Reboot Your LifeTampa Student Loan and Bankruptcy Attorney Blog

Bankruptcy is finally working for people with student loans — I expect to have a series up shortly about all the ways a bankruptcy can help now with both federal and private student loans.  This didn’t used to be true, and you may find people out there who follow those old rules and say that bankruptcy cannot help with student loans.  I’m afraid that after the IDR audit expires (deadline next Tues – 4/30), bankruptcy will in fact be one of the best – and often overlooked options to reduce crazy student loan debt.

Total and Permanent Disability discharges are also going strong — and never mentioned by loan servicers in our experience!  I just ran our numbers for 2023 and we had 28 TPD matters last year.  Discharges in as little as three months start to finish.  Something else that shouldn’t be overlooked if you find that you cannot work a full time job doing what you used to do.  That’s not exactly the wording that the TPD application uses, but it’s a way that we describe the process which we have found is more accurate than can you dress and feed yourself.  Remember, this is not an SSD review, it’s a vocational review of your ability to work.  We look at a lot of employment related factors, and our doctor can review your medical records and see you by Zoom or in person here in Tampa.  You can be anywhere though – even outside of Florida, even outside of the U.S. for us to help.

Double consolidation for those with Parent Plus loans is working to get people into the lower SAVE payment rather than getting stuck in a multi thousand dollar ICR payment.  There are rules and recommended procedures to do this though – see our videos or set a strategy session with us before you try that on your own.

Don’t forget, next Tues the 30th, is the consolidation application deadline for the IDR account adjustment – often referred to as the IDR Audit.  It’s also the last day before the PSLF processing pause goes into effect, so you may wish to download your payment tracking data from MOHELA before that date.

For more info on the PSLF processing pause:  https://studentloanborrowerassistance.org/the-pslf-processing-pause-what-you-should-know/

For more info on the IDR Audit and how it can help you obtain forgiveness by consolidating before 4/30:  https://studentloanborrowerassistance.org/last-chance-for-many-to-get-more-credit-toward-student-loan-cancellation/.

As we race toward the 4/30/24 deadline for submitting a consolidation application for the IDR Audit deadline, please know that Nelnet has the following phone and email.  They will accept a consolidation application by email.  We recommend calling them a few days after to verify receipt of the application.  There was no hold time as of today!

Nelnet Consolidation 866-426-6765

DirectLoanConsol@nelnet.net

Many questions surround the possibility and even probability of discharging student loans in bankruptcy.  The law around student loan dischargeability hasn’t changed in many years, the way I understand it – it’s just that newer theories on applying that law to private student loans have come to the forefront in recent years and then we had the rise of the Federal attestation process even more recently this past year.  The new bankruptcy IDR rules go into effect in July this summer and apply to any pending case.  There have also been a few class actions allowing for more certainty of discharge of loans after the fact even if an adversary action against then lender isn’t filed in the bankruptcy.  These involve situations where the loans are non-qualified education loans etc.

Bottom line, is that it’s finally working.  We are starting to see successful discharges of both private and federal student loans on a regular basis now.  This never used to be the case.

In fact, with today’s political uncertainties, it may be better to get a court ruling of dischargeability now rather than wait and see if some of the recent guidelines retract after the election.  A court ruling will withstand all of that.  Food for thought.

We’ve received some repeat questions lately by parents whose children are still in college.  Basically, they are worried that there isn’t enough time to get a double consolidation done to get into SAVE.

Here’s the rules:

• The loan does have to be fully disbursed.

A little birdie told me that Sunday’s show will be about student loans.  I just watched the one last week on Boeing and it was really good!  Made me pretty happy not to own Boeing stock… Here is the Boeing story https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8oCilY4szc

You can watch/stream Last Week Tonight with John Oliver on MAX, Max Amazon Channel and Spectrum on Demand as well as HBO of course.

With over 9 million views on the Boeing story, we are hopeful that this show on student loans will help raise awareness of the upcoming April 30, 2024 deadline to apply to consolidate the older federal loans known as FFEL loans to the newer Direct loans.  By doing this before the deadline, you will NOT lose your prior IDR history and in fact can re-date all of your federal loans to the earliest repayment date and get so much credit towards forgiveness.

For those of you who are on the receiving end of credit dings due to federal agencies messing up your student loans, the recent Kirtz decision allows a consumer to sue a federal agency under 15 U.S.C. Sections 1681n and 1681o for defying the terms of the Fair Credit Reporting Act.  The history of this case can be found here:  https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/department-of-agriculture-rural-development-rural-housing-service-v-kirtz/

While the case itself dealt with some agricultural entity, it will apply to all federal agencies that seek immunity from wrongdoing under the FCRA.  Only those in the 3rd Circuit are legally bound, but opinions like this have a way of wandering to other circuits and directly affecting the laws there almost immediately.

We are now regularly seeing false information being reported on someone’s credit reports about the remaining balance, payment status and other student loan related information.  Please reach out to us to help evaluate whether you have a case under the FCRA.  Remember, negative information on your credit can wreck havoc on other things including:

Finally!  Relief for Joint Spousal Consolidation Federal Student Loans

Did you know that married couples were allowed to consolidate their debt under a program that existed from 1993 to 2006 which allowed a single monthly payment and often a lower interest rate.  But it meant that each spouse was 100% liable for the other spouse’s debt.  Moreover, borrowers who had these Joint Spousal Consolidation loans were often left out of most programs.  We’ve long known of the problems plaguing borrowers in this “One Way In, No Way Out” program.

Borrowers were unable to sever the loans despite divorce, an uncommunicative partner, domestic violence or financial abuse.  Borrowers also were not eligible for most of the best programs which required a Direct Loan because they were trapped in the FFEL Consolidation Loan.

Good news: the Administration announced last week that in February, it will begin early implementing the SAVE provisions that provide cancellation of borrowers’ remaining balance in as few as 10 years of qualifying payments depending on the total amount originally borrowed.

Borrowers enrolled in SAVE will have their remaining balance forgiven after 10 years of qualifying payments if they originally took out $12k or less in federal student loans, with one additional year of payments required for every additional $1,000 borrowed, up to a max of 20 years for those with only undergraduate loans, and 25 years for those with any federal student loans for grad school.

So if you are a little over $12k initially borrowed, no worries, they are allowing for one additional year of IDR (SAVE) for each $1,000 over.