Hecs – is your higher education loan free money or a debt sentence? Let’s take a look at what we’ve signed up for:
Education can be really expensive
Fortunately, government loan schemes ensure we (young Aussies) can access higher education. In Australia, we have HECS (for undergraduate study) and FEE-HELP (for postgrad and vocational courses).
The government pays your university fees now, and you pay the government back as you earn. It is basically an interest free loan for the purposes of tertiary study.
When do you pay your HECS debt?
When you start earning an annual income above $45,881, you will be required to start repaying your HECS debt. But this number changes each year.
The repayment system is structured so that you repay increasingly more as you earn a higher income.
How much debt do I have?
More than 2.9 million Australians have an outstanding HECS debt, with an average of $21,577 debt outstanding per person. You can check your HECS balance out here: www.myHELPbalance.gov.au
Unfortunately HECs is not free money. It is however, some friendly friendly debt... Interest free, paid from pre-tax income & only payable when you earn above an income threshold
