Do you know where your federal and prirevate student loans are?
If you don’t, you should.
It’s hard to make payments, defer payments, and check loan balances if you aren’t even sure who owns your student loans. Thankfully, finding this information is easier than you might think.
Continue reading to learn the steps you need to take to figure out, who owns my student loans?
Use the National Student Loan Data System to Find Your Loan Servicer
Step 1 – Find out who owns your loans by visiting the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) at nslds.ed.gov.
Step 2 – Click on “Financial Aid Review” and log into the site with your FSA ID. After logging in, you’ll see a chart containing information about your loans and grants. Click on each loan that you want to learn more about.
Step 3 – The NSLDS will show you the balance, interest rate, loan type, loan status, and loan servicer for each of your federal student loans. Your loans might not all have the same servicer, so you need to look at each individual loan. Again, you might have multiple loan servicers.
Learn more about why you should use the National Student Loan Data System here.
Contact Your College about Federal Perks Loans
Need to figure out who owns your Federal Perkins Loan? Contact your college’s financial aid office. They’ll let you know if the college is the loan servicer or if the college works with an outside loan servicer.
If you already know that the Department of Education owns your Federal Perkins Loan, contact the ESCI Federal Perkins Loan Servicer at 1-866-313-3797.
What is a Loan Servicer?
A student loan servicer collects payment and helps you, the borrower, manage repayment. If you need to defer payments, enter forbearance, consolidate loans, apply for student loan forgiveness, or switch to a new repayment plan, you go through your loan servicer—not the federal government.
Nine different loan servicing companies service all federal Direct Loans and FFEL loans:
CornerStone – 1-800-663-1662
FedLoan Servicing (PHEAA) – 1-800-699-2908
Granite State – GSMR – 1-888-556-0022
Great Lakes Educational Loan Services, Inc. – 1-800-236-4300
HESC/Edfinancial – 1-855-337-6884
MOHELA – 1-888-866-4352
Navient – 1-800-722-1300
Nelnet – 1-888-486-4722
OSLA Servicing – 1-866-264-9762
Each of your loans belongs to one of the above loan servicers. But, how do you find out which one?
How to Find Your Collections Agency
If you fall behind on payments and default on your federal student loan(s), the loan(s) might end up in collections.
Try NSLDS First
To find the name of the collection agency, first, try viewing your student loans on the NSLDS website. If a loan’s status reads “default,” you might see contact information for a collection agency next to the loan. Contact the collection agency to make payments or learn more about your options.
Contact the Default Resolution Group
If you can’t find the information on the NSLDS, you can try contacting the Department of Education’s Default Resolution Group. This group will provide you with the address and phone number of your assigned collection agency.
For a phone call, contact 1-800-621-3115 or 1-877-825-9923 TTY.
To send non-payment mail, use this address: U.S. Department of Education, P.O. Box 5209, Greenville, TX 75403-5609.
The Default Resolution Group can only help you if your loans are held by the U.S. Department of Education (ED). ED owns all defaulted Direct Loans and some defaulted FFEL Program loans (the rest are owned by a guaranty agency).
The ED uses the following collection agencies:
Account Control Technology, Inc.
P.O. Box 11750
Bakersfield, CA 93389-1750
1-866-887-2800
Action Financial Services
P.O. Box 3250
Central Point, OR 97502
1-888-253-4239
Alltran Education
P.O. Box 702220
Tulsa, OK 74136
1-888-377-5000
Bass & Associates
P.O. Box 66080
Tucson, AZ 85728-5478
1-855-533-1107
Central Research
P.O. Box 1460
Lowell, AR 72745-1460
1-844-804-8467
Coast Professional Inc.
P.O. Box 2899
West Monroe, LA 71294
1-800-964-0881
ConServe
P.O. Box 457
Fairport, NY 14450-0457
1-866-633-7945
Credit Adjustments Inc.
P.O. Box 5640
Manchester, NH 03108|
1-800-347-9623
FH Cann & Associates
P.O. Box 877
North Andover, MA 01845
1-877-677-9126
FMS Investment Corp.
P.O. Box 1423
Elk Grove Village, IL 60009-1423
1-877-291-8405
GC Services
P.O. Box 27346
Knoxville, TN 37927
1-877-244-7901
Immediate Credit Recovery Inc.
P.O. Box 965156
Marietta, GA 30066
1-866-401-7190
National Credit Services
P.O. Box 766
Bothell, WA 98041-0766
1-800-445-9346
National Recoveries, Inc.
P.O. Box 120666
St. Paul, MN 55112
1-877-221-9729
Pioneer Credit Recovery, Inc.
P.O. Box 349
Arcade, NY 14009
1-888-287-0317
Professional Bureau of Collections of Maryland
P.O. Box 3725
Englewood, CO 80155
1-844-225-5501
Reliant Capital Solutions
P.O. Box 307290
Gahanna, OH 43230
1-877-404-8853
Windham Professionals, Inc.
P.O. Box 400
East Aurora, NY 14052
1-877-719-4440
What Are My Options if My Student Loans are in Default?
If your trip to nslds.gov reveals that you’ve defaulted on one or more of your federal student loans, you have three main options:
Consolidate Your Federal Student Loans
Consolidate your defaulted federal student loans to bring them out of default. A consolidated loan is simply a new loan that equals the total balance of your individual loans. The interest rate is the weighted average interest rate rounded up to the nearest 1/8th of a percentage.
You can apply for a Federal Direct Consolidation Loan online or via U.S. mail. If you apply online, you’ll see information for your new loan servicer at the end of the online application process. If you apply by mail, you should see the loan servicer’s contact information when you download or print the paper application.
After consolidating, enroll in one of the income-driven student loan repayment plans. These plans base your monthly payment on your income, making payments more manageable. Do this to avoid falling into default again.
If you already have a Direct Consolidated Loan or if you are in active wage garnishment, you’re not eligible for consolidation. Your next best option is loan rehabilitation.
Rehabilitate Your Federal Student Loans
Another way to get your loans out of default is through student loan rehabilitation. The process involves setting up an affordable monthly payment plan with the Department of Education. It might be as small as five dollars per month.
After you make nine on-time voluntary monthly payments with a 10-month period, you can rehabilitate your loan. This means the loan is no longer in default and collection agencies will stop calling.
You can only rehabilitate a loan once, so loan rehabilitation should always be a last resort.
Repay the Loan in Full
You can also get out of default by repaying your defaulted loan in full. Since that might mean coming up with a large sum of money in a short amount of time, consolidation and rehabilitation are much better options.
Who Owns My Private Student Loans?
Your private student loans won’t show up in the National Student Loan Database System. It can take a little more work to track down who owns your private student loans.
If you know the lender…
Contact your private student loan lender to see if they still own your loan. More often than not, the original lender owns the loan and will help you manage the loan. However, there is still a chance that another company now owns the loan. In that case, the original lender can provide you with the new loan servicer’s contact information.
If you’re in default, the original lender can also give you contact information for the assigned collection agency.
If you don’t know the lender…
If you aren’t sure who your lender is, pull up your credit report. A credit report lists all your lenders along with contact information, your loan balance, and your account number. Call the lenders listed to track down who owns your private student loan.
Can I Change Who Owns My Loans?
Yes, you can.
If your student loans are in good standing, you can refinance with a private lender. Refinancing involves obtaining a new loan to pay off any or all of your private and/or federal student loan(s). The bank, credit, or company you refinance with will own the refinanced loan.
Refinancing not only gives you the chance to switch up who owns your loan, but it also helps you better manage your student debt. By refinancing, you can secure a better interest rate, better loan terms, and/or perks like cosigner release or military deferment.
Learn more about student loan refinancing here.
Final Thoughts on Who Owns My Student Loans?
Finding out who owns your student loans is the first step toward taking control of your student debt. If you know who owns your student loans, you can enroll in automatic payments, look up your loan balance, sign up for a repayment plan, apply for student loan forgiveness, and more. Take the time to look up your loan servicer today so that you can explore your options.
