Hello,

Thank you so much for the forum. It is extremely helpful!

I am a lifelong learner. My loans from my recent PhD are currently in 6 month grace period. I have a second set of FFEL loans from my master’s degree. And in 2002 I consolidated my undergraduate loans with my husband’s to cut payments during unemployment. This is the loan that is the cause of my confusion.

The consolidation loan is serviced by Sallie Mae and is listed as a federal loan on their site. However it does not show up under my list of loans on the studentloan.gov site. My payment for this loan is $256.00

It was my understanding that IBR calculates the TOTAL loan payment that you can afford based on your adjusted gross income. For example, the estimator is giving me an IBR payment of $1000 based on my adjusted gross. But the consolidation loan is not listed in these calculations. So in essence, shouldn’t the IBR payment be reduced by $256 to account for what I am already paying?  How do I get the system (website, applications, etc) to take this consolidation loan payment into consideration.

I work in a public service career and would really like to enter into IBR so that I am eligible for the forgiveness after 10 year. However, the IBR payment is very high if not considering my current loan payment.