payments under that scenario? If you're only making $60k you would barely have to contribute anything on your own, but it would still be a small percentage I believe.

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by ih8makingscreennames » Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:34 pm

NYU's LRAP (if you are determined to be LRAP eligible but not PLSF eligible whatever that means) does actually pay off the loan. But the PSLF one (with the higher salary cap) doesn't.

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somethingElse

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by somethingElse » Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:43 pm

Based on the research I've done into LRAPs, it seems like there are some pretty obvious pros and cons to being on a PSLF/IBR plan and a non - PSLF/IBR plan:

Pros for the IBR/PSLF plans:
- You can make more money and still not contribute anything towards your payments relative to non - IBR/PSLF plans
- For this ^ reason, if you are/get married and your spouse's income comes into play, it could be a better option (depending on your school's fine print)

Cons for the IBR/PSLF plans:
- You could be screwed if the federal government changes things AND doesn't grandfather everybody in (based on what I've read though, this seems unlikely)
- Screwed for buying a house
- Negative amortization
- Way less flexibility (you're committing yourself to PI for ten years)
- Eligibility is different (some schools' non-PSLF/IBR LRAP programs let you have jobs that aren't necessarily directly legal-related; this applies to few schools though)

So it seems like it could depend on your goals/the kind of job you end up getting. If you find yourself being truly committed to PI for your long-term career and you land a job with, for example, the federal government, I could see IBR/PSLF being a good option. This is because a) Those positions will end up paying quite a bit down the line, enough that if you are on a non-PSLF plan you're going to have a significant amount to pay and b) Those positions are relatively stable (meaning you wouldn't have as much of an issue staying employed long enough to make the 120 payments).

Obviously a lot of this is dependent upon the individual schools' LRAP plans. But as far as I'm aware, all of the non-PSLF/IBR plans have pretty low caps, and once you start making north of ~100k, your out of pocket payments are pretty significant. But no negative amortization/reliance on the feds is of course the huge plus side.

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fliptrip

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by fliptrip » Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:06 pm

somethingelse55 wrote:^ Wouldn't Stanford technically not cover the entirety of one's payments under that scenario? If you're only making $60k you would barely have to contribute anything on your own, but it would still be a small percentage I believe.
This is right. In my above scenario, you'd pay $1,500/year (~$125/month) and Stanford would pay $12,300/year ($1025/month).

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somethingElse

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by somethingElse » Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:07 pm

fliptrip wrote:
somethingelse55 wrote:^ Wouldn't Stanford technically not cover the entirety of one's payments under that scenario? If you're only making $60k you would barely have to contribute anything on your own, but it would still be a small percentage I believe.
This is right. In my above scenario, you'd pay $1,500/year (~$125/month) and Stanford would pay $12,300/year ($1025/month).
Yeah, so in that scenario the non PSLF/IBR plans are pretty damn nice. But let's say you're making $100k. How much would you have to pay in Stanford's LRAP in that case?

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by Tls2016 » Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:16 pm

somethingelse55 wrote:
fliptrip wrote:
somethingelse55 wrote:^ Wouldn't Stanford technically not cover the entirety of one's payments under that scenario? If you're only making $60k you would barely have to contribute anything on your own, but it would still be a small percentage I believe.
This is right. In my above scenario, you'd pay $1,500/year (~$125/month) and Stanford would pay $12,300/year ($1025/month).
Yeah, so in that scenario the non PSLF/IBR plans are pretty damn nice. But let's say you're making $100k. How much would you have to pay in Stanford's LRAP in that case?
You really need to contact each school and go through the scenarios with them. They have experts who deal with the intricacies of the program.
This is the explanation of their program:
https://www-cdn.law.stanford.edu/wp-con ... erms-1.pdf

Here is their online calculator for you to play around with:

https://law.stanford.edu/apply/tuition- ... gram-lrap/

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somethingElse

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by somethingElse » Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:27 pm

Tls2016 wrote:
somethingelse55 wrote:
fliptrip wrote:
somethingelse55 wrote:^ Wouldn't Stanford technically not cover the entirety of one's payments under that scenario? If you're only making $60k you would barely have to contribute anything on your own, but it would still be a small percentage I believe.
This is right. In my above scenario, you'd pay $1,500/year (~$125/month) and Stanford would pay $12,300/year ($1025/month).
Yeah, so in that scenario the non PSLF/IBR plans are pretty damn nice. But let's say you're making $100k. How much would you have to pay in Stanford's LRAP in that case?
You really need to contact each school and go through the scenarios with them. They have experts who deal with the intricacies of the program.
This is the explanation of their program:
https://www-cdn.law.stanford.edu/wp-con ... erms-1.pdf

Here is their online calculator for you to play around with:

https://law.stanford.edu/apply/tuition- ... gram-lrap/
Thank you. So it looks like for Stanford's LRAP, it partially depends on how much debt you end up with. If you input $1500 as a monthly loan payment, with $100k income, you would have to pay $18k out of pocket for that year. If you input basically any monthly loan payment above $2000 (i.e. it isn't any different if you type in $3000 or $4000, etc), again with $100k income, you would pay $21.75k for that year.

Basically its a $9750 flat rate plus 60% of your income above 80k as per the PDF. I'm not sure why you don't have to pay as much if your loan payments are less (I know it makes sense since the school won't have to contribute as much) but I didn't read the whole PDF to see where it speaks to that.

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Re: Stanford v NYU v Penn ($) v Michigan ($$)

Post by fliptrip » Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:28 pm

somethingelse55 wrote:
fliptrip wrote:
somethingelse55 wrote:^ Wouldn't Stanford technically not cover the entirety of one's payments under that scenario? If you're only making $60k you would barely have to contribute anything on your own, but it would still be a small percentage I believe.
This is right. In my above scenario, you'd pay $1,500/year (~$125/month) and Stanford would pay $12,300/year ($1025/month).
Yeah, so in that scenario the non PSLF/IBR plans are pretty damn nice. But let's say you're making $100k. How much would you have to pay in Stanford's LRAP in that case?
Yeah, in that case, you're paying the whole bill. But, making $100k/year, you should be able to comfortably service that debt. You'd be spending only 14% of your 43% cap on housing + debt service, so you could do it.

This becomes more stark if you think about two folks with sticker debt at a non-IBR LRAP school and an IBR LRAP school. Let's run those numbers right quick:

You owe $300k, so about $3400/month. You're still making $60k.

At SLS, you still pay $125/month and Stanford covers the rest. If you have undergraduate or other need-based debt, they will cover that too, btw.

At our IBR LRAP school, you're likely paying nothing. If you have no FFEL Direct debt prior, you might qualify for that low $352 payment, which your school might make you take. Otherwise, your payment is $527 on IBR. If you make it five years, and not the full 10 for PSLF forgiveness, you're going to owe $384k :shock: Whereas at Stanford, you've been servicing that debt and will owe only about $175k.

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