Student loan debt? Elusive secrets to forgiveness & cancellations.

My awesome friend Kristen shared this info with me.

I have student loan issues. Not as many as I used to. Years ago I had some sort of gawdaful high interest Perkins loan. It was a small loan, but just aggressive enough to be a huge pain in the ass. Actually, it was 2 loans at $1,000 or so each. Anyway, I was paying some minimal amount like $20 a month on each, which could be a huge amount when you are a single mom on ONE income, at approx $10 an hour or whatever. I paid off a few hundred at some point but had struggled with it at other times.

Anyway, at some point I was hired as a Case Manager at Catholic Charities Support & Recovery Services. My clients were adults with mental health issues, and this was public mental health as we billed Mainecare for our services.

Every spring I had to deal with my student loans. All of them. Not just the small aggressive Perkins loans, the big slow sluggish jabba the hut student loans, too. Stafford, I believe the beast calls itself. I would keep tossing them into deferments and whatnot because if I didn't, I would fall behind and they could seize my ever lovin' spring tax return. (nooooo......!!!!!!).

At some point I was on the phone with ACS, probably crying my eyes out and carefully guarding my firstborn and the lady on the phone asked if I thought I might qualify to have my Perkins loans forgiven. I didn't think I would qualify, because my clients were adults and what she was referring to applied to people who worked with children in the public health setting. Turns out, I DID qualify. See, even though I worked in adult mental health I had a specialized client base: families with young children in the home. Even though my actual client WAS an adult, I often did things like refer their children for services or daycare, help with financial solutions for the family, find them subsidized housing, help them with their child protective or family court issues, etc. I was told that as long as more then 1/2 my caseload served a family with children in the home, it counted.

I had to write a letter, have my supervisor sign it, have HR do something with a company seal and submit this to ACS. I did this every year for five years. At the end of 5 years of employment with SRS, my 2k super aggressive fast moving cancer of a Perkins loan was GONE! Totally forgiven. It cancelled a certain percentage every year leading up the 5 years and kept the loans deffered in the meantime. There are similiar cancellations for Perkins for any public health profession and if you are a public school teacher in an area with specific percentage of low income families. There are also several more options for cancellation and deferment. Another added benefit was that, for a while anyway, every time I saw our prgram director I would be free of my usual suspicion of people in a role of authority and instead think "There is Sally. Sally saved me two grand, and the huge interest rate and sometimes late fees that was on my back every month." A warm fuzzy feeling would follow. This is not the moment I usually have when staring at authority.

Anyway, moral of the story: research the type of loans you have and see if you qualify for forgiveness. Call and ask them if there is any chance at all.

& click on the link below to learn about student loan debt forgiveness secrets. They are out there. It's a little like the financial equivelent of cryptozoology, but keep searching.....


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