<prompt> Human: Unfortunately, before I met my wife she went to a for profit college when she was just out of high school. The college was Stevens-Henagar and they financed her fees in-house. So, she has an agreement to pay back 42K over 18 years at 0 interest. To date 10K has been payed back.Recently, we received a letter from them offering to close the loan outstanding balance 33.7K for 13.7K. Currently, we have the cash to pay this back without dipping into the emergency fund. Seems like a no-brainer. Investing 13.7K over the 12 years remaining on the loan would require an 8 annual return to yield 33.7K. In my book, 8 guaranteed is outstanding.What I dont get is why they are offering this. In their letter they state they want to help our students reduce their student loan debt. Whats in it for them? Why would they throw away that kind of future return for some quick cash now?P.S. If there are any young people out there thinking of going to a for profit college, it is a huge waste of time and money for a worthless degree. Dont fall for their slick advertising. They may even label themselves as non-profit like Stevens-Henagar does. You would be much better off attending your local community college.  <response>: My guess is that this college is circling the drain. They are getting sued for financial aid fraud, but they also probably relied a lot on churn from getting new students signed up. Once googling them yields a result of financial aid fraud, the new enrollees probably dropped precipitously. That might have left them dangerously strapped for cash, and maybe theyve got other problems, like their graduates havent gotten good jobs and are therefore defaulting on their loans like crazy.They probably are getting strapped for cash to fight the lawsuit, while simultaneously getting starved of new cash by having new students dry up. They are therefore offering a quick buy-out for people with their student loans to stay afloat a bit longer. Negotiate them lower but its probably a good deal to take it. If they go bankrupt or sued into oblivion, you might get out of repaying the loans but you might not. Its been a bit hit-or-miss for students of failed diploma mills like Corinthian or DeVry. You may want to look into what happened with those. 