Consumer complaint received 2024-09-19 00:00:00
Product: Student loan — Private student loan
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer — Don't agree with the fees charged
Company: Navient Solutions, LLC.
State: MN

Complaint narrative:
I attended the Art Institutes XXXX Minnesota from XXXX - XXXX and earned a XXXX XXXX XXXX in Advertising. I was pressured by recruiters from the XXXX XXXX at the time to take out private loans as my only option to fund my education, and was ensured by them that I would have no problem finding a job after this in order to pay for my education. I soon learned this was far from the truth. 

Like many others who went to this sham school, I had great difficulty in finding employment after graduation and as a result, had a very difficult time making the high student loan payments to pay for my education. I defaulted on XXXX of my loans shortly after I graduated due to lack of gainful employment. I had to survive financially off of credit cards and personal loans in order to get by, and I am still trying to dig myself out of this financial hole to this day- along with trying to pay down the balance of my Navient private loans. I owe MORE now than I did when I took the loans out, almost XXXX  years later. 

At XXXX XXXX XXXX, I have not been able to save for retirement or contribute to a college fund for my XXXX young boys. I hate to think that they are paying the repercussions that came from me falling for the XXXX XXXX scam when I was a young adult, but it is hard not to see it that way. 

I have applied once for the XXXX XXXX XXXX in XXXX of XXXX and was denied- with only a vague response from Navient, stating that " Navient carefully considers a variety of factors in determining whether a private loan should be XXXX based on school misconduct and you do not meet the requirements for discharge based on misconduct by your school. '' How did I not meet requirements? I documented the great financial harm I have suffered from this, I went to a school that has been proven to have engaged in deceptive recruitment and predatory lending practices and has since been shut down, and I have been included in the XXXX XXXX 's blanket discharge of loans related to this school ( although this did not help me because my loans are private ). I meticulously put together a binder of evidence, including screenshots of the inflated job placement statistics and " average '' salaries for those graduating from AIM, screenshots of countless rejection letters from jobs I applied to and emails I sent in the years after graduation seeking assistance in finding a job, and emails that were left unresponded to by career counselors that PROMISED to help me find a position after graduation. 

I was lied to about the merits of this education, was pressured into taking out {$80000.00} in private loans at the time that I signed up for the program ( which, by the way, I was told I had to sign the same day that I met with recruiters ), and over XXXX  years later am still deep in debt from this experience. I do not have family to help me out financially, as my wife and I are both from low-income backgrounds- something I have now learned was part of the recruitment tactic of AIM, to target those from similar backgrounds with promises of a great, high-paying career. 

These loans should be forgiven due to the misconduct that XXXX took in recruiting myself and others, as well as the pressure they placed on myself to take out private loans for this sham degree. I am attaching a letter that XXXX XXXX XXXX wrote last month, echoing much of what I have said above. 

I have re-applied for forgiveness and sent in my evidence again via email, and this time included a personal statement outlining more specifically the financial harm that this all has caused me.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation