by Ashley
The White House recently announced its latest student loan forgiveness plan. I’m currently enrolled in the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program (PSLF), but hearing about this latest plan definitely piqued my interest.
Who Qualifies
One major factor is that folks must be enrolled in the SAVE repayment plan (Saving on a Valuable Education). This is different than my current income-contingent repayment plan. For those enrolled in SAVE, folks must have borrowed less than $12,000 and have made 10 years of payments.
Pros and Cons
For many, the SAVE repayment plan lowers monthly payments and it can shorten the length of time until loans are forgiven. For me, it would actually increase my monthly payment quite substantially (by several hundred dollars/month).
Lack of Information
Unfortunately, little information is available about the SAVE program. I’ve already made over ten years of payments – the threshold at which loans are supposed to be forgiven under this new plan, as well as with PSLF. However, several months of my payments “don’t count” toward the 120 payment threshold. I have no idea if those same rules and stipulations would apply with the SAVE program (though I suspect they would).
Similarly, one of the stipulations with this new forgiveness program is that less than $12,000 was borrowed. Across time, I borrowed significantly more than $12,000. But each individual loan was below that threshold. Would these individual loans still qualify for forgiveness? Or would I not qualify since the total amount of loans exceeds $12,000? I couldn’t find information about this.
Next Steps
I’m planning to give Mohela a call (when I have a spare hour or two…) to ask a few questions. My guess is that I’ll be advised to remain put with the PSLF program and wait for my forgiveness to be approved in the next couple of years. I recertified my employment in December and am still waiting for it to be processed so all my payments for the last year-or-so can be counted toward the 120 payments required.
Do you know if you qualify for forgiveness with the latest student loan forgiveness program?
Other posts I’ve written recently about my student loans:
Hi, I’m Ashley! Arizonan on paper, Texan at heart. Lover of running, blogging, and all things cheeeeese. Freshly 40, married mother of two, working in academia. Trying to finally (finally!) pay off that ridiculous 6-digit student loan debt!
Honestly, I’m scared to check into any of those calculators or repayment options at the moment. I have a REALLY LOW payment right now, and in the back of my mind, I think that if I put in how much I make to see what the options are – that it will flip some kind of switch in the system where they say, “Hey, you make way too much money to have this low of a payment.” Once a week or so, I log into Mohela just to make sure that the next month’s deduction will be the same amount. I’m trying to prepare for the day that the payment amount jumps.