<p>That is a huge amount of debt… I feel bad for the guy.</p>
<p>I don’t feel badly for him at all. He chose to take out those student loans. He could have attended less expensive schools, attended school part time or chosen some other path towards the career he wished to pursue.</p>
<p>There are few things that the bar takes more seriously than misuse of client funds. Anything in one’s record that shows that one is less than diligent in the use of outside funding sources, or that shows any propensity to act irresponsibly with money is going to be taken very seriously. Not only did this young man take out over $400,000 in loans (how one even gets that many loans is a mystery to me since there are caps on federal loans and credit reviews throughout the process of applying for loans), but he has failed to repay any material amount of them over the years, relying on deferrals and purported arguments with the loan servicing companies as a reason. </p>
<p>The reality is that even if he had disputes with his loan servicing companies, he should have been making some reasonable amount of payments while fighting the incorrect fees/interest. It seems to me that this young man has gone out of his way to avoid making payments on his extraordinary amount of loans.</p>
<p>As a potential employer (who does run credit checks, as most do, on potential hires), I would never want to hire this young man, who seems quite irresponsible in taking on such a rediculous (in my opinion) amount of loans and in failing to make any arrangments to pay them off, in whatever small increments. That said, whether the bar should have denied him admission is another question, though I completely understand the reasoning behind their denial.</p>
<p>^^“young man…young man…young man”</p>
<p>He’s 47. :P</p>
<p>Yes, KGZ, I think this is a vitally relevent part of the story. He is not a young man, and the debt has been piling up for 26 years. What a story. A lengthier discussion is going on over in the CC Parent thread</p>
<p>what’s more alarming is this:</p>
<p>“New York’s courts have overlooked misconduct like lawyers’ solicitation of minors for sex, efforts to deceive judges and possession of cocaine. Those instances have led merely to temporary suspensions from practice.”</p>
<p>I thought this was a joke. </p>
<p>How can New York admit lawyers who wanted to have sex with minors and snore cocaine? </p>
<p>That’s just ridiculous.</p>
<p>Hah, well, maybe it was unwitting solicitation of minors?</p>
<p>Aside from lawfulness, I might say that you can do drugs responsibly. Whereas this guy’s behavior seems sort of fundamentally irresponsible.</p>
<p>Amassing that much debt is indicative of foolish behavior over an extended period of time. I agree with the decision and think he should work as a paralegal and live frugally until he has paid off his astronomical debt.</p>
<p>This is a very interesting story. One point that I’d like to make is that Sallie Mae has a terrible reputation for taking advantage of people, I’d never borrow money from them. How does student debt go from $270,000 - $400,000 in 4 years? These companies pull this kind of stuff because they get away with it and they’ll continue to do it as long as it works for them.</p>
<p>I’d like to see the aspiring lawyer have to pay back something closer to the original amount that he borrowed, (plus a reasonable amount of interest).</p>
<p>“Applicant has not made any substantial payments on the loans”</p>
<p>If you take this to mean no payments, 270 –> 400 in 4 years only requires an APR of about 10.33%, which doesn’t seem unreasonable for unsubsidized loans for an individual with no substantial credit history and uncertain job prospects.</p>
<p>Plus the 25% (onetime) for the collection agency means that it went from 320 –> 400. So it might be 270 –> 320.</p>
<p>His situation seems fair. You take out 270k in loans, you don’t bother to pay anything on them or correct a problem which may or may not even exist for 4 years and yes, you should definitely owe more. It sucks that his legs each got messed up, but he could have spent a little less time on the beach and a little more time ensuring his loans wouldn’t become some of the bad assets sending us into recession.</p>
<p>If you’re already 200k+ in debt, why on earth would you pursue a masters? If it were me, I’d be eager to start chipping away at my student loans. </p>
<p>I’m with sallyawp, this guy sounds like an idiot.</p>
<p>Was it really necessary to go to school in London? After attending two great public universities.</p>