Hello...I wrote to Sallie Mae to inquire about loan consolidation. I have federal Stafford loans and will probably have five separate private Signature Loans when I'm done. Can anyone elaborate on this and/or explain in simpler words?

"Sallie Mae does not offer a consolidation program for private loans. All private loans may be sold to another consolidator. Only HEAL and Stafford MEDLOANS qualify for consolidation.

If you have federal loans eligible for consolidation, the private loans may be included on the application to determine the consolidation loan terms only. The private loans, themselves, will not be consolidated. The total amount of private loans to be considered cannot be greater than the amount to consolidate.

You can send one payment for all the loans on your SallieMae account. "

You cannot consolidate federally backed student loans with private (SallieMae Signature loans) as they are 2 different programs.

Sallie Mae is saying that your signature loans can be included in the paperwork to estimate total loan indebtedness. The more sl debt you show, the longer your repayment period. If you have more signature loan debt than Stafford loan debt, they are saying in that scenario, they won't use your private loan debt to determine indebtedness. You can estimate at least 10 years of repayment on federal student loans.

SallieMae can and does sell their student loans (fed and private) in the secondary market. You can shop around to see if anyone will consolidate your signature loans. A few lenders will if all your private loans are with them.

They are nice enough to take one check every month and then split the payment between the programs. :roll: