Speaker 1: College students graduated with an average debt of thirty thousand
Speaker 1: dollars in student loans in and that's just the average.
Speaker 1: As Senator Bernie Sanders made clear during the presidential campaign.
Speaker 1: Here at a rally in New Hampshire, we have a
Speaker 1: young lady here a hundred and eighty three thousand dollars
Speaker 1: in debt. Now, is that a result of going to
Speaker 1: Las Vegas and losing on the casino? No, that's because
Speaker 1: she wanted to get a decent education. But what about
Speaker 1: the debt of parents who are struggling financially but helped
Speaker 1: their children pay for the rising cost of college. A
Speaker 1: bankruptcy trustee can sue to take back tuition money paid
Speaker 1: to a college in the years before bankruptcy, but courts
Speaker 1: are split on the fundamental question. A bankruptcy judge in
Speaker 1: Atlanta rule this month that a Georgia woman did not
Speaker 1: have a legal duty to pay her daughter's college tuition,
Speaker 1: writing that he disagreed with the opposite decision reached by
Speaker 1: a Boston judge six months ago. Our guest is Heather
Speaker 1: Joe Harvist. She's a student loan expert. How to explained
Speaker 1: the legal issue in these tuition claw back lawsuits, Well,
Speaker 1: the question is whether the bankruptcy trustee can reclaim funds
Speaker 1: that were paid to a college and put them back
Speaker 1: in the estate of the debtor. So, in the recent
Speaker 1: Georgia case, the mother in that case had paid some
Speaker 1: college tuition for her daughter's education and the college UM
Speaker 1: wanted to retain those tuition payments, but the trustee wanted
Speaker 1: to recoup the value of that transferred fund for the
Speaker 1: bankruptcy estate. So the court considered whether the debtor was
Speaker 1: able to receive what they call a reasonably equivalent value
Speaker 1: in exchange for the money she had transferred to the university,
Speaker 1: and in that analysis, the court determined that UM she
Speaker 1: did not receive such value UM because finding that she
Speaker 1: did not have a duty to pay for her daughter's education.
Speaker 1: Heather is looking at whether somebody is has a duty
Speaker 1: or is really obligated to pay their child's tuition the
Speaker 1: way that courts should be looking at this question. I mean,
Speaker 1: people have felt for a long time, or at least
Speaker 1: a lot of people have, that they feel they have
Speaker 1: some obligation towards their kids to help them get educated,
Speaker 1: or a lot of people feel that way. Is it
Speaker 1: is duty as a legal matter really the right way
Speaker 1: to look at this question. Well, and I think that
Speaker 1: that's really the right way to think about it, because
Speaker 1: it is a question about which there are different opinions. UM.
Speaker 1: Parents certainly do UM in many cases express a feeling
Speaker 1: of that they have such a duty UM. Certainly, it's
Speaker 1: it's customary in our culture if parents are able to
Speaker 1: assist with their children's college education, it's typically expected UM.
Speaker 1: But in the recent Georgia case, Judge Hoffman looked at
Speaker 1: some conflicting guidance from prior decisions UH and determined that UM.
Speaker 1: In his view, there there was although there was a
Speaker 1: societal expectation that parents pay for college, that there was
Speaker 1: not in fact any corresponding legal duty UM, and that
Speaker 1: such a such a duty UM didn't did not UM
Speaker 1: exist even though the debtor may have felt such a
Speaker 1: moral obligation to pay for the college education. And in
Speaker 1: that decision, the judge talked about Judge Hoffman, the Massachusetts
Speaker 1: judge who had decided that it was right for the
Speaker 1: parents to pay, and in his decision, Judge Hoffman said
Speaker 1: the emphasis should be unreasonably in reasonably equivalent value often
Speaker 1: apparent won't know at the time she pays a bill,
Speaker 1: whether for herself or her for her child, if the
Speaker 1: medical procedure, the music lesson, or the college fee will
Speaker 1: turn out to have been worth it. But there's a
Speaker 1: reasonable equivalency, he says. And isn't it the same as
Speaker 1: if you know, someone gets joy one parent gets joy
Speaker 1: out of buying a sports car, and another parent gets
Speaker 1: joy out of paying for their child's college education. Should
Speaker 1: the college suffer? Well, you know, I think that it's
Speaker 1: an interesting series of questions because certainly, UM, we received
Speaker 1: various amounts of joy from spending our money on things,
Speaker 1: potentially including on education for our children. UM. But the
Speaker 1: court looks to whether the debtor in this case received
Speaker 1: any economic benefit UM as opposed to UM any you
Speaker 1: know less less tangible benefit as you describe. Well, Heather,
Speaker 1: One of the things it's interesting thing about this is
Speaker 1: the judge seems to have made a distinction between money
Speaker 1: that was paid out of a UH five nine college
Speaker 1: savings account and money that was paid separately, you know,
Speaker 1: going a separate from that just cash that I guess
Speaker 1: that the parent had on hand. Why is there a
Speaker 1: distinction there? Well, there there was some dispute over the
Speaker 1: source of the funds that were transferred to the university
Speaker 1: because they had been transmitted through the debtor's checking account.
Speaker 1: UM and the question, you know, there was some question
Speaker 1: about whether the funds that initially come from a five
Speaker 1: nine savings account UM and those accounts are special in
Speaker 1: that the funds are designated specifically for the purpose of
Speaker 1: UM education and qualifying tuition expenses. So the tracing of
Speaker 1: the funds was UH certainly a large part of the
Speaker 1: analysis in the case. Had there are the courts the
Speaker 1: place to settle this? In New York, Congressman introduced a
Speaker 1: ban on tuition clawbacks in bankruptcy in Congress. It didn't
Speaker 1: go very far, but I'm wondering if Congress is a
Speaker 1: better place to decide this. Well, certainly, it does seem
Speaker 1: that with some you know, dispute at the court level,
Speaker 1: with some different findings from different judges, that additional guidance
Speaker 1: would be appropriate. UM and and certainly UM bankruptcy reform
Speaker 1: with regard to education costs and UH student own discharges
Speaker 1: UM is UH. Do well, do you think there's any chance,
Speaker 1: you know, colleges are gonna start needing to probe into
Speaker 1: parents finances to make sure that they're not going to
Speaker 1: have a claw back, because if they're getting tuition, you know,
Speaker 1: when they can get money from people and not have
Speaker 1: to give aid necessary earlier, it's a big deal for
Speaker 1: them financially certainly. I mean, I think colleges have been
Speaker 1: and may redouble their effort to be UM confident in
Speaker 1: the source of the funds they're receiving, because just as
Speaker 1: you say, UM, having those funds um taken back is
Speaker 1: not going to sit well with their business model. And
Speaker 1: according to the Wall Street Journal, most colleges have been
Speaker 1: settling with a return of more than two hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy thousand intuition. Since thanks so much for being with
Speaker 1: us here on Bloomberg Law. That's Heather Jarvis. She is
Speaker 1: a student loan expert. That's it for this edition of
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Law. We'll be back tomorrow at one pm Wall
Speaker 1: Street Time. Please join us then, thanks to our technical
Speaker 1: director Reginald Basil and our producer David Suckerman. Bloomberg Markets
Speaker 1: with Carol Master and Corey Johnson starts right now on
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio. Good afternoon, Carol, Hi, June, Hi, Michael, Hi. Everybody.
Speaker 1: We've got the snap road show. We're gonna talk about
Speaker 1: already hitting some roadblocks. Also, chicken and burger is apparently
Speaker 1: the perfect recipe for M and a uh. And then
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk about Japanese drone that's a dog and
Speaker 1: I put it out on Twitter. Perfect recipe for a
Speaker 1: lot of other things too. Chicken and burgers. That's it
Speaker 1: for this edition of Bloomberg Law. Coming up Bloomberg Markets
Speaker 1: with Carol Master and Corey Johnson. This is Bloomberg