ziggypop

My loans with them were all Direct Loans (and, to be honest, I would probably recommend consolidating with Direct when it comes to that). However, I would not recommend ignoring their calls. You need to make sure that the loan is resold and rehab is completed. If they interpret your silence as being uncooperative, that won't help your case. If you have problems getting them to discuss rehab properly, then you may want to involve the ombudsman if you think that they are lying to you. Actually, I'm not 100% that they are actively lying so much as having no idea what they're talking about, although it's all the same result on your end. When I had some questions about consolidation, I spent 30 minutes on the phone with the guy who was trying to explain to me how consolidation loans were never fixed interest rates, so they couldn't tell me exactly what my payment amount would be over the life of the loan because it would change every year when the interest rate was reset! Good luck!!

DO NOT SIGN THOSE PAPERS !!!!!!!!!! I speak from experience here with Pioneer. This is exactly the same as what they did to me and now I'm a cautionary tale. In my case, they sent me the consolidation paperwork around my 10th payment (this was before the law changed to make it 9 payments) and told me that this was the final step and to get them signed right away to "get my loan out of default and my reports updated to remove the default" - sound familiar? Being stupid and panicked at the whole situation and thinking that they were using all the right words to mean that my loan was about to be rehabbed, I did it and now, even after 12 payments (plus a "down payment"), I didn't get any of the benefits of rehab. Your loan has to be resold to another lender to actually complete rehab (the 9 payments just make you eligible for rehab; they are not rehab in and of themselves). Call them and specifically tell them that you will not be sending the paperwork until you have confirmation that your loan has been rehabilitated. Also, by filling out the consolidation paperwork and sending it to them, you are letting them pick your consolidation lender. They're owned by Sallie Mae, so guess who you'll get? Yeah, all that and I'm also stuck with SM for the next 25 years!! You can do your own consolidation after the rehab is completed. Just an FYI, you may have to make 1-2 payments after your 9th before the loan is transferred to the new lender. Make sure you keep paying on it until you receive the new loan documents from the lender. Another hint, check your loan status on the NSLDB. I also found out, long after the fact, that they reported one of my loan payments as being "late" and therefore made me ineligible for rehab. It wasn't the case, so it didn't help the situation. I'm not sure how it could be late when it was auto-debited - by them - and I never received anything from them that a payment wasn't received on time (probably because they all were!), so I would never have had a reason to check on it. I hope this helps. Good luck!!!

It's the case with all student loans. Once it's been assigned to a CA, the guarantor won't even talk to you and you have to work through the CA. Hope this helps. Good luck!

It's all good! Federal loans are either Direct Loans, meaning that they're offered directly from the US Dept. of Ed, or else they're FFELP loans, meaning that you took them out from a private lender, but they're still backed by the government. I have to second Lynn's recommendation to consolidate with Direct Loans. They have way better income contingent plans. Other consolidation lenders may talk about back-end incentives, but they're not guaranteed and I have to advise you to stay away from consolidating with SM (believe me, I know that one from experience!). Good luck!

I didn't have Delta, but when I went through this, I didn't have to give any receipts or anything. What I did (which may or may not have been overkill, but it worked!) was create a spreadsheet with all of my income and expenses. I included everything I could in expenses - food, medical, insurance, taxes, etc. and showed how I came up with my proposed payment. I didn't make anything up, but it wasn't like I had been tracking my expenses prior to that, either. If there was anything that was "frivolous" (that's a comparative term here, obviously), but I couldn't get out of like my satellite TV that I was still in my 1-year contract term - or your car note - I just explained why I couldn't drop it. I turned that in with a couple of my most recent paystubs and that was fine. The amount I gave was a little painful, definitely, but it was something I knew I could maintain for 12 months. I hope this helps! Good luck!

APPROVING BANK Chase (as Subaru Financial) BUREAU PULLED TU CREDIT SCORE 699 CUSTOMER STATE OF RESIDENCE IL NEW/USED New YEAR OF VEHICLE 2009 MILEAGE 9 RETAIL/LEASE Retail AMOUNT OF LOAN ~$22,500 TERM CONTRACTED 60 mos. APR/LEASE RATE 5.9% MONTHLY PAYMENT $436.90 MISCELLANEOUS COMMENTARY: Several (paid) student loan COs (paid 4 years ago) and one unpaid ATT CO from 5 years ago. 18% util & 4 inquiries. 6 year banking/credit (CC) relationship with Chase prior to loan, but done through dealer

That's right. The exemptions apply only to defaults. Otherwise, reporting is the same as anything else.

Thanks to Marv who answered all of my (I'm sure elementary!) questions, I bought a 2009 Subaru Forester 2.5X Premium today --- my first new car !! It's straight off the truck (still has the plastic on the hood!), zero miles, with exactly the options that I wanted. Outstanding dealer -- including the test drive, I was in and out in just about an hour -- and the financing will either be 4.9% or 5.9%. My auto-enhanced score was actually higher than my regular FICO by about 35 points and put me right at 699 (a lot of inquiries was killing my score), with the cut off for the 4.9 financing deal at 700. He was going to see what he could do; even at 5.9% with my scores and a SL default that's still showing (but paid) on my report, I'm completely fine with it (my last loan was at 21% -- I'm thrilled with this!!). I can pick it up on Monday, although I'll probably have to wait until Tuesday because of work. Thanks for the help -- Creditboards is awesome!!

Credit Application: Your Age? 38 Your Equifax Credit Score? 693 Your Experian Credit Score? 707 Your TransUnion Credit Score? 668 How many years have you been on file with Equifax? 12 years How many years have you been on file with Experian? 12 years How many years have you been on file with TransUnion? 12 years YOUR PREVIOUS AUTOMOTIVE CREDIT HISTORY Do you have an open auto loan? No Will this open auto loan be a trade-in? N/A How many late pays within the last 12 months on the currently open loan? NONE How many late pays within the last 13-24 months on the currently open loan? NONE Your current open auto loan is financed with? N/A Your current open auto loan payment is? N/A Estimated amount you may be upside down in this vehicle? N/A Rate your payment history on this open auto loan from 1-10 (1=poor:10=Best) None open, but I do have an auto loan on my report that was paid off two years ago. One 30-day-late from 2003. YOUR REVOLVING CREDIT HISTORY Total number of revolving account(s) you have? 8 Total percentage utilized overall? ~17-18% How many of your revolving accounts are store cards? 2 How many of your revolving accounts are major credit cards? (i.e. Amex, MC, Visa) 6 How many of your revolving accounts are known subprime credit cards (i.e. Aspire, 1st Premier) One, possibly (Capital One) YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION How long at your current residence? 5 years, 4 mos. Do you Rent or have a Mortgage, or Live w/Relative or Other? Rent Your Monthly Rent or Mortgage payment? 1300 How long have you held your current job? 1 month (no unemployment between, however). This is what is concerning me the most. Since my credit's not stellar, I'm concerned this will be problematic. Your total provable monthly gross income is? $5833 Your provable monthly gross income is provable via what method? (i.e. computerized paycheck stub, or tax return, or bank statements) computerized paycheck stub Is there additional monthly income? What amount monthly? No Describe the source. N/A Is the additional monthly income provable? N/A Spousal income is not applicable. YOUR DOWNPAYMENT Please tell me your exact down payment in cash? (rebates and trade equity are not considered, please input a dollar value only.) $3000-$4000 (I would prefer less, if possible) Does any credit repository contain any Public Record? No If yes, please very briefly describe. Does any credit repository contain any Collection Account(s)? Yes If yes, please very briefly describe. 1 6-year-old Verizon C/O from 2002 (unpaid) and several student loan default TLs (all paid and in good standing since 9/2004) Please rate your overall creditworthiness on a scale of 1-10 (1=poor, 10= best) 6 (no late payments for 5 1/2 years) Please rate your Installment credit history on a scale of 1-10 (1=poor, 10=best) 5 (10 since 2004) Please rate your Revolving credit history on a scale of 1-10 (1=poor, 10=best) 9 (one 30-day late in 2002) New or Used vehicle you are considering: Please very briefly describe. 2009 Subaru Forester 2.5X Premium or, possibly, 2008 Nissan Rogue SL THANKS MARV!!!!

I have a feeling I already know the answer to this, but thought I'd go for the long shot and see if there was a way out. I'm looking to buy a new car in the next week or so. My car is 9 years old and starting to limp a little bit and I'm a little nervous that I'm one step away from a major crisis with it (no proof of that; I'm not trying to unload a lemon on a dealer!), so I'd like to get it done sooner rather than later. The dealer also has the exact model that I'm looking for in stock, including the exact options and color that I want. Unfortunately, I just moved and, like an salamander, didn't put my title in the safety deposit box before I packed and now it seems to be lost. I'm assuming I'm probably going to have to put off the purchase until the DMV can send a new one (which, I'm assuming, will probably be 6-8 weeks like everything else!)? I didn't know if there was some magic that the dealership can do to get a copy of it sooner. Any thoughts? It's a clear title -- no liens -- if that makes any difference. Thank you!!

It looks like your loan was subrogated (i.e., paid off) by the DOE in October of 2007, which starts the reporting clock all over again as of that date (student loans do not use DOFD). To get to this stage, the loan originally defaulted when the lender returns the loan to the guarantor for payment. If the guarantor is also unable to get payment, then after some period of time (I don't know that there's a standard period here), the guarantor files a claim with the DOE for payment and the whole thing starts over again. Who was the original lender and guarantor? If you check the student loan database that Stryker referred to, it will have all of that information. The school may or may not still have that information. If the loan is back with the DOE, they will likely be coming after you soon (note that most of the actual collecting for the DOE is done through CAs, although I don't think they report very often; DOE doesn't sell its loans). Check that database and you can get the history of this loan. So what does this mean as it relates to reporting delinquency? I have a loan that I eventually consolidated, so it is listed as paid, but there are lots of late payments. My CR reports that it was 120+ days late back in 2001. Does that mean that they dont have to remove, due to DOFD? If you were just late, but never defaulted, then the exemption from FCRA doesn't apply and the lates would fall off just like any other lates. Even defaults do fall off eventually; it's just based on the date of default, rather than DOFD that led to the default. Sorry for the confusion!!

It looks like your loan was subrogated (i.e., paid off) by the DOE in October of 2007, which starts the reporting clock all over again as of that date (student loans do not use DOFD). To get to this stage, the loan originally defaulted when the lender returns the loan to the guarantor for payment. If the guarantor is also unable to get payment, then after some period of time (I don't know that there's a standard period here), the guarantor files a claim with the DOE for payment and the whole thing starts over again. Who was the original lender and guarantor? If you check the student loan database that Stryker referred to, it will have all of that information. The school may or may not still have that information. If the loan is back with the DOE, they will likely be coming after you soon (note that most of the actual collecting for the DOE is done through CAs, although I don't think they report very often; DOE doesn't sell its loans). Check that database and you can get the history of this loan. Hope this helps! I would advise taking care of this soon (which doesn't necessarily mean having to pay it off right away in a lump sum, so don't worry!). DOE has some nasty collection abilities (garnishment without a court order, tax refund garnishment, disqualification from most governmental programs -- not fun!) and, as you're finding out, they have some exemptions from the regular FCRA reporting standards. Since this is showing up on your report again, depending on your balance owed, check into the rehab program, which will at least get the default notation off your record. There's a ton of info on it in this forum if you do a search. Good luck!

I just got approved for the Chase Mileage Plus (my first "cold app" approval !!). I have $3,300 CL on a Chase Platinum card that I've had for about 18 months and was approved for $6,000 with the MP (approved right after Chase said $3,300 was the "highest amount of credit available to me with Chase" -- whatever!). I've started traveling for work, which is why I wanted the MP card. Is Chase likely to let me merge the Platinum into the MP card at activation? TL age isn't a concern, so I don't care if the Platinum is the one that's closed. I want the miles, so I need the MP one to stay open. Combining them would not make this card my highest CL, if that matters (I have a Citi card with a CL of $12,800 - all such odd amounts!). Thanks for the help, everyone!!

I don't know the answer to your question, but I will bet you HUGE sums of money that they will consolidate you with Sallie Mae. That's what happened to me -- technically, the consolidation was with Southwest Student Services (who, by the way, were awesome), but about 3 months later I got a packet in the mail that my loan would now be "serviced" by SM, which, for all intents and purposes means that SM is the consolidator. But, don't worry, since I got the "benefit" of SM ( ), I also got the wonderful added plus of getting my interest rate reduction incentive that I was due to get through SW cancelled because it was serviced by SM, but I wasn't eligible for the SM incentive because they didn't actually "own" the loan (yes, it's a total scam!). So, in other words, you're not necessarily out of the woods even if you do get another lender at first. Second of all, and probably most telling, Pioneer is a wholly owned subsidiary of Sallie Mae. I don't know how much of a choice you have the matter, though. Remember, if you consolidate at any time before your loan has been resold to another lender, even if it's 2 minutes before, you will not get any of the benefits of rehab (yeah, ask me how I know about that one!). Just something to consider. Good luck!!!

No, unfortunately not. Student loans are not like regular debts and do not use DOLA for the reporting period. SL defaults report from 7 years after the default date instead of 7 years from the DOLA like other debts. So, it looks from what you have here that you defaulted in May of 2002, which would mean that your date is May of 2009 for reporting the default. Sorry! Hope this helps!