“Dear Steve,

I am a middle-aged woman who has been ill for over a decade and has not been able to work during that period. In the 90’s I took out Parent Plus Loans for my daughter’s education. I began to make payments on them as they came due until I became ill and lost my job and my house to bankruptcy. As you know, the loans were not dischargeable in bankruptcy. I went on forbearance for several years until I had used all the forbearance and economic hardship time I was entitled to. Eventually the loans went into default and fines and interest and penalties began to accrue. A 7500 dollar total became a 16,000 total. The federal government began to garnish my social security disability checks and were doing so for 2 years.

Suddenly the garnishment stopped and I was contacted about rehabilitating my loans. I had no one I could consult with about this matter and information on the internet seemed to suggest that these new rehab programs were not a wise idea and often cost the loan holder more interest and total costs plus put you back in the hands of private collections. I declined the offer to rehabilitate.

Collection agencies have begun to call relentlessly now. I would rather that they just continuing garnishing my checks rather than deal with these difficult people.

My question is: What happens now? Will they just eventually go back to garnishing my checks?

Lee”

The Answer

Dear Lee,

I’m not sure you were aware that the Parent Plus Loan can be forgiven if you are totally and permanently disabled. If Social Security is already reporting you as disabled, it may be much easier these days to have your student loans discharged under a disabled status.

Contact your current loan servicer and ask them for help filing the necessary forms to as for a discharge of the loan under disability.

But here is more information on the Total and Permanent Disability Discharge.

Please post your responses and follow-up messages to me on this in the comments section below.

Big Hug!

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