The bad news for student-loan debtors is that the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case filed by a debtor to clarify the “undue hardship” standard for discharging student loans. For now, the disparate rules laid down by the federal circuit courts of appeal will remain in effect, meaning debtors’ cases depend in part …
Surge in Student Debt ‘Borrower Defense’ Discharge Claims Read More »
When it comes to student-loan debt, state governments don’t usually help a lot. That’s not surprising because most of the loans come from the federal government, which offers a variety of repayment options. However, New York State’s Higher Education Services Corporation (HECS) initiated a new program at the beginning of the year to help out. …
New York State to Offer Aid to Student Loan Debtors Read More »
Rating agencies’ opinions of financial assets isn’t much concern to the New York bankruptcy world, but notably in mid-December both Moody’s and Fitch issued press releases documenting their pessimistic outlooks on a very unique type of financial asset: Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP) Asset-Backed Securities (ABS). The FFELP is the defunct federal program in …
Ratings Agencies Pessimistic About Student-Loan Securities Read More »
In the late 1970s, Congress amended the Bankruptcy Code to require student loan debtors to demonstrate that their loans posed an “undue hardship” on them in order to be discharged in bankruptcy. Over time, Congress tightened this restriction, eliminating its seven-year time limit and in 2005 extending the requirement to private student loans. The problem, …
Supreme Court Might Hear Law School Debtor’s Bankruptcy Case Read More »
The data-driven news site FiveThirtyEight.com recently ran a discouraging article on low-wage workers. To not belabor its point, workers in minimum-wage jobs are much less likely to move to higher-paying jobs than in the late 1990s, when jobs and pay raises were more common. In 1998, for instance, 20 percent of minimum-wage workers were in …
The Wall Street Journal recently ran an article about burgeoning graduate student debt. This phenomenon began in the last decade because of the Grad PLUS Loan Program, which covers all tuition charges at graduate and professional schools as well as living expenses. The point was to eliminate private lenders, who weren’t seen as offering fair …
It seems like yesterday when there were only a handful of options for dealing with federal student loans: consolidation, deferment, and forbearance. Then, in a matter of a few years, the government created a slew of acronymic hardship repayment programs: ICR, PSLF, IBR, and PAYE. Keeping these plans straight is difficult since they share so …
Government Proposing A New Student Loan Repayment Option: REPAYE Read More »
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ran an interesting article on private student loan debts and chapter 13 bankruptcy. I wrote on this very topic back in 2013, but the article combines a few additional points about bankruptcy worth discussing. For one, as far as it goes, the article is correct: Chapter 13 can reduce monthly payments to …
Chapter 13 Should Not Be Confused With Income-Based Repayment Read More »
Just last week, I wrote about LegalZoom’s offer to help sign student debtors onto the federal government’s income-based repayment scheme, even though the process is meant to be done by debtors themselves for free. There were two points from that post: One was that LegalZoom might not be the usurper of traditional legal services as …
New York’s Student Protection Unit Announces Closure of Debt Relief Provider Read More »
It’s understandable for New York bankruptcy lawyers to cast a wary eye at LegalZoom, the Internet-based legal services company. Most media portrayals treat it as the innovative new business that disrupts the lawyer-dinosaurs, allowing everyday Americans to obtain cheap legal services without the help of an expensive licensed professional, including drafting wills and even preparing …
LegalZoom Charges $699 for Help With Completing Free Government Forms Read More »
no cost, 30 minute consultations in brooklyn, ny or melville, li
26 Court St # 2211
Brooklyn, NY 11242,USA
phone: (718) 855-6840
toll free:(800) 297-6840
fax: (718) 625-1966
68 south service road, suite 100
melville, ny 11747
phone: (631) 454-5248
by appointment only
