To consolidate, or not to consolidate... that is my question.?

look closely at the consolidation contract and check on the length of the new loan. Before I consolidated my loans were to be paid back over 10 yrs. consolidation terms was 20 yrs, so the interest rate and the monthly payment was much less but I would have paid back a lot more than the original loan because they doubled the payment period. I still consolidated and told them to change it to a 5 yr loan instead of 20 and that was perfect for me. the interest rate was the same as for the 20 yrs and they did not charge me any type of fees for taking the shorter payoff period