Providing Debt Relief for Clients Throughout the State of New York


National Collegiate Student Loan trust is one of the largest private Student Loan lenders in the country. They are also one the most aggressive when it comes to pursuing consumers for defaulted student loans. They almost always send defaulted accounts into collection and aggressively pursue people through litigation in order to obtain default judgments against them. Default judgments are obtained most often because consumers either move around from address to address or because they are never properly served with the summons and complaint. A judgment then leads to a bank levy or wage garnishment which can last for years while judgment interest accrues at 9%. Borrowers often don’t have any assets or property but their co-signers who are parents or grandparents usually do. This puts co-signers in danger of having a lien placed against their home.

All of the negative repercussions of a judgment can be avoided by submitting an answer to the summons and complaint. Submitting an answer keeps the burden on National Collegiate Student Loan Trust to prove their case. An answer will have important defenses including but not limited to Standing. No consumer ever obtained a loan directly from National Collegiate Trust, rather these loans were taken out from a variety of lenders and guaranteed or insured by First Marblehead at the time which eventually turned into National Collegiate. Better yet, these loans have been securitized and put on the market to trade just as mortgage backed securities were in the past. That is why the caption on lawsuits often states something like: National Collegiate Student Loan Trust 2006-4. Hearsay is another major defense that has been successfully used in these cases. It is very difficult for National Collegiate to bring in someone from to attest to the proper transfer and acquisition of this debt to meet the hearsay requirement as usually they just have an employee rubber-stamping these sorts of agreements to acquire the debt. Often, when called in to a deposition, National Collegiate will send someone who gives vague general answers and does not really have the precise information necessary to prove that they are the rightful owner of the debt about or will voluntarily dismiss their case at that point because they lack the information necessary.

Forster and Garbus, Rubin and Rothman and Eltman Law are the most frequent debt collection law firms retained by National Collegiate to both sue consumers and to enforce judgments against them. However, submitting an answer with defenses and aggressively defending litigation in these matters will often result in either a very favorable settlement for the consumer or even a dismissal of the matter in some situations.