Capitalized Interest

When was the last time you pulled up your payment history, scrolled all the way to the back and looked at the amounts of capitalized interest that has been charged to your account? These are the things that I usually don’t like to look at but when I first checked it all out, I mean really really checked it all out, I couldn’t help but to smile. My payment history looks insane. Looking over it makes me wonder how in the hell could this be right. Better yet, how in the hell is this legal and allowed to be right. Just to touch on the capitalized interest issue check out what I have capitalized so far:

November 19, 2007 $ 2420.68

May 11, 2008 $ 772

May 27, 2008 $ 6982.55

November 11, 2008 $ 708.72

November 27, 2008 $ 1441.16

November 29, 2008 $ 1041.35

December 31, 2008 $ 177.53

January 27, 2009 $ 441.84

February 11, 2009 $ 203.10

March 31, 2009 $ 357.95

June 16, 2009 $ 311.25

July 29, 2009 $ 1772.59

September 30, 2009 $ 164.56

December 31, 2009 $ 378.06

January 29, 2010 $ 1198.90

March 16, 2010 $ 313.35

In 2007-2008 I capitalized $ 13,543.99

In 2009 I capitalized $ 3,629.35

So far in 2010 I capitalized $ 1,512.25

Grand Total: $ 18,685.59

So why are my minimum payments getting to be too much? The balance that is used to determine what my monthly payments will be has continued to increase. I wonder if this is why they never sent any payment estimates when you take out loans. I know that my Federal Loans sent me statements with this information, my Perkins loans did as well. I actually like to pay my Perkins loan and check out the statement because that is the only balance I pay on and watch it go down.
Think about it. When you buy a house, car or any other large purchase that needs to be financed there are payment plans and everything is understood (to a certain extent) before the agreement is signed and set in stone. Who would buy a house without knowing what their monthly mortgage would be? Perhaps people with money and no financial concerns wouldn’t, but I assume even most of them would want to be informed of their payment amount. So why is it that when you finance an education the same rules do not apply? Maybe it is because they know the amount you borrow has little to do with the amount used to determine your payments considering the principal grows like a weed.