Costs of Dental School

Cost of Dental Education Going up 60% or more for 7 out of 10 schools in Fall 2018

Official Townie

If anybody you know is getting a DMD or doing a specialty program starting in July 2018 or later, they better be able to actually pay all their loans back based on what Trump has proposed.

There's huge news boiling under the surface that not many people are aware of with Trump's desired changes to student loan repayment starting July 1, 2018 (the Republican Congress should support this too, so I view it as independent of the president). It's supposed to affect only new borrowers at that time.

Folks enrolled already in school should have access to PAYE and REPAYE, as well as current borrowers. However, any new loans taken out past that point for a degree program you're not already in would NOT be subject to the same protections that exist currently.

For the entering class in fall 2018, I do not expect they will have REPAYE, PAYE, or PSLF to fall back on. Instead, they'll have to pay 12.5% of their income for 30 years under the Trump plan until the remaining balance is "forgiven," meaning they'll owe a lump sum in taxes as if the forgiveness was a taxable bonus.

Here's how it works, say John is a rising senior who is applying to DS for fall 2018. He's planning on borrowing everything to finance his education. I expect the baseline scenario will be leaving with $400,000 in loans by spring 2022. We'll say his long term earnings are just "average" and that he makes about 175k adjusted for inflation for the remainder of his career.

I'm listing PAYE and REPAYE on there so you can see the cost difference. The Trump plan is almost double the cost of PAYE under current rules in this scenario.

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Granted, that cash flow is over 30 years, not 20 as in PAYE, but I've adjusted those dollars to the present to look at them too, and the cost in 2017 dollar terms is still way more. For a typical borrower who depended on loan forgiveness, I expect the cost to go up around 60% on average long term.

Summary

If we ask the question, is dental school a good idea financially for the average dentist, we should look to the median earnings and compare that to the median burden of borrowing for the education. My rule of thumb for being able to actually repay student debt is a long term debt to income ratio below 2. If it's below that, then you're probably going to be debt free one day. If not, then you're likely throwing yourself at the mercy of government repayment programs.

So by my calculations, 7 out of 10 dental schools will produce an economically nonviable product (for their median graduate) by spring 2022. You could make the argument that the REPAYE and PAYE plans allow high-cost schools to continue to exist, but I think the Trump proposal would kill that myth.

What Schools I Expect Will Eventually Have Trouble Attracting Applicants

Here's the list of schools I expect will not be good economic deals for the median dental student by the graduating class of 2022 under the Trump plan. I'm basing this based on a projected loan balance of $350,000 or above for an in state dental student borrowing the full cost of education. I'm assuming that the typical students going to these schools below will not be able to actually repay their student loans based on owing more than double their income long term, and will thus stick to the Trump repayment plan until forgiveness.

Midwestern University IL (projected debt load: $638,000 in 2022)

New York University College of Dentistry

A.T. Still University

Midwestern University AZ

USC Herman Ostrow School of Dentistry

University of Pennsylvania

University of the Pacific

Loma Linda University

Missouri School of Dentistry & Oral Health at ATSU

Tufts University

Western University of Health Sciences

Columbia University

Case Western Reserve University

Boston University

The University of Detroit Mercy School

Creighton University School of Dentistry

Harvard School of Dental Medicine

University of New England

Nova Southeastern University

Touro College of Dental Medicine at New York Medical College

Medical University of South Carolina College of Dental Medicine

University of Washington School of Dentistry

Roseman University of Health Sciences College of Dental Medicine

University of California, San Francisco School of Dentistry

LECOM School of Dental Medicine

Marquette University School of Dentistry

Temple University Kornberg School of Dentistry

Oregon Health Sciences University School of Dentistry

Virginia Commonwealth University School of Dentistry

University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine

Meharry Medical College School of Dentistry

University of California, Los Angeles School of Dentistry

Stony Brook University School of Dental Medicine

University of Minnesota School of Dentistry

University of Michigan School of Dentistry

Rutgers School of Dental Medicine

University of Nevada, Las Vegas School of Dental Medicine

University of Buffalo School of Dental Medicine

Ohio State University College of Dentistry

University of Florida College of Dentistry

University of Colorado (projected debt load: $352,000 in 2022)

Free dental student loan calculator

Travis Hornsby, CFA

Student loan consultant & Founder

Student Loan Planner, LLC

travis@studentloanplanner.com

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Cost of Dental Education Going up 60% or more for 7 out of 10 schools in Fall 2018

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Official Townie

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Do we have a list of the cheapest schools? I pretty much think it doesn't matter where you graduated anymore as long as you get your license. The cheaper school may just be the way to go.

Here's the list of the cheapest schools that I built, sorted from most to least expensive. Anything that I'm projecting a debt financed cost of education of under $350,000 for in state I consider "cheap"

University of Connecticut (my projected 2022 debt estimate $347,980)

Indiana University School of Dentistry

Howard University College of Dentistry

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Dentistry

University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Dentistry

University of Maryland School of Dentistry

University of Utah School of Dentistry

University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Dentistry

University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry

University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry

University of Kentucky College of Dentistry

Louisiana State University Health Science Center School of Dentistry

University of Louisville School of Dentistry

East Carolina University School of Dentistry

University of Mississippi Medical Center School of Dentistry

University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio Dental School

The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston School of Dentistry

The Dental College of Georgia at Augusta University

University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Dentistry

West Virginia University School of Dentistry

Southern Illinois University School of Dental Medicine

The University of Iowa College of Dentistry and Dental Clinics

Texas A&M University Baylor College of Dentistry