Can finding a good deal hurt your credit?

The New York Times has an interesting article about student loan borrowers. Whenever you apply for a loan, or a company runs a credit check on you for any reason, your credit score takes a small ding. When shopping for most types of loans, such as a mortgage or car loan, you only get penalized once for any credit checks that happen within the same time period. However, this doesn't apply to student loans, and if your credit score goes down, your interest rates can go up. This means that shopping around for the best rate on your private student loans can actually end up causing you to have to pay back more on your loans. You can read the whole article here.