PSLF vs for profit job

[kaml20]

Hello I am new to the forum and probably like everyone else concerned about my loan repayment options. I have completed my family medicine residency and am completing a sports medicine fellowship by July. My loan status as of now is as follows:

Loan 1: 42K DIRECT SUB CONSOLIDATION LOAN @7.125%
Loan 2: 350K DIRECT UNSUB CONSOLIDATION LOAN @7.125%

By July I will have made roughly 48 on time payments (minus 1 or 2 for forbearance months while renewing my repayment plan). I have had trouble finding positions within sports medicine and am now deciding between the following 2 positions to choose between:

A hospitalist position at a nonprofit hospital which pays 190K yearly
A position in private wound care that pays fee for service with salary fluctuation advertised as 200-300k yearly

The hospitalist position would allow me to continue making PSLF payments and afford me to have investable income
The private position would have me pay down my loan about 100k yearly, live as I am now for 3-4 more years, and allow me to be debt free as soon as possible (I would assume my income would be on the higher end as I'd be working full time).

I know it sounds ridiculous, however I am afraid of what would happen if the PSLF program was to be nullified as my yearly interest would be almost double my yearly payments. For example if the program were to be stopped when I had 1 yr of payments remaining I would have paid about 95K and had about 164K interest accrued in the 5 yrs I would have worked as a hospitalist. That means over a 1/2 million in loans to repay and I'd be 5 yrs older.

I guess my question is how much faith should I put in the PSLF vs finding a for profit job? at what difference in salary does it make financial sense to work for a for profit company and how does one calculate this?

[DMFA]

What's the hospitalist schedule, and does it allow for other work?  You can still earn outside the first job and do PSLF, as long as the first job is 40 hrs/wk and a nonproft/501(c)(3).  If you can moonlight outside of your employed job and make even more money while doing PSLF, you're having your cake and eating it too.

What is the rest of your life like?  How much do you want to work?  Are you content living the way you're living now?  Would you want to leave whatever job you're in to go into sports medicine?

If you're not willing to commit to working 6 more years as a full-time employed physician at a non-profit and are OK living as you are now, then refi to 5-yr var (SoFi has 2.565% not including 0.25% autopay discount) and pay it.  That'll be a monthly payment of about $7,000.  Or, if you don't want to commit to that much, then do 10-yr var at 3.365% for $3,900/month and just pay whatever you can each month.

If you are happy to work as an employed physician at a non-profit (+/- outside moonlighting) for 6 years, stick to income-driven and PSLF, paying the minimum possible (switch to RePAYE or PAYE; IBR is 50% more) each month. At that income, unless you marry another HIP, you won't hit the PFH limit (around $570,000/yr for your loans). Consider building a taxable brokerage account as a "just-in-case" fund if you're not grandfathered in or forgiveness is limited; the former is very unlikely, the latter seems somewhat probable.

[PhysicianOnFIRE]

There's more to consider between the two jobs besides the impact on student loans as they are very different jobs and neither is in the field in which you completed a fellowship. Which would you rather do? More comfortable doing? Which has better lifestyle / location, etc...?

That being said, if you had no strong preference either way, and are only choosing between these two jobs, I would opt for higher pay and an ability to refinance to a lower rate and pay the loans off more quickly.

There is much confusion and uncertainty regarding the future of PSLF. A few recent posts from my SL resource page on the topic from others:

• PSLF — The Time Bomb Goes Off?


• Does Anyone Know If They Qualify for PSLF?


• Here’s What the Latest PSLF Lawsuit Actually Means and How FedLoan Servicing Messed Up Big

If the jobs and pay were equivalent, I would still consider opting for PSLF, but that is clearly not the case here.

 

Best,

-PoF

[Miss Bonnie MD]

I would choose the job you like better, not based on PSLF. Unless things being equal which they don't sound like it.

[adventure]

Hey, my wife is a sports medicine doc.

Here was how we decided. You may, or may not find these questions valuable

1. Do you want to pursue a SM job?

- If so, what kind? Ortho office? Team doc? Family and sports? Rural ER? This may heavily influence where you can work.

- If not, what do you want to do?

- Do you have a job or offer yet? Do you want it? If you are doing X, and you wake up in 3 months, will you be happy? How about waking up next week? ... I know there are currently a number of SM positions posted across the country, which are actively hiring... Are you limited to geography? Are you just having no luck? If you want to do SM, don't give up now, if it's not a key thing, no worries, find something that suits you.

 

2. We decided $ was not a reason to do a certain job. We chose based on lifestyle, quality of life, type of career (sports med, in this case). We wanted a job that would make us happy, long term. 100% clinic or 100% IP wasn't going to do that. Getting in a high paying job, then being unhappy won't put you ahead $wise, or career wise long term. Getting the right job, no, career, was more important and would pay off over the long term.

If being a hospitalist sounds great, then go for it. Pretty different than sports though, which is fine. If you want to be a team doc, then that kind of limits your choices. If you want to do family, then you have more choices.

I'd say

first, determine what kind of work you want to do

second, determine where that puts you (geographically, type of institution)

third, deal with loans, refinance, maybe PSLF, etc if that's an option.

 

-- I agree w/ the folks above, if all else was equal, then yeah, PSLF seems good, but we humans tend to care what we do all day, and what kind of work we do, and we want to be happy. Don't make the decision on wondering if PSLF will be around, make it on what you want to do tomorrow. I think anyway, you'll have the cash flow to pay off the loans, some how, so

And congrats on almost being done w/ fellowship!