<prompt> Human: Ill be in college for the next 4 years and will probably graduate with at least 40k-50k in student loans. Ive pretty much established the avalanche method is the way to go but now Im looking to minimize the debt as much as possible and pay it off as fast as possible. Some of the loans dont rack up interest until after I graduate so anywhere I can save is a huge plus. Any advice on living cheap for the next few years till Im debt free will be greatly appreciated. Cheap meals, any money saving life hacks, any advice. Also, I have a few questions about how loans work. Is the interest x of the total loan or the unpaid part? Or is this specific to the loan? When people say theyll pay off the interest first, how does that translate to saving money? Is the interest amount just added to a total unpaid amount every year?Assistant: Any advice on living cheap for the next few years till Im debt free will be greatly appreciated. The largest expense you can easily minimize is housing. You can minimize that expense by either living with family or with roommates after college. You can also drive older cars and avoid eating out at restaurants to save money. Loans work like this:The amount you borrow is the principal amount. Lets go with 50k. You agreed to an interest rate when you took out the loans, and there may be different interest rates for different loans, but for simplicitys sake well go with 7.Each month, you will have to make a minimum payment on your loans. The minimum payment is the result of the terms of the loan--how much was borrowed, at what interest rate, and for how long. If you borrow 50k at 7 for ten years, your minimum monthly loan payment will be about 580. You can play around with this student loan payment calculator to see how that works. If you continue to make the minimum monthly payment each month for ten years, eventually youll have paid around 69k to pay off your debt of 50k. That additional 19k was all interest. If you pay off your loans faster, by making higher monthly payments, youll actually pay less interest in total, because you owed the money for less time. You could pay off 50k in loans over 5 years by paying 990 per month, and then youll have only paid about 9k in interest over the life of the loan. The interest accumulates each period, probably per month, and it is just 7 of the total left of the 50k. When you make your monthly payment, some of the money will pay down the accumulated interest on the loans, and some will reduce the principal still owed. If, in the middle of paying down your loans you have 30k left of the principal to pay off, then the interest for a month will be 712 months x 30k 175. Human: Great advice and thanks for the thorough explanation  <response>: Another thing to add about loans and living situation in college: If you find that you borrowed more than you needed for a semester, you can return the money to the school and ask them to return a portion of your loans. This reduces the origination fees and saves you some money.A Super Simplified Example:You are going to live in an apartment that costs 500 a month. You have a month-to-month commitment, and are going to live there for the whole school year. Well call that 6 months.Because 6500 3,000. You borrow an extra 3,000 on top of what you need to pay for tuition. The school pays themselves first with any other loansgrantsscholarships, and you get a 3,000 refund check to pay your rent.Then it turns out that you actually dont need to stay there the 6th month. Now you have this extra 500 you dont need. So you go to the Financial Aid office and you tell them that you want to reduce your loans by 500. If you have multiple loans, you tell them to reduce the one with the highest interest rate. If they all have the same interest rate, you want to reduce private loans first, then unsubsidized Federal loans, then subsidized federal loans.I hope that makes sense. It can get a little hairy and a lot of schools dont have time to explain in thorough detail, but with a little research like using this sub you should be able to reason through it if that comes up. 