Students who graduated in May with student loans may be facing six-month grace periods that are ending sometime this month. Once those grace periods end, graduates will be entering repayment on those loans. With multiple student loans in repayment, graduates will likely be juggling multiple bills, multiple due dates, and multiple monthly payments. To help make their student loan repayment easier to manage, NextStudent, a leading Phoenix-based education funding company, encourages May graduates to consider consolidating their eligible federal student loans with a Federal Consolidation Loan.

With the student loan consolidation program, graduates can bundle all their eligible federal student loans into one single consolidation loan with one lender, one monthly bill, and one monthly payment. Besides offering convenience and less hassle, a Federal Consolidation Loan gives graduates the security of a fixed interest rate -- they won't have to worry about variable interest rates going higher, leaving them guessing about their monthly payment amount. And because a student loan consolidation could extend the repayment term on their student loans by up to 20 years, graduates may be able to lower their monthly student loan payment amount, cutting their monthly payments by up to 50 percent.

To be eligible for student loan consolidation , a federal student loan must be in repayment, in a grace period, or in an authorized forbearance or deferment period. Graduates consolidating their student loans cannot currently be attending school more than half time. Parents with Federal PLUS Loans may also consolidate their parent loans with a Federal Consolidation Loan. However, parents and students may not consolidate parent loans in the parent's name with student loans in the student's name.

There's never any cost to apply for a Federal Consolidation Loan with NextStudent, and there are no fees, no credit checks, and no co-signers required. There are also no prepayment penalties, so graduates who consolidate their student loans will never be charged for paying more than the minimum each month or for paying off their student consolidation loan early.

Graduates who have private student loans in addition to (or instead of) federal student loans won't be able to consolidate their private loans with the federal student loan consolidation program. But graduates looking for the same convenience of a single consolidated loan for their private student loans may be eligible to consolidate their private loans separately with a NextStudent Private Consolidation Loan .