Collections, a way out?

[ITTSlacker]

Wanted to start by saying I am free of ITT and now searching for ways out of what debt I am currently in.

I have two friends who both attended with me. One graduated, one did not.
Friend 1 is a single mother of two with the same degree as me. Sallie Mae was charging about $350 required payment each month for her debt. She ignored calls, ignored emails, ignored letters for over a year.

Collections got ahold of her basically asking "What CAN you pay each month?" She answered she was a single mother of two and had no way to pay this. They somehow managed to talk her down to paying a measley $150 each month.

Friend 2 did the same thing and ignored all bill collectors and changed his number to avoid repeated calls.
Collections got ahold of him with the same story. They would change his $10,000 loan down to $7000 requiring only $150 a month. He agreed to that.

Here i sit paying a ridiculous $350 every single month doing the right thing and I wonder, at the cost of hurting my credit, should I also join the same path; ignore the calls and let it slip into collections where I can get a reasonable monthly figure to pay off over the next 10 years of my life. I would rather take an extended repayment plan over suffering the woes of paying more for a worthless degree a month than I do rent.

If anyone has experience with this let me know. Thanks.

[sevenalive]

I highly recommend you do not do this, ignoring the collectors only makes things worse. Do not let your loans slip into collections. Regardless of what ITT charged, what we think is actually owed and worth, we still signed the loan agreements and agreed to pay them. There is really nothing you can do to make the loans go away except to pay them. You could contact ITT's headquarters and try to have them refund you, but that is unlikely to work as I tried a few times. Check out this site: http://www.finaid.org/loans/forgiveness.phtml

Now in my case, the FAA electronically signed the documents, they even electronically e-signed for me and my parents. I did hand sign a few documents. That would be near impossible to prove who e-signed, but you can check out this form: http://www2.ed.gov/offices/OSFAP/DCS/fo ... ayment.pdf

I doubt your friends realized these facts about student loans:

• They cannot be claimed under bankruptcy, so nothing short of a total disability or death discharges the loans
• The government can garnish your wages to pay the loans.
• Take away all tax refunds you may be eligible for.
• More info here: http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/default-student-loan-29859.html

Call the loan provider or go the their site, many of them offer income based payment plans and other plans to lower the payments. I doubt you can get an interest reduction without consolidation your loans.

[aka name]

@ITTSlacker: Listen to Seven, your debt isn't the same as credit card debt

@Seven ALive: Great post, I made the topic a sticky

[ITTSlacker]

Thank you so much for the reply and helpful links. I'm glad to have kept up normal payments instead of letting them default. Mine were hand signed as well so just bite the bullet on this I guess. Peace Corps also doesn't sound like a bad option, I see there's a link on that in here too.


Very useful information you posted! Thanks again.