I owed over 20 thousand in debt. I have a personal loan for 16, 000. I've been paying 500 a month for three months and I still owe 15, 563.00 with a 19.9% finance rate. I have two credit cards for 1,500 together. I have a macy's store card. And I'm financing a dell computer for 1000. I have a student loan for 7000.00. what should I do. My credit score is 680 at the moment. I'm looking into buying a house in three years. If I consolidate now would it affect me then. I'm graduating college next year and should have a salary of 80,000. Please help me making this decision

First, don't be so sure you will earn $80,000 right out of college. Get the job first, or don't count your eggs until they hatch. If you are still a junior, you have several things to do before purchasing a house. Keep the student loan as is. It is probably a lower interest rate, and maybe you don't have to start paying it back until you graduate. I wonder why you needed a personal loan. Find a calculator on the internet, put in the percentage, loan amount, and the $500.00 you are paying each month. It will tell you how long it will take to pay at that rate. Probably about six to seven years. The 19.9% rate is way to high for a college student with that amount outstanding. But now you have the loan, you need to pay it. Consolidating these loans probably won't make much difference. I would go to consumer counselors and they can help you sort out this mess and educate you on credit so that you may not be in this jam again. (PS I've been there big time for a long time, just paid them off $130,000 in four years. It is very tiresome to keep thinking about money.)

It concerns me that you would consider combining your Student Loans together with other private loans. And are your Student Loans--Federal Student Loans?

If your Student Loans are in fact Federal Student Loans, combining private loans and the Student Loans together would cause you to lose all of your Federal Benefits that are attached to your Federal Student Loans. This includes your unlimited “In School” Deferment, your Federal subsidies, and your 36 months of Forbearance and Deferment if you ever need a temporary timeout on your monthly payments.

Also, your Federal Student Loan interest is tax deductible, which is another benefit that you would lose if you were to lump the two debt amounts together.

If you are concerned about improving your credit score I would suggest looking into the FFELP Consolidation Loan Program. Improving your credit score is one of the many benefits of this program, while at the same time allowing you to retain all your Federal Student Loan Benefits. For more information on combining your Federal Student Loan debt with other debt, please see the source below.

Good luck, I hope this helps!