Help Me Make the American Dream a Reality

mynameismandab — Sat, 03 May 2008 19:13:11 -0800

Future Lawyer-Financial Aid-Student Loan-Borrower/Cosigner-Filter: Help me help both and Myself and my Ecuadorian friend achieve the American dream--Many details and questions follow. My friend from Ecuador hopes to go to medical school to become a neurologist, but needs a $20,000 reserve in her bank account in order for her school to take on the enrollment liability and grant her an I-20.

We found that she could get a Sallie Mae loan as long as an eligible U.S. citizen would cosign for her, which I have agreed to do. She will request $50,000 for the coming year but keep only $27,000 and repay the rest, then do the same thing next year. Her total loan request will be $100,000 but will only owe $54,000 plus 5.75% interest.

I have requested contact information for her family living in Ecuador, as well as relatives of hers living in the States (all of which she has provided) and I have full faith that she will pay off the loan.

I am the first person in my family to go to college, am in my own graduate program, and will have accrued about $70,000 in Stafford loans by graduation. I also plan to attend law school in the next few years and will need loans to cover the costs. Currently the annual tuition is $32,000 at the law school I want to attend, but I will not be attending for another 2 or 3 years, so that will put law school at about $35,000 a year for 3 years, or about $105,000.

Given that the lifetime limit for Stafford loans is $138,500, I know that the remaining $68,500 of Stafford loans will not totally pay for school, but I need to keep as much of my loan funding available as possible.

So I have four questions:

1. Will my cosigning for her take away from My lifetime Stafford loan amount, or how does that work?

2. If the answer to the question above is, Yes, will her repayment of that amount release funds for me to utilize for my own education in the future? So if she pays back the full $54,000 plus interest, will that go back into the community chest for my future use and repayment?

3. Also, does anyone know if the total amount is frozen regardless of how much is repaid, or does the repayment amount provide for the possibility of borrowing in the future?

--That is, if I take out the full $138,500 but repay $20,000, could I take out that $20,000 again some time in the future and pay it back later? How does that work?

4. Once I have exhausted my lifetime Stafford loan allowance, what alternative resources will I have for financing my education--what are my chances of getting a good scholarship and for how much?

I hope this makes sense, everybody, and I appreciate any assistance you can provide. Thanks in advance.

Did I co-sign my life away?

majcher — Fri, 03 Dec 2004 13:56:08 -0800

A cousin of mine, who I was very close with during childhood, has spent the last decade or so since high school in and out of prison, for drug-related offenses. A while back, after being out for a while, and working steadily, he decided that he wanted to go to college. I was the only person in the family with good enough credit to help him get a loan - if I didn't do this, he wouldn't be able to go to school. He spent a couple years in school, had to take out two more loans, and finally graduated. He has since decided not to pursue a career in the field that he studied, and I'm not exactly sure how he's making a living these days.

Earlier this year, I started getting letters from the loan people that they weren't being paid. After many phone calls and a lot of cajoling, we got him a deferment for a while, which ends this month, but I just pulled down a credit report, and now I have three huge black marks against my otherwise pristine credit rating. I guess I really had no idea what was being involved in being a co-signer to a loan like this. This is unbelievably stressful for me. So, my question is, in two parts: how screwed am I? Is there any way that can have these (rather significant, and probably ongoing) dings to my credit removed? If my worst fears are confirmed, and he continues not to pay, do I have any recourse? I am not in a position to be able to repay the loan myself, and the rest of the family has become eerily silent on the matter.

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Help Me Make the American Dream a Reality

Did I co-sign my life away?