I defaulted on a student loan with Citibank about 4 years ago. Now, before they try to sue me, I want to pay off my balance in full. The problem is, I canâ??t find who now holds the loan. I called Citibank and they gave me the number of collection agency A, then A told me the account was transferred to B, then B told me it moved to C. C then told me that it went back to the original lender. So I called EdLoans who I know guarantees Citibank student loans and they donâ??t have it either. I called Citibank back and they said there is nothing else they can find out about it. Who else can I call? Thanks in advance.
Dumb Bob doesn't know who to call, but he suggests heavily documenting your extreme efforts to find and pay this debt. It would be very unfair if you were essentially waiting on them to decide that the defaulted interest had increased the total to an amount that they preferred.
If I were in your shoes, I'd hit the OC and each of the CAs with certified letters. Basically say that you want to pay this off, ask if that particular company is collecting the debt, and if not, who you should contact. Dumb Bob has a good point; documenting your good-faith effort to resolve the matter may be invaluable down the road.
What does your credit report say? Who has the debt? I would document everything said, as previously mentioned. I would send a certified RRR letter to Citibank only (cause they are the original creditor), and explain you want to pay it off and request a reply in 30 days. If no reply, and it's on your credit report, dispute it thru the bureau. If it gets verified, you then can find out who has it. Sounds like you can get this off your bureau very easily, however...don't let that give you false hope, thats a federal debt with no SOL. So someone can buy it, re report it, and hammer you 10 years down the road.
Citi may not know who owns it. If they own it and have assigned it, they should know who has the right to collect. If they sold it, they have no way of knowing if it's been sold again. And I'd never rely on what's on your credit report for something like that. Erroneous information is reported all the time. Contact the last collection agency you heard from and ask them to send proof that they have ownership or the right to collect before you pay anything. Make sure you keep a copy of that proof as well as proof you paid it FOREVER. Things have a way of popping up at the most inopportune time.
Thanks for the replys. I guess my next step will be to start writing letters. Maybe if I try to dispute it on my CR then the whoever has the loan will show up. I never thought trying to pay off something would be this hard. On my credit report it still shows Citibank with "claim filed with government". I've called the dept of edu and they don't show anything for me either.
Are you sure this is a private loan? If it is strictly a private loan, the lender wouldn't be able to file any sort of claim with the government since that loan isn't federally guaranteed. Private loans do have an SOL for filing by the way but if this loan was taken out 2005 or later, that might be tough to assert. I know two people who beat private student loans in court just this past year using the SOL defense but these loans were from 2001 and 2002. How they were able to go that long without getting sued is amazing but they beat them on SOL grounds.
