# Andre Vargas, AFC® — Senior Financial Educator | SB Loan > Andre Vargas is an Accredited Financial Counselor with eight years in nonprofit credit counseling and financial coaching, focused on payday lending alternatives and budgeting for lower-income households. Источник: https://sbloan.net/authors/andre-vargas/ --- # Andre Vargas, AFC® Senior Financial Educator at SB Loan. An Accredited Financial Counselor who spent eight years in nonprofit credit guidance and personal coaching — making small-dollar loans and their substitutes understandable for everyday people. AV **Andre Vargas, AFC®** · AFCPE-accredited **On this page** Background Certifications Expertise Reviewed articles Conflict disclosure Contact info ## Professional background Andre Vargas is the Senior Financial Educator at SB Loan, where she leads educational content for working households navigating short-term cash gaps. She holds the Accredited Financial Counselor (AFC®) designation from the AFCPE and earned a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 2016. After graduating, Andre joined a United Way financial-stability center in Milwaukee as a financial coach, running intake assessments for families facing eviction, utility shutoff, and payday-loan rollover cycles. In 2018 she completed her NFCC credit-counseling certification and stepped into a senior coaching role, mentoring newer coaches and writing the curriculum for the center's monthly money-skills workshops. From 2019 through 2023 Andre was Lead Counselor at a nonprofit credit-counseling agency in Minneapolis, where she facilitated more than 1,600 one-on-one sessions, designed a debt-management-plan template later adopted by two partner agencies, and built a self-paced budgeting course for first-time borrowers. She joined SB Loan in 2023 to carry that educational mission to a national audience — the same plain-language explainers and alternatives-first framing, delivered at the moment a household searches for help. Andre authors money pages and reviews state-specific cost content for accuracy and tone. ## Certifications held **Accredited Financial Counselor (AFC®)** AFCPE Accredited Financial Counselor (AFC®) · Active since 2018 **NFCC Certified Credit Counselor** National Foundation for Credit Counseling · Certified 2018 **BA Sociology** University of Wisconsin–Madison · 2016 **Years of experience** 8 years in nonprofit credit counseling and financial education ## Specialized knowledge areas - **Payday lending** — cost structure, rollover mechanics, state regulatory variation - **Debt management plans (DMPs)** — eligibility, creditor concessions, plan design - **Small-dollar alternatives** — PALs, employer EWA, nonprofit hardship grants - **Financial coaching** — goal-setting, behavior change, crisis-to-stability planning - **Household budgeting** — low- and moderate-income cash-flow planning ## Content Andre has reviewed Andre authored or reviewed the following pages on SB Loan: - [Payday Loans Online — Compare 23+ State-Licensed Lenders (2026)](/payday-loans/) - [15 Payday Loan Alternatives Ranked by Cost](/payday-loan-alternatives/) - [What is a Payday Loan? Plain-English Explainer](/learn/what-is-a-payday-loan/) - [Payday Loans in Texas: Laws, Rates, Limits & Alternatives](/state/texas/) ## Disclosure of potential conflicts **Disclosure.** Andre holds no securities in any company covered here. SB Loan pays her a fixed salary with no per-loan referral incentive. She has no outside consulting relationships with lenders, lead generators, or debt-relief firms, and volunteers unpaid hours with an NFCC-affiliated agency near her home. ## How to reach Andre For editorial questions, corrections, or interview requests, contact editor@sbloan.net. #### About our authors Each piece of content on SB Loan is crafted by a qualified author and receives a final review from another team member. [View our team of 6 authors](/authors/) --- #### Editorial standards [Review our editorial policy →](/editorial-policy/) [Our fact-checking steps →](/fact-checking-policy/) [Updates and corrections →](/corrections/)