So I went straight to a private Christian university when I graduated from high school in 2011. I’m the daughter of a Vet, and I went to college with high hopes of having school fully paid for with scholarships, grants, and VA benefits (NO LOANS). Unfortunately, after a very successful freshman year of college (Dean’s List 1st semester As and Bs 2nd semester) I was left with half of my schooling unpaid because those benefits never came through. Supposedly, the VA stated there was some missing paperwork on my dad so they couldn’t verify his veteran status. At any rate, I was forced to return home with no official transcripts to transfer my hard earned credits to another school and over $15k in debt to my name (which totally tanked my credit score at the ripe age of 20). Today, almost 6 years later, that debt has risen to almost $22k and they are still holding my transcripts hostage!
I need to know what are my options to pay that debt, get my transcripts, and move on with my life? Can I apply for scholarships/grants to pay off that debt so I can transfer or do I still have to be attending the school to do that?
It’s 6 years later and you just ignored the debt?
Why didn’t you set up a repayment plan with the school and worked to pay it back?
When this happened, did you or your dad try to get the missing paperwork (DD214, to prove his honorable discharge?) to them?
Most likely the school would still not have been affordable, even with the VA benefit.
If you had $15,000 balance after one year, that’s a lot, how much was the VA benefit going to cover?
If you want to finish your degree, you need to pay back the money you owe.
You should have started paying on it right away and you would have less to pay now.
I would follow up on the paperwork for your dad as mommdc suggested. If the VA won’t cover any of the loan then your only option is to set up a payment plan with the college. Nobody is going to give you $22,000 to pay off an old college loan. You won’t be able to transfer without your transcripts, so you need to contact the college and get this sorted out.
@mommdc I didn’t mean to ignore the debt it’s more like life kind a got in the way… and initially my mom did set up a repayment plan but she was on a fixed income and was only able to afford $25/month (which wasn’t even putting a dent in it) also my dad had passed away my senior year of high school so he wasn’t around to help us with this process. My mom did the best that she could with the resources that she had but I guess it wasn’t enough. I was so young and immature I dependend solely on my mom to get things done for me. I had no clue of the whole process, nor did I realize how expensive the school was ($30k/year and rising!) Had I known what I know now I would have just wine to a community school for my first two years of college then transferred to a public university. But it was a VERY expensive lesson learned.
@austinmshauri I’m looking into the paperwork issue now but I never got a loan. If I did I would’ve had my transcripts right now. I currently hold a negative balance with the school and the amount went into collections (that’s what really hurt my credit early on in life). It sucks that I’m just now working all of this stuff but better late than never, I guess.
@mommdc thank you. I come from a household of faith. So that honestly was never a topic of discussion. It was like “We’re just going to pray about it and believe God is going to work it out.” Literally. That’s it. Plus I can honestly say that my mom spoiled me lol. I’ve never had to work hard for anything more than buying a keyboard for myself. Smh.
@mommdc I really pray that’s not the case that they can still help out in some way. Thank you for the link! I’m going to see if my mom has the necessary documents to get the copy of the DD214
That balance is going to increase the longer you wait. It will take a year or more to pay off, even with a full time job. But if you want any hope of finishing your degree then that’s what you have to do.
Will you have money for school? You still need to pay off that balance, wouldn’t it be better to use the money for that?
Also how would you get credit for courses taken already, without that transcript?
Are you planning to start college all over again?
Wouldn’t that cost more than the $22,000 you owe?
I guess I really don’t understand your priorities.
That debt is not going to go away, it will.only grow, and will cause trouble if you ever want to buy a house or car.
OP: You CANNOT discharge student debts through bankruptcy. This debt will hound you for the rest of your life. Take care of it. Please don’t go happily on to your next school and assume this will go away. It will not. You are young. You will want a good credit rating someday, for a car or a house or just to have an emergency credit card. You will want to have financial options. You will not want to apply for jobs worrying about whether or not your potential employer is checking your credit rating before letting you have a job that involves cash registers, accounting, banking, etc. This. Is. A. Big. Deal. Once your debt is is collections, collection agency fees and penalties are constantly being added to the amount you owe.
Here’s one of the horror stories from the recent Rolling Stone article on student debt:
Are you working full-time? Repaying that loan has to be your highest priority. Make sure your payments are high enough to cover some of the principal. You won’t get anywhere just paying interest. Have you set up a payment plan yet?
@mommdc I do have financial aid and the school is WAY more affordable than the other school I went to (only $2k per semester). I’m fully covered with just the pell grant! It would allow me to use the surplus to put towards my balance plus what I save from working.
The advisor I met with at the new school let me know that with the classes I need to take (mainly music classes) I can register for them because 1. I tested out of some gen ed classes and 2. I took some classes at a different college and those courses transferred with no problem.
My major doesn’t require a lot of gen ed classes (only 7) and the music classes (that don’t require prerequisite classes) I’ve never taken before so I can enroll in them automatically. Plus the program isn’t in a chronological order meaning I can customize a plan that fits my situation. So I wouldn’t have to start over I can just do my classes in a different order than most because I have a special circumstance.
I still want to get my debt paid off but I was just tired of feeling like my life was on hold until then and figured out a way to work around it. Last I checked with the school I owe they said there isn’t any more interest or fees being accumulated on the debt. It’s just sitting there with a collection agency waiting to be paid. So I’m glad for that at least.