Consumer Protection Bureau wants your student loan stories

Now that the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau finally has a new director in Richard Cordray, it's ready to start doing the job it was created to do: protect consumers - and that includes those with private student loan debt!

They're seeking public comments on your experiences with private student loans so as to begin to start regulating this out-of-control, legal-loansharking industry. They won't know what the problems are unless you tell them, so please take a few moments of your time TODAY to share your stories! The public comment period ends next Tuesday, so please don't put this off! Do it today!

Thank you for your time and continued support!

Directly from the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's website: Your experience with private student loans

We need public input on important questions about private student loans. Whether you have two sentences or two pages to tell us, we want to hear from you.

Tell us about your experiences with private student loans.
http://www.regulations.gov/#%21submitComment;D=CFPB-2011-0037-0001
You can also submit your comments by email to CFPB_StudentsFedReg {at} cfpb.gov.

What kind of information are you looking for?
Among the questions we hope to answer:

•What kind of non-federal financing do families rely on to pay for education? When families choose private loans before exhausting their federal loans, what prompts this choice?

•What sources do families rely on for information about private student loan options? What sources and types of information do students consider about debt loads? How effective are private loan disclosures?

•What can students tell us about loans offered directly by the schools they are attending or have attended? What can schools tell us about how they select students for aid and how they fund this aid?

•What experiences have people had with repaying private student loans? Does it affect field of study or career choice? What resources or techniques have assisted students with avoiding default and understanding their rights as borrowers?

For a more detailed list of the specific questions we hope to answer, read our full Federal Register notice. (Note: even if you don’t have an answer to every single question, we want to hear from you. We are looking for a diverse set of perspectives.)

Your stories can help us understand how people make decisions about which loans to borrow. You can tell us more about how the private student loan market functions or doesn’t, how and why you got a private loan, and how it is or is not working for you. We want to make sure we have all the facts as we prioritize our work to make sure this market works for students, lenders, and schools.

Anyone can comment: applicants for private student loans, students in school, people in repayment, lenders, etc. We need your help to make sure we have a diverse set of perspectives as we prepare this report.

We will read every single comment. This summer, the CFPB and Department of Education will submit a report on the private student loan market to Congress. As we prepare our report to Congress on the private student loan market, we will use the comments we receive here to guide us as we prepare an in-depth view of private student lending.

In addition, your comment will be published in the Federal Register. Other people who may share your experience will be able to read your comment.

For more information about what we’re trying to do, read the full Federal Register notice. http://www.consumerfinance.gov/notice-and-comment/request-for-information-regarding-private-education-loans-and-private-educational-lenders/

Read our blog post that introduced the notice when we first submitted it to the Federal Register. http://www.consumerfinance.gov/chime-in-on-private-student-loans/

And if you have an experience to share, tell us about it.