How To Avail A Personal Loan For An Executive MBA Degree

If you are a working professional, there may be times when it has crossed your mind that a management degree will help you in your work and your career. You are aware that completing the course will help you improve and expand your professional network, help you think outside the box, familiarise yourself with national and local regulatory frameworks and trends, as well as provide you better job opportunities. However, you are constrained as you need to continue working to support yourself and your family. Secondly, you do not have enough savings to cover the cost of admission and course fees.

Fortunately, there are many reputed academic institutions offering Executive MBA degree courses for working professionals. This is a post-graduate management programme especially designed for professionals who have a minimum amount of working experience. This minimum amount may vary from institute to institute. Some offer full-time courses while others offer part-time courses which allow you to keep working while earning.

There are also several banks and NBFCs which offer personal loans for educational purposes or educational loans for Executive MBA programmes. In this article we discuss how to go about getting a personal loan so that you can enrol in an Executive MBA programme while continuing to work.

The first thing you need to do is find out the personal loan eligibility criteria. Most lenders will first look at your credit score, a metric maintained by credit rating agencies which is a mark of your credit worthiness. This needs to be 750 or more, though this may vary from lender to lender. In general, the better your score, the better are the interest terms you will be entitled to.

Lenders will also verify your ability to repay the EMI. They will do this by verifying your saving and spending patterns from your recent bank statements. It will stand you in good stead if you make a clear budget for yourself to find out how much you can set aside each month for EMI payments. Following this, use a personal loan EMI calculator available on websites like IIFL Finance, to find out how different interest rates and loan terms affect the EMI.

Compare the terms and conditions, and the personal loan eligibility criteria offered by different lenders when you apply for loans under the Personal Loan category. It is also wise to check whether there are any other loan products which may be better suited to your needs. (You will find our article on “Loan against securities or personal loan which is better option for you” useful in this regard). There are several banks and NBFCs offering online personal loan facilities. Many of them have an online assistant – usually chatbots – that answer basic questions about eligibility and documentation. Some will offer you a call-back. Research well to shortlist the lenders offering you the best terms and conditions before you apply for a loan.

Once you have shortlisted your lender, go to their website and go to the “Online Loan Apply” section. Some platforms may also encourage you to download their app. The app is often useful to help track a loan once the personal loan is approved and the funds transferred. Upload the necessary documents. This usually includes address and identity proof, PAN details, salary and income details and recent bank statements.

Once you have uploaded/submitted the documents, the lender will take a decision regarding whether or not to offer you a loan and the interest rate they can offer you. This could take a few hours or a couple of days depending on the lender. Sign the loan agreement only if you are confident that the terms offered are the best in the market for the loan for your Executive MBA program. Once an agreement is signed and the loan amount transferred to your account, it is next to impossible to cancel the loan agreement. You can learn more about this in our article on “How do I cancel personal loan after deal confirmation?”

Enrolling for an Executive MBA programme from a reputed institute is a useful way to further your career. Do check the several loan products offered by IIFL Finance to decide which one is best for you.