[mejane470]

This is a complicated situation, if someone can shed any light on this for me I would greatly appreciate it.

Back in December my dad, who is the cosigner of this loan, received a summons to court for my loan w/ Key Bank, which is actually 2 loans, totalling 18,000 dollars. I had not yet been able to make a payment due to previous unemployment and other student loan debt (private as well).
I contacted Key Bank, and was told by the Key Bank representative that if I made the payment to bring it up to date and applied for forbearance, it would not go to court. I did this, and did not make payments for the months after it as it was on forbearance and I was trying to keep my other loans from defaulting.

So this whole time I thought my loan was on forbearance, I did not receive any phone calls or emails that my loan was going into default. Then all of a sudden my dad gets paperwork from an attorney for garnishment, saying that we lost in court!

I tried to talk to someone at Key Bank, they told me to call AES, who told me to call Key Bank, back and forth. I called a court clerk, and she told me the judgement was against my father and not me..which was confusing. Apparently even though Key Bank told me the arrangements I made would keep the loan from going to court, because my father did not file anything with the court (because he thought we didn't have to, since the bank said it wouldn't go to court) a judgment was made.

Through my employee assistance program, I spoke to someone for legal advice, and they basically told me that being misguided by the bank, and not knowing my loan was in default is not a legal defense. He said my best option was to talk to the attorney that issued the garnishment papers and see if I could work something out, but that it would be hard since a judgment had already been made and they didn't have to do anything like that unless they wanted to be "nice", which would be unlikely. He suggested one thing my dad could do would be to take out an equity loan and try to offer a lump sum like 12,000, and I would just pay my father. (That is assuming he can geta loan like that)

Is there no way to work out a payment plan? I keep reading about loan rehabilitation, can you do that with a private loan that has a judgment against it now? Would it be beneficial for me to hire a lawyer? Please help! Any insight is appreciated!

[Mr. Knowitall]

Periodic garnishment is, in effect, a "payment plan". None of the rules affecting student loans and forebearance for student loans apply to a court judgment.