While I don't agree student loans should be discharged. I do believe we needed better loan options. If private lenders offered income based repayments this would only help. We basically have nothing except forebearance for 2 years. After that you are pretty much screwed. When it comes to my loans I've always paid ontime, however my life has been put on hold. I live with my parents, ride a bus, and because of the economy I work a $10 an hour job. At the end of the month, I only have money for my loans. I still borrow money from my parents. All I'm asking is for better repayment options. I think this at least gets them looking at private loans.

 

"Fresh start" is the language from the bankruptcy code as the intent of the law.

Perhaps we should follow Dubai's lead and start throwing people with bad debts in prison.

BTW, it's not that easy to discharge your debt like it used to be.

See if you'd qualify:

LegalConsumer.com :: Free Bankruptcy Information, Means Test Calculator, Exemption Laws,

Don't forget to include your spouse's income too even if your spouse isn't gonna file with you - gotta include all of your household income.

 

bingo!!

for those of you against the discharge...whats someone like this do? whats someone even worse off than this do? when you go into forbearance the interest still accumulates. forbearance is good for 2 yrs, what then? if you go back to do some classes to do in-school deferment, its cheaper than making the monthly payments on the loans, but the interest again continues to accumulate. before you know it, thousands and thousands in debt is being added yearly while you wait for the dream job that you MAY eventually land, and then even when you land it its not what it was when you began training to be a pilot and you can look forward to being raped by management for the rest of your career. but hey, that shouldnt be dischargeable. screw the borrower for the one life they get to live for making a mistake, right?

 

Let me first emphasize that I do not have any plans to try to charge off my loans through a bankruptcy.

However, I'll go out on a limb and wager that neither of you have a substantial amount of student loan debt. At the same time, I'll also wager that neither of you have been unfortunate enough to have lost a job in this economy.

Am I correct on both counts?

There are a lot of people out there who are literally indebted to someone else for the rest of their natural lives. I have a considerable amount of student loan debt, and I'm honestly doing what I can to pay them. But, there are many people with $200,000+ in loans who simply cannot afford to "make the payments and be responsible for [their] actions." How can people taking home $1600/month afford a $1500/month loan payment? Don't give me the "they should have known" spiel, either; this industry was very different not 10 years ago.

Walk a mile in someone else's shoes first.

 

I think most people with these loans probably got into it, planning on upgrading, and being able to comfortably make payments. Now those same people are still reserve FO's, or maybe have even been furloughed. There is so much beyond the borrower's control to just use a blanket statement like "There goes fiscal responsibility." Sure, maybe you took the loan, got a job, upgraded, and paid it off no problem. Good for you. Many aren't so lucky. It's not the borrowers fault that he/she was born a few years later, got into the industry a few years later, only to have everything come to a sudden stop as soon as he/she finished school or got a job.

 

With all of this being said, has it become a little more difficult to get this kind of borrowing? I mean I have heard a few people saying that they had trouble getting financing for college but I don't really know whether or not they had terrible credit or no one to co-sign.

I mean seriously, when I enrolled in college it was truly a cake walk to just borrow as much money as you needed with no questions asked. My parents were middle class people that never really made too much. I could have borrowed up $50k per year as far as the lenders were considered. I still shake a little when I think about how they would ask my how much I needed and I would just tell them what the school told me I would need. 2 days later it was paid and there was a check for the difference in my mail box. Ok, I'm 19 years old and have a check made out to me for $9000 in my mail box? I'm thousands of miles from home and this is quite tempting. Sure, my parents instilled good values in me so I put it in the bank and used it for the next semester. But I watched a lot of students taking that money and buying motorcycles, cars, boats, alcohol, strippers etc....... For the sake of humanity I really hope this has come to an end.

So needless to say, a lot of people really put themselves in this position but there are lots of guys such as myself that have done everything correctly and if we stay in this profession will not be able to buy a house until after we retire. That is if we ever get to retire.

You should have to go through a long extensive investigation by a board as to whether or not you are in the position you are because of stupidity or that you were truly misled on your investment. Yes, I believe that BK should be an option but only after an background check and so on. Damn you Keybank!

 

Hey dumb idea, but the idea that you can't repossess anything with an education isn't quite right. What if they repossessed your degree and diploma? I'm being serious. Lets say you were hired at a job and an employer tried to verify if you actually had said diploma and degree, the college would say no, and you could either be denied the job, or fired for falsification. Any ideas?

 

For all I care they can have it back. It really hasn't gotten me anywhere. Call that a bad attitude or what ever you want but I would be glad to return my diploma, be out of debt and go do some cheap online degree to fulfill the requirement for the job.

Hindsight is definitely 20/20.

 

Both arguments are essentially correct. Makes no sense to loan tons of money to kids with no hope to repay it, and makes no sense to allow said kids to borrow tons of money and then just walk away when they cannot pay it. Bottom line is, it may not be popular, but not everyone should go to college. Certainly should not if you very likely cannot afford it. Nothing wrong with learning a trade.

 

Interesting idea, I said interesting...I have about $100,000 in student loans and hey I don't want to pay for them so if a bank came to me to "repo" my ratings what is the value?? $12,000-$14,000? The pay I would get if I went to work at Commutair or Colgan?? Now would I still be liable for the remaining ballance or would the loan be forgiven?? If you can make that happen I'm in $1285 a month back in my pocket would be awesome!!! Keep the ideas coming!!!