In repayment for 16 years and no end in sight
Submitted by jpdc on Thu, 12/08/2005 - 11:02pm.
I consolidated one of my massive loans ~1990 and got stuck with an interest rate of 9%. I was legally only allowed to "reconsolidate" for a measly .5% reduction. Needless to say I have paid incredible interest so far and minimal reduction in my principle...that is only one loan. The other loan with DHHS....I have only barely kept interest at bay for the past 16 years....a 9K loan is now 46K and growing as the interest is variable. I have been politically active over the years but without much result on this problem (senators, congressman). This site appears to be very new but with some effort it can become a cornerstone for the massess to fight back.
...and they will have my phone number in the afterlife!
My $20k loan is now over $100k because of illness resulting in default, then out of default and consolidation, now with forbearance but continuing accumulating interest, and I can't even work in the field I went to school for. I declared bankruptcy but of course could discharge none of the SL debt. I am more than willing to pay back the original amount of the loan plus reasonable interest, but this financial burden amounts to usury, in my opinion. I have written two congress people, a Governor and the DOE...polite replies saying, “Sorry, nothing we can do.” There was a point in my life where I welcomed death, thinking how my life insurance would pay off this massive debt, therefore protecting my son. I’m sure they will enslave him with this if it’s not paid off when I leave this earth. I have a better attitude about it now though, hoping to one day be able to afford a good attorney to help me strip this loan of some of the grossly unfair accumulated interest. Oh well...
disability
if you are disabled you can file for a disability discharge, but other than that you are a slave to the loan institution. Your son will not have anything to do with your loan if something happens to you...it will be discharged from disability or death... Sometimes I think that as sick as it sounds....death is the only way to get rid of a federal school loan. I myself am disabled and have filled out the disability form after six months of having them return it to me for not filling it out correctly, but it finally went into review to claims dept. I am waiting now and it may take up to sixty days for a respond back. I bet it gets thrown out for any reason they can find to throw it out. My doctor finds me disabled and SSI finds me disabled. Not sure how a loan is to be paid back if someone can't work a normal job for repayment due to a non-healing injury. My loan went from 15k to now over 34k. Its unfair how they increase like that and yours up to 100 k is very unfair. If an unpaid school loan is forgiven after non payment in 26 years from what i am told, you then get it waived away. One thing though... the amount forgiven at the end will be outrageous and you then have to claim that as income at the end of that year which now you need to pay income tax on. You never win.... Disabililty or death is the only way out. You may want to look on jumping off your house...."just kidding though" don't jump yet.... I know people who have had their loans discharged and the person still owns her own business and is totally able to function normal. She had a doctor fill out the papers and now she has now loan left. Maybe laws will change soon in the future.
I Hope You Win Disability!
Lots of prayers going your way that you win
disibility Tony!
Dreamharp
disability
the longer it seems to take to get a reply back the worse I feel about the whole thing. I went through many many many doctor appts as well as many times refilling out that dam'n form correctly. I know that the form needs to be specific, but it got really strange the few times it got sent back to me before it was actually submitted to claims. Any questions emailed to them needed to be very specific and they rarley returned emails with a specific name on the email that it came from. Always used initials only and was always a different person I emailed too for questions regarding my application. I am told it takes up to 60 days to find out what is going to happen. If it does not go through I don't know how it will ever get paid. I need to wait until the end of Aug until I reply again to them. If it gets passed it will then go into that 3yr period of non-repayment with no interest added. It actuall begins the date of my logged injury which is 01/14/04-01/14/07 is the end.