I posted yesterday but didn't get any feedback here. Talked to a student loan debt attorney today and wanted to post what I was told in case anyone else is in the situation I'm in. My private loan has accumulated $15k in interest and is now a charge off on my credit report. I was making payments but Navient would not give me lower payments so I paid what I could afford. Now that they have charged it off they are willing to work with me and reduce the payments. Why is that? If I would have continued making payments before charge off at the 6% interest rate, I would have ended up paying them $47,000 on an original $12,000 loan. Now that I've defaulted and it's been charged off they can no longer collect interest so the most they can get is the $27k that is my current balance. As far as my credit, it took a big hit when they reported it charged off. On the flip side, by going into the settlement agreement with them the attorney said they have to update it as charged-off paying as agreed, and within 6 months I should see a rebound to my score.
