The Iron Lady R.I.P.

[JoeRock]

@JoeRock, no disrespect mate, but when you get out into the non-student world that £30k of debt is going to cripple you in ways you can't even imagine.

I started out with only £5k of debt and it screwed me for several years, I shudder to think what 30 would do.

Was that a student loan though fella, and if so, did you start H.E between 1990 and 1997? As I started mine a lot later than that my loan has no effect on my credit rating, so really doesn't play that big a part at all. If I don't end up in a well paying job (over £21k) then I don't pay it back either, and if after 30 years I've not paid it all back then it gets cancelled.
For me, because of the nature of the work I want to enter I'm assuming that I will end up paying it back, but it is extremely unlikely that I won't earn £30k more over the course of my lifetime with a degree than without it (just because I can't enter my planned place of work without one!) What I pay back over a year is basically 9% of my salary after 21k. So If I'm on say £31k, then i have to pay £900 of my loan back, about £75 a month. The only time it will make life a bit more difficult is if I emigrate (which I'm planning on doing for a year or two after uni to teach scuba diving) as the payment threshold is quite a bit lower in most other countries, so what I'd probably end up doing is asking the company I work for to instead of giving me a higher salary, pay for my rent or similar instead, so that my salary is less and I don't lose as much from my student loan repayments on it whilst I'm not in a well paying job!