Going overseas with a student loan

If you leave New Zealand for 6 months or more, you will generally have to pay interest on your student loan (currently 6.6%). Although there are some exceptions, such as when you are studying overseas or working for the government.

Once you’re living overseas you'll then need to make repayments twice a year to Inland Revenue – unless you’re on a ‘repayment holiday’.

A repayment holiday allows you to take a break from your student loan repayments for up to 3 years.

Repayment holidays don't stop interest accruing on your loan though, so you may want to make some voluntary payments.

And if you make voluntary repayments of $500 or more in a tax year while you’re overseas, you could also get the new voluntary repayment bonus - 10% of your voluntary repayment credited to your student loan account.

You can see the impact of going overseas with or without a repayment holiday in our updated Student loan calculator.

More information:

Overseas interest exemptions

Overseas repayments

Repayment holidays

Voluntary repayment bonus