Older borrowers are struggling with student loan debt even more during COVID-19

Kimberly King was burnt out in her nursing career. Before COVID.  So she took on student debt to change careers — and was defrauded by what she says was a predatory online college. Now at age 56, she’s back 40 hours a week in her registered nurse job, and taking classes again to get a nurse practitioner degree.

“I had no choice but to go back to nursing, and seek an advanced degree in the same field I was trying to get away from, in order to pay my newly incurred debt,” says King. Between her own $72,000 in student debt now, and the approximately $25,000 in a parent PLUS loan she took out for her husband’s child’s education, King is one of more than 8 million Americans over the age of 50 who hold student debt — and just shy of being one of the 820,000 of them with student debt of $100,000 or more. In fact, there’s nearly one person over the age of 50 with that whopping amount of student debt for every person under age 35.

“At this point, I just work hard every single day of my life, praying that this will all be over soon and I will come out ahead,” says King. At 56, she feels like she’s, “approaching retirement rapidly, which makes me very nervous.”

Increasingly, older Americans are taking on student debt – for their own or their spouse’s education, or more commonly, on behalf of their children and grandchildren. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) found that between 2012 and 2017, the number of student loan borrowers aged 60 and older increased by 46 percent or more in half of all states. Because of factors like fixed incomes and other debt, these older borrowers are particularly vulnerable to student debt default and delinquency, often impacting their ability to retire securely.

Older student loans borrowers on fixed incomes complain to the CFPB that they struggle to keep up with income-driven repayment (IDR) plans they enrolled in while receiving a salary. But too often, loan servicers are not advising these borrowers that after a loss of income they can recalculate their monthly payments.

Now, a new poll shows older student loan borrowers are also disproportionately impacted by the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on their economic security – and this impact is a significant source of anxiety. Savi partnered with Student Debt Crisis, the nation’s leading advocates for student borrowers, to conduct the national poll in mid May. We had an astonishing 38,802 Americans respond from all 50 states. That’s a response rate more than five times the size of any of Student Debt Crisis’s prior surveys.

Student loan borrowers over the age of 46 were 50% more likely than borrowers aged 18 to 45 to report that student loan debt contributed to bankruptcy or closing a small business. About one in three respondents overall said they were unaware of federal student loan relief enacted by Congress as part of the March 27 CARES Act, but the rate of misinformation was slightly higher for older borrowers.

For student debt holders over age 65, two-thirds reported greater anxiety and depression due to their student loans, compared to 55% for other age groups.  Six percent of this older group reported having their Social Security benefits garnished during the COVID-19 pandemic, despite the fact that the U.S. Department of Education was directed to pause such garnishments.

There’s no doubt the cost of higher education in America exceeds most Americans’ ability to pay without them, or their parents or grandparents, taking on significant debt. And there’s ample evidence that the student loan system is a confusing and bureaucratic process that has yet to be remedied, despite federal efforts to do so.

Now these realities are compounded for multiple generations of Americans by the worst economic collapse since 1929, employers are taking action and beginning to provide immediate relief for their employees and members via innovative, online tools. We believe in needing reforms and restructuring around today’s student loan policies, we know it can take a long time while borrowers are in need today and are unable to let their lives be controlled by policy. That’s also why we have created a free site* available to everyone during the COVID-19 crisis. Americans of any age who have student loans and have lost a job, been furloughed, or had hours reduced because of the COVID-19 crisis can learn more about income-driven repayment or make other smart tweaks now, before payments resume on October 1.

We know it will be a long road back to financial security after the current pause in federal loan payments and interest accrual expires on September 30. We believe that enrolling in an income-driven repayment plan now can ensure that a borrower has a payment they can afford for up to 12 months — and if they have no income, that monthly payment can be $0.

In Kimberly King’s case, she’s waiting. She’s not making payments on her own debt. She has applied for Borrower Defense to Repayment, which the Department of Education offers in cases where they determine a student has been defrauded by a predatory institution.

Older Americans still feel the loss of retirement savings or net worth inflicted by the 2008 meltdown.  The COVID collapse may be a blow from which many never financially recover. An investment in a brighter future, like higher education, should not be the cause.

Tobin Van Ostern is co-founder of Savi, an online service that walks student loan borrowers through the best repayment and forgiveness options. Savi is a student loan benefit provided by leading employers, financial institutions and membership groups. Previously, Van Ostern has led work at the 2008 Obama campaign, Center for American Progress and YI Advisors with a plethora of national news features. Drop a line and learn more: tobin@bysavi.com. *See the free site here.