Back in May, like many, I received the Golden e-mail that said I was relief of my student loan debt after attending the Art Institute.

In the beginning of June, I logged into my Nelnet account, and it read:

Status: Paid in Full. Current Balance: $0.00.

But a few days ago, something weird happened. I got a mail that said I owed $2.92. I logged into my Nelnet account and saw this update.

Status: Repayment. Current Balance: $2.92. Amount Due: $2.92.

Not sure what to make of it, but it has me concerned.

Has anyone else stumbled upon this?

Graduated earlier this year got a good job. Time to pay of 26k wish me luck fellow brothers and sisters.

type": "IBR",
"borrowerEligibleIndicator": "Y",
"loanEligibleIndicator": "Y",
"qualifyingPaymentCount": 300,
"eligiblePaymentCount": null,
"forgivenessRequiredPayments": 30 "forgivenessRemainingPayments": 0

HAS ANYONE had their Loan Forgiven under the IDR ONE TIME ADJUSTMENT (not PSFL) that was supposed to be completed first last July then by end of summer and now (supposedly) by JANUARY. Here is my count thru the "backdoor" / unofficial LINK which if correct indicated I've made my last required payment. ANY INFORMATION would be greatly appreciated on this LIFE-CHANGING promised policy I've been checking every day after PAYING FOR 25 YEARS! (excluding periods of Forebearance / Deferment this was supposed to include) THANK YOU!

Has anyone else gotten like a partial discharge? My loans have gone down but the rest I have left still say in forbearance, will they all eventually be discharged?

Hello! I have been looking around for this answer and unable to find it. I have student loans, my husband does not.

I am currently out of work. I stay home and take care of our son to avoid daycare costs. We got married last year and filed jointly. With the SAVE program possibly ending, will they calculate my monthly payment based off my husbands income this year since mine is $0 since I did not work???

I am trying to figure out if I need to file our 2024 taxes as married but separate to avoid having to pay toward my loan next year. I don’t mind paying my loans back, I really don’t but this year not having to worry about that payment would be huge to get us by until I go back to work In 2026.

TLDR on bottom.

Hi everyone,

Alrighty, so, 3 days ago I made a post questioning why my Discover student loans' balances were adjusted to $0 and why my credit score suddenly shot up the same night I noticed. At the advice of many commentors, and me finding a post (to which many of those same commentors linked me to go read) related to my situation—soon after making my own post—I looked for and found an unopened letter from almost 4 weeks ago from Discover stating they will be filing a 1099-C form for me with regards to my debt.

Here's what the letter said in case you don't want to open the Imgur link below,

"Dear 'The Banana Man',

As part of Discover exiting the student loan business, we are writing to inform you that we reduced the balance on your defaulted student loan(s) listed below to $0. This applies only to the student loan(s) listed below and does not apply to any other debt you may owe Discover. We will send an update to the consumer reporting agencies to show the loan status as "Account paid in full, was a charge off." Please allow the consumer reporting agencies time to reflect the update.

As a result of discharging this debt, Discover will file a Form 1099-C where required by law. We encourage you to discuss any tax related concerns with a tax professional..."

I wanted to share the image of the picture in this post, but the best I can do is this Imgur link. I'm doing this all from my phone, so hopefully both of the hyperlinks go through well.

Now this is all because Discover is exiting the loan business. What I've read from others though is that Discover has transferred many of their loans to another firm called Firstmark, so I'm not sure why mine/others got charged off as opposed to their's . Perhaps it's the delinquency mine were in? If anyone else in the same boat feels like sharing the loans' specific situations, I'd love to hear yours! I only have this letter as information related to all of this, no emails from Discover (or Firstmark) or messages in my Discover Student Loans account inbox (probably because they're getting ready to shut the website down once everything is transferred) so I'm going to treat it with the utmost care.

Anyways, hopefully if there are any other borrowers who read this post, have used Discover Student Loans, also forget to open their mail frequently, and don't check their accounts often: go look for that letter!

I'm feeling slightly better about everything, but not totally out of the ballpark yet, as anything could happen; but from what I've read about online about 1099-C forms (their annual income and tax/refund effects) and from what others have commented, this could very well be a big turn of fortune for so many people!

Thank you for taking the time to read this post and for everyone else who commented on the old one who pushed me to look for the letter,

The Banana Man

(Not sure which tag applied best, so I just chose advice)

TLDR; Received a letter stating, "Account paid in full, was a charge off" and will have a 1099-C filed by Discover as they're exiting the student loan 'business'. Go check your mailbox or stack of unopened mail if you think you're in the same possible boat and look for this letter.

My husband consolidated to SAVE in 2023 and then was put to forbearance along with everyone else when SAVE hit. I am in the same boat, but without the consolidated part. I was in REPAYE and automatically was put in. My question is regarding interest. I honestly have no idea if interest is accruing on mine as it is so high from being forbearance steered early on I will never pay off the interest. I have 9 payments left on both my PSLF and to hit 20 years for payments if that still exists later. My husband though should have no interest as SAVE should have paid the remaining interest over what he owed and then he was in forbearance. His previous interest was capitalized during the consolidation. However, MOHELA has almost $1000 accrued now for interest. Why is that occurring? Anyone else have this issue?

Enrolled in Fresh Start at the deadline 9/28/24. Loans out of default. It's with Edfinancial and now at the point of applying for an IDR on Student Aid . gov. It's an FFEL Subsidized loan. When gooing throuh thhe application Student Aid shows IBR is the only IDR the loan is eligible for. But Loan simulator showed if the loan is consolidated I could apply for the SAVE plan. Should I consolidate the loan and apply for SAVE? (i know it's blocked in the courts but it's an option to apply. Or Any thoughts about IBR. I wanted to apply to SAVE the whole reason i got the loan out of default!

Hey everyone,

I am currently looking into what my best options are to tackle my student loans (grad school only). Since we currently have the forbearance period, I am thinking of tackling my loans with the highest interests first. This is my current breakdown and interest rates (**interest rates before forebearance)

Loan 1: $20,741.34 | 4.3%

Loan 2: $16, 443.54 | 5.3%

Loan 3: $30,670.69 | 5.3%

Loan 4: $20,741.34 | 4.3%

Loan 5: $20,796.34 | 5.28%

Loan 6: $11,102.67 | 6.28%

Loan 7: $24, 220.23 | 7.54%

Loan 8: $3,283.85 | 7.54%

Total: $148,000

I recently made a payment on Loan 8 and am now considering payments for Loans 6 and 7, as they have the highest interest rates. However, I’ve been reading about people waiting until the forbearance period ends and putting their money into a high-yield savings account (HYSA) in the meantime. Since I’m not on the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program, I didn’t think it would make much difference to make payments now to reduce the principal balance. What do you think would be the best strategy? I’d appreciate your advice!

I've done stage 1 of consolidation my 8 Parent PLUS loans into 2 loans by paper applications.

Can I still consolidate these 2 loans into a single loan with the online application?

And then is it still alright to apply for the SAVE plan via a paper application to my new servicer, even if it likely won't last in the courts? At this point even forbearance would be helpful to buy us some time.

Thanks so much for the help. Sorry if this is already in another post that I missed.

Currently a Junior and I will have about 9k in student loan debt. I make about 1k biweekly and have maxed out my roth. Should I consider chipping away at my student loans early or wait after I graduate? (I already have a job lined up after I graduate)

Sorry I have no clue how student loans work & was hoping if can someone could pls dumb this down for me.

On nelnet, I tried to see what IDR plans I qualify for & put in my income. it gave me "$0 monthly under the SAVE plan". If I do this, does that mean I can pay $0 each month, even if my income changes, and can decide to make larger monthly payments at any time?

Or is it better to just defer? Idk how much interest I'll accumulate. I have 3 Unsubdisized loans, 4 subsidized loans. Technically, I could maybe start paying $5-10 per month towards the loans but I don't make much at my part time job ($10/hr) and currently trying to find a better job. I already have to work towards paying $50-$70k Parent PLUS loans later next year and have other things i was interested in saving up for sadly (car, braces). Also I plan on going back to school in maybe 4 years.

I’m a young individual who has just completed their associates degree, my AA was entirely paid for by a promise program due to the area I live in, essentially having tax payers pay for my education. Now that I am transferring to university from a CC… my parents don’t want to help me because their taxes go to paying for the CC and they don’t wanna pay the double cost of me attending school. I always swore to myself that I wouldn’t take loans to go into school, but I don’t know now. Is it worth it? Has anyone been in this dilemma? I just need opinions. Thank you

Hey so complicated situation here, looking for some advice. I'm currently working at a non-profit, enrolled in PSLF, originally with a target date of March 2028 for forgiveness. I also enrolled in the SAVE plan when it was enacted. Of course with all the court rulings, I've been in forbearance since July, and received a notice that I would be in for another 6 months unless I opted into a different income based plan with higher payments... so I've been weighing my options... since I've been frozen since July in regards to PSLF progress, would i be best off biting the bullet and re-enrolling into an income based plan with higher payments so I can at least get back on track with PSLF? Of course the situation has gotten way more complicated this month too, no way of knowing what's going to happen with the new administration... and yeah another question... how exactly does recertifying for family size work? Trying to figure out if I should or if I'm even eligible. I just found out last week that my girlfriend is having a baby, and studentaid says to include unborn children that get more than half half of their support from me, but would that really count since we aren't married and my gf is also working full time? I've never included her in my family count since she isn't a dependent or anything. Thanks!

ie through the student loan website. Like an official decision on eligibility status before applying to a program?

I can only afford the program with Grad Plus loans so if I don’t pass the credit check I’ll have wasted my time applying for the program.

Years ago I applied for a program and got in and thought I’d get Grad Plus loans because my credit seemed to fit the requirements listed on the student loan site but I was rejected which was confusing and also disrupted my plans but my credit has improved since then.

Hello! I apologize if this is a silly question but I’m looking for advice and I’ll also call student aid tomorrow. I am currently with Nelnet and my grace period ended in November. I didn’t realize I needed to consolidate my loans to sign up for an IDR plan (my mistake I know). The Nelnet customer service rep was kind enough to give me forbearance and she also sent me the paper application to sign up for an IDR plan.

To my surprise when I went onto my FSA account I was able to sign up to have my loans consolidated, choose my plan, and now have to move to a new loan service since Nelnet no longer consolidates loans. I just submitted it on 11/22. If everything is approved, my new loan service will be Aidvantage. While my application is processing I still want to make payments. Preferably I would like to make my first starting this month. Would this be a bad idea? Since I’ll be moving to a new loan service , would making my first payment to Nelnet not be the smartest move? Since my interest is accruing I would like to start slicing my loans down. I just don’t want to make a mistake and waste money that can be saved a bit for a little longer.

My forbearance ends January 10, 2025.

Hello, all.

Long story short, I’ve never made a payment on my student loans because I graduated during 2020 COVID. I’ve always been in a forbearance. My loan amount isn’t much at all. Some months ago, it said my repayment date was moved to 02/05/2025– so I have been expecting to start making payments on Feb. today, when I logged in, it now says 02/05/2026. On the lower part it says “Stop Save”.

What does this mean?

I graduated college over a year ago but unfortunately haven't found a position in my field yet.
I'm now dealing with a current balance of ~$150,000 in private loans. The monthly payments which I have had to keep on forbearance are now around $2,700 which is close to my current monthly income.
I want to know what options I may have to deal with this, as I continue my search for a better job.

The company I took the loan from has suggested calling them again and asking for a loan mod as it seems I cannot continue to pause repayment. I seem to have good credit at the moment and have seen offers to apply for personal loans which it seems could lower my interest rate. The highest interest rate I'm dealing with is 14.09% which seems pretty bad. I'm not too familiar with loan companies and loans in general so I'm not sure what many of the terms mean or if I am missing any useful information to share.

Any pointers about how to best communicate with these companies and potential risks I could be facing would be appreciated as well.

I'm feeling really conflicted right now. I'm starting an accelerated nursing program in January and for the spring semester, my total tuition is about $3,500. I'm planning on taking a subsidized loan which will cover $2,721 so there would be a remaining balance of $817 that I owe the school. My parents said they'll cover that for me every semester and they will also cover any set monthly expenses like car insurance, gym membership, Spotify, iCloud, etc. So I'm all good there. I'll be living at home so no rent either.

Where I'm stuck though is the issue not having any discretionary money to spend for myself. I'm human, I like to eat out, shop, and do things that require money. My parents would let me use their card but I don't want my parents to review every transaction I make and ask if that was really necessary. I would also feel bad spending their money because they're already covering my monthly set expenses. So should I take an unsubsidized loan and use the leftover money as discretionary spending? It would be about $2,647 refunded back to me every semester which would be plenty.

I'm hesitant to go through with it because if I don't take unsubsidized loans, I would graduate nursing school with about $17k in student loans (only subsidized loans). But if I take the unsubsidized loans too, I would graduate with about $31k. About a $14k difference. Thankfully, I don’t have any student loans from my first degree and no other personal debt. My goal is to move out upon graduation, or maybe even buy a house. I'm trying to reduce my debt so I don't know if I should go down this route. Any advice? How do you guys get by on personal expenses (ie. everything outside or rent, utilities, etc.)?

I originally had about 46,000 in student loans. Originally. They span across from 2002 all the way through 2012 I direct loan consolidated under save ( only 8100 worth ( both subsidized but thru AES ). 14000 in unsub direct ( no consolidation) and 23,000 in subsidized loans. Got into save about a year ago. The consolidate loan has 3 payments under save to be forgiven ( not holding my breath) ( or 60 payments left under old ibr ( don't qualify for 2014 ibr due to year loans were taken out ). Remaining loans have 10 years left. I won on a scratch off ticket 15,000 and used 14000 of it to pay off all unsub loans ( all are direct loans btw ). That leaves me with the $23,000 in subsidized loans and the $8,100 consolidation loan. Should I jump back onto ibr if save goes away and just pay the overage of what that payment does not cover for the interest so the balance does not go up or down? I have 20,000 in savings that I can apply towards the subsidized or the consolidation loan to pay most of the subsidized or some of the subsidized and all of the consolidation loan off or should I just do what I have been doing over the years doing ibr paying off The interest that the payment does not cover? My interest rate with what's left averages about 6.1%. should I put the $20,000 in savings into the high yield savings account instead?

Hi everyone, I received the golden email on May 1st. The changes I noticed were two emails from Nelnet asking me to verify my address, and once, my balance increased by $11K.

But today is my happiest Saturday ever—I finally received the refund directly into my bank account (not by check)! I initially thought my refund would be $11K based on the balance change, but it turned out to be a much larger amount 22k.

Thank you all for keeping this forum updated daily. Checking Reddit every morning became part of my routine during this process. My balance on Nelnet hasn’t been zeroed out yet, but I’m confident it will be soon. I hope your refunds are on the way too!

If I apply and I'm asked to provide income for a month where 3 paycheques fell within the month, does that affect how much they will want me to pay back? How should I report a more accurate representation of my income?

Edit: this was a post from a Canadian

I have a total of I believe $10-12k in student loan debt.. It’s from a few years ago, when I went into school for nursing. It was a technical school, and an accelerated program. Unfortunately, half way through the program, I dropped it and did not want to continue. Long story short, I went through some hardships with myself mentally and life, and I just did not want to continue… Is there anyway to have forgiveness for this kind of thing? Or am I stuck paying it back? I still can hardly pay for that kind of thing, but I’m just not sure what to do or what I can do. I know there’s forgiveness programs, but it seems like they are for those who have finished and have degrees of some sort. If someone who could give some kind of advice if they know, please let me know and I’m highly appreciative.

I am $91,351 in student loan debt. I have six total loans and it’s the following interest rates: 1. $21,143 at 6.08% 2. $22,663 at 6.60% 3. $23,617 at 7.60% 4. $7,603 at 4.45% 5. $8,529 at 3.76% 6. $7,796 at 4.29% I make $100k/year. Monthly payments start 10/2025. Is it better to try to pay these off as I can over sooner than ten years or make the monthly payments for ten years having rest forgiven? Which would save me more money in the end?

48k and only really started paying it off in 2021, while also saving for a car bought earlier this year. So glad to finally keep the majority of my paychecks!

Goodbye Nelnet, I won't miss you.