You can consolidate your federal student loans too, but make sure that you do not consolidate both your federal student loans and private student loans into a single student loan debt consolidation program. Just as other debt consolidation loans, you must make your student loan debt consolidation payments to a single lender, who further disburses to your old creditors.

To go for debt consolidation of your student loans, your minimum balance should be $5,000, and you must either be in the six month grace period after your studies, or are already repaying your student loan.

Before selecting your student loan debt consolidation option, review all the advantages and the disadvantages:

• Through debt consolidation you make your student loan payments to a single lender.

• Depending on the balance of your loan amount, your consolidated student loan has an extended repayment term from 10 to 30 years.

• When negotiating with your bank or financial institutions, ensure that your phased repayment plan allows you to easily meet your monthly payments and have a good credit rating, at the same time.

• The rate of interest for student loan debt consolidation is capped at 8.25 percent for federal student loans.

• Once the rate is fixed you cannot take advantage if the interest rates fall in future.

• There are no fees charged for student loan debt consolidation.

• Once approved, you cannot undo your debt consolidation of your student loans as they have already repaid in full to your previous creditors, and they no longer exist.

You can still obtain debt consolidation for your over due, or unfulfilled, student loans if you negotiate a satisfactory repayment plan with your bank, or debt consolidation lender. Married couples, too, can consolidate their individual student loans together. This is regardless of how much each owns before consolidation, and must now agree to pay the consolidated amount.