Don't be me.

8 years ago I sat down with some workers from my school and they helped me come up with this tiny little payment plan on the student loan because that's all I could afford at the time, I was told that when I make more money I could take a look at it again and figure out a new monthly payment. These small payments would just keep the interest on the student loan down. We set that student loan on autopay and I've been working and making my student loan payments ever since.

Everything in the economy has gotten worse, yet even then I've always been proud of myself for never having missed a single payment, ever. Even if I've never been in a place where I could insecure my payment to something real, I really was proud of that. Well. Some other stuff happened in my life and I needed some financial documents. I had to reset all my passwords to get back into ECSI and I could see that all my monthly payments were listed. But weird thing is that it says "amount due: 0"

Wait what? Zero? That can't be right, but even if it WAS true then what have I been making payments for? Where have my payments been going all these years?

So I reset my password for the federal student loan website and get into that and I see my loan....it's gone up. By a lot. Next to my loan is something displaying my payment coming in via ECSI. They're together on the page, but according to the history tab the student loan is that the student loan has not been getting any of my student loan payments. I can see that my ECSI account and my student loan account are connected, and ECSI is correctly taking the payment from me once a month, but it's never gone towards my student loans. All the years the money just been taken and gone somewhere else. I have yet to figure out where. I'm going to have to call my bank and have them blacklist ECSI for the moment, but the bigger problem is that I just trusted the system and thought I was correctly doing what everyone told me to do, I took out a loan, I've been paying it back. Or so I had thought.

So now what I'm left with is that the actual loan has just been sitting there gaining a shitload of interest. From their point of view I must be a deadbeat who never pays his debts.

I'm a bit confused as to how I've never faced any consequences of this. Even after just like one year or something I would have expected them to barrage me with phone calls and emails asking me why I was never paying back my loan. Instead they seem to just be okay with it? They've never come after me for it.

But regardless I know about it now, and now I'm ****ed. I've been grinding my legs away at my jobs for 8 years for nothing. I've done literally nothing to advance my lot in life. I wanted to have a home. I wanted to have a child. But I never found any higher paying jobs. Now I'm middle aged and I am more in debt than I was when I took out the loan and I have less money than ever.

Don't be me.

I’ve been on this thread for years. I started school in 2014. Got screwed over more times then I could count. Finished undergrad 2018. Got wrongfully kicked out of grad school accruing and extra 46k in student debt for nothing. Finished grad school in 2023 April. I’ve been a physical therapist for 3 years and 2 months. In 7 minutes I’ll be the last paycheck I’ll ever have to put towards student loans. I paid all 225k back and I did it in just over 3 years. Freedom was the most expensive thing I’ve ever purchased. It is possible if you give everything though we are set up in a system rigged to lose

Finally bit the bullet and switched plans. Just got tired of watching the interest accrue. So I picked the graduated Fixed plan cause it makes the most sense for me, and when I'm about to submit the change it lets me know that all the unpaid interest I had accrued during my time on an IBR will be added to the principal balance of my loans when I switch. So not only am I now going to pay $1500.00/mo, but now I'm getting like at least 10k in interest added to my principal. That is unnecessarily punitive to a borrower that is already going to struggle to make ends meet with the new plan. Thanks a lot.

I’ve been looking at the options to get out of my SAVE plan, and think I have chosen my route. I just bought a new home and plan on going with the lowest plan possible until we get through the holidays and my finances regulate from the move/moving costs. I’d then like to transfer over to either the Graduated Extended or RAP (open to any input on either of those). On the estimates that are on each of them, I am warned that it is an estimate and that Nelnet will send the actual amount once approved. Just curious if the estimates have been pretty on point or if they are way off. Trying to mentally prepare - going from no payment to a pretty hefty one 😮‍💨

Ok. Long time lurker and commenter but believe this may be my first post. I dove deep into the options for my loans after SAVE and under various AI tools to dig through the docs, laws, etc.

The conclusion was for me to go to IBR, run the following studentaid.gov after logged in and session started (open a second/new tab and enter the following URL).

https://studentaid.gov/app/api/nslds/payment-counter/summary

This gave me a lot of lovely information that helped me determine what I was and was not eligible to do.

MY loans range from 2000 to 2012. I have a few parent plus loans PRE summer of 2026 thankfully.

AI directed me to move to IBR, pay the required payment and I will be granted forgiveness when I hit (I believe) 300 payments. I'm approximately halfway there. Slightly over actually and my current work arrangement has my payments very low (I make little on paper, investments, etc. long story for another day). I did get a warning NOT to take out any parent plus loans after this summer, which I will not. My son is still in school and we'll find other funding sources.

TLDR: AI told me to get on IBR and get my qualifying payment count via the link above. I have about 10 yrs of payments left. I CANNOT take out any new parent plus loans or the clock restarts.

Anyone else familiar with this strategy? Should I be placing trust in our future silicon based overlords (big question? different thread maybe? Perhaps they are kinder than our current meat based? hmmm....)

Thanks Reddit peeps!

I got an email today from EDFinancial. My 90 days came and went and I was alerted that I have another 30 days before I got into the standard plan.

For realsy this time, super cereal. I have no idea whats happening and I dont think they do either.

I’ll likely be between jobs and need to do the $0 recertification. I expect a significant pto payout and my job is never timely so this could take weeks. Ie i will likely receive taxable income even when not employed.

Has anyone recertified for the $0 successfully (or not) despite their pto check?

Hi guys, my grace period just ended and I need to pick a payment plan. I have 40k in graduate loans with an average interest of 7.6% I am still not making a ton of money as I am just starting my new job, about 2k a month but it should increase rapidly. I am not looking for loan forgiveness, just something to hold me over until I’m making more money and can afford to pay it off in chunks. I can barely afford my bills right now.

The RAP sounds like a good idea because of the forgiven interest but with my income changing unpredictably and not knowing a ton about my payment options I’m worried. I’m the first in my family to go to college so I don’t have anyone to ask about loans, please help. Thank you!!!

I don’t have a 2025 tax return yet (filed in 2026) and yes I know it’s late. I do have a 2024 tax return (filed in 2025). I just received a denial letter on my recertification request because of my income documents and it literally says, “tax returns from the previous two tax filing years.”

I called MOHELA and they claimed they’re going to reprocess my request but what is the deal, why do I have to explain this to them that my 2024 tax return is from my previous two tax filing years? Has anyone else dealt with this?

To avoid going from $0 to a $500/mo student loan payment starting next month, I want to enroll in school part-time. I'm a parent of 2 and work full-time so it has to be easy. The whole point is to avoid payments that aren't touching my interest payment anyway and I'm taking them to the grave. I'm not burning $500/mo. Can't afford to.

Has anyone done the research on which schools have affordable online programs and what classes would be easy? Who else is doing this?

Hey everyone,

I’m currently in the final stretch of my student loan payoff journey and wanted to get some outside perspectives on a refinancing move I'm considering.

To give some quick background: I started out with 5 loans total, all around 8% interest (grad school). I’ve been paying aggressively towards them and am now down to just two federal loans left (totaling around $30,500):

•    Loan #1: ~$7,000. I’m aggressively paying this off and will be completely done with it by the end of this year.
•    Loan #2: ~$23,500 at an 8.08% interest rate.

Potential Plan: I’m looking at refinancing that remaining $23,500 loan with ELFI at a 4.11% fixed rate for a 5-year term. I already have my Truth In Lending agreement ready to sign.

The monthly payment on the refi loan would be less than $437.50/month, which is the amount my employer contributes monthly toward student loans as a benefit.

By locking this in:
•    My employer's monthly benefit will completely cover the new private loan payment in the background without me spending out of my pocket over the 5-year term.
•    If I leave my employer before 5 years, I would aggressively pay off the rest on my own. The reason I’m considering not to pay off the $23,500 aggressively is that if I rush to pay it off early out of my own pocket, I’d be throwing away "free money" by losing out on my employer’s monthly contribution. My employer has confirmed they would contribute to the private loan and continue paying over the 5 years. 

Dilemmas & Questions:

1. Federal Benefits vs. The Math:
   I’ve had people in my ear telling me never to give up federal protections for a private loan. The only scenario where staying federal would benefit me is if broad student loan forgiveness actually happens soon. I think chances are small. Given that my rate drops from 8.08% to 4.11%. My employer benefit should pay it off about 6 months sooner than staying at 8.08% due to decreased interest.  Am I missing any risks with this line of thinking?

2. The Bonus Structure Math:
   The only slight drawback to keeping this loan active is how my overall compensation works. Part of my compensation includes performance bonuses based on revenue generated past a set multiplier of my base pay. Adding an extra $437/month to my base compensation increases that multiplier hurdle. However, I’ve done the math: the tax-free employer student loan contributions outweigh the small commission gain I’d see from having a slightly lower base hurdle.

3. Servicer Opinions (MOHELA vs. AES):
   Through this offer, my servicing options come down to either MOHELA or AES (American Education Services). I’ve heard plenty of horror stories about MOHELA from classmates, but I haven't heard much about AES. 

Does anyone here have direct experience with AES?
Are they decent to work with (e.g., auto-pay reliability, customer support)?

Would love to hear Reddit's take on both the overall refinancing strategy and opinions on AES. Thanks in advance!

I’ve got student loans spanning from May 2008 to January 2026. Though most of the loans are older, like 2012 or earlier. I was on IBR, then SAVE.

SAVE ended so I went to IBR and payment went up. I’m recertifying due to a change in family size. PAYE is $80 lower than IBR.

But PAYE will go away soonish.

Am I okay going to PAYE as long as I can and coming back to IBR, or will the PAYe payments not count towards my discharge?

I submitted my IDR application in September. Nelnet keeps saying they need more information before processing my IDR application. The problem? They keep telling me a letter or an email has been sent with what information they need. I never got either. I have sent messages to them through the site and I've sent emails. No response. The wait times on the phone have been nuts. So before I settle in for a long wait on the phone to figure out what is going on - has anyone had this happen? What information????

My biggest fear happened this morning. I have been on PAYE for 12 years. Logged in to FSA, had the loan department on the phone with me as an agent could not help. I went through each page and got to payment plan options. NO PAYE as an option. The loan department looked at every loan ( 11), when they were disbursed, no feel loans, no deferment/ forbearance, no default.. and I am paid ahead! We tried it 2 xs. He said there must be a backend glitch that he cannot fix!

He walked me through the electronic paper copy. I had to find a way to put a signature on it and used docfly which seems to have worked. I am now on hold with Mohela waiting for an advanced agent. I have not uploaded anything to them yet-

I am in the open window time frame, not too early. The anniversary date is 1/14/2027. What do I say to this agent to ensure my recert is PAYE and not another plan? Please provide guidance. Thank you

I am freaking out! I have $82k in SAVE. They just emailed me that I have 90 days to choose a new plan. I calculated how much it would be, it included my husband's income too and it says I need to pay $600 a month. Which is insane as I am a therapist who gets paid hourly by client services as in I get paid depending on how many clients I see so sometimes it is more or less. plus now I am pregnant and due in Feb, workplace does not offer paid maternity leave. so I will be out of income and it is unrealistic to ask my husband to pay when we have a lot of expenses

Like many others, I am on SAVE and I got my 30 day warning on October 1st. Yes, I have procrastinated. I guess I'm not interested in riding the uncertainty out and just want to go on a new plan and be done with the scare tactics. I have a lot of options and am curious what you, as a smarter person than I, would do? (aside from time travel and never take out loans in the first place)

• my loan size is $42,627.63 ($5,901.47 of that is interest)
• Option 1: IBR, $0/mo, discharge amount: $72,053, end of term: 2041
  • Hypothetically, if I made the same forever, I'd pay $0 forever (not likely)
• Option 2: Repayment Assistance Plan, $15/mo, discharge amount: $33,483, end of term: 2046
  • Hypothetically I would pay $10,211 in interest when the term ends
• Option 3: Graduated Repayment Plan, $286-$381/mo (it gradually increases), total paid over life of the loan: $55,979 (of which $13,425 is interest), end of term: 2036
• Option 4: Standard Repayment Plan, $484/mo, total paid over the life of the loan: $53,652 (of which $11,098 is interest), end of term: 2036

I guess I'm tempted to do Option 3 or 4 just to get the ball rolling. I don't think I've ever paid more than $1K towards my student loans since graduating in 2014, especially with the various loan forgiveness promises throughout the years. It just felt like holding out might be worth it (whoops).

I don't foresee the next 2 years changing much politically. God forbid there is more Trump or someone as bad/worse than this administration 2 years from now. I guess my current PoV is to pay what they want now, ride it out, and hope for some sort of alleviation in 2028/2029.

I just paid off my car, so I have ~$400/mo that I'm not paying, though that "excess money" has evaporated in the current economy. My healthcare went from like $120/mo to over $470/mo this admin as well.

For anyone looking for logic on my low IBR payment, I am self-employed and my income is very up and down.

Thank you in advance for your helpful insight.

As the title says, I had to take a medical LOA from my last semester. I'm currently pivoting majors and I only need an internship and maybe two classes to get this new degree. Because of the LOA I need to pay about 15k for this semster that I didn't finish and I am stressed about it. I don't have a job, yet, and I am broke from paying for almost my entire college career. I have reached out to the financial aid office at my college and I am going to have a meeting with them about what I can do. Any advice would be wonderful, and thank you.

Has anyone used MK consulting for their loans before?

They’re saying they can get 130k of my loans discharged and bring my payments down by half

Thru “diff programs” and changing my loan dates etc

Almost been 90 days and haven't gotten the additional 30 day notice yet but I see a lot of people are getting one.

I have both undergrad and graduate student loans. I’m in the process of trying to place my student loans in IDR. All my undergraduate loans are already place in, but my grad school loans are not. I’m not sure how to get them into IDR. Do I have to reapply?

Has anyone else experienced this?

Two loans hit their 300 payments according under ICR (yes I’m old) in Jan 2025. Federal Loan Servicing website and the back door counter all state as such.

Servicer, the dreaded MOHELA, does not acknowledge/process this until March 2026, which means I made 17 months of extra payments. MOHELA then does “payment reversal” for each of those extra payments, leaving me with almost a $900 credit between the two loans.

Now those loans continue to sit there with negative balances. I have been contacting MOHELA throughout the year and they said overpayments would be credited to my other existing loans. Ok, cool. Finally this month I was able to reach humans on the phone and after several days and multiple rounds of “escalation,” I was told that while there is indeed a negative balance on the loans, there is nothing to credit. That they have attempted to do so, but there’s no funds to credit to anything.

I literally have received zero money from MOHELA in the form of any refund, and those loans have been sitting with a negative balance in my account for the better part of a year.

Today I was escalated once again, this time to management, and I am supposed to expect a call back with resolution in 10 business days.

So, hive mind, how hosed am I? I have all records of making payments, the payment counter, them reversing payments, everything. I am so angry I’m just shaking…what advice if any can you provide? Anyone else been in this situation? I just want my $900 in overpayment credited to my other loans!

Did anyone else recently certify mail their Borrower Defense application to the PO Box in Kentucky and have it forwarded to another address? How long did it take the govt to finally upload your application?

I’m considering going onto the Standard Repayment Plan after SAVE ends, possibly just letting them move me over. I know the online calculator may not account for everything, so I’m hoping someone can help me understand how the repayment timeline would work.
Two of my loans were consolidated when SAVE was first announced. The other loan wasn’t included, so I’m guessing it was already eligible.
That separate loan dates back to 2009, but I didn’t even know it existed until 2018. It was the loan that ended up with the Debt Resolution Group. I had been making payments on my student loans, but for some reason, none of those payments were being applied to that particular loan.
My main question is: When I leave SAVE and enter Standard Repayment, would I get a fresh 10 years to pay off that unconsolidated loan, or would its age mean the remaining balance could be due in full? If neither, how would they determine the remaining repayment term. And what about the other loans that were consolidated do I lose some years off those too? How does it work? Thanks!!