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Student loan troubles...help?  

post #1 of 9
Thread Starter 
Here is my situation. For a variety of reasons, we've had very low income since being out of college. I've been late on many student loan payments, and my monthly payments were huge to start with ($800+ a month for one loan, around $130 a month for another). Since I was late, my interest rate skyrocketed, and my credit score has gone down, far. I've looked into consolidation, but since they are private loans, not federal, no one will consolidate them. We asked our bank about it a year ago, and they were like, "Sure, how much are your loans? $15k?" Umm, no...I owe $71k to Sallie Mae and $16k to another company. Of the $71k to Sallie Mae, over $44k of that is interest alone. I am so scared and so screwed. Help? What can I do? I keep going round and round in this circle of being late on payments because they're so high, then the credit score getting lower, then not being able to consolidate even if I CAN find someone who will consolidate private loans.

And all of this is for a useless associates degree at a school that now has an awful reputation. My husband went there, too (so we have his student loans to pay, too), and when he goes on interviews, he is constantly told that our school is viewed as a joke by our respective industries. So needless to say, we're not exactly bringing in a huge amount of money.
post #2 of 9
Not sure what you're asking. There's not much to do about them except pay them or get them into deferment or forbearance. Then generally can't even be included in a bankruptcy.
post #3 of 9
Have you tried calling Sallie Mae to see what you can work out with them?
post #4 of 9
Where did you go to school?

You can't bankrupt Federally subsidized/unsbubsidized student loans but you *may* be able to bankrupt private student loans. I'd talk to an attorney.
post #5 of 9
My sociology instructor showed us a dateline piece on Sallie Mae and what a complete nightmare it is to borrow from them. I hope you can work something out that's more managable. s:
post #6 of 9
Quote:
Originally Posted by SherryR View Post
My sociology instructor showed us a dateline piece on Sallie Mae and what a complete nightmare it is to borrow from them. I hope you can work something out that's more managable. s:
My DH's student loan is through SM, and we haven't had any problems, but this makes me glad we took out our most recent one through a different company.
post #7 of 9
I'm glad you've had a good experience, I'm sure a lot of others have, too. I've never had any dealings with them and I don't know anyone personally who borrowed from them. And I'm sure for this piece they did, they found the worst "cases" they could, as happens so often, unfortunately.

Oh, I found it; it wasn't Dateline, it was 60 minutes.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/...n1591583.shtml
post #8 of 9
They offer an "interest only" option that I've done when money is tight. This way the interest doesn't keep going up, even if you're not paying down any principle.

The other people are right, though. If your credit is already way low, and you're getting nothing from the education to make you any money, look into bankrupting.
post #9 of 9
I know this is probably not realistic, but if you enroll as an evening student somewhere to finish a BA you can defer your loans. There are also weekend programs with some schools. I would also look into deferment and contact the lenders directly. I have a hard time with your payment plan. I have 61k in student loan debt (law degree) and my payment after consolidation is 383.56 a month. It will increase over time, but not substantially for at least 5 years.
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