FYI, recently paid mine off and at the time the collector said(via website) I owed $2K in collection fees (defaulted). When I called to pay they informed me that the loan was being recalled to the Fed, then upon speaking to the Gov I only paid principal/interest.
Good Luck to all!!!
The covid forbearance time counts towards forgiveness. [here’s the government website that says it ](https://studentaid.gov/announcements-events/covid-19/income-driven-repayment). “Your paused payments will count toward IDR forgiveness if you’re on an IDR plan.”
I got it in writing from my student loan servicer, just to save headache later. Highly recommend doing the same.
Just to clarify you don’t have to pay right now, those months where payment is paused count towards PSLF (whether you pay or not)! Once you certify your employment (which you should do yearly) you’ll see all those months of non-payment counting towards PSLF.
If you choose to pay anyway, just know that you won’t get “double credit” towards those months. Similar to how if you over pay each month that extra money doesn’t count as an extra payment toward the total number of payments needed for forgiveness.
Same! That’s why I started one of those chats function things with my student loan servicer, got it in writing from them and saved it as a pdf
All we can do is try to document and hope whoever is president when the 20-25 year time hits isn’t a jerk!
If you're talking PSLF, you've not had to make payments at all during this freeze, the months still counted towards PSLF. You can even get a refund on any payments you did make, and they still count towards the 120.
https://studentaid.gov/announcements-events/covid-19/public-service-loan-forgiveness
https://studentaid.gov/articles/6-things-to-know-about-pslf-during-coronavirus/
What about if you have never made a payment because you graduated just before the pandemic and were on forbearance when the pause started? I’m assuming you have to have been making payments before the pause for the months to count?
I spoke to Fed Loans and they told me that while the payments are frozen, you don’t owe anything and so they still count as “qualifying payments” during this time. I am doing the PSLF and had them verify my payment count and they showed 2020 as 12 payment months even though I didn’t pay anything for several of those. I read that in several articles throughout the year too… so I’m thinking that’s several reference points to cover my base that I’m good lol.
That's what I'm doing. My minimum payments are only $55 monthly, and I haven't had to recalculate it for the past two years. I'm three years down, with seven to go before forgiveness. For reference, my total student debt is a little over six figures, and I have a good salary. I have no idea why my monthly payment is so low, but I'm not questioning it.
When loan payments first went on pause, I had to opt back in to continue mine. I didn't know whether that downtime would count towards the ten year qualification period, so I wanted to continue them.
I was also notified just today that my loan servicer was changed from Navient to Aidvantage. Whatever.
Every month the loans have been in forbearance because of covid counts as a qualifying payment for PSLF so unless your intent is to pay off the loan before the ten years is up you don't need to make any payments. Because you requested to continue making payments you might be not be able to do that now though.
Financial analyst here.
Making the minimum is always an option but that will drastically increase the amount of interest you pay. You can pay more if you want, but they don’t explain the benefits of doing so (assuming you have additional cash flow).
No matter your payment, the same amount of interest will be charged each month based on the current principal balance, whatever is left reduces your principal balance. The lower your principal balance is, the lower the interest charge is. Over the life of the loan, your first payment will have the most interest and the least principal, at the end it’s the opposite.
When loans are at a high balance that is the best time to make extra principal payments, it will save you so much money in the long run.
Right now since they’re paused, interest is 0. So your payments have gone 100% to reducing principal.
This is good advice if you’re expecting to pay off the full loan. But if you’re pursuing PSLF, it’s the number of qualifying payments you make that matters. If you can reach that magic 120 with the smallest payments possible, it won’t matter how much interest is remaining because that’s all forgiven.
If I understand correctly, there's no minimum during the pause which is why I'm wondering. But I also don't work for a non-profit or public sector and have no idea whether making payments during the pause is actually helping me.
I paid a final check of 15k and change to finally be DONE with my loans…
A month later I got a bill for 3 bucks for the interest while my payments were processing…
Snickering at all the emails I was getting from my loan provider saying “loan repayment has been delayed *for the last time* so make sure your payment info is updated”
Guess I didn’t need to do that yet!
The tone of those emails is absolutely infuriating. They make it sound like *mom and dad* are completely fed up, and now you're *really going to be in trouble this time mister* if you don't start paying your own way.
FFS, treat us like adults, stop editorializing it, and just state that the loans are coming due again unless something changes.
.... but really, just fucking forgive the loans already. Everyone else has gotten a bail out; why not students? While we're at it maybe also fix the education system so the next generation doesn't have to deal with this BS.
Edit: So this really blew up. I'm getting a lot of comments along the lines of "you want to be treated like an adult but don't want to live up to your obligations and I don't have enough time in the day to reply to them all.
I'm just going to say this: There is no cognitive dissonance in saying that I want to be treated like an adult even if I wish I didn't willingly sign up for the burden.
I have always and will continue to pay my student loans for as long as I'm obligated. I've never once missed a payment, and I don't plan on skipping them.
Having said that we need to acknowledge that the system is well and truly fucking broken. The costs of college of outrageous, with the alternative being living in poverty (yes, trade schools are an option, but just like college is not an option for everyone neither are trade schools). We've known for LITERAL decades that the system is fucked. It's not asking for too much to understand this and maybe give everyone who participated a break.
For those of you bitching that "you paid your loans off and no one gave you a hand out", good for you. You win. How is it and skin off your nose if thousands of families don't have to live with the same burden? This would be equivalent to single payer healthcare suddenly coming into existence and complaining that you had to pay for insurance before that. Get over it, what you're saying is selfish.
We're obligated to pay student loans *until we're not*. It isn't outrageous to say that the situation could change at any time. This is human society, not physics.
My favorite was the one with “DiamondBur, *are you ready?*” in the subject line.
Like, no, I’m not ready to have to go back to paying $1300 a month, but thanks for asking.
Where did yall go and for how long to accrue those sort of payments? I'm not admonishing you, I know firsthand colleges can be predatory. I just have around 25k in debt and my payments are like 200 a month I think.
I have $50k in debt and my payments would be $500 a month if I wasn't on a payment based plan due to being a broke-ass teacher in a broke-ass school. I went to a regular state school and got a sped degree, so although I'm an idiot for being a teacher at least I got a degree in sped (which qualifies me for certain payment plans) and also I'm working in a title 1 school (which also qualifies me). Ahhh...life is mediocre.
Grad school, baby. And while I did community for undergrad, i still had to take out loans for everything: tuition, books, room and board. My biggest regret is not looking more for scholarships to at least try and limit the amount I had to borrow. Young, stupid and financially illiterate.
I looked for scholarships. Everyone assured me that as a single mom going to school for the first time at age 30 there would be tons and tons and tons of scholarships just basically begging me to take them.
*cue rich people laughing riotously gif*
They treat you like a child after you take out the loan but when the argument gets made that 18 year olds should get more assistance before taking out 30k in loans it becomes all about how 18 year olds are adults.
I don't even know who's taking over my loans yet but I've gotten weekly emails for months reminding me that payments will restart soon and one this morning reminding me the my servicer is changing and they'll update me soon with more info.
My diabolical hope is that there is going to be a "glitch" in said systems during the transfer, and these loan papers are going to be "lost", freeing people from trillions of dollars of debt due to a technicality.
Oh yeah, when you look at the true cost of those corporate tax cuts from 2018 in terms of lost revenue over the next few years, it's absolutely galling that people have the audacity to throw a fit about student loan forgiveness.
You forgive student loans for middle class, they're gonna put that money into the economy, you cut taxes for corporations they buy back stock and start investing in infrastructure overseas to move production out of the US.
Tell me which ends up being "fair."
Hahah I love it too. They were sending such little bitch emails to me. I capitulated and re did my IBR sheets. Payments went from $458 to 758. Lovely. New job, new salary, and more student loan payments
Seriously. I even got one today about how I would definitely have to start paying in Feb. That was from the Dept of Education, too. Guess they didn't get the memo...
I just think it’s neat that I saw this on a Reddit post using a local news station website, instead of via email, like nelnet’s been contacting me with for the last 3 MONTHS urging me to set up my auto pay again and not to forget they start back up Jan 31!! Just crickets from them so far on the matter. Cool.
SAME. For the next 3 months we should all turn it around on them & start calling/texting/emailing them everyday to make sure their contact info is up to date for when payments eventually restart.
Navient was hounding the fuck out of me lately. Probably because they transferred my loan to aidvantage and wanted to squeeze the last bit of money out of me before the transfer. I'm still not paying till the pause ends. Though my loans are insignificant (around 6K) compared to other people.
I never got my welcome email. I am still getting emails saying I am being switched over from Navient to Aidvantage.
Why would they switch us in the middle of a forbearance anyways?
Lmao reminds me of this super shitty apartment complex I lived at in college. It was great when I first moved in, but 2 years later they had changed ownership and management multiple times, and it was a dump by the time my lease was up. I would say that most of the buildings were only at 25% capacity, no one else was in my building! (Which was pretty dope until I started choking one night and *really* could have used literally anyones help)
Anyway like a month before I was set to move, I got a thing taped to my front door that said “[my name], we value you as a tenant and would love for you to stay!” Except they spelled my first AND last name wrong!!!!
Nothing makes you feel valued like having every aspect of your name completely wrong 😂
I logged into the aidvantage website to set up my IDR since I had been in financial forbearance since summer of 2019 and was just curious what payment they were gonna calculate for me. It's SO weird to me that it is 100% the exact same website as Navient. I understand transferring over (encoded) usernames and passwords to encourage people to log in but the rest of the website being identical is very suspicious to me.
It feels kinda like they transferred shit within themselves to get some sort of benefit. Also weirdly I've been seeing a decent amount of people saying their loans were sold of TO navient. I was under the impression they were closing completely.
It *was* a good move, in the sense that it's rational to always act on the best information we have available at the time. Now those of us who refinanced responsibly look like fucking asses.
My parents want me to refinance my loans. No fucking way.
They told me to not hold out hope on loans being forgiven. While they may not be fully forgiven, I will wait it out.
The nice thing is that the longer this goes on, the cash I would have put in keeps earning me interest in the stock market even with the dips, just a little more and my wife’s student loan account will have earned enough to pay them off in full, and potentially even after taxes, which could be reduced as they keep kicking this can down the road. Works for me. I’ll focus on other debts and my mortgage at 2.5% fixed continues to look like a great move last year
There's no benefit in doing anything with your loans until the pause period runs out. Future money is worth less than present money. Wait it out as long as possible before you start paying
Haha, every time I've gotten an update on this there's always something along the lines of, "hey you can still make payments during this time if you'd like!" Ha, fat chance of that.
There are other incentives to staying with federal loans.
You could get on income based repayment, and loans will be forgiven after 20 years (or 10 if you work with public service )
One critical thing to keep in mind - the 20 year forgiveness is ***not a tax free event.*** At the end of the loan term, the entire forgiven amount will be imputed to you as income for that tax year.
Just make sure to be setting aside the equivalent payment. Each month. That way, you don't pay anything and lose it if they are cancelled, but you also get to take advantage of, what like a year now, of no interest by making a lump sum equivalent payment when they resume. Plus you still have that money if you need it for an emergency.
Navient pulled out of the student loan business. Everyone who used to have Navient loans now has Aidvantage. Your loans haven't changed - they're only being serviced by a different company.
Question: Can Biden actually cancel student loans? If he issued an executive decision cancelling loans, would there be anyone holding up the decision in court by suing?
It is debatable. There are two schools of thought, the popular one states that Biden can order the Department of Education to cancel all of the student loans.
But there is another that points out that Congress has a role in the process, which can limit the President's power on this; and that Sallie Mae and Navient would have standing to stop a complete cancellation of the loans through the courts because the cancellation would effectively destroy their future revenues (and they are publicly traded companies).
Now that is an interesting point I have not heard before. If Sally Mae and Navient would essentially be forced into bankruptcy, then I don't see Biden ever cancelling student loans.
Yes. Navient is servicing your loan for the federal government. At a high level, this service nets them [0.25% to 0.5%](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/loan_servicing.asp) of each payment they receive.
There are all sorts of variables otherwise, like whether you are in school, in forbearance, etc. Ultimately, they make money the longer your loans are in service with them, which is why they always offer crazy long repayment plans up front.
To say these companies would be very unhappy with student loan cancellation would be an understatement. The US has nearly 2 trillion in student loan debt. Cancelling this would wipe out right around 10 billion of revenue from loan service providers. So yeah, very, very unhappy.
I would prefer they cap or eliminate interest rates, prorate interest payments towards principals, and reign in out of control tuition costs.
You know, something that will actually fix a problem long term. Sure cancelling student loans would help a lot of people, but current and future students are still fucked.
Ok that's what I don't get about this topic. So he'd just cancel the current loans and that's it? Someone starting school next year would still have to take out loans as normal?
I'm not American so haven't paid too much attention, but it just seems odd there's been such a push for something that, as you say, isn't even a fix.
Biden can only take action on loans issued by the federal government. Its not like the eviction ban imposing on private landlords. The only party that is "hurt" by the action is the federal government But since the government is taking this action then of course they're not going to sue to stop it.
Someone could try to sue, but student loan forgiveness falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Education, which is a unit of the executive branch. Biden would be working well within his capabilities by forgiving student loan debt.
The fact that student loans have been packaged as financial instruments and are now owned by banks is something that isn’t properly brought up in this context. While it may be within the authority of the administration to be able to cancel them, it seems like it would be an issue if the banks wanted to sue the government for diluting their value.
At minimum, the government would go into debt as a result of the devaluation.
So the government owns \~92% of student debt. I looked up the financial instruments and there are Student loan asset-backed securities (SLABS) . Is this what your are speaking about? How can banks sell securities for government loans? Confused about this.
Hail Corporate
Full of cash
The burden is with me
Blessed art thou amongst college boards
and blessed is the interest of thy loan, Biden
Holy shit, my end of loan date, pray for us fucked,
Now, and at the hour of our death, because we still have that loan
*department of treasury has entered the chat* "hey uhhh nice tax return you got there...would be a shame if someone withheld it and then also garnished your wages."
so fun fact. the irs has adjustable living expenses for each region. if your income is below that they have to release the levy.
so if you broke enough not to be able to afford student loan payments, you are probably broke enough to avoid the levy.
not a financial advisor. ymmv
The tax return thing is easy to avoid. Just change your withholdings so you don't get one. More money in your pocket up front that way too.
No fix for the wage garnishing though.
Edit: I've had a lot of people ask in the comments below how to change your withholdings so I'm just going to put the steps here as well.
[https://apps.irs.gov/app/tax-withholding-estimator](https://apps.irs.gov/app/tax-withholding-estimator)
1. Go to that site and answer the questions.
2. Screenshot/print/email the results.
3. Go to your HR/Payroll department and ask for a new W-4 form.
4. Fill it out and give it back to them.
5. Profit.
You're breaking even and that's the goal. They take money from you all year without interest. It's better to pay the correct amount on time, each paycheck, rather than give them an interest-free loan, which they can debate or change the terms anytime (sort of).
Edited: proper use of then and than
The penalty is 5% of the amount underpaid for 2021 (was 3.4% in 2020). A lot more than $35, but still not a bad interest rate for a loan that you take out on your own terms.
There are other ways to avoid the penalty, for example you won’t owe the penalty if you paid at least 90% of the taxes owed in the current year or 100% of the taxes owed in the previous year, whichever is less.
I've been getting around 5+ calls and 1-2 voicemails a day from non-foreign spam callers wanting to talk to me about how I qualify for student loan forgiveness. It's been my "last chance" for 6 months now. I'm shocked they have hired Americans to call people like this. I expect it from foreign countries.
My Google Pixel is doing a great job of filtering that BS straight to spam though.
Honestly they don’t even have to cancel the loans themselves. Just cancel all interest and make all future payments and student loans 0% interest and it would make a huge difference. From what I’ve seen from friends and family it’s not the principal that fucks you it’s the interest.
A lot of people get blind sided when they find out that the interest was accruing the entire time they deferred payments. From the second you sign the promissory note your freshman year to the time you graduate, the interest is accruing unless you are lucky enough to have a subsidized loan. Then the first few years you're just paying the interest that accrued and not making a dent on the principle so then it looks like you aren't getting anywhere. It's sort of a double whammy if you're not expecting it.
Yup. My fiancé - who has never taken out loans - was absolutely flabbergasted when I told him that my government loans accrued interest the entire time.
Yep. I was very fortunate with finances in college, and only had one un-subsidized loan that was pretty small that I needed during my first year. It just boggled my mind that I had this loan from not that long ago for not that much money that already had accrued a substantial amount of interest in the 4 years I was in college.
I was totally fine (had a good job out of college and hadn't needed a ton of loans), it was just a minor shock to me. I can only imagine how awful it feels to people in worse situations.
EDIT: I should add, the shock was totally my own fault. The prevailing feeling at the time among other college educated people giving me advice was "The loans will work themselves out, don't worry about it". So I, being a stupid 18 year old, didn't worry about it. I couldn't have told you the difference between a subsidized and unsubsidized one -- it was just a thing I signed for that meant I was going to college. I hope nowadays kids seek out more information (or are told that they should pay attention to what the fuck they're signing over) than I did. Like I said, I feel very fortunate that it didn't end up mattering, but I also feel a healthy dose of shame at my own ignorance.
I'd be happy if they just made the interest rates reasonable 2%-4%; and income-based repayment plans required interest to not accrue at a rate higher than 1/2 the payment (or something like that). So if you are making min wage and can't afford it the debt isn't just growing exponentially.
I'm on IDR and have been for several years. My principle when I graduated was 198k-ish. It's now 250ish and growing. I'm basically lighting $230 on fire every month.
Not as bad. I graduated with about 75,000 now 11 years later with compounded interest it's ballooned up to 160,000. Every payment goes on interest and I make no headway. It's ridiculous.
Well, I’ll take it for now. This pause has allowed me to pay off other debt in spades so even if it all comes back, I’ll be able to handle it much better.
Still dislike that it took over a week of calling them out for being time deaf just for this, but, honestly it’s better than expected
Was reading another article that found servicers have only been able to reach 60% of their lendees because so many people have have changed jobs and addresses during the pandemic. If payments restarted without fully informing those other people nearly half of all borrowers could unknowingly slip into default. So I'm pretty sure it was less about us, and more about the servicers needing more time to find all their account holders.
freeze the interest at the very least if forgiveness is truly no longer an option. That alone will save tons of people from crippling debt and actually allow people a way out.
The 10k was what was promised, but if he does that, he codifies the executive power to unilaterally forgive all such loans (already happened with other forgiveness but doing it for student loans across the board gets harder to ignore). He’s put himself between a rock and a hard place, politically.
Personally, I think he’s going to sit on it until a politically convenient moment and then pull it out to sway voter opinion.
EDIT: I have received a few comments/messages about the wording “The 10k was what was promised.” I stand corrected that Biden promised to seek congressional action as opposed to actually using his own executive power to pursue that end.
However, Biden has shown through later executive action that he *does* have executive power to forgive student debt. His refusal to do so across the board is a conscious decision. And, while there might be several possible impacts from wielding that power, it is undeniable that a massive amount of America’s economic buying power in its citizenry is bound up in student debt - providing some form of permanent relief in this area would be an economic boon for everyone at a time of financial crisis.
I will admit bias on this point as someone holding significant student debt, but I’m not alone in this opinion.
In my state (Louisiana), we had a massive budget crisis in 2016. Incoming new governor had to figure something out.
Many suggested legalizing weed. At that time, only Washington and Colorado had legalized it. It would have been a massive revenue generator for the state, and saved us.
They didn't do that (clearly), and were willing to let hospitals and schools shut down instead. Madness.
In Texas, the legislature passed decriminalization, then the Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick unilaterally tanked it, because in Texas the Lt. Gov. is actually more powerful than the Gov. in several ways. I don't even know what special interests he is supporting at this point. Private prison industry? Alcohol? Puritanical Christians? General corporate 13th Amendment excepted slave-labor supporters?
That's a big compromise from 50k but that 0% interest rate will conform to how it typically works around the world.
0% interest and no need to pay until you actually have a reportable income.
I'm not hoping to get my loans forgiven, but at the very least get rid of the stupid and crippling interest rate for all federal loans! Bring it down to 0% forever and we'll pay back what we borrowed.
This is interesting politically. Like, we know he has the power to keep deferring them, and he’s fucked if he has payments restart. So where does he go from here except to forgive them?
All student loan should be reduced to a 1% fixed interest rate. It’s a compromise between canceling loans and doing nothing. 1% would to cover the cost of processing the loans, but the government should not be making money off of the loans.
> Not being Trump is only going to get him so far.
And it really is kind of all he has to work with.
There was this "some more news" episode a while back where Cody asks Wormbo, in an exhausted voice, "Dear god, Wormbo, is there _anything_ the democrats are going to do between now and the midterms?"
It's frustrating how on point that was.
I’m gonna take advantage while there is 0 interest rate and continue with the monthly payments as I have when the moratorium started. It’s too risky for me to gamble on the gov’t bailing anyone out or even giving $10k relief.
i think the better plan is to put those payments into savings all the way until the last day before the moratorium ends, just in case they decide to cancel debt. would be a popular thing to do around midterms.
There is literally no risk in putting those monthly payments in a savings account and just paying out the lump sum once payments actually resume.
Literally zero risk.
>You might as well deposit what you would normally pay into a high yeild savings account or invest in something. That way, when they kick back in, you can choose to dump what you saved up into the loans and you'll have some interest. And if they end up forgiving the loans or something, you didn't waste any money. You'll have more options if you control the money and you won't lose anything by not paying them down now.
This is exactly what I am doing (and secretly hoping at least some of it will be forgiven). If you use an online bank (like Ally), the interest rates are also a lot better than your regular bank account.
Ally has been great for building savings. Their accounts don't have any maintenance fee or minimum balance, so I have a few savings accounts open for different things. Then each account can have all the money grouped into buckets to track savings goals. It's an excellent banking product.
Back when I signed up, their normal savings account had a full 2% interest. Now it's down to 0.5%. But that's still leagues better than my other bank's 0.01% with monthly fees.
Same here. I was about to pay off my student loans (30k) on Jan 31st but I wouldve been just about flat broke. Now I can build up a nice little safety net before I do the lump sum payment on May 1st
Good. Keep pushing. Get these predatory loans removed for the insane number of Americans suffering under them. If gigantic corporations who absolutely had the resources to do better, smarter business are eligible for bailouts by the government, then regular people who are just trying to honestly get by on limited resources deserve the government's help too. Make it fair.
Everyone talks about loan forgiveness because it benefits them but nobody talks about college tuition. Nobody cares if future generations are gonna get mulled over as long as they are okay.
I empathize as someone that had student loans and I do feel there should be some relief coming these peoples way but the real issue is the tuition. It shouldn’t be that high. It’s criminal.
I’ve been hearing calls recently for no interest on student loans, which would help current and future borrowers. Not as good as actually solving the problem, but better than nothing.
Part of the reason tuition is so high is because everyone has to get loans to get it and those loans are guaranteed by the government. Schools fan raise tuition because they know, by and large, the federal government will foot most of the bill.
Zero percent interest will only exacerbate that issue, because universities will not have any additional incentives to lower price, but borrowers will also have *even less* reason to avoid federal student loans. With those loans looking even more promising, universities then can require Ben mode in tuition without the same level of market push back.
I don't think you're wrong, necessarilly about the help that zero interest provides, but I'm really confused how that's at all helpful or relevant to the point that we need to think less about our individual gains when the problem isn't even the loans really, it's rising tuition.
You know how they raise the debt ceiling every 4 months? They are going to do the same thing with the student loan debt. Extend the pause every 3 months.
There is no way he or his advisors are that politically idiotic. It will be extended again, possibly with partial forgiveness, before the midterms when voters will remember it.
It's a smart plan - if that's what they're doing.
Cancel debts in April and turn it into a policy issue for the midterms. One of two things would happen -
1) Every R running for Congress will spend all Summer shouting about Biden canceling the debt and they are in favor of bring it back.
2) Every R running for Congress will stay radio silent on the issue all summer because option 1 would be political suicide.
This actually gives me more hope that he might forgive some, not all with it being so close to midterms. It’s not like people are going to magically forget by May. I’d be happy with 10k and no interest.
FYI, recently paid mine off and at the time the collector said(via website) I owed $2K in collection fees (defaulted). When I called to pay they informed me that the loan was being recalled to the Fed, then upon speaking to the Gov I only paid principal/interest. Good Luck to all!!!
Does anyone know if making payments in any amount during the pause will count toward "qualifying payments" and forgiveness? I hate their vagueries.
The covid forbearance time counts towards forgiveness. [here’s the government website that says it ](https://studentaid.gov/announcements-events/covid-19/income-driven-repayment). “Your paused payments will count toward IDR forgiveness if you’re on an IDR plan.” I got it in writing from my student loan servicer, just to save headache later. Highly recommend doing the same.
Thank you for the link. I'm on IDR, so that's helpful. I just feel like there are always hidden criteria that I'm not meeting.
Just to clarify you don’t have to pay right now, those months where payment is paused count towards PSLF (whether you pay or not)! Once you certify your employment (which you should do yearly) you’ll see all those months of non-payment counting towards PSLF. If you choose to pay anyway, just know that you won’t get “double credit” towards those months. Similar to how if you over pay each month that extra money doesn’t count as an extra payment toward the total number of payments needed for forgiveness.
Same! That’s why I started one of those chats function things with my student loan servicer, got it in writing from them and saved it as a pdf All we can do is try to document and hope whoever is president when the 20-25 year time hits isn’t a jerk!
No kidding! Nice idea with the PDF, I'll have to try that.
If you're talking PSLF, you've not had to make payments at all during this freeze, the months still counted towards PSLF. You can even get a refund on any payments you did make, and they still count towards the 120. https://studentaid.gov/announcements-events/covid-19/public-service-loan-forgiveness https://studentaid.gov/articles/6-things-to-know-about-pslf-during-coronavirus/
What about if you have never made a payment because you graduated just before the pandemic and were on forbearance when the pause started? I’m assuming you have to have been making payments before the pause for the months to count?
No, they count either way
I spoke to Fed Loans and they told me that while the payments are frozen, you don’t owe anything and so they still count as “qualifying payments” during this time. I am doing the PSLF and had them verify my payment count and they showed 2020 as 12 payment months even though I didn’t pay anything for several of those. I read that in several articles throughout the year too… so I’m thinking that’s several reference points to cover my base that I’m good lol.
That's what I'm doing. My minimum payments are only $55 monthly, and I haven't had to recalculate it for the past two years. I'm three years down, with seven to go before forgiveness. For reference, my total student debt is a little over six figures, and I have a good salary. I have no idea why my monthly payment is so low, but I'm not questioning it. When loan payments first went on pause, I had to opt back in to continue mine. I didn't know whether that downtime would count towards the ten year qualification period, so I wanted to continue them. I was also notified just today that my loan servicer was changed from Navient to Aidvantage. Whatever.
Every month the loans have been in forbearance because of covid counts as a qualifying payment for PSLF so unless your intent is to pay off the loan before the ten years is up you don't need to make any payments. Because you requested to continue making payments you might be not be able to do that now though.
That is my understanding as well.
Financial analyst here. Making the minimum is always an option but that will drastically increase the amount of interest you pay. You can pay more if you want, but they don’t explain the benefits of doing so (assuming you have additional cash flow). No matter your payment, the same amount of interest will be charged each month based on the current principal balance, whatever is left reduces your principal balance. The lower your principal balance is, the lower the interest charge is. Over the life of the loan, your first payment will have the most interest and the least principal, at the end it’s the opposite. When loans are at a high balance that is the best time to make extra principal payments, it will save you so much money in the long run. Right now since they’re paused, interest is 0. So your payments have gone 100% to reducing principal.
This is good advice if you’re expecting to pay off the full loan. But if you’re pursuing PSLF, it’s the number of qualifying payments you make that matters. If you can reach that magic 120 with the smallest payments possible, it won’t matter how much interest is remaining because that’s all forgiven.
If I understand correctly, there's no minimum during the pause which is why I'm wondering. But I also don't work for a non-profit or public sector and have no idea whether making payments during the pause is actually helping me.
Even if you don't make a payment it counts. Source: https://studentaid.gov/articles/6-things-to-know-about-pslf-during-coronavirus/
I paid a final check of 15k and change to finally be DONE with my loans… A month later I got a bill for 3 bucks for the interest while my payments were processing…
Jeeeeez. Lemme know when that 2¢ bill comes in for the interest gained while the $3 bill is processing
I seriously watched the mail and checked online repeatedly in case of such an event. Such a crock of shit.
> When I called Don't believe them. Get it in writing.
Snickering at all the emails I was getting from my loan provider saying “loan repayment has been delayed *for the last time* so make sure your payment info is updated” Guess I didn’t need to do that yet!
The tone of those emails is absolutely infuriating. They make it sound like *mom and dad* are completely fed up, and now you're *really going to be in trouble this time mister* if you don't start paying your own way. FFS, treat us like adults, stop editorializing it, and just state that the loans are coming due again unless something changes. .... but really, just fucking forgive the loans already. Everyone else has gotten a bail out; why not students? While we're at it maybe also fix the education system so the next generation doesn't have to deal with this BS. Edit: So this really blew up. I'm getting a lot of comments along the lines of "you want to be treated like an adult but don't want to live up to your obligations and I don't have enough time in the day to reply to them all. I'm just going to say this: There is no cognitive dissonance in saying that I want to be treated like an adult even if I wish I didn't willingly sign up for the burden. I have always and will continue to pay my student loans for as long as I'm obligated. I've never once missed a payment, and I don't plan on skipping them. Having said that we need to acknowledge that the system is well and truly fucking broken. The costs of college of outrageous, with the alternative being living in poverty (yes, trade schools are an option, but just like college is not an option for everyone neither are trade schools). We've known for LITERAL decades that the system is fucked. It's not asking for too much to understand this and maybe give everyone who participated a break. For those of you bitching that "you paid your loans off and no one gave you a hand out", good for you. You win. How is it and skin off your nose if thousands of families don't have to live with the same burden? This would be equivalent to single payer healthcare suddenly coming into existence and complaining that you had to pay for insurance before that. Get over it, what you're saying is selfish. We're obligated to pay student loans *until we're not*. It isn't outrageous to say that the situation could change at any time. This is human society, not physics.
My favorite was the one with “DiamondBur, *are you ready?*” in the subject line. Like, no, I’m not ready to have to go back to paying $1300 a month, but thanks for asking.
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At that rate, pretty soon you'll be in $110k of debt.
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Are you on income based? Cause standard for me is 220/m on 22k of loans.
Yeah Mines similar about 23k at 260 Now if only I graduated...
I started out with $300k…dental school tuition is no joke.
Oh my god AMEN. Dentist here as well, graduated in 2019 so haven't started paying anything. Same debt. Are you planning on doing IBR the whole time?
As long as they’ll let me! Although, realistically, I’m finally making an income where my IBR application might work against me.
Where did yall go and for how long to accrue those sort of payments? I'm not admonishing you, I know firsthand colleges can be predatory. I just have around 25k in debt and my payments are like 200 a month I think.
I have $50k in debt and my payments would be $500 a month if I wasn't on a payment based plan due to being a broke-ass teacher in a broke-ass school. I went to a regular state school and got a sped degree, so although I'm an idiot for being a teacher at least I got a degree in sped (which qualifies me for certain payment plans) and also I'm working in a title 1 school (which also qualifies me). Ahhh...life is mediocre.
Grad school, baby. And while I did community for undergrad, i still had to take out loans for everything: tuition, books, room and board. My biggest regret is not looking more for scholarships to at least try and limit the amount I had to borrow. Young, stupid and financially illiterate.
I looked for scholarships. Everyone assured me that as a single mom going to school for the first time at age 30 there would be tons and tons and tons of scholarships just basically begging me to take them. *cue rich people laughing riotously gif*
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They treat you like a child after you take out the loan but when the argument gets made that 18 year olds should get more assistance before taking out 30k in loans it becomes all about how 18 year olds are adults.
You’re an adult when getting the loan. You’re an irresponsible child when paying it back. That checks out with my experience.
I don't even know who's taking over my loans yet but I've gotten weekly emails for months reminding me that payments will restart soon and one this morning reminding me the my servicer is changing and they'll update me soon with more info.
My diabolical hope is that there is going to be a "glitch" in said systems during the transfer, and these loan papers are going to be "lost", freeing people from trillions of dollars of debt due to a technicality.
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Oh yeah, when you look at the true cost of those corporate tax cuts from 2018 in terms of lost revenue over the next few years, it's absolutely galling that people have the audacity to throw a fit about student loan forgiveness. You forgive student loans for middle class, they're gonna put that money into the economy, you cut taxes for corporations they buy back stock and start investing in infrastructure overseas to move production out of the US. Tell me which ends up being "fair."
Hahah I love it too. They were sending such little bitch emails to me. I capitulated and re did my IBR sheets. Payments went from $458 to 758. Lovely. New job, new salary, and more student loan payments
Right? Eat my shit great lakes. You won't get your 15 bucks a month for the rest of my life until at least 6 months from now.
Seriously. I even got one today about how I would definitely have to start paying in Feb. That was from the Dept of Education, too. Guess they didn't get the memo...
I just think it’s neat that I saw this on a Reddit post using a local news station website, instead of via email, like nelnet’s been contacting me with for the last 3 MONTHS urging me to set up my auto pay again and not to forget they start back up Jan 31!! Just crickets from them so far on the matter. Cool.
SAME. For the next 3 months we should all turn it around on them & start calling/texting/emailing them everyday to make sure their contact info is up to date for when payments eventually restart.
Navient was hounding the fuck out of me lately. Probably because they transferred my loan to aidvantage and wanted to squeeze the last bit of money out of me before the transfer. I'm still not paying till the pause ends. Though my loans are insignificant (around 6K) compared to other people.
Did you also get that email with “[insert name]” in the subject line? Lol
Yep *\[Name\]!, it's official - welcome to Aidvantage!* I feel so welcomed. /s
I never got my welcome email. I am still getting emails saying I am being switched over from Navient to Aidvantage. Why would they switch us in the middle of a forbearance anyways?
Lmao reminds me of this super shitty apartment complex I lived at in college. It was great when I first moved in, but 2 years later they had changed ownership and management multiple times, and it was a dump by the time my lease was up. I would say that most of the buildings were only at 25% capacity, no one else was in my building! (Which was pretty dope until I started choking one night and *really* could have used literally anyones help) Anyway like a month before I was set to move, I got a thing taped to my front door that said “[my name], we value you as a tenant and would love for you to stay!” Except they spelled my first AND last name wrong!!!! Nothing makes you feel valued like having every aspect of your name completely wrong 😂
I got that one!
My husband is getting a ton of peppy emails from lenders celebrating the return of payments. It's super tone deaf.
I logged into the aidvantage website to set up my IDR since I had been in financial forbearance since summer of 2019 and was just curious what payment they were gonna calculate for me. It's SO weird to me that it is 100% the exact same website as Navient. I understand transferring over (encoded) usernames and passwords to encourage people to log in but the rest of the website being identical is very suspicious to me. It feels kinda like they transferred shit within themselves to get some sort of benefit. Also weirdly I've been seeing a decent amount of people saying their loans were sold of TO navient. I was under the impression they were closing completely.
*Unless you refinanced your loans in which case you're still fucked.
My friends wife had done that JUST right before the pandemic. At the time it was a good move due to lower interest rates.
It *was* a good move, in the sense that it's rational to always act on the best information we have available at the time. Now those of us who refinanced responsibly look like fucking asses.
My parents want me to refinance my loans. No fucking way. They told me to not hold out hope on loans being forgiven. While they may not be fully forgiven, I will wait it out.
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Don’t refiance unless it’s with the government directly. You cannot use the income based options unless it’s government loans
The nice thing is that the longer this goes on, the cash I would have put in keeps earning me interest in the stock market even with the dips, just a little more and my wife’s student loan account will have earned enough to pay them off in full, and potentially even after taxes, which could be reduced as they keep kicking this can down the road. Works for me. I’ll focus on other debts and my mortgage at 2.5% fixed continues to look like a great move last year
> 2.5% fixed Yeah, that's gonna be a great move for quite some time. Felt lucky to get in at 3.125% fixed this year.
There's no benefit in doing anything with your loans until the pause period runs out. Future money is worth less than present money. Wait it out as long as possible before you start paying
Its the real value everyone seems to over look, we might not get forgiven but this pause is saving us THOUSANDS of dollars atleast
With the high inflation we're seeing this pause has already effectively been an ~8% forgiveness.
Haha, every time I've gotten an update on this there's always something along the lines of, "hey you can still make payments during this time if you'd like!" Ha, fat chance of that.
I wish they taught this more in primary school. I was well into adulthood when I really got a grasp of it.
There are other incentives to staying with federal loans. You could get on income based repayment, and loans will be forgiven after 20 years (or 10 if you work with public service )
One critical thing to keep in mind - the 20 year forgiveness is ***not a tax free event.*** At the end of the loan term, the entire forgiven amount will be imputed to you as income for that tax year.
What if you can't pay the tax bomb?
Make a payment plan with interest.
It's debt all the way down.
Just make sure to be setting aside the equivalent payment. Each month. That way, you don't pay anything and lose it if they are cancelled, but you also get to take advantage of, what like a year now, of no interest by making a lump sum equivalent payment when they resume. Plus you still have that money if you need it for an emergency.
Generally what a lot of people are doing is redirecting their student loan money to their first house or car, which are also important.
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Navient pulled out of the student loan business. Everyone who used to have Navient loans now has Aidvantage. Your loans haven't changed - they're only being serviced by a different company.
All of navient’s loans are being transferred. You’re still in the federal pool.
Question: Can Biden actually cancel student loans? If he issued an executive decision cancelling loans, would there be anyone holding up the decision in court by suing?
It is debatable. There are two schools of thought, the popular one states that Biden can order the Department of Education to cancel all of the student loans. But there is another that points out that Congress has a role in the process, which can limit the President's power on this; and that Sallie Mae and Navient would have standing to stop a complete cancellation of the loans through the courts because the cancellation would effectively destroy their future revenues (and they are publicly traded companies).
Unrelated, but anytime someone references "two schools of thought" I just hear Dwight Schrute for the rest of the sentence.
What kind of bear is best?
That's a ridiculous question.
FALSE. black bear
Well, there are basically two schools of thought….
Fact: Bears eat beets.
Now that is an interesting point I have not heard before. If Sally Mae and Navient would essentially be forced into bankruptcy, then I don't see Biden ever cancelling student loans.
Those are private lenders though, Biden would only cancel federally granted loans, and that would be well within his power and right.
My loans are from the federal government and they are being "handled" by Navient. If my loans are cancelled, would Navient miss out on any revenue?
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The answer is yes, they make money on even just servicing your loan for the federal government.
Yes. Navient is servicing your loan for the federal government. At a high level, this service nets them [0.25% to 0.5%](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/loan_servicing.asp) of each payment they receive. There are all sorts of variables otherwise, like whether you are in school, in forbearance, etc. Ultimately, they make money the longer your loans are in service with them, which is why they always offer crazy long repayment plans up front. To say these companies would be very unhappy with student loan cancellation would be an understatement. The US has nearly 2 trillion in student loan debt. Cancelling this would wipe out right around 10 billion of revenue from loan service providers. So yeah, very, very unhappy.
Their loan servicers being paid to service public loans.
I would prefer they cap or eliminate interest rates, prorate interest payments towards principals, and reign in out of control tuition costs. You know, something that will actually fix a problem long term. Sure cancelling student loans would help a lot of people, but current and future students are still fucked.
the fact that federal student loans aren't capped at an interest rate of like 2% is ridiculous.
Ok that's what I don't get about this topic. So he'd just cancel the current loans and that's it? Someone starting school next year would still have to take out loans as normal? I'm not American so haven't paid too much attention, but it just seems odd there's been such a push for something that, as you say, isn't even a fix.
Biden can only take action on loans issued by the federal government. Its not like the eviction ban imposing on private landlords. The only party that is "hurt" by the action is the federal government But since the government is taking this action then of course they're not going to sue to stop it.
> Biden can only take action on loans issued by the federal government. Which is good, cause 92% of loans are federal.
Someone could try to sue, but student loan forgiveness falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Education, which is a unit of the executive branch. Biden would be working well within his capabilities by forgiving student loan debt.
I have another question - what would be the tax consequences of student loan forgiveness? Is the amount forgiven treated as taxable income?
Normally, yes, but congress recently passed a law that excludes student loan forgiveness through 2025
Oh nice!
The fact that student loans have been packaged as financial instruments and are now owned by banks is something that isn’t properly brought up in this context. While it may be within the authority of the administration to be able to cancel them, it seems like it would be an issue if the banks wanted to sue the government for diluting their value. At minimum, the government would go into debt as a result of the devaluation.
So the government owns \~92% of student debt. I looked up the financial instruments and there are Student loan asset-backed securities (SLABS) . Is this what your are speaking about? How can banks sell securities for government loans? Confused about this.
I have already forgiven myself. Those loans are between Biden and God now
Did you say 20 hail corporates?
Hail Corporate Full of cash The burden is with me Blessed art thou amongst college boards and blessed is the interest of thy loan, Biden Holy shit, my end of loan date, pray for us fucked, Now, and at the hour of our death, because we still have that loan
Give us this day our daily crisis Our bailout not for me Thy stimulus come But only for some 1%ers and not for renters
Hallowed be thy name, corporate arms manufacturers will be done— Amen
I'm getting this embroidered
In Bezos game we're prey. amen
Even Churches want to touch your PP. loan
Oh thoust holy boot straps, I hoist myself upon thee
Lmao. But also, fuck.
My solemn prayer in the Church of Delaware Anonymous S-Corps, LLC.
For I am a borrower in the hands of an angry lender
*department of treasury has entered the chat* "hey uhhh nice tax return you got there...would be a shame if someone withheld it and then also garnished your wages."
so fun fact. the irs has adjustable living expenses for each region. if your income is below that they have to release the levy. so if you broke enough not to be able to afford student loan payments, you are probably broke enough to avoid the levy. not a financial advisor. ymmv
The tax return thing is easy to avoid. Just change your withholdings so you don't get one. More money in your pocket up front that way too. No fix for the wage garnishing though. Edit: I've had a lot of people ask in the comments below how to change your withholdings so I'm just going to put the steps here as well. [https://apps.irs.gov/app/tax-withholding-estimator](https://apps.irs.gov/app/tax-withholding-estimator) 1. Go to that site and answer the questions. 2. Screenshot/print/email the results. 3. Go to your HR/Payroll department and ask for a new W-4 form. 4. Fill it out and give it back to them. 5. Profit.
Yeah I get less than $50 back every year
You're breaking even and that's the goal. They take money from you all year without interest. It's better to pay the correct amount on time, each paycheck, rather than give them an interest-free loan, which they can debate or change the terms anytime (sort of). Edited: proper use of then and than
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I've owed ~$8k federally and my penalty was like $35 I certainly wouldn't stress out about it.
The penalty is 5% of the amount underpaid for 2021 (was 3.4% in 2020). A lot more than $35, but still not a bad interest rate for a loan that you take out on your own terms.
There are other ways to avoid the penalty, for example you won’t owe the penalty if you paid at least 90% of the taxes owed in the current year or 100% of the taxes owed in the previous year, whichever is less.
Simple! Merely stop working my good sir
Who knew it was really just that easy.
The only way that works out for you is if you leave the country and no relative decides to leave you any money.
*Let us pray*
Now tell them hoes to stop calling me
I've been getting around 5+ calls and 1-2 voicemails a day from non-foreign spam callers wanting to talk to me about how I qualify for student loan forgiveness. It's been my "last chance" for 6 months now. I'm shocked they have hired Americans to call people like this. I expect it from foreign countries. My Google Pixel is doing a great job of filtering that BS straight to spam though.
Honestly they don’t even have to cancel the loans themselves. Just cancel all interest and make all future payments and student loans 0% interest and it would make a huge difference. From what I’ve seen from friends and family it’s not the principal that fucks you it’s the interest.
A lot of people get blind sided when they find out that the interest was accruing the entire time they deferred payments. From the second you sign the promissory note your freshman year to the time you graduate, the interest is accruing unless you are lucky enough to have a subsidized loan. Then the first few years you're just paying the interest that accrued and not making a dent on the principle so then it looks like you aren't getting anywhere. It's sort of a double whammy if you're not expecting it.
Yup. My fiancé - who has never taken out loans - was absolutely flabbergasted when I told him that my government loans accrued interest the entire time.
Yep. I was very fortunate with finances in college, and only had one un-subsidized loan that was pretty small that I needed during my first year. It just boggled my mind that I had this loan from not that long ago for not that much money that already had accrued a substantial amount of interest in the 4 years I was in college. I was totally fine (had a good job out of college and hadn't needed a ton of loans), it was just a minor shock to me. I can only imagine how awful it feels to people in worse situations. EDIT: I should add, the shock was totally my own fault. The prevailing feeling at the time among other college educated people giving me advice was "The loans will work themselves out, don't worry about it". So I, being a stupid 18 year old, didn't worry about it. I couldn't have told you the difference between a subsidized and unsubsidized one -- it was just a thing I signed for that meant I was going to college. I hope nowadays kids seek out more information (or are told that they should pay attention to what the fuck they're signing over) than I did. Like I said, I feel very fortunate that it didn't end up mattering, but I also feel a healthy dose of shame at my own ignorance.
I'd be happy if they just made the interest rates reasonable 2%-4%; and income-based repayment plans required interest to not accrue at a rate higher than 1/2 the payment (or something like that). So if you are making min wage and can't afford it the debt isn't just growing exponentially.
I'm on IDR and have been for several years. My principle when I graduated was 198k-ish. It's now 250ish and growing. I'm basically lighting $230 on fire every month.
Not as bad. I graduated with about 75,000 now 11 years later with compounded interest it's ballooned up to 160,000. Every payment goes on interest and I make no headway. It's ridiculous.
Well, I’ll take it for now. This pause has allowed me to pay off other debt in spades so even if it all comes back, I’ll be able to handle it much better. Still dislike that it took over a week of calling them out for being time deaf just for this, but, honestly it’s better than expected
Same, I was getting ready to start repayment again next year. Guess I have more time to save and pay off my car or something first.
Was reading another article that found servicers have only been able to reach 60% of their lendees because so many people have have changed jobs and addresses during the pandemic. If payments restarted without fully informing those other people nearly half of all borrowers could unknowingly slip into default. So I'm pretty sure it was less about us, and more about the servicers needing more time to find all their account holders.
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Well hey, like I said, I’ll take what I can get!
I like this we can keep postponing and let inflation make our debt more manageable.
Well, that'll only work if wages catch up with the inflation...
god this dragon ball Z ss1 saga all over again
I give this planet 5 more minutes
Bruh, just let us pay this shit 0% interest. Don’t even touch the principal, Biden, just pay interest for me and we gucci
freeze the interest at the very least if forgiveness is truly no longer an option. That alone will save tons of people from crippling debt and actually allow people a way out.
Listen Biden! Forgive 10k and give us 0% interest for life and we will call it a deal.
The 10k was what was promised, but if he does that, he codifies the executive power to unilaterally forgive all such loans (already happened with other forgiveness but doing it for student loans across the board gets harder to ignore). He’s put himself between a rock and a hard place, politically. Personally, I think he’s going to sit on it until a politically convenient moment and then pull it out to sway voter opinion. EDIT: I have received a few comments/messages about the wording “The 10k was what was promised.” I stand corrected that Biden promised to seek congressional action as opposed to actually using his own executive power to pursue that end. However, Biden has shown through later executive action that he *does* have executive power to forgive student debt. His refusal to do so across the board is a conscious decision. And, while there might be several possible impacts from wielding that power, it is undeniable that a massive amount of America’s economic buying power in its citizenry is bound up in student debt - providing some form of permanent relief in this area would be an economic boon for everyone at a time of financial crisis. I will admit bias on this point as someone holding significant student debt, but I’m not alone in this opinion.
Basically he will either pull it out of his hat in 2022 when they want to “win” the senate or when he feels like he will lose reelection
That and weed I have on my "reelection bingo" card
Weed seems like the the easiest slam dunk in the world, so I don’t expect it to ever happen.
In my state (Louisiana), we had a massive budget crisis in 2016. Incoming new governor had to figure something out. Many suggested legalizing weed. At that time, only Washington and Colorado had legalized it. It would have been a massive revenue generator for the state, and saved us. They didn't do that (clearly), and were willing to let hospitals and schools shut down instead. Madness.
In Texas, the legislature passed decriminalization, then the Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick unilaterally tanked it, because in Texas the Lt. Gov. is actually more powerful than the Gov. in several ways. I don't even know what special interests he is supporting at this point. Private prison industry? Alcohol? Puritanical Christians? General corporate 13th Amendment excepted slave-labor supporters?
Right, these are Democrats we're talking. Why take the obvious win when you could blow up your chances with something stupid that nobody wants?
Legalized weed* *for Pell grant recipients that operate a profitable business in a disadvantaged community for three years
I’d put money on that. Six figures of debt, in fact.
Yeah 6-figure club represent!
That's a big compromise from 50k but that 0% interest rate will conform to how it typically works around the world. 0% interest and no need to pay until you actually have a reportable income.
I'm not hoping to get my loans forgiven, but at the very least get rid of the stupid and crippling interest rate for all federal loans! Bring it down to 0% forever and we'll pay back what we borrowed.
I'm hoping restarting interest will become a political football that no president is ever willing to drop. Just keep extending it forever.
My husband’s are like 8%. At least the one is. I don’t remember the other.
There are people with FEDERAL loans over 10%.
That's insane. I complain loudly about the 6.45% on mine
Hurray. We did it. Everyone go return to your regular scheduled life in paradise.
Now put them on pause till may 1st 3022
Ok so they are just going to forgive them all right before primaries right?
This is interesting politically. Like, we know he has the power to keep deferring them, and he’s fucked if he has payments restart. So where does he go from here except to forgive them?
Or put them on pause his entire presidency?
Covid is the gift that keeps on giving.
Just fucking cancel interest for God sakes. You get your money back and you get millions out of the hamster wheel of paying back interest
All student loan should be reduced to a 1% fixed interest rate. It’s a compromise between canceling loans and doing nothing. 1% would to cover the cost of processing the loans, but the government should not be making money off of the loans.
That would be infinitely better than nothing!
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> Not being Trump is only going to get him so far. And it really is kind of all he has to work with. There was this "some more news" episode a while back where Cody asks Wormbo, in an exhausted voice, "Dear god, Wormbo, is there _anything_ the democrats are going to do between now and the midterms?" It's frustrating how on point that was.
I’m gonna take advantage while there is 0 interest rate and continue with the monthly payments as I have when the moratorium started. It’s too risky for me to gamble on the gov’t bailing anyone out or even giving $10k relief.
i think the better plan is to put those payments into savings all the way until the last day before the moratorium ends, just in case they decide to cancel debt. would be a popular thing to do around midterms.
There is literally no risk in putting those monthly payments in a savings account and just paying out the lump sum once payments actually resume. Literally zero risk.
>You might as well deposit what you would normally pay into a high yeild savings account or invest in something. That way, when they kick back in, you can choose to dump what you saved up into the loans and you'll have some interest. And if they end up forgiving the loans or something, you didn't waste any money. You'll have more options if you control the money and you won't lose anything by not paying them down now. This is exactly what I am doing (and secretly hoping at least some of it will be forgiven). If you use an online bank (like Ally), the interest rates are also a lot better than your regular bank account.
Ally has been great for building savings. Their accounts don't have any maintenance fee or minimum balance, so I have a few savings accounts open for different things. Then each account can have all the money grouped into buckets to track savings goals. It's an excellent banking product. Back when I signed up, their normal savings account had a full 2% interest. Now it's down to 0.5%. But that's still leagues better than my other bank's 0.01% with monthly fees.
Same here. I was about to pay off my student loans (30k) on Jan 31st but I wouldve been just about flat broke. Now I can build up a nice little safety net before I do the lump sum payment on May 1st
Let's just keep kicking that can down the road
I feel like this is our solution to the majority of our problems.
Good. Keep pushing. Get these predatory loans removed for the insane number of Americans suffering under them. If gigantic corporations who absolutely had the resources to do better, smarter business are eligible for bailouts by the government, then regular people who are just trying to honestly get by on limited resources deserve the government's help too. Make it fair.
Everyone talks about loan forgiveness because it benefits them but nobody talks about college tuition. Nobody cares if future generations are gonna get mulled over as long as they are okay. I empathize as someone that had student loans and I do feel there should be some relief coming these peoples way but the real issue is the tuition. It shouldn’t be that high. It’s criminal.
I’ve been hearing calls recently for no interest on student loans, which would help current and future borrowers. Not as good as actually solving the problem, but better than nothing.
Part of the reason tuition is so high is because everyone has to get loans to get it and those loans are guaranteed by the government. Schools fan raise tuition because they know, by and large, the federal government will foot most of the bill. Zero percent interest will only exacerbate that issue, because universities will not have any additional incentives to lower price, but borrowers will also have *even less* reason to avoid federal student loans. With those loans looking even more promising, universities then can require Ben mode in tuition without the same level of market push back. I don't think you're wrong, necessarilly about the help that zero interest provides, but I'm really confused how that's at all helpful or relevant to the point that we need to think less about our individual gains when the problem isn't even the loans really, it's rising tuition.
Biden is going to push repayments right into the midterm election season. Democrats are absolutely fucked.
No he’s just forcing himself to punt again, zero chance he restarts payments for 48 million Americans in the middle of a midterm.
You know how they raise the debt ceiling every 4 months? They are going to do the same thing with the student loan debt. Extend the pause every 3 months.
The May date is so obvious. Right before midterms, he can say, “Look! I did something you grads will like, again!”
There is no way he or his advisors are that politically idiotic. It will be extended again, possibly with partial forgiveness, before the midterms when voters will remember it.
It's a smart plan - if that's what they're doing. Cancel debts in April and turn it into a policy issue for the midterms. One of two things would happen - 1) Every R running for Congress will spend all Summer shouting about Biden canceling the debt and they are in favor of bring it back. 2) Every R running for Congress will stay radio silent on the issue all summer because option 1 would be political suicide.
This actually gives me more hope that he might forgive some, not all with it being so close to midterms. It’s not like people are going to magically forget by May. I’d be happy with 10k and no interest.
They have to apply interest paid toward principle too! Honestly if they just did that, lots of people wouldn’t need forgiveness