If you are like many Americans, you have a large amount of student loans looming over your head like a black cloud. Student debt is not something that is uncommon in today’s world, but can it keep you from owning a home?

In order to understand the type of effect your student loan will have on your ability to get a mortgage, it is important to know the two basic types of debt that a mortgage lender looks at. The first type of debt is an installment loan. An installment loan is a debt that you must pay a fixed amount every month. Your student debt is considered an installment loan just like auto loans, mortgages, etc.

Installment loans, specifically student loans, have an impact on your lender’s decision on granting you a mortgage. While the impact of large installment loans can be adverse, it is unlikely to be as detrimental as large amounts of revolving credit (which ordinarily come from credit cards). In other words, student loan debt is more favorable than credit card debt so having a large amount of student loans is not going to look as bad on your credit score as having a couple maxed out credit cards.

However, if you have student loans and you do not take them seriously, you could adversely affect your credit a great deal. Many students use their student debt to begin building their credit history. If you default on your student loans, your credit score will be greatly affected. That is why it is so important to make payments on your student loans on time every month to avoid those dings on your credit history.

If you are planning on applying for a mortgage in the near future, it is important to start paying down your student loans. But it is more important to pay down your other debts as well. The federal government allows many forms of aid to help you repay your student loans. For instance, the normal repayment program allows you up to 25 years to pay off the loan in small monthly installments. There is a consolidation option which allows a borrower to combine several student loans into one easy to manage payment each month. This often results in a lower monthly payment and longer repayment terms. You can also choose to defer your loan payments for several years if you have a financial hardship.

With all of these options available to help you repay your student loans, defaulting on your payments is the worst option to take if you ever plan on having a mortgage. Keep your student loan payments up to date and they won’t have the horrible impact on your credit history that you may have originally thought.

Everyone knows how hard it is to get a decent rate in today’s market. Only a handful of banks offer savings rates greater than 1% APY and CD rates over 2%. So when you see a higher-than-average-rate, it's hard not to jump at the chance to get a good return for your money. After all, deposits are FDIC insured up to $250,000 so you won't lose your money even if the bank fails, as long as you deposit your money in a product that carries FDIC insurance like regular savings accounts and CDs. However, if the bank is in poor financial health, should you still deposit your money there?

The FDIC assures consumers that no depositor has ever lost a penny of insured deposits since the FDIC was created in 1933, so you can be sure that the money you invested in FDIC insured accounts will be protected. However, it may take a few days for you to get your money back.

Depending on how the FDIC chooses to resolve the bank failure, one of two things could happen. The preferred and most common method of resolution involves a healthy bank acquiring the failed bank. In this scenario, the insured deposits of the failed bank become deposits in the acquiring bank and your money is available immediately. When there is no bank acquirer for the deposits, the FDIC will pay the depositor directly by check up to the insured balance in each account. Federal law requires the FDIC to make payments of insured deposit “as soon as possible.” Most payments usually begin within a few days after the bank closing. While the FDIC notes that every bank failure is unique, they follow standard policies and procedures so that most deposit insurance payments are made within two business days of the bank failure.

The reality is that it is safe to deposit money in a bank which is at risk of failure as long as you stay well within FDIC coverage limits. It however is important for consumers to be aware of their bank’s financial health and to understand exactly what their FDIC insurance coverage is. For more information on matters related to holding deposits in a bank that faces possible FDIC seizure, please read this article.

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We all know that PayPal is an easy way to make purchases and to send money from person to person. When you use your debit, credit card or PayPal credit account to make a personal transfer (if you send money to your child, for example), PayPal receives a fee of 2.9% + $0.30. Now, banks want to get in on that market.

Last week, a press release from clearXchange announced Bank of America, Chase and Wells Fargo are forming a partnership so that consumers can make person-to-person payments electronically amongst the three banks. In the press release, Mike Kennedy, EVP and Head of Payments Strategy at Wells Fargo, indicates they launched the venture because they “want our customers to be able to easily send money to anyone without having to establish a new account outside their primary bank.” The banks are endeavoring to make transferring money between their banks even easier than using PayPal as well: the only thing someone has to know is the email address or mobile phone number of the person they want to send money to, and the banks will take care of the rest.

The LA Times reports that Bank of America and Wells Fargo are already testing the payment option in Arizona, and Chase will soon join them. The new service will be free to customers while it’s being tested, and the banks will later separate fee structures. After the network goes national, other banks will be invited to join.

This isn’t the first time PayPal has gotten competitors; in 2007, Amazon launched Amazon Payments. PayPal soon responded by launching PayPal X, so that its platform is opened up to developers to build person-to-person payments on multiple platforms, not only PayPal. It will be interesting to see how PayPal will respond this time, after the new bank partnership goes national.