4 things student loan borrowers should do before July 1

MoneyWatch: Managing Your Money 4 things student loan borrowers should do before July 1 We may receive commissions from some links to products on this page. Promotions are subject to availability and retailer terms. .chip { background-image: url('/fly/bundles/cbsnewscore/images/chip-bgd/chip-bgd-moneywatch.jpg'); } By Angelica Leicht Angelica Leicht Senior Editor, Managing Your Money Angelica Leicht is the senior editor for the Managing Your Money section for CBSNews.com, where she writes and edits articles on a range of personal finance topics. Angelica previously held editing roles at The Simple Dollar, Interest, HousingWire and other financial publications. Read Full Bio Angelica Leicht June 2, 2026 / 2:03 PM EDT / CBS News Add CBS News on Google The student loan decisions you make in the coming weeks could impact your balance for the foreseeable future. Jinda Noipho/Getty Images For most of the past decade, the smartest thing many federal student loan borrowers could do was wait — whether that meant waiting for a payment pause to be extended, waiting for a forgiveness program to clear the courts or waiting for the rules to settle. That wait-and-see strategy is about to backfire for many borrowers, though. On July 1, the federal student loan system will stop being something borrowers can ride out and become something they have to actively manage.That shift traces back to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which the Education Department is using to collapse a tangle of repayment plans, cap how much families can borrow and unwind the SAVE program that has kept millions of student loan borrowers in payment limbo. These changes will have a direct and clear impact on the federal student loans landscape, and unlike past overhauls, much of it lands on a single date. That, in turn, leaves a narrow runway for borrowers. And, whether you're a parent weighing a student loan for your child, a graduate student mapping out tuition or a borrower who hasn't logged into y...