It's Never Too Late To Start Over

Brought to you by the Every Dollar App, start budgeting for free today. Normal is broke and common sense is weird, so we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Networks and the Fairwinds Credit Union Studio, this is the Ramsey Show, and I am at Rachel Cruz hosting this hour with my good friend and co-host of Smart Money Happy Hour, George Campbell, so we'll be answering your questions at 4-8-825-225, but your life and your money. Let's pregame before the happy hour. I know, when you wait for a recording right after this, so we're together all afternoon, man, George. I apologize already to Rachel, don't worry. All right, let's go to Kurt in Charlotte, North Carolina. Hi Kurt, welcome to the show. Hi, thanks. How are you guys doing? Hi, we're doing great. How are you doing? Good. I'm doing good. So I got a question. So we have some debt and I'm not quite sure how much. I know we do have a loan for $25,000. We have a car payment, we have two car payments, and my wife says she has, we have about three or four years left on the one car, but every time I bring up, they've Ramsey. Every time she says, I hear that name, I don't want to talk to you, I don't want to have anything to do with you because I hate that name. I want to fuffle what Dave says, but she doesn't want that. So I just feel like we're continuing, just continuing to just pile on more debt, and I mean, she wants, you know, we want to do things, but it's like, how can we? I don't say it to her, but it's like, how can we have? We don't have any money. We're just going deeper into debt. Yeah. How long have you guys been married? Twenty years. How long? Oh, okay. How long was she married to her ex? Just the short time I believe a year and a half. Oh, okay. Okay. So she has thrown the baby steps out with the bathwater here. It's unfortunate. Correct. Yeah. Just a trigger for her. She associates with her past trauma. And so therefore anything you talk about, the baby steps in Dave, but does she actually want to get out of debt on the underneath the surface of that? I don't, I don't think she does. I think she's, I don't want to say used to living like this, but yeah, it's probably the normal for her. Yeah. And I think there, there's a lot of situations where people just can kind of coast. They're not, they're not in the disaster zone, but they're also not thriving. They're kind of just average. You know what I mean? It's just kind of that normal feeling. You got too far away. A lot of hardest places to be. Yeah. It is sometimes tough if there's not a massive motivation for change. And for some people, it's spiritual and emotional. Some people, it's circumstantial like, I mean, it's, you know, it looks different for everyone. And so I think more of the concentration would be how you guys get on the same page, right? I mean, we obviously agree on a way to handle money here at Ramsey Solutions. But what we want to see you guys is, is win in your marriage and win with money. So I'm just, I'm, I want to talk through a little bit more of how to get you guys on the same page. Okay. So when you do bring it up, what, what's your wording? Because sometimes, Kurt, I'm not going to put you in this bucket, but some, some, some of our listeners sometimes are very enthusiastic. And it's almost this like, I'm going to, a level of shame, you're doing it wrong. It's all about her, you, you, you versus less about what you're thinking and feeling and desiring. Does that make sense? That does make sense. And, and she doesn't, so she does not, right now, she doesn't work. And so she hasn't worked for many years. And so she says her job is to take care of the house and pay the bills. So when I try to bring up, well, how much do we owe on this? I don't like flat out say, what are we owe on this? How much do we have on this? How much is a month of payment? I just kind of nonchalantly, you know, try to get it out of her. But she just, I don't know the exact any numbers, I don't want to say any numbers, but some of the numbers. You don't know a lot. Yeah. I mean, as you're listening to you, like I don't, yeah. And, and Kurt, you know, asking how much you guys owe on something that's not wrong. That's not shameful. I'm like, overstepping there. That's not an overstep. And overstep would be like, I can't believe that you keep doing this. And this is your fault. And the fact that we're here is because of your decisions, right? Like it's more point. But you asking how much you owe on a car loan, Kurt, I think that's okay. I think that's okay. So, I think Rachel's right, lead with the, the I statements. I feel like I've been in the dark. I feel like I haven't been doing a good job leading in this area. We've been married this long. And I feel like I'm just kind of floundering here. And I want to be on the same page. I want to accomplish some amazing things with you. Are you willing to go on this journey? And I want to know what's going on with our money, like that, that's okay to say. Do you feel like you tiptoe around her and other issues besides just money? Money is pretty much the only issue I tiptoe around with her on. And I don't know why. Okay. How old are you two? We're 50. Okay. So what does she want at 52 or 55? Does she have any goals, dreams, desires? I know her, what she talks about to me and is, oh, we want to, you know, when our daughter, she's 13 when she goes off to college, if we want to, you know, move here and have, you know, an acre or two and, you know, buy another house. And she says that. But I think I'm thinking that while she says that, I'm thinking in my head, how are we going to do that? We don't even have any money saved. But what if you go with her on the dream and go, I love this. Now let's reverse engineer this dream. What must be true for us to have a second home and send our kid to college debt free? Well, we need margin. What's taken up the margin? Oh, you know what? What if we got rid of the car payments? Man, that free ups and money we could then invest. And what if we save this much over time and we could afford that second home and cash? And what if I could retire at 56 instead of working because I have to at 78? Now it's a different conversation. There's nothing to do with Dave. The byproduct might be we follow a plan that works. But right now I think we need to do some dreaming together. Yeah. I know. And I do agree with that. It's just that I'm, maybe I'm more of a realist and think we can't do that. There's impossible. There's always a how person and a wild person in the marriage and you are the how you're like, yeah, that's not going to work. And she's like, wow, way to be a dream killer. Kurt. And it's probably when she thinks rams he is, there's a bunch of dream killers that we can't do anything. Funny, daddy. She's nothing does. You know, and so, yes, and I want you to, I really want you to step in and it doesn't have to be combative, but two adults in a marriage should have equal say in what is going on. And so she has carried the weight, but also carried all of the influence. And that needs to be really evened out that, yes, she can still pay the bills. Like what my husband's the one that goes on and actually hits the buttons and does it. Thank God. We're not making it fake. So that's okay, but you, but, but sitting down together and agreeing on what is going on with your money and knowing where it's going, that's not an out of bounds conversation. It's actually leading to a healthy marriage. Yeah. I agree with that. You know, having that conversation with her just to, you know, be involved with her and see how she does things and see how it, and then slowly make suggestions based off what, you know, I'm observing her doing. Yes. You need to get really good at improv, Kurt. And the key to improv is yes and so when she says it, go, yes, and what if the way to get there was this, what if we crafted a plan to get to your goal instead of, oh, we're never going to own a house because we got two car payments. Yeah. Now it's a fight instead of a dream session. And I think that that vision and dreaming needs to come first. The why has to come first before we need to get on a budget. Your spending is out of control. Yeah. So you're never going to go well. And George, we find in money and marriage, when you have those conversations and the conflict arises and you actually learn why she's frustrated here, why she's scared here, why she is annoyed with it. Like you actually start to get to know your spouse more. And you avoid the hard conversations. You never get to the depths of really what's going on within them. So it's actually such a positive because you get to know your spouse at a better level, at a deeper level. And then that's when you can really start to create solutions because you're a team working together, not just two individuals running on separate tracks. As your business grows, everything becomes more complex. There was a time when Ramsey Solutions had too many disconnected systems and not enough visibility across the business. We wasted too much time chasing information instead of making decisions. That's why we got NetSuite. NetSuite brings your financials, inventory, CRM, and more together in one place. More than 44,000 businesses run on NetSuite, including Ramsey. And now they're taking the next step with NetSuite next, making it easier to put AI to work across your entire business. NetSuite next helps you make the most of your time, automating routine work like forecasting demand and following up on overdue accounts. With NetSuite next, AI is built into everything you do. So you can ask questions just like when you're talking to a member of your team. And right now, you can and try NetSuite next for free. If your revenue is at least seven figures, go to NetSuite.ai/Ramsey. That's NetSuite.ai/Ramsey. (upbeat music) - Up next we have Wanda in Seattle, Washington. And I, Wanda, welcome to the show. - Hi. - Hello, how are you doing? - Well, I'm doing okay, just a little stress. - Oh, I'm sorry, what's going on? How can we help? - I'm trying to figure out how to get some money in my savings or in my savings anywhere. We make 102,000 a year. - Okay. - We're now at $57,000 in debt. - Okay. - I have $175 in savings, and that's it. - All right, are you working and your husband? - No, we're both retired. I'm 73 and he's 76. - Okay, but you make $102,000 is that from pensions? - Or is it, yeah, he's retired military. He has disability and his pension and full security, and I have full security. - Okay, so is that 102 going to be for the foreseeable future? - Yes. - Okay, well that's-- - Until we get our next pay raise. - And when-- - Is it like a cost-living adjustment? Is that what the pay raise is? - Yes. - Okay. - So it'll just slowly go up to meet inflation basically, but it's not like you're getting a true raise, or you're gonna have a ton of extra margin, necessarily. - No. - Okay, so what kind of debt's the 57? Lay it out for us. - I have $14,000 in credit card debt, and I have $32,000 on a travel trader, did I really don't want? And then that's $16,000 on a personal loan. - Okay, now it's everything. - Yeah, that's everything. I do have a truck that I'm missing, which if I knew how to get out of it, I'd get out of it. - Okay, so at least truck, okay. For the $32,000 trailer, I'm assuming you've looked to sell it, 'cause you said you don't really want it. How much could you get for it? - Yeah. But I don't know if we were, if we've got one, you'd call it, and underneath, you know, under water on it. Okay. - But is it worth 30K or is it worth 10K? 'Cause there's a big difference. - It's worth 30, it's only two years old. - Okay, so you might be able to get out unscathed, or maybe you put in a thousand bucks to get out of this, but that gets sort of over half your debt. - Yeah, that's amazing. - What's the payment on that? - $87,000. - Okay. - And what's the $14,000 in credit card debt? How did that happen? - Well, we showed you how smart we are. We financed our house, paid off all our credit cards, and in two months we were back up to seven times a week. - Wow. So we never actually fixed the behavior underneath. - No. - We just played a little shell game, and we're back to where we are. Well, are you guys ready to change? - Yep. - 'Cause that part we have, that's the mood of all of us. - Oh, I am. - That each of us, he wants to be debt-free. So I'm, you know, so that I, so you don't pull me in. - Let's put the money where the mouth is there. 'Cause you guys have a great income. If you called in and you were about working, making a hundred grand and had 50 to pay off, I'd go, great, we can solve this thing within six months. - Mm-hmm. - Yeah. - Sell the trailer, live on nothing, and throw it all to debt, you guys are done. And then you have all this margin for the rest of your life to build wealth with. - Yeah, how old are you guys, Wanda? - 73 and 76. - 73 and 76, okay. - Yeah, so there's a shorter life expectancy here. - No. - I don't think we'll make it 30 years. - I mean, you made it this far. - I mean, we're gonna go positive. You know, you never know. - 'Cause life expectancy is not really, it doesn't reflect reality. Because you've got people who died super young, people who died super old. So the fact that you made it into your seventies and you guys were in decent health, sounds like? - Yeah. - Okay. - So Wanda, here's what we're gonna have you do. George, tell me if you agree with my assessment. Number one, Wanda, we're gonna cut up the credit cards. Okay. - Okay. - You have to stop. - As of right now, I put a block, I stop on it. - Great. But cut 'em up. - Cut 'em up and close the account. - Do you have one near you right now? - No. - Hmm, that's unfortunate. - Okay. My husband has, my husband has his, and I'm minor in a lock box somewhere. - Okay. - Perfect. So tonight, though, Wanda, you promised me in George that you guys are gonna sit down at the table. You're gonna take all those out and you're gonna look, and you should be mad at them, Wanda. They've not helped you. - No, they haven't. - They're horrible. They're terrible. They're terrible. And so you should want to just demolish them. And if you do it in a creative way, just DM me and George and let us know. But yeah, get rid of the credit cards. That's the first thing. Number two, I want you guys to do a written budget, and I wanna figure out how much money you can get out every single month that's extra, okay? So you guys, what you bring home every month, what can we, if we don't go out to eat, whatever we do, month to month, how much money can we get back? And it would be fun just to add to it that if you sold this trailer and you got an extra 300 bucks, right, add that in. So it's like, could you get up to $1,000? Could you get to 1,500? What does that look like for you all? And I want you to find that margin because I want you to get this, I think you said you have $175 in savings. I want you to get that up to $1,000. And I want you to do that fast one. I want you to look around and see if there's stuff you can sell, how you can get that. And I would say, I don't know, George, what, two months? - I mean, you should be able to do this in less than 30 days based on numbers. And that's, so that's, all right, we gotta add 250 a week to this thing. What can I sell this week? How can I cut our budget to create that much margin so that we can get to a little bit of safety? 'Cause once last time you guys had $1,000 to your name and kept it for a while. - Quite a while ago when we were actually debt free. - Yep, yep. So yep, so that's gonna be your first step one, though, okay? Is that? And then I want you to keep that momentum of that 250 a week or more, whatever you can find to start throwing at this debt. And if you, if you can sell the trailer, then you guys will have $30,000 of consumer debt, okay? So if you have $1,000 a month, obviously, it's gonna take you, you know, a little over a year. If you have, if you do 1,500 a month, it'll take you 20 months, so less than two years. You guys can be debt free. And if you could do more, I mean, you guys are bringing home how much every month? What ends up in your bank account? - $85. - Okay, so think about that. $8,500, could you live off of half of that to cover just your basic bills and your minimum debt payments? - Most likely we have before. - Okay, so now we're talking 4,200 going at this thing. If you use half for living, the other half for debt, you're done in six months, seven months. - Okay. - So we're not talking sacrifice forever. We're talking about six months of sacrifice and then six months to build up an emergency fund. - That's good, George. I was way less aggressive. I was like 1,000 a thousand to be. - As you 10 to be. - $1,000 a month, one, do we can do this? - We can. - George just found you 4,000. - Because you told me you can live off half of your income if you guys got serious about this. - I mean, seriously wanted. And then you guys are in retirement making 102 a year. It's great. And if you guys wanted to do some extra savings on the side, which I think you should, you should be on that debt, get an emergency, get a fully funded emergency fund, but you just kind of keep that lifestyle going for a bid. And if you could do this in six months, you could get that emergency fund in five months. - Yeah, you'll get there no time. Do you guys have a mortgage? - Yeah. - Okay, what's the mortgage every month? - 24/82. - Okay, and how much is left on that? - Well, we just financed in last May. So, three, three, 50. - 350 left. Okay, well, you guys will be in good shape to keep affording that mortgage and even throw extra at it and invest once you knock out these consumer debts. So right now, let's start to really build for this future ahead of us. Let's imagine two years from now, you guys are completely debt free with the emergency fund investing for the future, paying off the house early and no stress in the house. - And I'll say one, like the future is now for you all. Like, I mean, it is like, it starts today. - It starts today, but it is, yeah, it has to happen now. I mean, it really does. For you guys to, yeah, to not have stress about this. I mean, you know, you guys are in your seventies. It feels chaotic financially. You've made some bad mistakes, repeated those bad mistakes, but this, honestly, is the moment that you both look at each other and say, okay, we're gonna have to do something different because the credit cards aren't helping us, the personal loans aren't helping us. What are we gonna do? - We deserve a better life in this and we're clear. - Yeah, so do the opposite. Yes, where you're living on less than you make, you're getting out of debt, you're staying out of debt. You have cash in the bank for an emergency fund. And it's all so doable on day really is. So you guys had some hard work in your lives to create that 102. and so we want that to go as far as possible for you. (upbeat music) Back to school time means you're depending on your vehicles more than ever. Whether you're driving kids to school, helping one move into a dormer, just managing a busy fall schedule. The last thing you need is your car break down and throw your plans off track. That's why I recommend a Christian Brothers Automotive. One of the smartest things you can do is stay ahead of potential car problems before they become expensive repairs. And Christian Brothers makes that easier with their digital vehicle inspection. You see exactly what their technicians see, so you're not left guessing about what's wrong or wondering whether the repairs are actually needed. You get honest recommendations and the information you need to make a wise decision. 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All right, let's go to Olivia in Miami, Florida. Hi, Olivia, welcome to the show. - Let's get her on the line here. - Oh my gosh. - Let's, the button stuck, the button is stuck. I promise you, Rachel clicked. - I did. Okay, there she is. - All right, we got you. - It's back, it's back. - How are you doing? - Hi, Olivia. - Can you hear me guys? - Yes, we can. George, fix the button. - I know, you're on. - IT support. - How can we help? - My husband and I have very different spending habits. He is a more of a, in the moment kind of person. Like, she sees something, he likes something, he buys it. And then what happens is Friday comes and I can't pay the babysitter. And he likes this rent. And I like to be more organized with money. And I respect that it's his way of living. But let's say yesterday we had a negative in our account where over $100,000 in the deck. And he hired guys to like do construction, to extend their house. And you know, I respect his way of living. But I think you need to stop respecting his way of living. - I don't. - He's putting your entire family in jeopardy and in danger. - Very stressful. - Nothing about this demands respect. - This isn't like, oh, he likes a shirt. And he's gonna go buy it. This is, this is bad. Like, you can't, you're not even, you're not able to pay for your actual needs in life of what you're needing to do. - What do I do? - How long have you been married? - Five years. - Okay. It sounds like you're at the end of your rope. Like, you're like, I've talked to him. I've tried everything and nothing's worked. Is he combative? Is he defensive? What does he like when you approach him going, hey, we're $100,000 in debt and we can't pay for our bills. Are you not scared? Are you, do you not feel a sense of urgency about this? How does he respond? - He's like, no, I'm gonna get a deposit next week or in a month or now. We'll be fine, everything's gonna be fine. And sometimes he's right, but shadow is. - No. - Well, and so what's gonna have to change within him is that he may be fine, but his wife is scared to death and his wife is stressed out. And so in order to love your wife, well, you actually have to surrender some of the things that you want in order to take care of her, right? And that's where this money stuff stops being money and it starts being marriage. It's marriage issues that your husband does not listen to you and doesn't respect you, Olivia. In order to change his behavior, in order to, and again, you're not, you're, and what you're asking for is not crazy, like, this is pretty basic math here that he's just completely going against. - What can I, is there anything I can do without changing him? Like, I don't know if I can protect myself, maybe just so that I can stress about it all the time? - For the short term you can, but for, that's not a long term solution 'cause if anything, it just continues to divide your marriage. The goal would be that you guys, as a married couple, heal and find a path forward. And then the money habits and all of that follow. I don't want you to just avoid the issue by opening up your own account for the long term. Now, for the short term, we can talk through some of that. If you really do feel like, - You need enough money in your own account to pay the bills so you don't get foreclosed on. - Yep, how much do you guys make a year? - It's luxury, the last year is more than the high 200. - Okay, are you both working? - I work for him. - You work for him, okay. So how much do you bring home, do you bring home a paycheck, like, does that? - I don't, I don't do the salary, you know? I just work. - So you work for him for this business? - Yeah. - And then all the money just flows into, y'all is checking the account? - Right. - Okay. - What kind of work do you do? - Um, he does construction, and I do his books ironically. - So you tell us, what is the path forward for him to see this thing for what it is? You guys make $285,000, and you have nothing to show for it. You're going backwards every single month. - I don't know, I guess I need to have a conversation with him, and how do I go about the conversation? - Usually the most productive way is more concentrating on you, Olivia, 'cause the sad thing is, you can't change him, you can tell him and express to him, exactly what you're feeling, what you're thinking, what your desires are. I mean, and at this point, Olivia, I mean, what your ultimate homes are, right? You don't wanna live like this for the rest of your life, where you're scared you can't even pay your bills. And so, you know, an ultimatum that if he doesn't do X, Y, and Z, meaning like he doesn't spend over X amount without you both agreeing, he doesn't spend extra until X, Y, and Z is paid. You know, these kind of things, that is a, that's a normal way to live. And if he refuses to do that, then yeah, then I mean, I would be taking a salary then from the company and paying myself and having my own account, until you guys can get it on the same page, right? And so there's some, and it's not like a, I'm gonna throw this in your face in a threatening way. It's more of a, I'm scared to death and I'm stressed, I'm losing sleep at night. I feel like I'm losing you as my husband. I don't feel like I'm being heard at all. I don't feel like we have equal value in this marriage. You know, this is how I'm feeling. And so, in order for, yes, and in order for us to move forward, if you don't do X, Y, and Z, then these are the steps that I'm gonna need to make this work for the short term. - I'll have to catch myself. - Yes, for the short term, absolutely. - Do you guys have kids? - No, we have one kid, yeah. - Okay, how old? - How are the kids? He's one. - Okay, did that change anything for you guys in the marriage? - Yeah, it did because now when he spends on the kids, I can't see anything, just for the kids. - For the one-year-old. What does the one-year-old need? - Yeah. - Other than formula and diapers. - You need a $300 worth of choice. - Okay, but you can say something, Olivia. This is your money, too, just because the purchase was designated to another person, it's your money. This is your money that he's spending, too. It's Y'all's money, I mean, is what I'm trying to say. Like, you have as much say in what is going on with this. And so, yeah, I mean, at that point, if you lay out your heart and again, and we're being a little bit probably like, hardcore because I want you to fight for you. But you can do this with a lot of calmness and humility and all of it, but yet be stern in what you're needing, 'cause that survival is what you're talking about. - And this is a solved problem, 'cause if you're high income, you guys could be dead free in 12 to 18 months. So this is not a lifetime of sacrifice, if that's what he's thinking, it's, hey, we got a reset here. We don't have any financial foundation. We are at risk all over. We got payments up to our eyeballs while making almost $300,000. We should be doing better than we are. And if he can't see that, again, to Rachel's point, you're not gonna change him in that point. You need to decide what you're gonna do. But I would not just be putting up with this going, well, he's just a stubborn guy. He has a preference make us broke forever. It's not like he prefers tie and you like Mexican. This is far beyond that. Or he sells, you know, I try to be. I don't want to be the kind of wife that's like, oh, I can't do this. You can't do that. He has done that. Olivia, you're not. You're not, you're not. It's not like you guys have all this cash sitting around and he wants to go buy a ninja slushy on Amazon and you're like, you can't buy that. That's stupid. Like, this is, this is paying bills. This is keeping you guys afloat that you're not in the negative in your checking account. So to, to, to be out of 10, that is okay, Olivia. That, this, it calls for a 10. That is not you nagging. That's you having money. Yeah, the fact you guys make 300 grand and you're still going into debt every month, that's a problem. Yeah. And Olivia, that, you guys may want to go see a marriage therapist because the fact that that's even a thought within you, I, needs to be probably worked out. And that, I'm not saying that to shame you. I'm just saying like, what we're hearing, the language around your marriage and how he needs to be treated. It sounds like you're tiptoeing when he needs to, he needs to, he needs to get a torch. Man up. I've met plenty of people over the years who had a product that they wanted to sell, a side hustle that they wanted to start or a business idea they couldn't stop thinking about. But they never took the first step because getting started felt complicated. Shopify makes it much easier. You can build a professional looking online store in no time flat with everything you need already built in. Then when customers are ready to buy, Shopify checkout helps more of them actually complete the purchase. That's important because abandoned carts don't make you money. And when you need help, side kick, Shopify's built-in AI assistant can help you troubleshoot, answer questions and keep making progress. The point is you don't have to spend your time figuring out what comes next. You can spend your time getting it done. All you need is the idea. Shopify handles the rest. Start your free trial at Shopify.com/ramzie. Shopify.com/ramzie. That's Shopify.com/ramzie. Next up, we have John in New York City. Hi, John. Welcome to the show. How can we help? I'm kind of curious if I'm about to commit financial suicide. I've been following the baby steps for a while and I am looking at changing jobs and I've been at this company for a very long time. But it's gotten to a point where I'm super frustrated and don't want to be here anymore. What's a long time? How long you've been there? Coming up on 20 years. Wow. What do you do? 19 and a half years. I work in manufacturing. Okay. And you want to jump ship to what? Working on boats. Like a mechanic? Yes. Okay. And do you have the skills to do that? Would that require some licensing, some education? So I have a job offer. Wow. A company that is willing to train. Great. What are they going to pay? But it's a big pick up for me. Okay. So I'm currently making about 135. This new job would be about 48,000. Okay. Are you single? I have a fiance. Okay. What does the fiance think about this? She's kind of down for whatever I'm down for. I'm the I'm the breadwinner of the house and I need to you know, keep things afloat. What does she make? So she doesn't make very much. She makes about 15,000 a year. What does she do? She's actually on disability. Okay. So for the foreseeable future 15K is the ceiling? Yes. Okay. When do you guys get married? I'm not sure about that. Okay. How old are you guys? I haven't said a day. I am 44. She's 52. 44 and 52. Okay. And what's your financial situation? Do you have any savings? How much debt do you have? Yeah. So we said I've been following the baby steps for a while. And now I'm kind of struggling with the other side of actually being okay with spending some money. So I managed to receive up. I got about 550 in the 401. That's split between traditional and wrong. I got about 25,000 in the stock market, about 30,000 in a high yield savings account, about 10,000 in my working checking and savings account. And no debt. I owe 57,000 on my house, which is worth how to reorder come out. She said we would list it between 350 and 375. Nice. Okay. No consumer debt. So you're in really good shape on that side. Where is this job going to be? Do you have to relocate? Yeah. So that it's actually down in the Bahamas. So this is like a life change. Yeah. This is a complete complete life change. Okay. I'm on aware of the cost of living in the Bahamas. Is it more or less than New York? So that's actually there's a shared living arrangement with this company. And I would have the potential to stay there and not have to pay rent. fiancee is welcome as well. However, it's shared living and I'm not really sharing. Yeah. Like you're like your house with other people. Yeah. So it's basically to bedroom apartment. And there's two of the employees live within that apartment. So you have your own bedroom room bathroom. But you share a living room and kitchen. Okay. Maybe doing that while you're still engaged. When you guys get married and probably not, right? Right. That's that's the idea. Yeah. So what wouldn't be comfortable with that? Yeah. That's fair. That's fair. Okay. So have you figured out cost of living down there? How much it would take you to pay rent and everything a month? Yeah. Roughly, I'm thinking probably around $3,000 months. Okay. So what you make basically will for the most part be going towards living and you may get, I don't know, a couple hundred bucks or a thousand bucks extra a month. Because after taxes, if you're making 48, right? I'm like, I don't know what the Bahamas tax I mean. Yeah. But if you're making 48 gross, you're going to be probably netting around three grand. Yes. So they only pay an insurance bond, which is like three and a half percent. Okay. So it's not as much. I would also feel be concerned about the potential US income tax, whatever that might be. Because you're not going to be a citizen there. And you don't have to pay it. Okay. Correct. Yeah. Um, man. Okay. Well, there is also I am a, I am a disabled veteran. Okay. And I do have substantial income from that as well. Okay. How much equal to that's 4500 a month. Oh. Well, you buried the lead there. That really helps us out here with the expenses. We were scared. You were running it up to the line. But if you have that kind of margin, I'd say, oh, I'm not. I don't know what they say in the Bahamas. Captain John. I mean, it sounds like a fun adventure. If your fiance is on board and it's not going to destroy your relationships, even if you do this for a couple of years, I was going to say, yeah, some wiggle room to do this and then go, oh, that was fun. I think you'd be fine. Yeah. Again, long term. I don't know if that's what you want to do. But the great thing is you've set yourself up well that your investments are going to continue to grow. You're going to be able to live well within what you are making probably hopefully maybe still investing. I don't know how that works with taxes and I don't know. But kind of figuring that out. And yeah, and then maybe you look up in five years, six years, you're like, you know what? I could probably go get a job and manufacturing again for 90,000 different company less stress and keep moving. And then you're going to get some equity from your home when you sell it to do this move. You'd walk away maybe 300 grand right there. You can just invest that. Just leave that for the time being. And yeah, I mean, you'll come out for sure over a million dollar net worth, John. By the time this is all said and done. Yeah, we're saying that I'm sitting at 950 right now and maybe that's part of the block right is continuing to move the gold post and one is enough and not right. That's that's kind of what I'm struggling. I'm just wondering is there an alternative where you go do a different job that you enjoy and the boat stuff is still a really fun hobby. Maybe it's a side hustle versus jumping ship pun intended. I would say that, but it's it's be different. He's working on the I don't know harbor New York versus the Bahamas. You know, yeah, I mean, it sounds enticing. It's it well, it just sounds like a different lot like it. It's almost like you're just itching to get a different lifestyle too. And it doesn't sound like this is a permanent pay cut. The goal would be how do I get back to making, you know, close to six figures or more while doing something I enjoy. If you came back though, but would you be okay with him on a, what's the other side there? Is there a is there a room to grow there in the career? But I hate to say it. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It's gonna do it for free. You got a million bucks sitting in the bank. You live off of what you're making. I mean, I don't do you have kids, John? - No. - I mean, I can't-- - She has three that are out of the house. - Okay, okay. - I mean, it sounds like a fun adventure. To me, there's a low-fail scenario. - It doesn't bother me. - Knowing that this may not be a forever plan. - Why do you keep saying that? - I'm just wondering, is she gonna be 68 working on boats in the Bahamas? - She might be. He might be-- - What do you think, John? - I mean, the goal would be to own my own boat and sail it around the world. Or at least, you know, island hop and cruise. - Now we're talking about it. - Wow, all right. - That's some vision right there. - That's what you can invite me and, John. We'll bring our spouses in. - You can thank Rachel for her great advice. It'll be a super yacht. - Okay, so that's great. I mean, in a sense of having, there is an external goal, right? So you're not just sitting idle. Like, there's something you're still working towards, which is your point, George. That's like, how can we be growing working towards something and the boat things great? And you'll have plenty of margin in your budget with what you're getting from the military and what you're making to make that a goal. So yeah, save up for the boat and do charters. And I think it's great. - Congratulations, John. - All right. All right, well. - Put in your two weeks. - Are you okay? - Yeah, I'm about to go to HR. - No! See, all right, good luck. George, that's what scares me, you know? - Yeah. - We have fun and-- - We get to say whatever we want. - But John has to go meet with HR. - And I actually take the advice. - And then he's gotta tell me a Rachel Cruz told me. - I do, I see him by that. If they, I do, I see him by it. - But it's a good reminder, you don't have to do work that you hate just because it's good money. - That's right, absolutely. And you don't have to go to the Bahamas to find a great life. To your point, he could have found a totally different manufacturing job, yes. But it sounded like-- - This was a dream is for a long time. - He's single, wrote down what was his age? - Forty. - Forty-four. - Fiancé's 52. - You know, and there's not much tying them down, so it's like, you know? - If not now, then when? You know, he's still got the energy to do that. - I think it's fun. - Send us some picks, John. - I can do it. - I'm gonna see you working on this boat in the Bahamas. - I know, beautiful water. - Oh. - Enjoy it. You worked hard. Yeah, you got plenty of money. You're gonna be fine. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - If you're behind on your bills, doing more of the same isn't going to fix it. You need a different plan. And that's why I tell people about guardian litigation group. If you've missed payments, if collectors are calling nonstop, or if you're getting letters about legal action, that's your signal. And it's where a lot of people wait too long, because the longer you wait, the fewer options you usually have, and once it turns into a lawsuit, things can get more expensive and more complicated fast. Guardian litigation is a law firm, not a call center. From day one, you are assigned an attorney who represents you. So if a creditor moves forward, you're not caught off guard, and you're not hit with surprised legal fees. Guardian litigation only gets paid when the debt isn't negotiated and the client accepts the settlement offer. This is about stepping in early while you still have leverage. Don't ignore the problem. Take control of it. Go to guardianlit.com/ramsy right now. That's guardianlit.com/ramsy. - It's any advertising. Results may vary, and no specific outcome is guaranteed. (upbeat music) - Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fairwind's Credit Union Studio. I am Rachel Cruz, hosting this hour with George Campbell. All right, we're gonna go to the phones, and in Jackson, Tennessee, we have Ron on the line. Hi, Ron. Welcome to the show. - Hi, Rachel and Joe. I just hope you guys are doing well. I have a quick question. Have you ever ever seen or heard of a store offering a significant discount if you finance and oppose the paid cash, even if it's 0%? - What kind of store are we talking? - It's a furniture. - Okay. Just to make the numbers round, if my wife and I went to the store, I found a nice piece of furniture we wanted. Let's just say the numbers were $1,000. Let's offer the right of a check. And I say, no, we don't want your $1,000 today. We'll get, let us pay $800 and do it over 12 months. Have you ever seen that? - Yes. - It's almost like-- - And again, I'm not asking about this. Is this dead? Can I forget cash flow? That's up next question. My business sense is going off as, people don't offer 20% gets discounts for nothing. And so I'm wondering what is the incentive we need to do something about that? - Well, they have the data that shows how much they're going to make in interest charges when that person can't pay it off in the promotional period. And so they're making their bets that they're going to make more than the 20% discount they're giving you off of the debt they're going to sell you. - And they probably will, because what they end up doing is putting, it's almost like a nine-day same as cash kind of scheme, right? So you go and if someone that can't just sit there and write an $800 check and they take this deal, then, or the $1,000 to take to $800, yeah, their likelihood of them, at some point, getting behind on the payment. And if they miss one payment, then it's all back interest, all back fees, I mean, they make so much money off of those kind of deals. - Now, is this one particular store or are you seeing this at every single furniture store you walk into? - Just one particular store. I mean, we did not have furniture very, very often. I think the last time we actually went into a store and bought furniture was years ago. - Okay, well, what I would do is, I would waive that amount of cash in their face and say, "Have $800 cash here." If you don't like it, I'm walking down to the next store. That's it. - And just walk away. - Yeah, I literally went into them and say, "Hey, if I do this, I hate doing this. I've never done a finance company to my life." And I know you guys have and that's why I'm calling. I literally said, "Hey, if I do this, the very first opportunity to get this balance to zero, here's the check for it." And they said, "Okay, we'll still do the discount anyway." So I'm just really confused, that's all. - Yeah, I mean, it's just a system. - This happens in car dealerships too. They'll say, "Here's the price." And they find out you're paying cash and go, "Oh, no, no, that price was only for financing." - 'Cause they make more with the financing. - They get kickbacks. They're gonna make money off the interest. And so I just don't deal with places. Even a zero percent, I don't deal with places that don't have integrity. I say, "Here's the price, that's what I'm paying." - Because if you go and read the fine print of what you're about to sign up for, I guarantee you that it says there will be a, it's zero interest if you pay on time. If you don't pay on time and you miss something or they don't get the check in on time or it doesn't clear their system, then it's all back. And the interest sometimes on those drawers is more than credit cards. - Oh, it's insane. - 30% I mean, it's just wild. So no, they know what they're doing. - And what they're really doing is they're just inflating the cash price. They're not actually discounting it. They're just inflating the cash price to where the financing price looks so much better that everyone's gonna go, "Oh, well why wouldn't we finance?" So it's all psychological. It's just mind games they're playing. - Uh-huh. Okay, yeah. - So again, I never deal with stuff. I know you guys do and I appreciate you. She had no light on this. - Yeah, for sure. - Yep, and what I always worry about George is, some people try to take the deal to get the $200. - Thinking they won. - Thinking they won. And then, I mean, these companies, sometimes they come back and they go, "Well, it didn't clear our system within that 24 hour pay period. It happened." - And if you didn't read the fine print, you have to pay by this certain date before the terms are up. - And what you sign up for, yep. And so if you play with snakes, you can get binned, so I listen. Just stay away from that. - I just play this game buying a car. And they were like, "Well, here's the price." And I was like, "I'm not paying these random stuff you threw on there." And so I left and went to a different dealership that treated me with fairness and integrity. - It's a beautiful thing. - Here's the price we agreed on. I'll write you a check for that amount. - That's right. That's one thing of not being emotional when you're buying something. Something as small as a chair at a furniture store or a house, right? Like, we get so invested or a car. And this one particular thing, I can only have this, this right in front of me. And then you lose all negotiating power. And the power to walk away and find a better deal. And so you just can't get emotional about this stuff. - And I'm personally just not a fan of a lot of these furniture stores. 'Cause the margin is high. The salespeople can be slimy. So what I hear is what I do. - What does it pry on people that can't afford it either? - Yeah, do your research. Take that exact couch. Take a picture of it, get the tag, research it online. You can even upload a picture of the couch to Google and it'll show you similar couches at a cheaper price. - Amen. - So do your research people. Don't just walk in and get hosed by a salesperson with these financing deals. Oh, it's only today. Only good for today only. I'm sure it is, but I'm sure it is. - All right, let's go to Lynn and Knoxville, Tennessee. Hi, Lynn, welcome to the show. - Hi, thank you so much for taking my call. My question is, I have about $50,000 saved up for a down payment on a house, but I'm not planning on buying a house right now. It would be at least two years, but it could be, but not necessarily less than your four to five year recommended timeline for putting money in the market. - So two years is kind of your window. For, you want to buy in, let's say, 20, 28? - Possibly, it kind of honestly depends on my relationship status at the time, because I would either need significantly more savings or to be married for, the down payment to make sense and be within your parameters unless I want to get a little tiny fixer upper. Got it. So, two years from now toward affording something on your own with your own savings would be really tough. But you're sort of hoping that you'll be married with two incomes by then? Yeah, in a political world, that'd be great. Okay. Is there someone special in your life right now? No, that's why I say at least two years, but maybe less than five. Yeah, yeah. Well, $50,000, that's a lot. How long did it take you to save that? About the last five years. Okay, good for you. Well, so you can sock away another $10, $15 grand a year at this point? Mm-hmm. Maybe not quite that much because I did open a Roth IRA and start maxing that out. You're sounding like an eligible bachelor. Yeah. Well done. So, would I invest this money knowing that it could be two, even three years? I personally wouldn't. I would store it in a high yield savings account and just let it grow at three and a half percent instead of what could happen in the market because here's what inevitably will happen because this is life. You'll go, "Yeah, time to buy a house and the market will be down 15 percent for no reason." And now you've lost money, quote unquote, on paper. And it's going to be heartbreaking. And so the more time you have, the higher the chances that your money will make more money. But the balance will be higher than when you started. So, if it takes me six or seven years, I shouldn't get upset about the amount I could have made because it's better to have the money flexible when it's not a guaranteed long-term timeline. Now if you told me for sure, I'm not going to buy a house for the next five years, I'd say, "All right, let's invest it. Let's let it ride." But it sounds like there's just a lot of variables right now in your life that you're unsure of. Yeah. How old are you, Lynn? 29. 29. Okay. Do you see yourself in that area for a while where you are? Oh. Highly likely, but not 100 percent. Okay. Yeah, I'd probably just, I'd probably lay low for a year or two, and if you look up maybe in a year or two and you're like, "Something, nothing really has moved about my situation." Then maybe invest, right? Because there's nothing looming, but I'd probably just give yourself a beat. Let me tell you what I get asked all the time. When should I get term life insurance? How much do I need? Is it affordable? Employees are the right questions to be asking. So let's take a quick review. The fact is, term life isn't a baby step. So if anyone is dependent on your income, you need to have 10 to 12 times your income in life insurance. Now, and most people are surprised by how affordable term life really is. Even if you're not in perfect health, look, I understand the hesitation since most insurance companies make it more of a hassle than it needs to be. Not a standard insurance, they're not an insurance company, they're a broker that works for you. That means they'll shop and compare the top term life companies to find the most competitive options on the coverage for your family. For almost 30 years, I've recommended Zander for straight answers, competitive rates and coverage that actually protects your family. Call 800-356-4282 or go to zander.com for a quick and easy quote. The Ramsey Show question of the day is sponsored by YRIFI. If you have fallen behind in your private student loans, every month can feel like you are still, that you're standing still. YRIFI helps borrowers explore refinancing options that can help you start making progress again. So go to YRIFI.com/ramsey, that's letter Y, R-E-F-Y.com/ramsey, may not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Shana in Indiana. I've been listening to the show for years and have never heard anyone mention cell phone debt. My husband and I were reviewing our bill recently and realized that between the two of us, we owe a thousand dollars on our phones that we bought two years ago. Should we add this debt to our snowball? Juicy. This is a newer thing because everybody is just weaving their phone price into the plans and the companies love it. They do. And prices of phones have gone up. It's the price of a laptop now. So much. Like it's crazy. Because you literally have a laptop in your hand. That's true. Oh. As do I. So is this debt? Unfortunately, yes. It is a necessary payment you have to make for a previous decision. And try not paying it. And that'll tell you a lot about if it's a debt or not. That's a good point. What happens if I stop paying? Well, it'll go to collections. You could get sued. I don't know if they're repoing phones yet, but that's probably the near future. Come get it. Apple's now leasing phones. I don't know if you saw this. So we've, I mean, it's just like anything else now. Yeah. Least your car. Least your phones. Never own anything. And remember, they're doing this. A lot of the goodness of their heart, they always find a way that they are going to make more money doing what they need to do, right? So just as a consumer, don't, don't fall for it. So should we add this to our debt snowball? Yes. Yes. Yeah. I would pay it. And then pay cash next time. All right. Let's go to Sam in Washington, D.C. Hi. Sam. Welcome to the show. Hi. Hello. How can we help today? Well, I've been listening for a few weeks now and trying to get started and I have had historically the high yield interest saving account as one of the accounts we've had. So I have that and we don't have a lot in there. My husband and I are both I key support as in the industry of I key support toll income is around 200,000 a year. But I went into the every dollar app and put in our stuff for August. And it's showing us that we have more payments than we have incomes. Wow. Uh, just then there's 325,000, not including the house. Wow. Student loans. What is the, what are the debts about a third of it is my student loans. Okay. So will you list out your debts for us? There's a lot of them. You can give us the big chunks. Yeah. Okay. This much is in hard debt. Car debt. Personal loans. We have two cars, about 60,000 total. Okay. We made a lot of bad bad choices. That's okay. We get talked in the buying things. Okay. Time share. We could probably have put up God. We got out of time shares years ago. Okay. Who's talking you into this? Sales people go figure. You need to stop talking to people. That would solve a lot of it. Okay. Is a lot of credit card debt, Sam? Yeah. We do have credit card debt. Um, but we also have some home improvement debt as well. So the last latest one was a roof that is in short for 50 years and is good for 100. Are you trying to sell me on a new race? Oh my God. You're leading with the features of this roof. What did it cost you? 50,000. Okay. I won't be around in a hundred years. I can care less about this warranty, but okay, cost you 50 grand for new roof. So we definitely got ripped there. That's an insane amount on a roof. And we have new HVAC from three years ago that we knew we have an attorney involved with that. Um, but you owe on that as well. We, you are on that and the company that sold it to us for oversold and didn't sell properly and the thing isn't worked. Sam, I'm going to be honest with you so far. It sounds like your debt has been everyone else's problem. You were talked into it. I got scammed. I was told this. If you want to get out of this thing, the first step is to realize it's not all your fault, but it's your responsibility. Yes. No, I can't. We completely understand that. Okay. Sam, I want to know how you guys have been month to month now because if you plugged in all your numbers and I go, gosh, we're in the red. How deep in the red are you? 800. 800. Okay. Where has that been coming from the past couple of months? I mean, if the payments have been consistent, where, and you guys have been short, 800 bucks, are you going deeper into debt or do you have savings that you're taking from to cover that 800? No, we don't have savings because every time we try to start, something happens. Okay. And it gets drained. So, I don't know how you've been living or that. So you're using the credit cards to cover any gaps? We don't have gas. We have two electric vehicles. No, I was saying to cover the gap of like 800 bucks that you need. You're using credit cards to fund that. I don't know. for some of it. Yes, I believe. Yeah, that's where all the credit card debt is ending up from. Okay. Okay. Has your husband looked at this stuff too? Have you guys sat down and looked at the budget together? Or is this just you so far? Yeah. No, it's, both of us are tired of paycheck to paycheck and not. I get more anxiety over than he does, but he does get frustrated. Okay. Well, I'm glad you called Sam because yeah, we're going to be able to really just walk you down what we call the baby steps and you're going to have to in order to make this work. Is it's going to have to be a complete 180 of what you guys have been doing how you guys have been making decisions buying things how you've not been budgeting how you know me everything you've been doing you're pretty much going to just do the opposite. And so the fastest way to do it is that first step is a thousand dollars and and you keep it yep in that high yield savings account and don't touch it. And then you're going to be looking at a mountain of debt and as you listed out smallest to largest and you said we have a lot of debt. So if it's multiple credit cards, multiple still and I mean like literally write them all individually out and actually look at it and say, okay, this is where all of our money is going. And it's probably going to be pretty shocking. You may have already done that because you guys said you plugged in your income to every dollar. And then from there, you're going to have to figure out, okay, we're going to be working extra. We're going to be selling some stuff to get some cash in fast. We're going to cut our lifestyle. And instead of, you know, acting like you make 200, we're going to act like we make 80. We're going to live on nothing, nothing in order to get this margin up to start knocking out this debt. But the great thing is to say I'm as as you guys start paying it off, paying up some of these debts. It's going to free up those monthly payments. So it's going to cause you to have more and more margin as you go down the debt snowball to pay it off. But yeah, I mean, as you're looking at it, it's going to it's going to be a bit. And I would look at getting rid of these cars just to give you a quick win. Yes, yes, especially if you're not under water on them, if you can profit off of them and use that cash to buy yourself some cheap cars, five grand each. That's going to be your ticket out because then you've got 265 left. And if you threw like, let's say you take home 12, making 200 K, take home 12 a month. If you can throw seven K at the debt, you're done in three years. So that's the napkin math that we now have to reverse engineer and go, okay, we need to come up with $7,000 and live off five. And there's a good chance. A thousand of that is in the car payments, right? So if you get rid of that, that's going to free up cash immediately. And then yeah, looking at your lifestyle, but but that's it. And and salmon, what's wild is that this is so doable and what's crazy to when we see people do this, especially as they are working their way out of debt. When it's over a 24 month period, some people do it, you know, 18 to 24 months, but when you're looking at a three year journey here, it's amazing the amount of people like it raises in this time. They find some side hustle, they start working harder, they get the promotion. It's crazy. So your income's hopefully going to be increasing throughout this process too, which is going to help bring extra margin. But it's going to take, it's going to feel like whiplash of how you guys have been functioning with money. But you know what? You want the opposite result. You're tired of where you are. And so that means there's going to have to be some changes and it may be uncomfortable for a bit. But you're going to start to have this normalcy of what this looks like to have control of your money. A lot of banks are happy to hold your money, but Fairwinds Credit Union helps you make progress. Most people spend years focusing on their financial goals and never stop to ask whether their bank is helping them get there or just holding on to their money. The real goal is building an emergency fund, paying cash for your next car, saving for a home, looking at your finances and actually feeling some peace. That's why I love Fairwinds. Their smart bundle gives you up to 10 free high yield savings accounts to help you stay organized as you say for different goals. Plus, early direct deposit and no monthly fees. And you get support from real people who want to help you win with money. You can even get the Ramsey debt is normal, be weird debit card, which is linked to your free Fairwinds spend smart checking account. To tell the world, you think differently about money. So look, if you're working the baby steps, your bank should be helping you move toward financial freedom, not just park your cash. Go to Fairwinds.org/Ramsey to open your smart bundle and start making progress today. That's Fairwinds.org/Ramsey, insured by the NCUA. [Music] One of the biggest mistakes that people make is thinking that they can skip out on having a will because they're too young, too healthy, or they just don't like they own enough to make it worth it. Listen, A Will helps protect your family. It gives you clear instructions and can keep your loved ones from having to guess what you wanted during a difficult time. So if you're ready to create one, go to momabarelegal.com. And if you don't know where to start, text quiz to 3-3-7-8-9 and we'll help you figure out what's best for your situation. But again, if you want to create a will, go to momabarelegal.com. Yeah, momabare legal forms. They're amazing. I always throw in forms in there. That's why the website. I know. I got tripped up. They're shortening the name. They make it a little simpler for us to type in. I appreciate that. But they're great, easy state-specific wills, you guys. It does not take long and I'm telling you, it is so worth it. Everyone needs a will. If you listen to the show long enough, you know the heartbreak that happens when someone didn't have a will, didn't update the will and the family's left grieving while picking up the pieces and it causes a relational nightmare. So please get it done. And we'll throw in life insurance. If you have a family, if someone's dependent upon your income or if you're a stay-at-home mom, life insurance guys. My first question, I find out someone passes, "Did they have life insurance?" And they say, "No, my heart sinks." Because then the road ahead is going to be so much more difficult. Yes, so yeah, you can go to Zander Insurance for term life. We'll just throw it all out there, George. These are all things. It's the adulting package. It is, so please, please get it. All right, let's go to Nick in Dallas, Texas. Hi, Nick. Welcome to the show. Hi, Rachel and George. Thank you so much for taking my call. I really appreciate it. You fan of what you guys are doing and you guys have my dream job. But anyways, I am calling in bottom line up front. Not my wife and I are not super sure what we should do with our house. You want to sell it? A little bit of context. We live outside the Dallas, Texas. We've been in the home for some February 2025. We're planning to be in the home longer than we are, but what happens? We're planning to move to Atlanta, Georgia to be closer to family. Fortunately, we have the house paid off. I understand that you have to not recommend. Yes, I understand you guys do not recommend doing long term long distance rentals. And we don't we don't want to do that either. However, we live in a construction community. Our home has been listed for coming up on two months. We've had zero interest and we want to explain more of why we want to go to Atlanta. But I'll pause there. We're going forward to your guys' recommendation. Have you talked to your agent as to why there's been zero interest in 60 days? Yes. Yes. So what do they think? A new construction. Yes. A little bit of a new construction community. They can. The houses that are going up right across the street from us are able to do, you know, about like a $30,000 incentive that we, you know, just can't compete with. So people would rather build it directly custom and have more options at a lower price. Exactly. Exactly. How long will the development be in process? Do you know how many more, is it how many more lots they need to build out in that area? Well, they're developing a new phase, just as stones throw away from us. So it'll be years before they're completely done building new houses. But there's still people who want a house now and don't want to go through that process. And don't have the timeline to wait for a new build. Yeah. So I don't buy that as a full excuse of just like, well, they're still building home. So people don't want mine. Is it priced too high? I mean, that's realistically for the current market, which is obviously cooled a lot. Yes, I mean, it's definitely priced fair. We bought the home at 323 and we so we listed it initially at 314 9. So I thought we'd priced it fair, but we got zero zero interest. That's like definitely runs runs around with some of the comps. I mean, but to mention though, there aren't there are no retail homes that have sold in the past 90 days, you know, and. So it's hard to find good comps because there's not a lot of action out there. Exactly. Exactly. Man, that is tough. When do you guys have to make this move? What's the urgency? So urgency is we've got two two young kids. We've got a daughter who's a year of four months old and a special needs son who's four months old. So we're just really itching to be in Atlanta to be closer to family who can help there so that. And the house is paid for. - Fortunately, not like, yes, ma'am. - Okay, so what I probably would do, Nick, is, 'cause I mean, how much do you guys make a year? - Close to, definitely on the commission, anywhere between 175 and 200. - Okay, 'cause what I would do is, I would go ahead and go to Atlanta, and I would just, I would rent there for a year. Go sign a year contract, and it's gonna not be fun because you went from owning to renting, it's gonna feel like a little bit of a step back. But I would give yourself some time and not be rushed on this house, 'cause you don't have to be urgent. Like, it's not like you're trying to balance two mortgages, and you're like, "We can't afford both mortgages, "we gotta sell one quick." Time is on your side, which is an amazing thing. That's part of why not having debt that it allows that time margin, which actually allows you to probably get a better deal on this house. So I would go to Atlanta, and I would rent somewhere for a year. Keep the house up. I would look at one of our trusted real estate agents, not saying that yours isn't great, but I know ours in the program, like we interview them and make sure that they are high quality. And I would look and maybe get a different option with a realtor, and I would be patient, and I would sell this house. So I think eventually it will sell. You don't have to sell it in 60 days. You don't have to sell it in 90 days. So I would take my time with it, and then reevaluate maybe if it's been, you should be able to sell it. So I'm like, I don't even wanna put it out there, that it'll be nine months and it won't sell, because I really do think, yeah, eventually it will. I just don't want you to be in a rush to do it. - So I would just budget for the insurance taxes, some utilities to keep this thing afloat while you guys make this move to Atlanta, but you put yourself in a position where you have that option, which is amazing. So you'll look back on this, and it'll just be like an annoying thing you guys had to deal with during a hard time in life. But I like the idea of not making it a fire sale, and just knocking down the price until it's at $2.75, and now you're really, you're eating a lot of this cost through fees and selling it for less than you paid for it. - Right, okay. - So it's just a harsh timing of just, you guys bought where things were expensive, and the market cooled during the last year, and especially in Dallas, where there's just, you know, not a ton of demand, people want to buy homes, but there's not a lot at the price they want it. And so I would be trying to figure out why are home selling that are selling in my area, and how can I start to match that to get the thing to move? - Okay, that makes sense. Great, I'm a little surprised that you guys that I went with the long distance rental, but hey, I'll take it. - Well, I wouldn't rent it out personally. - No, because you're gonna eventually want it-- - I'm saying you just sit on it. - Oh, just hold, okay, don't rent it out. Sorry, Rachel, I thought that-- - Oh, sorry. - No, just sit on it. - She was saying go rent it at land-of-free-- - In Atlanta. - Yeah. - Okay. - Yes. - Okay. - Gotcha, have the house sit. - It's gonna be harder to sell when you go tenant it there too. - Yeah. - So that's gonna slow things down. - Yeah, and if you guys aren't coming back to Dallas anytime soon, because it sounds like families in Atlanta, no, I wouldn't want to be tied to Dallas. It's like just sell the house, be done, take the equity, and go buy something great. In Atlanta, once it sells, so yeah, no, do not rent it out. If you need to change real estate agents just to get another flavor in there, do that. - Get a second opinion. - Yep, I would rent in Atlanta until this house sells, and then use that equity and any other cash you guys have to buy something permanent in Atlanta, 'cause it sounds like that's where you guys want to be. I heard a stat, George, and I hate to throw it out 'cause I need to check. But it was something around the idea that Dallas Fort Worth had more new homes being built in the whole city, California. - That is wild, 'cause of how hard it is to get anything built in California with the regulations. - Mostly that, yes, but also-- - And Texas is like throw 'em up. - It's just like, yeah, it's just boom. I mean, people are houses growing up everywhere there. It's pretty wild though. - We're seeing that in Nashville and like the downtown area. They threw up all these apartments and condos and-- - My gosh, it's crazy. - It's just too much supply. - It's a lot, it's a lot. So yeah, in those areas, you will feel a little settling back to normalcy. But it is still a wild market out there. But yeah, Nick, I hope that helps. I hope it gets sold quick for you guys. But yeah, I would make that move with those two kids being close to family go rent somewhere. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - If you wanna free up margin in your budget, one of the first things you should do is take a hard look at your monthly bills. Because every dollar you overpay is another dollar you don't have for reaching your financial goals. And overpaying for your phone bill? Well, that makes zero sense. And it's why I recommend Boost Mobile. Their unlimited plan is just $25 a month forever. No contracts, no hidden fees, no surprise price hikes. If you already have a phone you love, you can keep it and keep your number when you switch. And if you're skeptical, Boost Mobile offers a 30-day money back guarantee. So you can try it risk-free. Listen, your phone bill should fit your budget not the other way around. Reaching your financial goals is easier when you can pay less for the same service. Switching to Boost Mobile now is just a smart money move. Go to boostmobile.com/ramsy and make the switch today. That's boostmobile.com/ramsy. $25 forever requires customers to remain active on Boost Mobile and Limited Plan. (upbeat music) - If you enjoy this show, and it's helped you, then will you please do us a favor and share it with your friends, with your family, subscribe. Leave a comment, just engage because it is one of the best ways to get to the word out about the show. And because we want to see people win with their money. We want to help them. - And if you're listening, I assume you enjoy it. Otherwise, this is like a hate watch for you, which is strange. - Yeah. - But people do. - Sure, we love you. - Sure, we love you. - Share with those who need it the most. - That's right, that's right. All right, let's go to Claire in Seattle, Washington. Hi, Claire, welcome to the show. - Hi, I am so excited to be on here. Unfortunately, not under these circumstances. - Oh, no. - So my question is, should we disinherit our son completely? And the circumstances, we are the cautionary tale to not do too much or give too much to your kids. So we're retired. We have worked hard all our lives. And my son got a divorce about five years ago. And quit his job. He had addiction issues and needed, you know, to get those under control and lose weight and do all that. And then he went to school. And we supported him through all of those, emotionally, financially, he had a daughter as well, supported him through all of that, never did get a job. And we spent a lot of money through all of that. And like probably close over, close and over to three quarters of a million dollars. And we asked him, we told him that it was time to get a job and he quit talking to us. And also kept his daughter away. Who we raised through a lot of that. - Oh, Claire, I'm so sorry. - So we're kind of all done because we just cut him off. We just said it's time, you know, time. So he lives in our garage house above our garage. - I'm hard to cut him off at that point. When he's 50 feet away from you. - Wait, what? - I know. Yeah, he lives above our garage. So he gets, he's gotten free rent, free everything. And, you know, it's like, it's, it's bad. And yes, we take full responsibility for that, you know. - Well, no, yeah, I mean, no, it's not your fault. He did make decisions. Yes, were you guys still giving money? Yeah, but also you were not forcing him to make these decisions or lack thereof. That was not you, that was him. That was him. I mean, we told him that, you know, he turned this into this situation that was supposed to like get him started to, yes, you know, so how long ago did you guys cut him off about probably five weeks ago? - Okay, so it is fairly new. And then what's gonna be happening with the living situation? - Well, he has a fiance and we told him he had until the end of the year or until he got married to be done with that. - Okay. - So likely it's gonna be the end of the year. I'm assuming he's not gonna be married in the next couple of months? - No, unfortunately. - So December 31st is his last day living in the carriage house? Is that clear to him? - Possibly. - That is clear to him. In fact, we're writing up an agreement to that fact. - Okay, and he's not working right now still? he's looking for a jerk. job because he has no money. Yeah, yeah, which he did get money. And his fiance is living in the carriage house too? No, no, no, no. She's living in her own house. OK. Yeah, whoof. Well, the positive is that, yeah, when you cut off the source, you don't have many options but to go and find a job to work. So that is the right move and for him. Is he in recovery? Has he been sober? Or what's his-- Yes. He's been sober for probably four years now. Oh, good. OK. Yeah. So you've already cut him off now. But you're saying for the trust, once you guys pass, you're saying, should we disinherit everything to him? Well, because he hasn't had a job. So you know, and then he has to keep a job. So he has to prove himself to keep a job, not just have a job, get a job, but he has to keep a job. And he hasn't been financially responsible with money he's had. And so it's like, you know, that creates a pattern as well, because he's been living the life of Riley. I mean-- Well, you're not obligated to leave anything to anyone. You can give it all to a charity if you so choose. But also, to your point earlier, Claire, he was living the life that was given to him. So I do wonder on his own merits if you look up in a year that this could have been the best thing that's ever happened to him. Yes. And you see, I know-- My gut is I would not do a full disinheritance, but I would do is a structured trust that has all kinds of distributions and clauses tied to sobriety and work and education. All of those things you can set up within the trust, where he's not getting a dime unless XYZ are true. Yeah, and the executor of the trust can make sure that these things are-- the obligations are hit in order for him to get this money, right? And this is often-- And it's never all at once that's, hey, at this age or at this, you know, myelstone. I mean, how much will be good? How much will you guys be leaving, Claire? Like, I ask that's wise. Like, net worth wise if the house is old and all that. Over 20 million. OK. How many kids do you guys have? One. Oh, it's just him. Yeah. Wow. And his daughter. He's OK. Oh, my gosh. Sorry. In my head, I-- So if this doesn't go to him, where would it go? As of now. To his daughter. All to the daughter. And I just see the way it kind of ruined him. So it's like, you know, we were thinking of possibly a lifetime discretionary trust, which it doesn't-- you know, it keeps generational kind of things. Have you worked with a state planning attorney to figure out what's the right one for what you're trying to accomplish? Yeah, we're kind of in the throes of that right now. OK. But because it's easier to add somebody versus take them out. But it's like, what do we do? I like the idea of it being a structured trust for now. And again, you can always change that in the future, because that already has a lot of stipulations before he would get it done. There's also generational skipping trust to where it would just go to his daughter, your granddaughter. But again, we don't know her future. And so I would still have provisions there. And obviously, she's a minor I'm assuming. So it would be a while until she could access this. And Claire, you could do something in it, a clause that says, for the next-- like, if something happened to you and your husband in the next 12 months, that he doesn't get this money for six years. And he has to establish himself for six years before he even sees a little bit of it. To make sure that there's somewhat of a pattern happening in the positive direction that he-- again, where he is today of $20 million got dumped on him. You're exactly right. It would be horrible for him. It would not be a blessing. So for him, for the dignity of him and his character to live out a certain way before he sees a dime of it, I think is very reasonable. How old is he? He'll be 33 this year. And I'm not excited about his new wife. Well, that's something else to think about. Exactly. So what makes you not excited about it? It is a character thing, a financial thing that you're not thinking she's-- I think she might be in it for the rainbow-- the gold pot at the end of the rainbow. And so that worries me. Well, I wouldn't worry too much until-- They actually get married. You know, his track record has not been great with following through, right? So-- but if they get married, I mean, yeah. And at this size of an estate, it's going to be cumbersome. It's going to be annoying to have to go back and redo something, but it would be worth it, right? Like, if you have to make decisions today-- It's a $20 million decision. Yeah, I would push it out and make sure that he can't really get anything until-- I don't know, I'm making this up 40. Just for him, he needs to hold a job. He needs to learn to work-- I mean, all of that so that this money doesn't ruin helm. And then if he ends up getting married, and there's still feelings towards that, if you have some kind of a dendom in the estate with that, but in a state attorney should be able to work through some of those hoops, but, oh, Claire, I'm so sorry. I know that's such so heavy to carry. But yeah, call us back if you need us. [MUSIC PLAYING] Hey, guys, it's Rachel Cruz. If you're working the baby steps, every major expense deserves a second look. And health care is one of the biggest expenses in most family's budgets. And that is why I recommend that you check out Christian health care ministries. CHM isn't insurance. It's a health cost-sharing ministry. That means members help pay one another's medical bills. And they've been serving Christians since 1981. CHM programs start at just $115 a month. And here's why that matters. If you are paying more than you need to for health care, that money could be going toward paying off debt, building your emergency fund, or reaching your next financial goal. And your monthly cost isn't based on your medical history or where you live. Y'all, a lot of families find CHM gives them more room in the budget. That's why so many members say they're better with CHM. And right now, new members can receive a 50% credit towards their first month of membership. Go to CHministries.org/budgets and use promo code Ramsey. At CHministries.org/budget and promo code Ramsey. Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Fairwinds Credit Union Studio. And we're taking your calls at AAA8-825-5225. All right, let's go to Sarah in Los Angeles. Hi, Sarah. Welcome to the show. Hi, how are you doing? We're doing great. How can we help? Hi, so I recently got into some money through a settlement from work. And I wanted to see how I go about that with wanting to pay off my mom's house. She owes about 200K and then trying to afford a house in the expensive neighborhood I live in. How should I go about that? Oh wow, okay, what happened? It was basically just getting almost maybe about $1 million. I honestly can't really talk about that. That's fair. So yeah, that's fair. Sorry. Are you okay? Are you good? Oh, yeah. It's been a long time coming. It's been a long time. I actually started listening to your show because I knew this was coming and I've been reading the books and listening for the past six months. Oh wow. Okay. Amazing. So you're getting $1 million in a settlement now. Is that going to be tax free? Is that all tax free? Tax free. Okay. Okay. And how much do you have in savings right now? Nothing. Do you have any debt? No, I do about all together with my car and consumer everything, about 31. 31 for you. And then do you rent right now? I do. Okay. And why do you want to pay off mom's house? She's done everything for me. I just want her to be stressed. She's just amazing. I already know her. She's not even going to want me to. Just as a gift. So this is just like a nice thing. Is she okay financially otherwise? Kind of. Yeah. A little bit. Kind of not too dirty. You credit cards. They know they shouldn't even talk about that. So they're fine. They own a house and everything. You know, they. But. If you pay off this house. Is there any chance they would go. Take a second mortgage because they need help financially. Okay. Okay. Okay. Not if my mom or you single about. Perfect. Good money. Good. That's the only always my problem. Yeah. My mom is instilled. She hated that I even opened up credit cards. She's instilled me not ever doing stuff like that. Like. She's even ashamed. She had to open the one up recently because she's against it. So no, she wouldn't do that. Absolutely not. Okay. And you're single no kids? Yes. Okay. So you've got 31,000 in debt to pay off, plus we need an emergency fund, so that's a great place to start. Let's put our own mask on first. And how old are you? I am 36. Okay. And you want to buy a house in the greater Los Angeles area? I mean, either that or I'm thinking of moving in three years. Do I, I don't know if I should just invest them on mutual funds or keep renting? I guess I just don't know my next move. And also, I should say, I do want to pay off my brother, some of my brother's stuff too as well. Not a lot, maybe his car just, you know, I can't not go without paying his, like some of his debt off. Well, see now I'm wondering, well now cousin Jerry, he's wondering why you're not paying off his loans too. And dad's going, hey, I'd like to buy a truck. And so that's my fear is that this turns into people coming out of the woodwork knowing that you've got something, you came into some money. So I would just be cautious. I love that you want to be generous with it, but I also don't want to enable and cause relational chaos in the family. Right. I'm decided on keeping it between my brother and my mom. And I've decided that's what, what's going to now and that's it. I've kept it that way for years. So. Yeah. And, and the way to kind of look at this too, Sarah, just to think about, it's almost the same mindset as like a lottery winner, right? And I hate to even say that because I know you went through a lot to get this money. I know you didn't just go buy a ticket and win this, but, but the idea that alumpes them is just given to you. You know, when we think about money, money is like a magnifying glass. It makes us more of what we already are and our habits more of what our habits are. It doesn't change us. It makes us more of who we are. And so you are a generous person, which I love. I mean, your natural instinct was to like give this money, it was some of this money away, right? And so you are a natural, generous person. So when a million dollars is handed you, that's going to be magnified, which is beautiful. But also if there are bad money habits that you got to be aware that this money is not going to fix those. And over time, this money may be gone and the habits still remain. So you do have to remember to change your behavior. You have to have some absolutes in your life. Like I'm absolutely not going back into debt. I absolutely will always have a three to six month emergency fund that will have some absolutes that you fall back on that are different than today. And because you don't have money saved and you do have $31,000 in consumer debt. So I don't want those attributes to be magnified with this money. I want the opposite if that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. And that's funny because I've been scared of this happening so soon because I'm like, man, I want to get out of the debt on my own and start building my fund before this happens because like I've been doing pretty good with not using my credit card listening to you guys. And, you know, so I agree. I do. This is something I do want to change a habit, 100%. Yes. Well, how much do you make a year in your job? Probably around 90. 90. Okay. So yeah. 90 to 100. 90 to 100. Okay. So what I, I don't know, my, my instinct right now is, I think you're pretty set on helping your mom. So I would be okay. Well, again, I would tell her not to talk about it because just like George said, I think people are becoming out of the woodworks. I would do that. And then I, I would pay off her debt and get that fully funded emergency funds and a high-yield savings. And then the remainder, which may be 700, I almost would park in a high-yield savings for like a year. Okay. And just, I don't, I don't, um, it sounds like you've got some life changes coming up the next two to three years and what you mentioned. I wouldn't buy right now, especially if you're going to be moving in three years. And there's a part of me that I would still have a handle on my lifestyle of what I make per year in your job. Um, and again, you're going to have no debt and you have a fully funded emergency fund. But learning to live off of that 90 of what you make, I think we'll create and instill some like very disciplined habits. So that way, if you do choose to pull some money out to buy a new car or something, um, there's still that constant rhythm of living within your means. Hmm. That makes sense. That's a good idea. And if you just park that money, if you park 700 grand in a high-yield savings account with the current rates, you'd probably net about two grand a month just doing that, just letting it sit. Oh, wow. So make sure it's in a high-yield savings account and not a traditional brick and mortar bank and fairwinds.org/ramesy. You can set up a whole smart bundle, including that. But I would have wise counsel around you. So if you don't already have these three, you definitely need them. You need a good real estate agent. You need a good CPA for the tax side because even gifting money to your parents, gifting 200 grand, you got to make sure that you're filling out the right forms. Otherwise, it's going to go against your estate. And so you may want to be strategic with how you give. And then you also want a good financial advisor. As soon as you're talking about making these big money moves, a lot of zeros on the end, they can help you make sure that you understand what you're doing while keeping you in the driver's seat. So you're going to have to build some muscles you don't currently have. But I feel like the fact you've been researching, I've got to watch this show. It tells me that you are very cautious, you want to be wise with this. It goes low with this era. You know, we even say if people go through an event, like they lose a loved one and they get life insurance, we say don't make any major decisions for a year and just sit. Because there's just something emotional about seeing that many zeros in an account that you had before, you know, and there's like, there's kind of a part of you that just wants to just settle in and not make any big, knee jerk decisions right now. But getting some of those people in your corner, we're going to be smart. But it's awesome, Sarah. I'm so, so happy for you with this. Hey, it's Dave Ramsey. If you or someone you know owns a small business, listen up. What if you could build the kind of business you'd be proud to hand down to your kids? Over 30 years, I've been able to build Ramsey solutions into a business that's going to be a blessing for my kids. I'll show you how to do the same thing at Entry Leadership Master Series November 8th through the 13th. During this five-day conference, you'll get my strategies for building a winning business that outlasts you. Visit RamseySolutions.com/MasterSeries for tickets or click the link in the show notes. We wish that we could get to every call and question here on the show, but if you do have a money question and you want an answered, make sure to check out Ask Ramsey. So this is on our website and it's our free AI tool and it's built and trained on Ramsey principles. So you'll get the answer the same way as if you had called in on the show. And even some of the follow-up questions of getting the right information about your situation to give you the perfect answer, it is there. It's amazing. This is a great tool. So go to RamseySolutions.com and check it out and we'll put a link down below if you're listening on podcast or YouTube. All right. Let's go to James in Boise. Hi, James. Welcome to the show. Hey, Rachel. George, thanks for taking my call. Absolutely. How can we help? So, I have a job working for a hospital and I have 150K a year and I have a 47,000 emergency fund and no debt except for a couple hundred thousand left on a house. And got us, got us provided some side hustles where I consult on the side for some hospitals and little hospitals and most of them pay and the one, and there's only that one. So the one is about seven months behind and charge 1.5% late fee. Now we're up to about $1500 a month in late fees. Whoa, this keep rolling with a late fee or would you press them for the 87,000 mail, yeah? I mean, are they going to pay you anything at this point? What's been the communication? All right. Well, I mean, I keep sending them away. So they've been behind before up to maybe 40,000, but I don't know if they're just using the money. Maybe they get more use out of it than 1.5% and I'm charging them. But I think they pay on the squeaky wheel and I'm just collecting late fees. But they've paid the late fees before. Yeah. Okay. So there's a precedent here that they're willing to pay the late fees knowing full well they signed the contract with you saying we agreed to the late. Yeah. Yeah. There's nothing wrong with collecting the late fee. It's not quite gotten. Okay. They just not built up quite this much debt yet. Yeah. It's not fun when someone owes you that. I mean, this is a lot of money. They owe you. You said 87,000. Yeah. Okay. Is it a hospital that you say or an individual? Hospital. Okay. Or would you be willing to take them to like a small claims court for this? Well, I mean, I don't think I would have to, but I mean, definitely would. You know, I want to just blow this off, but yeah, so I would ask for the full. Yeah. I would ask for it. Yeah. I would go and ask for it. And then I think I would be done with business with them because I think it's just add some stress and make sure your books all wonky and it's taking a lot of time in their part to deal with this. Well, it doesn't, I mean, I just tack on the one point, I mean, I'm collecting 1,300 next month, 1,500 in just late. Well, you're only collecting. collecting it on paper until they actually pay. - True, and if they do pay, I mean, I imagine they would. So I can person for some and they'll probably pay. It's just, I don't know, one advantage. It's nice when they get up there, but. - Yeah, but it's just a lack of integrity. If they're not paying you on time and it's been seven months, it's not like a mom and pop. This is an actual hospital. - Correct. - That's making a lot of money. - Yeah, well. - So they have the money to pay you? - Yes. - Okay, I would press for the full amount and go, hey guys, I just need this final payment, but where our relationship here is done. And if there's anything in the contract that stipulates after this many months, it goes to small claims court. I don't know what they sign, what you set up with them, but I would enforce whatever they signed. - And you said, you feel kind of weird of like, do I just sit here and just like keep collecting late fees? I mean, I guess you could, but I would always have something in the back of my head of like, okay, they owe me. Like, I don't know. I think I would just. I added to the tab. - Yeah, I think I would ask for the amount and be done. And then if they want to start over this whole process and you choose to engage that, then that's one thing. - I'd be having them pay up front from now on. - Yeah, just for you to have your money. - Yeah, absolutely. All right, let's go to Alex in Minneapolis. Hi, Alex. Welcome to the show. - Hi, Rachel. Hi, George. Thanks for taking the call. - Absolutely, how can we help? - Yeah, so my wife and I are just starting off with the baby steps run step two. Right now we have $106,000 in debt. Of the $106,000, $34,000 is a car. That car is $12,000 under water. We want to sell the car and then save up to buy a car with cash. But we're kind of like unsure on how to do that because it's a secure loan. And so if we sell the car, I guess we're kind of thinking that we have to have the $12,000 to figure out the difference. - Yeah, they can't clear the title until you have that loan paid off. - Yeah. - So a lot of people go to the actual lender that's holding the loan and they do the whole transaction there. - Okay. - That's the easiest way to do it. Have you got actual quotes on what the car's worth? Where's this $22,000 number coming from? - Tell you what to look. - Okay, and is that private party or trade-in? - Private party. - Okay. - And you've actually looked up, have you looked up listings for similar cars? To see if they're actually selling for $22, or if they're listed for more? That might give you a good picture. - Right. - Okay. - And then I would get quotes from every single place possible, every dealership, the carvana, the car max, to get a sort of a floor of, okay, I know I can get at least this much for it if I did it this way versus listing it on my own. But where's case, you need to save up the cash or get a loan for the difference from a credit union. - Yeah, you may have to go get a $15,000 or $16,000 loan just to have some margin to go buy a car, a $5,000 car, pay this one off, and at least that takes your loan from 34 to 16,000. That feels better. How much do you guys make a year? - Together, $275. - Oh, fantastic. - Okay, okay. - So either way, you could get rid of all this debt. - Yeah, you may not have to get, I mean, you could get rid of the car, but the car's not killing you. I mean, you guys could just pay it off if you want it and not go through the trouble of paying others. - If you can pay off the car in under two years and you love the car and it's less than 50% of your total income as far as all your cars are concerned, then you can keep it. - Okay. - But the fact that you're wanting to sell it tells me there's another piece to this. - Yeah, I think it's just following the debt snowball method. You do paint off the lowest debt. Like, would it be reasonable to basically reprioritize the car so we can pay it off within two years? - I wouldn't reprioritize it. I would still put it where it falls in the debt snowball 'cause the truth is your income is the winning piece here. - You don't think you can pay this car off in two years, Alex, with all the rest of your debt? - No, I don't think so. - Okay. - What do you guys take in home every month? - Oh boy. - I want to say, 13,000, so we also have six kids. The van, no surprise, it's a mini van. The car is a mini van. - Okay, yeah, I would consider keeping it and just going, how can we be more aggressive in other areas? 'Cause you still got to come up with the difference and so that's still gonna be a hurdle. - Yeah, what are the debts before the car? Personal loans or credit cards or what are they? Credit card, credit card, personal loan. We have legal debt, we have a student loan, and then we have medical debt, and then we actually have a substantial tax bill and the car's the widest. - Okay, pieces. - Oh, okay, okay. - I would put the tax bill at the top. We always prioritize the IRS before anybody else 'cause they can destroy your life, garnish your wages. So I would attack that first and then do the debts snowball traditionally. But I'm just wondering if you guys bring in 13 could you live off of, let's say, five or six and throw the rest of the debt? - Yeah, I wanna say yes, I think that's, I'm sure we probably can figure something out. - Have you guys done a budget, a pretty detailed budget for the month? - Yeah, we just started it. I think we're on like our second week of doing it. - Oh, okay, okay. - Nice, that's great. - I'm just doing napkin math and I'm going, okay, if we throw $8,000 at this debt, it's gone in 13 months, just over a year. - Sure. - But that means we have to learn how to live off five for our household bills. - For one year, can we do that? And it's gonna be-- - Yeah, it's gonna be tight. - Shopping a lot of all the beans and rice, rice and beans. - PB and J is all around for the kids. - Yeah, it's not gonna be fancy dinners, but we are, we're gonna make it through and save on the grocery bills with six kids. That's probably where a lot of your money's been eaten. I mean, man, it-- - We're shopping in bulk. I'm sure you guys already have to be strategic with the food, but that I feel like it's the biggest area to save too. - Yeah, but if you have this much debt making $2.75, they may not be that strategic with it. They may just be-- - Let's eat it. - Oh, I don't know. I don't know. So yeah, places that you can cut things you can sell. - Eating out for a family of eight? That's like 200 bucks, anyway. - Oh, your Chick-fil-A bill. In about itself, it's amazing. - Yeah, I'm mad. (upbeat music) - Hey, guys, Rachel Cruz here with big news. The 2027 Ramsey Gold Planner is here. And you can get it at our lowest price for a limited time. Guys, this isn't just another calendar. It's the only planner with exclusive monthly content from John Deloney, Jade Warshall, and me to help you set clear goals and actually stick to them all year. So don't wait. Order yours by August 23rd to get our lowest price, just 35.97. Go to RamseySolutions.com/store to get the deal. That's RamseySolutions.com/store. (upbeat music) Up next, we have Mary in Dallas, Texas. Hi, Mary, welcome to the show. - Hi, George. Hi, Rachel. I just wanted to add that I actually grew up listening to Dave Ramsey. So I have low key resentment for all the Ramsey kids because my parents would listen to something Dave did to his teenagers. And that's what I then had to do with him. - I'm so sorry, Mary. My therapy bill is so large. So yours probably won't be too large. I'm just kidding. - No, it's great. I'm sorry. - My parents, no, my parents for my graduation present gave me Dave's book, the whole money makeover. And I read it right after I graduated. And I remember rolling my eyes and being like, this is the stupidest book. Everybody knows this. Well, I don't understand why somebody makes a whole much money by writing the obvious. And then of course, by the time I made it for my freshman year, I was like, oh. - Oh wow. - This is heavy. - No. - Oh my gosh. - It was so heavy. - Yeah, it was the foundation of my marriage. Like my third dating and we talked about Dave Ramsey and I fell in love with him 'cause he already had a retirement account. So Dave would be proud. - That's hot. - That Roth IRA. - Only for the Roth IRA ladies. - That Roth IRA, man. - Really? - The first thing he introduced me to is like, do you have a retirement account? I was like 18 and I was like, he's the one. - That's what I knew. - Oh my gosh. - So funny. - I love it. - Okay. - It's also good. - So my question is for you. We've been raising the gay brand B and we kind of use our own language over the 18 years but like we're in like three, four, or is it three, four, and five, right? We're like supposed to be paying our house so we bought four years ago in seven years. Like we're doing really well. But one of the things my question for you is how do you go about knowing how much money to put towards a dream? And that's kind of my question for you. So you can ask me our finances and you can ask about the dream and how much money it wants. Like what would you like to hear? - Okay. - So you're debt-free with an emergency fund and you have a dream to do what? - Okay. - So I have finished writing my fourth novel. - Wow. - And the third novel, thank you. The third novel I wrote, I spent the last year and a half trying to. find representation. So editing, write, sending it through some things, rewriting and I mean, you guys have all published books, you know the industry is really difficult. And so like I sent it to one agent that like she was asking for a book, I found it like my book was exactly right, she was open for a week and she posted later that she got like 800 submissions right in the span of a week. So I know this is a really hard process to go through especially from the blind. So not like thinking it's going to be magical and amazing. And using your method of like getting yourself out there and needing these agents, right. And it just takes money. And I, as a state home mom, who's like really conscious with our money, I'm having a really hard time putting money towards a dream. I can't prove it's going to be worth it. But my husband is incredibly supportive. Like we literally were just in the car having this conversation where he was like Dave said if you had $5,000 and it burned would it be okay, right. He's not wrong. Yeah, but like my heart is what my heart is dying. Like with $5,000 I could make a beach trip, right. It seems really selfish to put it towards myself. So that's kind of how do you go about thinking about like how did you a dream? And also like not throwing money at a dream and being a thinking fund if that makes sense. You're very wise. And I always remind myself this, there are guys that spend way more golfing that are terrible at it and make no money doing it. So just if that makes you feel better with your hobby. That's a good way to think about it. Have you published a novel yet? Or are they all just sitting there? No. So they're all just sitting there. So I'm not in like a huge hurry, right. I know like if it's not this novel, it might be the next one that's how a lot of authors work. But why have any published ending? Well, you mean like self-published? Is that what you know? Yeah. Yeah, cut them us on. They can do it. They'll do like the print or order. Yeah. So one of the things is it would take it takes quite a bit of money and then it takes a lot of like going out and using social media and paying for that to get advertisements and like going and doing stuff, which again from my research, I haven't seen that a lot of people actually make it that way. And so again, that's kind of the thing where I'm like, I don't know if that seems worth it. I've seen numbers as well with $20,000 to get out there up to 50. One of the things that I was looking for towards that my husband was talking about me doing is like you can go to these conferences and meet agents face to face or like go through these classes where they go through your novel and at the end of it, you meet these agents. So it would be getting to be face to face. But again, they're anywhere from like $500 to $500. What do you paying for? It feels like a scam. What are you paying money for? Yeah, don't buy like a $10,000 publishing package where you might get to me. I would say the agent is not your problem. Think about it like a musician. I know independent musicians who are not on a label who crush it and they own everything they do without giving up their soul. And I just don't want you to think that a publisher or an agent is your ticket because they might write you a check for 20 grand one time and they never recoup the costs and you never make a dime. And nobody reads the book. So I'd rather you out there hustling, getting in in rooms and social spaces where people are reading those types of books create a following online and then you make it. Yes. And then either you can choose to keep going or if you have evidence of books that have been sold, that is more enticing to a publisher than someone who hasn't done, you don't even mean had anything sold. Yeah. They're looking to see, can we sell these books? And if you're an unknown author with no social following, that's going to be a tough time. So I would spend my time building a social following and getting in spaces where people are interested in these types of books and trying to network as much as I can. Okay. You know, paying a dime. Yeah. Who won? Who has done that? And she did tell me that she has ended up spending like $10,000 like from like things like going to conferences to get in there, like printing them herself so she can sell them to bookstore. Yeah. That's a better use of your time. I think that's yes. But I wouldn't just like buy some package that's supposed to get you in the right rooms. Go to the conferences. Sure. Pay to do that. Pay to self-publish the book. But at some point, you got to build a following. Yeah. The people that want to read your books. There's almost four million books that are published a year. Totally. It's, you know, I mean, and I know you know this industry probably in and out because you've been, you've been loving it. It's been, you know, you're hobby. So it is on like, should you like put a number on it and you're like, you go here and then you don't go beyond it. Yeah. I think it's a good way to do it. We make about 175. 175. Okay. And you guys are. I'm also with a homeschool mom. So I like do homeschool. So like again, these conferences that we can totally do, do add there are other things that are part of the equation as well. But I can do this on the other side of homeschooling too, right? There's no like time limit on this. But again, my husband's like, feel free to spend money. And I'm like, I don't know. I don't see that it's like proof that it'll actually work. Well, I'm not looking for a direct ROI. If I put a dollar in, I get two dollars at what I would do is set goals for here's what I want to do this year. I want to go to two conferences. I want to do, I want to print a hundred books and then you guys decide. And make 30 social reels. Yeah. And do all the hashtags of book, you know, to mean like the type of novel it is and start yeah, have some goals. Yeah, that you're shooting for. But I think the truth is it's just a lot of work on things that don't cost money, which is creating content on your own around the contents of the book, which that won't cost you. It costs you time. But there's no way to leap forward that and just say, well, if I just put $10,000 in this vending machine, I'll sell a thousand books. Yeah. But if you know that money is going towards conferences that you should be at, you know, whatever, plain tickets to get there, you know, whatever that looks like for you and that you and your husband are feel good with, okay, if we put this money out, you know, you're, I mean, you're kind, it's a little bit of a gamble. But, you know, what are you like, what else you're going to do? Like you guys have done well financially. You're not talking about taking out a hundred thousand dollar small business loan to get something started. You're moving at the speed of cash and just keep re-evaluating. So yeah, it'd be okay spending, you know, five, 10 grand. If you guys are good with that and just say, okay, let's see where this gets me. And then let's talk, you know, March of 20, you know, March of 27. It's kind of our next pillar, right? Have some time. Here's the milestone. Here's what I want to be. That's right. And just start mapping it out. But I think, I think you'll naturally get weary over time if it, if something isn't happening and you're like, okay, I am throwing money at the thing and it's not happening. But put some out there. You guys have to cash for it. And yeah, try to make the dream happen, which is, is always fun. Exciting. As a fellow reader, Rachel might read it. Center at the end with the book. Love a good novel. Hey guys, Rachel Cruz here. And I love summer. There is more fun on the calendar, more time with your people and way more chances to make memories. But you know what else there's more of spending. Oh, between the extra groceries and gas and camp fees and family trips, it all starts to add up so fast. And before you know it, money stress starts to seal the fun out of everything. And that is why I love the every dollar budget app because it helps you plan your money, track your spending, and find more margin in your budget so that you can put extra cash towards the goals that matter most. Enjoy your summer without the money stress. Download the every dollar app in the App Store or Google Play and start for free today. Our scripture of the day comes from Jeremiah 119. They will fight against you, but will not overcome you for I am with you and will rescue you. Declare is the Lord. Elon Musk said the first step is to establish that something is possible and then probability will occur. Probably will occur. All right. Yeah. It's a very Elon quote. Yeah. I saw probability. Is that a tough word? No. It just feels like something Elon would say. I can hear him saying. Probability of this situation. I don't know. I feel like you're just like or you love math. If that's yeah. That worries you so much. Oh man. All right. Let's go to Kate and Indianapolis. Hi Kate. Welcome to the show. Hi Rachel. Hi George. Thank you for having me on the show. Yes. Absolutely. So I just found out that my husband gambled $121,000 in daily trading. Oh no. So sorry. And yes, these were the money we had from our previous townhome that we sold and we're in a process buying a new home that we paid $50,000 deposit. It's a non-refundable deposit. So we need to like process with this purchase of the new home. So you already paid the 50 grand. and it's locked into that new house and now you don't have the funds to put down on top of that. - Correct. - Oh my goodness. - Okay. - How'd you find out? - Yeah, what happened? - Well, I kind of like I saw like the money were not there. He was telling me he invested and stocks and crypto and I kept asking him to show me the money and he's like everything's fine. The money are safe, like I'm like why did you take the, 'cause we had the deal to put 20% down for the new house and the rest of the money he would like invest in stocks and cryptocurrency, yes, so. - And so he lied about that? He was actually day trading? - He did, he did lie about that and it's not the first time we lost money in the past and not just amounts of money, but yes, here we at. So he has a gambling addiction. Has he been seeking out any help for this? Or does he not aware? Does he think he doesn't have a problem? - He thinks he doesn't have a problem. He thinks he invests, but he failed at investing. - How old is he? - Yes, he is 43 and I'm 40. We have two kids. - Well, it's been 17 years now. - Okay. Do you work outside the home? - Yes, I work full-time. Yeah, we bring home together like two, 40 a year before tax. - What do you make on your own? - About 90 or 100. - Okay. - And what is he saying this next step is gonna be? 'Cause he knows that there's a house on the line. - He's saying he'll take care of the payments. He says he's gonna pay for kids' activities and our kids go to private schools. So obviously we need to switch them to public schools. And he says he's gonna take care of everything and I said down and I showed him like financially he cannot take care of everything. - Does he still have access to all of your money? - No, not to what I make, no. - So you've separated accounts or has it always been separate? - Yes, we separated a while back, but sometimes he wouldn't be on time with payment. So I would have to cover what he couldn't cover. - How much debt do you guys have? - Well, he has personal debt like $20,000 and credit cards and also in business loans like $127. I don't have any personal debt. - Are you sure that's all the debt he has? Because what I would do is pull credit reports for both of you from all three bureaus to make sure. - That's what he told me. - I'm not going off of what he tells you anymore. - I know, yeah. - So tonight you're gonna pull all three reports from all three bureaus, both of you. 'Cause you need a full picture of the damage here 'cause I think if he's lying about this, there's other debt and we need a clear picture if we're gonna move forward at all. 'Cause I don't know how you're gonna afford this house now 'cause the rest is gonna have to be on a mortgage and he's saying I'll handle it. - Correctly, yes. - What's the house cost? - I don't know how we're gonna. It's $5.50. - So you're talking about taking on a half million dollar mortgage. - Yes, correct. - Okay, and he's totally fine with doing that and you guys will qualify based on your income? - Yes. - Oh boy, this scares me. I mean, there's so much more than that. The house is the least of your problems with this point. - Okay. - You have someone who is a gambling addict, a pathological liar who's committed tons of financial and fidelity while you have two young kids at home. - I understand. - So if we don't solve that problem, the house isn't gonna fix anything, even if we solve that one. - Well, how do we solve this problem if he doesn't see it as an addiction? - You're gonna need to reveal that to him and it might take other people to reveal that to him. I don't know that you can convince him. - Yeah, I think you guys, I mean, regardless of whether he admits it or not, I think you guys need, you need marriage counseling, ASAP. - We had a session and he's been like, he said he doesn't want to do it anymore. - Well, I think he's telling you something then, Kate. - I know. - And that's a really sad reality. - He's choosing his gambling addiction over his family at this point. He's opting out of them. - Yeah, Dr. John Zelloni always talks about how your actions are basically the words you're not saying. And if he's not willing to fight for this marriage, Kate, that puts a hard strain on decisions in the future, probably. I probably would not go through with buying a house with him right now. - 'Cause you already told me that he has not been consistent on payment. So what happens when you guys have a bigger mortgage payment and he doesn't have the money 'cause he gambled it all away, the money? - Well, and from a marriage perspective, he's telling you he doesn't want to work on your marriage. - I know, I know. He's convincing me that I don't, like I see it differently. - No, you're not the crazy one, Kate. - The kid's calling that gaslight at this stage. - Yeah, that's right, yes. He lost $121,000 by quote-unquote day trading. - Yeah, before that, he lost like 50,000. - That's right. - Before that, he lost like 10, 10,000. - Yeah, so there's, and again, I'm always so cautious when we get to this point in a conversation with a call 'cause we have about three more minutes with you and then you have to go make these decisions about your life, Kate, but, I mean, there's some ultimatums that, I mean, if you wouldn't put up with this if it was drugs, right? That, well, he, you know, piss in this or, you put something else in the money slot, the gambling slot and-- - Give up how I see it. - That, and it should be how you feel. And I'm so sorry. And so I think, for UK, I would go see, I would go find a great therapist because I think you're gonna need some language and some identity work to be able to stand really strong for you and your kids. And then, and then he's gonna have to make some decisions based on what you need because he's the one that broke the trust, not you. He broke the trust. And so there's gonna be some things that he's gonna have to do to repair that trust for this marriage to move forward. And. - Yeah, you can't force him into recovery, but what you can do is put up from very clear boundaries that you're going to separate your money so that he can't do damage to your family any longer and that if he wants this to continue, then he's gonna need to see a gambling addiction specialist who can assess him. - Yeah, yeah, that's how I see it. - Yeah. - So do we process, we have to, like, go buy this house because there's no way back. Do we buy it and sell it? 'Cause at this point, I think I'm going to buy it. - I would talk to the lender and see what your options are and see what the contract you signed says, see if there's a way to get out of it. - And you may have to forfeit a penalty or something, but I wonder if there is a way for you to get out 'cause I would not put my name on a house with him right now. I think your marriage is on the rocks. - And even if you lost that deposit of 50K, he's done more stupid tax in the last year than that 50K deposit you'd lose. And he'll continue to do it if we don't put an end to this. - Yep, yeah. - Yeah, the behavior's not changing on his end and he doesn't care to change it is what it sounds like. He'll make 50K in the next three months. So we can rebuild that. But what we need to do is focus on his inability to lead this family well and not destroy them. - I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, but I would find a great counselor in your area and have them walk with you through this process. But oh, I'm so sorry. Well, thanks for a great show, George. Thanks everyone in the booth and remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that is to walk daily with the Prince of Peace. Christ Jesus. (upbeat music)