While students are always worried about the fact that student loans can’t be discharged through bankruptcy, one of the greatest opportunities for the stressed out college students is student loan forgiveness or loan repayment options. When the students fail to repay their loans due to stringent financial hardships, they start worrying about the ways in which they can eliminate their debts in such a way so that they don’t have to worry about it later. The student loan forgiveness programs come as a respite to the borrowers who are saddled with a huge amount of educational loan debt. Such programs eliminate anything around a few thousand dollars to $100,000 of student loans. However, unfortunately, such programs usually receive fewer number of applications as most students are unaware of these opportunities.
Student loan forgiveness and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, around one-fourth of the American workforce might be eligible for loan repayment or the student loan forgiveness programs. After the students graduate from college, they’re usually given a grace period to look for a job so that they can start repaying their federal loan payments. But if you are living in a real world, you will be aware of the fact that there are faint chances of grabbing a good job with which you can continue paying your federal loans. Figuring out whether or not you qualify for the student loan forgiveness programs require some legwork but once you come to know about them, you will be surprised by the number of options. Below listed are the ways in which borrowers can get a portion of their student loans waived off through the student loan forgiveness programs.
- By joining the military: Did you know that from the National Guard to the Army, each and every branch of the military has its own personalized student loan forgiveness program? However, the amount that will be forgiven will depend on the rank that you’ve achieved as a government employee. All those who are interested, they should contact their local branch in order to come to know about the options.
- Be a public school teacher in an area with low median income: Have you ever heard of the Teacher Forgiveness Program? Through this program, up to $17,500 can be waived off from your FFEL or Direct Loan. However, this can only be done in exchange of five consecutive years as a teacher in any low income elementary secondary school.
- Get a government non-profit job: Those who borrowed student loans under the William D. Ford Federal Direct Loan program, you can apply for Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program. Through this program, the full-time employees in the non-profit sector can easily have a remaining portion of the outstanding debt forgiven after they’ve made 120 qualifying loan payments.
- Apply for the Income Based Repayment Plan: Any student borrower who doesn’t have the ability to repay his debts, should choose to apply for the Income Based Repayment Plan. Through this program, the monthly payments of the students are not more than 15% of the discretionary income. In reality, there are some borrowers who make so little money, that they end up qualifying for $0 payments. After he completes 25 years of making the adjusted payments, the remaining balance is completely waived off.
Therefore, when you’re someone who has been saddled with an overwhelmingly large amount of student loan debt, you need not fret as the student loan forgiveness programs are there to help you out. For all your other debt issues, you can request online financial help in order to eliminate your liabilities.
