Consumer complaint received 2017-01-20
Product: Student loan — Non-federal student loan
Issue: Can't repay my loan — Can't decrease my monthly payments
Company: Navient Solutions, LLC. (IN)

I attempted to get my college education for the first time in 2009, and that 's when I had to borrow from XXXX, which is now Navient. Well at least that 's who is servicing my loans now. I can honestly say that it was the worst mistake of my life. I should have never started business with them or I should have never started college, but I did n't know any better because I was only XXXX years old and had no clue about student loans. They gave me a private loan which they called a " Smart Option '' student loan, however it was anything but smart. At first I had to borrow {$17000.00} for my tuition balance at University XXXX. The company approved my loan, and gave me 12 % interest rate, and made me pay " interest only '' monthly payments while I was in schools and working part-time. For the next semester I had to borrow again, and mistakenly and regretfully my parents made me go back and borrow more from XXXX. This time I was short {$5800.00} for the tuition. XXXX approved my loan at 11.75 % interest rate with the same conditions as I mentioned above. I had such a hard time being able to come up with my payments that it caused me to drop out and forget about pursuing me dream and getting higher education. I said to myself that I would never borrow private student loans again. For some reason, the whole time I made payments and paid thousands of dollars in interest, neither of my loans went down even by a dollar. When I stopped making payments it was because I was n't able to afford them and paid only what I could at the time. One day I get a notice that XXXX became Navient or at least transferred my loans to them. I began getting numerous phone calls per day to my cell phone from Navient harassing me and asking me for money. I called Navient numerous times asking them to work with me, to lower my payments or at least interest rates but they kept insisting that " there is nothing that they can do for me ''. I was told that to even consider lowering my interest rates, the company would need to pull my credit and affect my credit rating even more. The last time I checked my statement I saw that my interest rates were increased for some reason instead of being lowered, but no one needed my credit to do that? or even notified me? I 'm unable to afford $ XXXX/month when I 'm a student and also working as much as I can just to have the means to live. Now, because of this awful organization, my credit is ruined and I have someone harassing me for money on the phone all the time. My loans went from the {$17000.00} that I originally borrowed to {$19000.00} and the second went from XXXX one is {$6400.00}. Additionally, Navient charged me a lot of late fees which made loans even higher. This is even after I already paid XXXX of dollars in interest rates. 12.375 % and 12.625 % interest rates for these kind of loans, especially for student loans is way to excessive. This company is ruining my life by not letting me to have the chance on paying off these loans. I will never be able to pay these loans off unless something different happens. This is the worst financial organization in the United States, and I 'm praying to XXXX that our government will finally step in and do something about these unfair practices. Unless something happens, the student loan debt will continue to increase as well as college drop out numbers. Please assist me with this and finally help me with this huge burden.