I have been attending college since 2003. I started as a music major but when the ecnonmy crashed, I changed majors. Since then, I have lost my father, gotten a divorce, accumulated a lot of credit card debt and my student loans have gotten out of control. At this point, I am still trying to finish school and the only way that I have been able to pay for my education has been private student loans and federal student loans. I was unable to work for a long time because I was in and out of hospitals and other mental health facilities. I have close to 125,000 grand in total student debt and all I have to show for it is a Cosmetology/Esthetician license. At this point, I am pushing 27, remarried and we can barely support ourselves, much less put food on the table. I have not been able to pay on any credit cards or installment debts for months and months. I have considered bankruptcy but I’m afraid of my ability to be able to find a place to live or to finance anything later. I understand about credit and how to rebuild it but that issue aside… I can cope with that.
Most of my student loans are private. They are not willing to work with the debtors either… Im going to have to pay close to 1600 a month once all of my loans kick in. I dont know what to do about my life, the debt, or anything anymore. I feel like the only way out (and to save my mother from ruin because of me) is if I died. I don’t want it to have to come to something like that. Student loans cant be discharged in bankruptcy either.
I have been doing the very best that I can to make something of myself. I can’t help what has happened to me in the past 9 years but I’m trying to at least do what I need to do in order to save my mother and husband from my financial destruction. I think that my husband will eventually leave me once all of my loans are out of deferment. I feel so helpless and hopeless. I have been living practically destitue for years now. I have nothing to show for how hard I have worked either. I can’t find a decent job no matter how hard I try.
At this point, any advice will help. I cant sleep, I’m sick all of the time, I lost my insurance a couple of years ago so I can’t go to counseling or be put on any kind of medication (if that would even help me at all at this point) What can I do? Please…help me….
Allison
Dear Allison,
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I hear from a lot of people that feel either suicide or fleeing the country are the best solutions for their student loan issues. It’s a terrible curse people face with especially private student loans.
Before things turn permanent and final let’s put our heads together and see what is possible,
How close can you be from graduating with a degree?
How much do you owe in government backed loans?
Do you have any other debt you pay now?
Did anyone cosign with you on these student loans?
Please post your responses and follow-up messages to me on this in the comments section below.
A lifelong series of consecutive Chapter 13 Bankruptcies may act
as a safe harbor for your income should a student loan creditor start to
garnish your wages or levy your bank account.
The point is not to get a discharge, as it is nearly impossible to obtain
a discharge for a student loan, but rather the benefit of a Chapter 13 for someone
with crippling student loans may allow you to protect a sufficient amount of
your household income so that you can maintain a basic standard of living.
By entering the protections of a Chapter 13, you may be able to decrease the
amount you currently are forced to pay. It
will immediately stop a garnishment, and in some cases force your student loan lender
to accept less per month than they are currently taking from you.
A Chapter 13
requires you to make a monthly plan payments to the bankruptcy trustee assigned
to your case for the duration of your 3 to 5 year plan; and, unlike after a
typical Chapter 13 discharge, which provides a debtor the benefit of a fresh
start, you will complete your plan with that same crushing student loan debt that
you had before, plus any interest and fees that may have accrued during the
life of the plan. Depending on the types
of your other debts you may have, part of your monthly Chapter 13 plan payment
may pay down a portion of your student loans.
Then
what? Filing another Chapter 13 may
again be the temporary 3 to 5 year relief you need to make ends meet.
You might ask
why bother filing a Chapter 13 if it will not wipe-out my student loans? Such a series of life-long, back-to-back
Chapter 13 bankruptcy filings may provide a financial prisoner of student loans
the necessary financial safe harbor he or she needs to pay for life’s most
basic needs: rent or mortgage, food, utilities, clothes, gas, healthcare, car
payment, and more. It is not a method of
accumulating wealth, but a last resort when a student loan lender leaves you
less than you need to make ends meet. It
is not a way of getting rid of your student loan debt, but instead allows you
to ignore the student loans until you might be able to pay them off one
day. Call it a financial purgatory, or,
for some student loan borrowers, a lesser of two evils.
-Richard Komisars, Esq.
Attorney at Law in San
Diego, CA
(619) 888-8272
This should not be
considered legal advice and does not create an attorney-client
relationship. Should you seek legal
advice, please contact a lawyer.
Hello again…Thank you for the response. I have resorted to researching career/school tracks that are in demand and pay well. I am hoping to start a program in Diagnostic Medical Sonography. The average pay for that field is $60,000 a year. I would be an idiot to keep attending college for a 4 year degree in a field that I was not going to find work in; much less a job that paid a salary that I would require to make loan payments as well as support myself. After this semester, I should have about 2 years and a half before I will be done with the program ( that is if I even get accepted into it. It is a competitive program).
Yes, I have about 13 grand in other revolving debts ( credit cards and owing to cell phone companies that I no longer have contracts with), I am paying monthly on one personal loan that at one point was used to help pay off debt from my divorce. I am current on that account. I also have a car that is valued at about 24 thousand that I am paying on monthly. I just found out that I have to start making payments on one of my student loans starting this February.
Yes, I have cosigners on my private student loans; my mother.
As far as my federal student aid ( non private), I am not positive the exact amount that I owe to day, but I think that I safe number would be 35 thousand.
Everything seems so hopeless. I have tried to estimate a budget for myself after graduation with an anticipated 125,000 in debt. I am expecting to have to pay at least 1200-1600 a month just in student loan payments. I have considered filing for bankruptcy in order to clear all of the excess revolving debt ( the 13 grand mentioned above) but I really don’t want that to be on my record for 11 years. I have also considered debt settlement but I’m jobless, incomeless, and I cannot afford to make any payment period at this time.
I need help desperately… I dont want to be miserable and stressed out for the rest of my life. 🙁
Allison R.
Let me make a correction: I think my federal aid is closer to 25 grand, not 35.
Allison,
First off, I believe in you and know that we can work this problem towards a better future. It’s not over by any means. But I certainly can appreciate at times that it feels that way.
An obstacle has two faces. One face is the pain to creates, the other is the solutions that are available. Right now you are naturally being drawn to being fixated on the past and the problem side. I need for you to do a 180 and start looking forward to the solution side.
The past is what it is. All the regret and worry isn’t going to change that. More people than you would imagine have fears and regrets and for some it paralyzes them and leads them to panic and drastic actions. Panic and fear are not reality.
I actually started my life and training in the medical field and was a leader in medical ophthalmic ultrasonography. I absolutely loved that field and find the diagnostic imaging field to be fascinating. My claim to fame was that I was the first person to perform ultrasonic measurements of a dogs eye for an intraocular lens implant to restore vision from canine cataracts.
Recently my father needed an abdominal ultrasound to rule out an aneurism and I got to see the latest technology. It’s so cool. The tech was raving about her job and what she’s able to do these days with it.
Before you head out in this new direction I would suggest you find a local imaging center and talk to a ultrasound tech or two and pick their brain about the field and get any tips for the best training to find a good job in the field. Let’s get you setup for easy success.
Avoid anymore private student loans at this point.
The good news is the government loans can be placed on an Income Based Repayment plan and depending on where you work your federal student loans may be eligible for a complete discharge after ten years of reduced payments. Check out the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program.
On your other unsecured debt if that is not manageable for you we’ll have to look at other options for that.
On the private student loans, we are just going to have to deal with that. On option is to ask your mom to contribute a bit towards that each month since she is the cosigner. I’m sure she’s motivated to keep that out of default.
But what I’d really like to do is have to do all of the above and then sit down with both your husband and mother and lay the entire situation out on the table and come up with a plan you all agree to for moving forward with this.
I feel confident you can mutually develop some plan that gets everyone on the same page and motivated to making this work.
What do you think about this approach?
Steve
Hi again, The first issue that I want to address is asking my mother, the cosigner to help pay for some of my loans. Honestly, she is in no financial position to be able to do that at all. She has already had to help my husband and I out for months and months because we have not been able to find jobs and therefore, we haven’t had the money to pay our living expenses. I don’t have the heart to ask her to do any more than she alreaedy does. She said she will help as much as she can with the monthly payment on that one student loan and she has been making payments that are covering the interest on another smaller private student loan. At this point in time, that is as much as she can do.
I have spoken with a couple individuals who started in radiology tech and crossed over to sonography and echo. They said that they love their job and that there is a lot that you can do with it than you think. It seems like a good option for me. At this point, I just need a reliable, secure and well paying career.
I’ll definitely check out the federal loan forgiveness program. I hope that I will be able to somehow incorporate my career into a field that will work for the program. I just hope that it isn’t so low paying that I will be sacrificing being able to pay other living expenses.
What is your suggestion as far as my current outstanding revolving debt? Like i mentioned before, I would like to try and settle with the creditors and aviod bankruptcy.
Thank you again for getting back in touch with me…being able to discuss this stuff really makes a difference in how I am able to cope with it from day to day. It has been affecting every aspect of my life.
Allison
Hi again, The first issue that I want to address is asking my mother, the cosigner to help pay for some of my loans. Honestly, she is in no financial position to be able to do that at all. She has already had to help my husband and I out for months and months because we have not been able to find jobs and therefore, we haven’t had the money to pay our living expenses. I don’t have the heart to ask her to do any more than she alreaedy does. She said she will help as much as she can with the monthly payment on that one student loan and she has been making payments that are covering the interest on another smaller private student loan. At this point in time, that is as much as she can do.
I have spoken with a couple individuals who started in radiology tech and crossed over to sonography and echo. They said that they love their job and that there is a lot that you can do with it than you think. It seems like a good option for me. At this point, I just need a reliable, secure and well paying career.
I’ll definitely check out the federal loan forgiveness program. I hope that I will be able to somehow incorporate my career into a field that will work for the program. I just hope that it isn’t so low paying that I will be sacrificing being able to pay other living expenses.
What is your suggestion as far as my current outstanding revolving debt? Like i mentioned before, I would like to try and settle with the creditors and aviod bankruptcy.
Thank you again for getting back in touch with me…being able to discuss this stuff really makes a difference in how I am able to cope with it from day to day. It has been affecting every aspect of my life.
Allison
If intervention was required the most logical choice would be bankruptcy. You can still get student loans even if you have been bankrupt.
The issues isn’t so much the amount of the debt but how it impacts your life. Without being able to get help or assistance from others the only way to neutralize the unsecured debt payments is going to be with bankruptcy.
Read through this article and see if it helps to answer many of your questions about the reality of bankruptcy and other solutions.
Steve