The Average Debt for College Students

College students can wrack up so much debt that they feel the only option is to flee the country -- 2 to 4 percent of student loans are owed by borrowers abroad and most of this is assumed to be noncollectable, according to Jen Haley of CNN. The average student has tens of thousands of dollars in student loans and thousands more in credit card debt.

Student Loan Debt

Student loan debt makes up the vast majority of debt holding by students, because the federal government does not require good credit or a cosigner to take out a federal student loans. Two-thirds of college students borrow money to pay for college and the average senior in 2009 graduated with about $24,000 in debt, according to Jacques Steinberg of The New York Times. Between 1994 and 2011, the average amount borrowed rose every year, with percentages varying between 1.7 and 17, according to The Wall Street Journal. The average rise in student loan debt is about 6 percent a year.

Student Credit Card Debt

Eighty-four percent of college students held at least one credit card, according to a 2009 Sallie Mae survey. Students who had a credit card racked up an average of $4,138 by the time they graduated in 2008. Including students without a credit card, the average undergraduate has $3,173 in credit card debt. More disturbing is that many students use credit cards to pay for college expenses. Thirty percent use credit cards for tuition and 92 percent used credit to pay for textbooks and other expenses.

Effects

Debt prevents millions of college students from attaining the big-ticket items that many expect from entering adulthood. Thirty-nine percent of students claim they will be paying off their debt for at least 10 years and 28 percent said debt interfered with their "rites of passage," such as acquiring a mortgage, according to a 2006 Mathew Greenwald & Associates survey.

Tip

Ideally, parents should educate their children about handling credit cards before they go off to college and plan a yearly budget in advance. Congress passed credit card regulatory reform in 2009, which makes it impossible for students to acquire a credit card unless they can prove an income or get a parent to cosign on the account. The student and parents will also have to weigh the costs and benefits of a public versus private school. Private school tuition can cost double that of a comparable public school.