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20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

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Anonymous
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20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

I defaulted on my student loan over 20 years ago. It was Defered while I was in the military, I got out in 1994. The loan was actually in 1989.

 

It does not show up in my Credit Reports, I dont get any mail from anyone about it, but like a year ago I got a phone call about it, on Veterans Day. I basically told them I will never pay it and hung up. Maybe I should of heard them out because maybe they were offering a Veterans Day "Special"

 

The last info I have on it was I had it paid down to like $3000, though I thought it was paid even lower than that, and it had ballooned to like $10,000 for the collection fees, total BS. This was around 2005, after I was interested in paying it and went to their website and entered my info.

 

3 years ago I started an application for a VA loan, and I told them I had defaulted on my Government Student Loan, not GI Bill, just normal guaranteed student loan, they said the default did not show up.

 

I have a PDF file from Equifax, and it is not on it.

 

Is that normal for a loan to not show up?

Message 1 of 23
22 REPLIES 22
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

Its my understanding that debts older than 7 years do not show up on credit report.
Message 2 of 23
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

Im not sure why it's not showing up but there is a website you can check your student loans balance if any are on file. I will look to see if I can find it. I would suggest you start there. Also if you know you are in default I would look into loan rehabilitation program. I had a very old  default as well. I contacted the debt collector and told them I wanted to use the rehab program. They first quoted me monthly payment over $800 on 14000 of debt. I was like you are kidding right lol. Tell them you want itemize you monthly debt . My payment was dropped to 100 a month. After 9  on time monthly payments your loan is no longer in default and shows on your credit score as never missing a payment. Also the age of your credit for the account will be the original loan date. It really helped me get my finances straighten out and I was able to purchase a new home With my VA loan

Message 3 of 23
scvbd99
Frequent Contributor

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

unpaid federal student loans, defaulted or not, stay on your credit report indefinitely. 

 

after they're paid in full, they'll fall off after 7 years.

 

so, either you or somebody else did pay off that loan, or there's some sort of error in reporting by whoever services the loan.

 

does your loan show up here?

 

https://www.nslds.ed.gov/nslds/nslds_SA/

 

if so, i wouldn't count on it to stay that way.  you're sure it's not being reported on your ex/tu/eq reports at all? if so, no that's not normal. 

 

or is it a private loan? maybe a Perkins Loan from a university that's now defunct?

800+ for all 3 CRAs.

Student loan forgiveness/discharge FINALLY complete.
Message 4 of 23
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

scvbd99, I am going to have to disagree with you.  I completed rehabbing my loan in May and TU and EX have deleted the old tradelines completely (waiting on EQ).  They were replaced by tradelines with the new loan servicer dating back to when I originally took out the federal student loans with a "pays as agreed" status and no late payments.  They actually show no payment history on them.  My understanding is that this may not be the case with everyone (getting the old tradelines deleted), but the new tradelines will back date.  Technically, all they have to do is remove any comments indicating that the loans were ever in default, but some do more than that.  

Message 5 of 23
scvbd99
Frequent Contributor

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

nothing you said has any applicatiion to my reponse to the opening post. 

 

i said that unpaid student loans stay on your credit reports indefinitely, and i'm not making it up. your rehabbed loans that remain unpaid are still on your credit report, right? the debt doesn't go away, and neither does reporting on that debt on your credit reports. after rehab, the debt just gets a new servicer, like you said. 

 

anyway, the person i responded to said nothing about rehab.

 

as far as what you're saying (which again, has nothing to do with this thread) when you rehab a loan, all information about it ever having been in default is requried to go away by law. any other deraugatories removed are 100% up to the CA/servicer. personally, i had 18 defaulted student loans that i rehabbed, and 15 of them had the late payment history before default removed. the other 3 wouldn't budge, and left my late payment history on. it was totally worth the rehab process, though.

 

and yes, of course you get new tradelines for each defaulted loan you get rehabbed when it gets a new servicer. it's pretty awesome. 

800+ for all 3 CRAs.

Student loan forgiveness/discharge FINALLY complete.
Message 6 of 23
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

I assumed you were referencing the post above you that suggested rehabbing as an option.  My mistake.

Message 7 of 23
scvbd99
Frequent Contributor

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

no worries

 

i actually have no idea if the OP would be able to rehab te loan in question. if it's a qualifying loan type, i'd bet that he could so long as it had never defaulted before. you can only rehab a qualifying loan once. 

800+ for all 3 CRAs.

Student loan forgiveness/discharge FINALLY complete.
Message 8 of 23
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

I defaulted my Student loans 15 yrs ago and never paid a dime. Guess what? After 7 years it ALL disappeared from all 3 credit reports! I called and was told this: Even though the federal government can collect federal student loans forever, negative information (such as missed payments, collection accounts, defaulted loans) must be removed after seven years!
Message 9 of 23
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: 20 year old Defaulted Student Loan

While some Student Loans (Stafford) cannot be reported after 7, they can tax intercept the hell out of you until it is paid off.

 

They can also Tax Warrant (Lien and Levy) you as well.

 

That literally means they can sieze your checking and savings accounts, real property, and so on, if you go too long.

 

I was somewhat fortunate, as half of my Student Loan 15 years ago that I had deferred and then been making payments on, was forgiven due to the University being sued for fraud.

 

So my Student Loan accounts show as paid as agreed (transferred to another office) from when they were forgiven.

 

They drop off soon, so bye bye free cheap bump in history, but those were Stafford and until they were forgiven I kept getting annual notices that if I defaulted they could take all of the steps above including private collections.

 

The other types of Federal Student Loans (Perkins) are immune from the 7 year rule and will show up literally forever as has been said before.

Message 10 of 23
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