i have a major debt issue. i have private loans as well as federal loans which i consolidated with a different lender. So, basically i have my federal loans with one lender and all my private loans with another lender. I fully understand the seriousness of defaulting on federal loans, but do the same rules apply for private loans?? I mean, if i default on private loans will they garnish my wages or my tax refunds, since my credit scoring was used to give my the loan so it was obviously not a federal program but a private one. So is defaulting on a private loan just a problem for 7 years or just as bad as federal loans. So are the consequences of federal default the same as private loan default??. I have trying to get the answers for months, please help.