Boston Student Loan Lawyer

Law Office of Adam S. Minsky

BREAKING: New Details on Expanded Student Loan Forgiveness

| Articles Current Events Income-Driven Repayment Loan Forgiveness Policy & Reform

A couple of months ago, Congress passed new legislation expanding eligibility requirements for Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF). That legislation gave the U.S. Dept. of Education 60 days to create formal notice and a procedure for evaluating applicants requesting forgiveness under this expanded program. We haven’t known what the procedure would be, and how or when borrowers could gain access to this program – until now. And, unfortunately, I think it’s going to be a mess.

First, a recap of PSLF. To get your student loans forgiven under the program, a borrower must make 120 “qualifying payments.” A “qualifying payment” is one that is made (1) on the right type of federal student loan, which is a Direct loan; (2) under the right type of repayment plan – which is either an income-driven repayment plan or the 10-year Standard plan; while (3) working in qualifying employment. Read More

Here’s a List of Rollbacks to Student Loan Protections

| Articles Current Events For-Profit Colleges Income-Driven Repayment Loan Forgiveness Policy & Reform

The Trump/DeVos administration has been busy during the past 18 months, rolling back significant protections for student loan borrowers and their families. Just in the past couple of weeks, there have been two new developments that curtail regulation of predatory schools, lenders, servicers, and debt collectors.

First, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), now under the leadership of Trump appointee Mick Mulvaney, effectively eliminated its student loan division by rolling it into a different department that has no investigatory or enforcement power. Previously, the CFPB’s student loan division had issued comprehensive, data-driven reports on the atrocious state of federal student loan servicing. It had also brought numerous enforcement actions and filed several lawsuits against predatory companies, including Navient, returning upwards of $750 million to student loan borrowers and other consumers harmed by unfair or harmful business practices. It looks like we can no longer count on the CFPB to do this work. Read More

MA Senate Passes Student Loan Bill of Rights

| Articles Current Events Policy & Reform

This week, the Massachusetts State Senate unanimously passed the Student Loan Bill of Rights – powerful legislation that would enshrine new state-level protections for student loan borrowers in the Commonwealth. I was proud to testify at the State House last year in support of the bill, and I am thrilled to see it pass the State Senate with bipartisan support.

The bill still has to pass the House and be signed by Governor Baker before it becomes law. But this is a major first step. If it becomes law, the legislation could do a lot to protect student loan borrowers. Here’s how:Read More

BREAKING: Expanded Eligibility for Public Service Loan Forgiveness

| Articles Current Events Income-Driven Repayment Loan Forgiveness Policy & Reform

Last week, Congress passed – and the President signed – a major spending package that touches nearly every element of society. Buried deep within the 2,200 pages of legislation are some interesting provisions regarding the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program, which allows borrowers to get any remaining balance on their federal student loans forgiven after 10 years of “qualifying payments.”

First, a recap of the PSLF program. It’s not so much about “10 years” of qualifying payments as it is 120 individually qualifying monthly payments (which, if made consecutively, add up to 10 years). A “qualifying payment” is one that is (1) made on Direct federal student loans, (2) under a qualifying repayment plan – which is either the 10-year Standard plan or an income-driven repayment plan, while (3) working full-time for a qualifying public service employer.Read More

BREAKING: Budget Targets Loan Forgiveness and IDR Programs

| Articles Current Events Default Income-Based Repayment Income-Driven Repayment Loan Forgiveness Pay-As-You-Earn Policy & Reform

The Trump administration released a budget blueprint yesterday, outlining how it wants Congress to address government spending. The proposal calls for sweeping changes to student loan programs – reforms that would have a major national impact. Here are some specifics:

  • Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) would be eliminated.
  • Current Income-Driven Repayment (IDR) programs like Income Based Repayment (IBR), Pay As You Earn (PAYE), and Revised Pay As You Earn (REPAYE) would be eliminated, and a new IDR plan would take its place. This plan would have payment amounts somewhere between PAYE/REPAYE and IBR, with a shorter repayment term (15 years) for undergrads and a longer term (30 years) for grad students.
  • Subsidized federal loans would be eliminated, meaning all federal loans would accrue interest at all times, even during periods of in-school deferments.

Read More

Surge in Sallie Mae and Navient Collections Lawsuits

| Articles Current Events Default Private Student Loans

During the past few months, I have seen a fairly rapid increase in new collections lawsuits being filed against student loan borrowers in Massachusetts for defaulted student loans that were previously held by Sallie Mae and/or Navient. This is noteworthy because in my experience, these loans had been predominantly placed with non-attorney third-party debt collection agencies, or out-of-state collection law firms that rarely filed suit. This is a major shift.Read More

Student Loan Law End-of-Year Review

| Articles Current Events For-Profit Colleges Income-Based Repayment Income-Driven Repayment Loan Forgiveness Pay-As-You-Earn Policy & Reform Private Student Loans Taxes

Well, 2017 has been quite an explosive year, hasn’t it? And there’s been a lot going on in the world of student loan law – so much, in fact, that it can be a bit overwhelming to keep everything straight. So as we wrap up this year, here’s an overview of what went down for student loan borrowers, and some hints of what’s to come in 2018.Read More

BREAKING: Major Changes Proposed for IBR and Loan Forgiveness

| Articles Current Events Income-Based Repayment Income-Driven Repayment Loan Forgiveness Pay-As-You-Earn Policy & Reform

News outlets are reporting that the House GOP has drafted legislation that could reshape the entire federal student loan system.

The bill is called the “Promoting Real Opportunity, Success and Prosperity Through Education Reform Act,” or the “PROSPER Act.” The full text of the proposed bill has not yet been released, but an outline of the proposal was released to the media. Here’s what we know (and what we don’t know):Read More

BREAKING: Tax Bill Targets Student Loan Borrowers

| Articles Current Events Policy & Reform Taxes

Late this week, the House GOP unveiled its much-anticipated tax reform bill. The bill makes a lot of reforms to the tax code for both individual and corporate taxpayers. There are some major changes proposed for student loan borrowers.

First, the bill eliminates the student loan interest deduction. Currently, individuals earning an income of up to $80,000 per year (or $160,000 for married couples filing jointly) can deduct up to $2,500 per year in interest paid on their student loans, although the benefit begins to get phased out once an individual hits $65,000 per year in income. There are over 44 million student loan borrowers in the United States, and an estimated 12 million of them claim this deduction. Read More

Two Major Student Loan Servicers to Merge

| Articles Current Events

BREAKING NEWS – Two of the largest student loan servicers in the country have just announced a merger. Nelnet will be purchasing Great Lakes Higher Education for $150 million.

Currently, the U.S. Dept. of Education contracts out servicing operations to four primary companies: Nelnet, Great Lakes, FedLoan Servicing (part of the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Authority, or PHEAA) and Navient. These servicers also manage private loans on top of their federal student loan portfolios. Assuming the merger is approved, the combined Nelnet-Great Lakes entity would become the largest student loan servicer in the country.

What is fascinating about this – and, arguably, quite troubling – is that while student loan servicing remains atrocious, Great Lakes generally has the fewest customer complaints of the four major U.S. Dept. of Education servicing companies. Great Lakes is also the only nonprofit servicer of the four.  If this merger is approved, Great Lakes will effectively cease to exist, as it will become part of Nelnet. That will leave only three major servicing companies handling Direct federal student loans, two of which are currently subject to major lawsuits for systematic servicing problems (Navient and FedLoan Servicing/PHEAA). Read More