Make A Plan Your Future Can Trust

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 network and the fairwinds credit union studio this is the ramsey show i'm george camel joined by dr john deloney we're taking your calls at 888-825-5225 that's the only way to jump into the conversation john is in chicago up first what's going on john hey good afternoon gentlemen thanks for getting me on the line here sure man what's up okay so my wife and i we are in baby step three and looking to the future wanting to put our money in the best place for growth but uh also security and you know if you talk to anybody the uh with the state of the world right now uh confidence in the dollar we're uh just wanting to you know to make sure that it's in a place that's not just going to evaporate basically so wondering is it worth investing in the in the stock market instead of tangible assets let's say gold uh silver land that sort of thing great question man thanks for asking that i know i know that's in every internet news feed and lots of yeah when you say everyone and like everyone believes this are you seeing headlines the social media scrolling or is this people in your actual physical circles it's more uh headlines news feed uh i think it's it's probably just coming through pretty pretty heavily on what i'm seeing on on social media and yeah um and who i talk to in in my workplace that sort of thing so i i can speak george's man he's he is the investment guru i'm not but i can speak to the last i checked that the dollar is going to be in the stock market and i'm not going to be able to do that so i'm going to up in the short term strangely it has been pulled from the reserve bank on a percentage basis more than it has been in the past which says that the the rest of the world is saying we don't know if we can trust you guys y'all owe a lot of money like those kind of things but the even foreign currencies get get converted to dollars at some point so all that to say is you're talking about such a structural it's kind of like how do we prepare if suddenly we all start breathing hydrogen instead of oxygen right like it's it would be such a shift that i i this is me personally i don't have one penny in gold because if we switch from hydrogen to oxygen i don't know what i would do with a bag of yellow rocks you get what i'm saying right i don't know that that would be the thing that saves me at that point because you're talking about such a structural shift such a sea change it would have to be cataclysmic and it would be it simply would be right if every country in the world stopped taking the dollar you're talking such a cataclysmic shift that it's like getting hit by a meteorite as one of my buddies who's works in banking once said he's like dude that's that's a meteorite situation and so but i do man i'm with you and when i feel all this instability all the uncertainty like i've long joked like that when i put my money into my stuff into mutual funds when i put it into retirement accounts i don't know if it's gonna be there you know what i mean and that's just that's called risk right and when i've got kids i've got my own fit like man it i i often am checking in with george checking with dave like this is right right so i that you're feeling dude i'm there with you i get it totally um and i think that's the risk part of investing and whenever i'm looking at what could happen honestly the only the only thing and it feels trite george the only thing i've got is to look back on history and say here's how this has worked and that's that's not always if in fact it's almost never a fail proof safe like a fail a fail safe way of looking at the future but it's all i got it's the tool i got right so there's two discussions here one the dollar is going to go to zero the stock market will collapse that is just not going to happen so now we can talk about inflation that's really what you're talking about hey inflation trying to be in inflation yeah you're right we should not keep our money under a mattress let's put it somewhere that's going to grow but now you're saying i don't trust the stock market and that's a separate deeper discussion i still think investing the stock market is worth it in fact that's the only place i invest i own my primary home free and clear and i have my money in retirement and outside of retirement in index funds and mutual funds my life is that simple i have great confidence in the s&p 500 which is the benchmark for the u.s stock market top five companies it's up twelve and a half percent year to date even with everything happening in the world i'm putting this in big air quotes even with wars going on inflation rampant the u.s economy just keeps on going and will will there be downturns one thousand percent yes that's that's that's the ride on a roller coaster could there be a 25 dip in there right sure but you're not taking all your money out in a single year based on a dip right so just ride the wave man because my money has grown exponentially in the stock market over the last what twelve years i've been investing and so if you're not investing you're extra screwed the only way to beat inflation is to invest but i would not do it in alternate you know alternative assets and commodities like gold and crypto i just personally don't do that it's too volatile if you're trying to reduce anxiety that's not the play yeah no crypto has always been kind of a little suspect for me it hasn't made a whole lot of sense gold that's one thing but uh well hindsight's 2020 if you invested in crypto in bitcoin 15 years ago you wouldn't be calling the show you would own the building so it's just i wish i could go back and get uber on day one but you know i just dollar cost average into the stock market same amount every month out of every paycheck and it's boring and it's slow but i sleep better and the other piece is just turn off the headlines what good are they doing you at this point that that's the part and by the way i to to branch off of george i have bought land that's a thing for me deloney loves dirt and i love dirt yeah and some call them a dirt bag in fact quite quite a few people believe um but i i i do like it and i like to tell myself no it's for recreation for kids it's for my friends when they come up but also it's kind of a little if it all goes down i got a place to go right so like but but that's i mean i'm gonna do that in the right way i'm gonna do that with cash right i'm gonna do that after i've secured like my that i've got my own emergency fund for for the rest of my life i'm gonna do that with cash right i'm gonna do that for things that i know are gonna happen like the air conditioner is gonna go out i'm gonna need a fridge things like that um and i'll tell you the way i've handled rightly or wrongly the way i've handled the anxiety that you're expressing that george is talking about is i made a commitment when i started uh retirement funding after a long conversation with the cfo of a big company back in texas when i was gonna pull it all out and beat the market and do this and all that is i'm gonna i'm gonna pull it all out and beat the market and do this and all that is i'm gonna i'm gonna pull it all out and put money in retirement and i'm not i'm i'm not i'm committed to the end of that ride kind of like going to disneyland getting on the roller coaster i'm just not going to jump off of it so if there's not an end to this thing and we all fly off into space and then crash to the ground i got on right so i i'm just not gonna i've committed i'm putting it in there and i'm not going to take it out so i'm just along for the ride now okay that's encouraging yeah we're uh you know we've we've had our our fair share of time uh not having uh what we need and want to make sure that our future is set up for success and uh the best way to do that seems to be uh seems to be the market but um yeah no i really appreciate it and also like double click on that the market yes long term but a way to quell anxiety in the present is to not owe anybody any money and i know that sounds cheap and i know that sounds cheap and i know that sounds cheap and that's all we ever say if you don't owe anybody anything you don't have a house payment i promise you the anxiety overall goes down every single time yeah you want to be on the right side of that earning interest instead of paying it and you will sleep better at night congrats on making it to baby step three keep going man okay george we hear from so many people that are trying to live out the ramsey plan right they're getting out of debt and everything but the hard thing is there's not many banks out there that actually support the way we teach people to handle money yeah most banks they don't want you to win with money so they charge a bunch of nuisance fees there's all this fine print and worst of all they are pushing debt products at you non-stop yes but the good thing is is that fair wins isn't like most banks they're not like the other guys they're not like the other guys yeah they are not pushing debt and they're not pushing debt and they're not pushing debt and they're not pushing and they actually want you to win with the baby steps and so what's great too is they created the smart bundle for ramsey fans which includes a high yield savings account and no monthly fee checking which is huge because it's rare to have a checking account tied to a high yield savings account you can get all that with fair wins and for the nerds out there you can have 10 different high yield savings accounts for different goals so you got your emergency fund the car upgrade fund the vacation fund the world is your oyster so beautiful and check out the debit card the new one live like no one else, DepaCard. - Oh, that's beautiful. - It's so beautiful. - That's a conversation starter. It's so good. And when you swipe or you tap, every time you take it out of your wallet, you're remembering that you are living like no one else and you're being intentional with your money. I've been using Fairwinds for months and months now. I love their features, the app, the customer service. It is all so good and so aligned with the Ramsey principles. Absolutely. So y'all, we both bank at Fairwinds and we love their commitment to Ramsey values. So check it out. You can get that smart bundle. We're going to drop a link in the description or you can go to fairwinds.org slash Ramsey today. That's right. That's fairwinds.org slash Ramsey insured by the NCUA. Sarah's in Tampa, Florida up next. Sarah, welcome to The Ramsey Show. Hey, guys. Thank you so much for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? So I have an issue with my mom. Last year, she lost her job and sadly, she has not been able to find work, even though she's been trying, having interviews. The issue is that she will not change her spending habits. She won't budget. She won't listen to any advice. Trying to help her is like pulling a mule out of concrete. And my husband and I just don't know what to do. We've just kind of thrown up our hands and said, okay, she's just going to do whatever she wants to do. And we just don't know what to do. Is there anything other than throwing your hands up that you think you could do? Honestly, I feel like we've exhausted everything to try to help her. We've sat down with her. Family members have sat down with her, family, friends. In the beginning of last year, she even did the financial piece. And that didn't change her spending habits even then when she had a job. We just don't know how to convince her to like change her spending habits to make her situation better. Her only income. That's her social security and she goes into the negative every single time and yet she's crying. She doesn't have money for gas and this and it's like, well, if you'd stop getting your nails done and buying expensive groceries, you would probably be able to have extra money. But she just, she won't listen. - Does she have somebody, you or your siblings, does she have people bailing her out all the time? - I think she has like a long time friend that I think she has asked for money from. Here and there, she has asked to borrow money from us now and again and then it's like, well, when I get my social security check, I'll pay you back. - Did y'all give it to her? - You know, stuff like that. We do, only because we know that she does pay back when that check comes in, but that's the extent of it. - What does she make? - Her social security is like $1,500. $288 a month, somewhere around there. - How does she pay rent or her mortgage? - She pays it with her social security check and everything else, like she's constantly in the negative. And you know, she gets behind on her bills. - That's why I'm confused how she's even paying you back for money she borrowed if she's in the negative every month, just trying to cover her own bills. - Yeah, because as soon as that check lands, like she'll pay us back the $40 we loaned her for gas money or whatever. And then, you know, we've even offered like, we'll manage your bills for you. Like, you know, just give us the password. We'll take care of it and she won't do it. - Is she renting? - She lives with us. So she's been living with us for the last four years. - Well, you buried the lead there. So she's got free housing. - Oh, I'm sorry. No, no, she does not. - So she's not gonna get, she's not gonna be homeless. I'm just trying to figure out how do we just set her up to where she's got food, shelter, utilities, transportation, and anything else is by the wayside. Because here's the path towards like the starting line for you and your husband, not losing your own minds and your own marriage in this conflict is autonomy, agency, that's the nerd word. Y'all two are in the driver's seat. Y'all make the choices. Y'all make the decisions. And number two is choosing reality. Trafficking in, here's what is real. Not what we hope, not what we wish, all that kind of stuff. And so what you're telling me is she already lives with you. No matter what you do, she's not gonna change. And so the only people that you can change right now are you and your husband. That's it, I mean, and you can't change him. You can change yourself. You can decide I'm gonna show up as this person. The only thing I will ask you to do, I'll plead with you is if you're gonna give your mom money, A, don't ever loan it to her because that just like, 'cause then you start, even if you don't want to, you start, eyeballing, oh, you went and did this. Oh, you went and did that. Or why'd you buy this? You owe me 40 bucks. Like don't put yourself in that position or her. If you're gonna give her 50 bucks, give her 50 bucks. And I think it's best done at the beginning of a, like you and your husband sit down and say, okay, here's reality. What are we going to contribute and how much, if any? And then y'all sit down, clear as kind. You sit down with your mom and say, here's the new reality. We're gonna give you a hundred dollars a month and you're gonna live here and we're moving on. Or we're gonna let you live here rent free 'cause you're mom and we're not kicking you in the street. Or your time here is over. You gotta live with your decision, right? So y'all get to where you're gonna be, own your decisions and then based in reality and then move forward. 'Cause right now what you're doing is you're banging your head up against a problem. And I can't think of few things other than the loss of somebody like through death or separation. I can't think of many more things that are more heartbreaking than when somebody you love needs help. And they won't accept your help. It's heartbreaking. It's a season of grief. I would love to love my mom in this way and she refuses to allow it. So then after that point, all I can choose is who I'm gonna be and what I'm gonna do next. - Right. - Was there any agreement when she moved in of here's how this is gonna go? - Yes. So we sat down with her and we made a written agreement that the first year with us would, yeah, well, because she has a son. - Good for you. - Yeah, well, because she has a son. decades long of bad spending habits. Um, so the agreement was the first year would actually be rent free. The, the deal was though, we would have to manage her bills and help her get out of debt, which we did. We helped her, you know, or it was her money cause she had a job, but like we made sure that her bills got paid on time, no car payments. So she doesn't have any debt. So that's good. Um, but then after that first year, she would start paying rent and contributing to the household. Um, and so that, that was our written agreement and she stuck, she stuck to it. But like I said, she lost her job a year ago, hasn't been able to find work, but she still gets her nails done. She still does streaming services, just things that she doesn't need that. And so on the other side of her own situation, on the other side of any written agreement, there has to be an, or what? So what is y'all's or what? You're getting a Victor. No. Okay. And listen, I wouldn't evict my mom either. So there's no shade here. I just want you to own, like we had this plan, but we didn't think through the, or what? And basically your mom's calling your bluff. They're not going to kick me out. And if you're not going to kick her out, then don't kick her out, but don't sit there and stew over. We have this agreement that she's not following because y'all didn't have the, or what attached to that agreement. Yeah. Yeah. And dude, I applaud you. You're a hero to me for even sitting down and getting a written agreement. Like in the first place, most people never do that with their aging parents. So good for you. Are you guys in a good place financially? I mean, we, we do make good money. However, we do have debt of our own. We are doing the, the snowball effect. My husband has two jobs. I'm trying to get a second job so we can pay down that rent. We would love to, um, and, to be clear too, we invited her to live with us when a situation became difficult for her. We felt that it was the biblical right thing to do. So that was why we even agreed to, for her to live with us in the first place. Um, but we're, we're trying to get our own debt paid off. We would love to get in a place financially where we could, so just support her so she could just live her life and not even have to worry about, I mean, she's 77. She should be retired, but she doesn't have retirement. She doesn't have anything because of the decision she's made throughout her life. Right. We would love to be able to just support her, but we can't. So we're, we're in the baby step number one. We're trying to snowball our debt, working two jobs. And she knows all of this? You've sat down and said all of this to her. She understands the full situation. Yes, she does. And does she have her own debit card? How is she spending money? Does she have access to a credit card? Um, I don't know if she has access to a credit card, but she does have her own debit card. Yeah. Okay. I would make sure she doesn't have access to a credit card. That way we can limit, the damage. And I would consider creating a situation where you give her like her envelope of her budget for the month with cash or your own debit card where you can control the funding of it so that she doesn't damage her own finances. That might be a good compromise where she still has some autonomy, but she's not going to go out there blowing her social security check every single month. So to be clear, we should kind of do an, or else, you know, kind of situation with her to basically force her hand because nothing she's done. Right. And you can do that because she lives with you. You are holding some cards here. Yeah. It's, it's either make peace with your situation. situation and stop going to bed angry. That's a choice. Or yeah, haven't or what? We're going to give you $50 at the beginning of a month and there will be no more money. Don't ask, right? And so you get to control what you do in this situation. And by the way, I hate this for you. I hate this for everyone involved. 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Go to chministries.org slash budget and use promo code Ramsey. That's chministries.org slash budget and promo code Ramsey. James is in St. Louis up next. James, welcome to the show. How's it going? So I am wondering, I have nothing invested. I'm wondering if I should, 43 years old and wondering if I should do a Roth IRA at this point or just an individual brokerage account. Why are you using both of those options? Why the brokerage account? The thing I don't like about an IRA is I don't like not being able to get to the money if I need it. Well, you're 43. What would you use the money for before you're 60? Well, it'd be one of those, like, if I lose my job or something and need it, then I just want to have access to it, basically. Okay. So in case of emergency, you'd want to have some cash. Can we build you an emergency fund that does that in a high-yield savings account? I currently have 10,000 saved. Okay. And I have no debt. Good. So what would be six months of expenses for you? Let's say you lost your job and for six months you couldn't find one. I would need, I had that somewhere and I lost that. 20 grand, 30 grand? It would actually be, the 10,000 would cover six months. That's not mathematically possible. Unless you have no house payment, no car payment. Right. I have no house payment. Is the house paid off? Yes. Wow. Okay. So you're in a good spot then because you can invest as much as you want. What's your household income? It is 40,000. Okay. So 40K a year. And how do you have a paid off house? I'm curious. I would be an inheritance. Okay. All right. So we recommend investing 15% until the house is paid off. But after that, you can invest even more. So in your situation where you want to make up for lost time, I would be investing into a Roth IRA to start. And 15%, you'd be right there to max it out. So you can start with a Roth IRA. Do you have an employer retirement plan as well? I don't have one set up. They do offer one. Do you know what it is? But I don't. I don't know. Okay. So that's part of your homework. Thing one is find out what your employer retirement plan is. They might have a Roth 401K option, and that'll just come right out of your paycheck before it hits your bank account. And I love that idea because you're sort of forcing the discipline. Okay. But a Roth IRA is a great option that's not tied to your employer. You can just go open one. And if you want help with that, you can reach out to a SmartVestor Pro at ramseysolutions.com to walk you through that. But the goal here is we want to have money when we can't work anymore. Okay. So the Roth is fantastic for that because you're going to pay the taxes now, but then you won't pay taxes again. So think of that as net income in retirement. Okay. And I like that it's locked away until 60 plus, because I don't want you robbing that brokerage account that was supposed to be for James's retirement, all because an emergency happened. So that's why I'm recommending you have a bigger emergency fund, because all it takes is one or two things happening at once for you to blow 10K just like that. Yeah, that's my concern for you, brother. Yeah, that's my concern for you. You know what I'm saying? If Walmart is having $10,000 as your full emergency fund, like, man, I had to replace my entire central air conditioning unit two months ago, maybe a month and a half ago, and it was way more than that. Like just a roof or like, man, getting some sort of cushion. What do you do for a living where you make 40 grand? I'm at a Walmart distribution center. Okay. Is there any room for advancement there or for overtime to where you could just hit the gas for a year and get yourself a little more cushion across the board? A little bit of overtime, but not really a lot. Okay. Is there an ability for you to do ride share in the evenings? Like, if you listen to the show, you hear these heroic stories of folks who just paused their life for 18 months, and they work two jobs, three jobs, four jobs. They do janitorial work at the church on the weekends. Then they go drive. They drive ride share, and then they work full time. Then they take whatever overtime they can get. But they just do it for a season, a short, maniacal sprint to get themselves out of this cycle of always being on the edge, to get some margin in your life. You know what I mean? Just some peace. Okay. How much margin do you have currently every month? If I said, hey, after all the bills are paid, how much could you invest? I could do about $700 a month. Okay. Can I plug that into a calculator to show you what would happen if you invested that into a Roth IRA? Yes. All right. So you're 43 right now. Let's say you retire at 67. Is that fair from your late start? Yes. Okay. $700 a month from the age of 43 to the age of 67. I'm going to go with a 10% annual rate of return. If you invest it well into mutual funds and index funds, that's what you'll see. I'm going to hit calculate, you would have $832,000. And if that's in a Roth account, act like that's net income, because you're not going to pay taxes on that. Pretty impressive considering you only put in 200 grand of that. Over 600,000 was just compound growth. Now, let's say you could invest $1,000. Can we aim a little higher? Yes. That would turn into 1.2 million almost. Now we're talking. Okay. But if you invest in social security, you might be able to retire with some dignity. So that'll just help you kind of get in your head what it's going to take to retire at 67 as a millionaire. And it's very much possible, but I want to dig into more of what do you want from life in the meantime? Are you single? Yes. Okay. So paint me a picture of James five years from now. If I could wave a magic wand, what does his life look like? I don't know. I don't know. I haven't really. Are you still single? Are you still doing the same job? Probably not doing the same job, but I would still be single. Yes. I'm not working to start a family. Okay. So that's intentional. So at least we have some homework on the career side. It sounds like there's something that you'd rather be doing that you haven't pursued yet. Is that fair? Yes. And what is that thing? Do you know? No. I have been trying to learn coding and iOS development. Okay. What have you been doing to learn? I have been doing online courses and trying to find mentors and stuff like that to teach how to do it. Cool. So that might be a future where five years from now, you're a software engineer or developer making 80K. And as you can see, that would multiply the number of people that you're working with. Right. And I think that's a good thing. I think that's a good thing. Yeah. start. They're in their thirties, their forties, they haven't invested yet. And I love this example from James to show you that you can still retire a millionaire, a million dollars in an account just by starting at 43 and putting in 700 bucks a month. Now, some people go, well, George must be nice to have $700. And I go, Hey, add up your debt payments for me. They go, okay, that's car payments, 500 student loans or another 400 of the credit cards. Okay. We just found a thousand bucks right there that could be used for investing. If we decided we're going to go hard at this debt, knock it out. Right. And man, it feels so obtuse these days because it's so, it is hard out there, man. It is. I just filled my truck up yesterday and it put me in such a bad mood, right? It was just, and I know you and your gas-free vehicle that drives itself. We also have a minivan, John. Oh, minivan, nice. Yeah. So I, man, I get it. And there's that old saying, like conflict deferred is conflict amplified. You're going to have to face the music now. And, or at some point you want to face it when there's some government entity saying, this is going to be your retirement home and your bed, and this is who you're going to share it with, whatever. That's going to come, or I'm going to not buy this car. I'm going to not do this. I'm not going to have fancy pants things at 43, 47, 57, because I got a late start. Um, I'm going to have, I'm going to, I'm going to do the small things now that are inconveniences that are uncomfortable so that I've got autonomy at some point you got that's coming. I'd rather own it as soon as possible. And make whatever choices I have to make right now so that I'm the driver's seat later. When you take your car to the shop, you're probably thinking two things. How much is this going to cost me? And is it going to get done right? What you need is a mechanic who will give you transparent information so you can make the best, for your car and your wallet. Christian Brothers Automotive is the official auto repair shop of the Ramsey show because you can trust them to take care of your vehicle the right way. Their digital vehicle inspections let you see exactly what their technicians see, giving you confidence on which repairs are urgent and which ones can wait. Plus every repair is backed by their nice difference warranty, three years or 36,000 miles with a guarantee like that. You can walk away knowing that your car and your wallet are taken care of. Schedule your service today and get 10% off your visit at CBAC.com slash Ramsey or click the link in the description. That's CBAC.com slash Ramsey. 10% off up to a $250 value. See store for details. If you're wondering why we keep mentioning baby steps, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, it's because they're the foundation of everything we teach. So if you're new here, start there. We'll drop a link in the description of this episode if you want to learn more about that framework. Jill is in Lincoln, Nebraska. Up next, what's going on, Jill? Hi, thanks for taking my call. Sure. My question is, how do I save for a large amount of money I will need to pay when my parents pass? Oh, tell us more. So we own a business together. I will inherit current value. It will be worth 3.8 that I will need to pay my siblings for a different part of it, which current value would be right at $2 million. So do I do life insurance on my parents? Do I put money in a stock or a CD? What's the best way going about saving for that when that time comes? Are they going to leave this business to you with the expectation that you disburse it equally among the siblings? Are they going to leave it, the worst case scenario is they leave it to quote, unquote, the kids? No. The will is, written current values. So it's land or farmers. What my part of that is, current value is 3.8. But I need to purchase the rest for my siblings. Yeah, why do you have to buy them out? Because they don't have enough cash on hand to pay them closer to equal. If that happened today, I would owe $2 million. But if I couldn't. But it's locked inside of the land. It's not like, you know, can you pay them out of the profits of the business until they get there? Yeah, over 10 years? Or are they going to be this kind of siblings that are banging on your door saying, I want my money right now? So here's, let me mention this and then I'll see if I can answer. If I was unable to come up with the $2 million to pay them, if I sold it, current value today, it's worth 3.7. Okay. So it's a farm. I would like to keep it together. I know this expense is coming. But I don't know how to, what's the best way to plan for that time? What are the profits generating from the farm? Because I have this conversation with some regularity now because of, especially in farming communities, and I've lived in two different farming communities. The land value has. Has far exceeded the actual operating capital, the operating revenue of these farms. And it just takes one kid to come bang on the door and say, I want my money now. Or what I've seen is it's a spouse or an ex-spouse that says, I want my cash now. So it forces everybody's hand to either sell the property or come up with some tricky loans or a mess. How much on these two properties, like $6 million worth of farming land, how much money are you making every year? Let me put it this way. Do you have the money to save up $2 million as a buyout over the next five, 10 years, however long your parents are alive? 10 years, probably yes. If I just put it away, did not make any improvements to the farm. Five years, it would be close. I mean, I don't see another way around it. So you think don't keep the money, like working for you, put it in an account that's earning interest. I put it in a high yield savings account because you have a, you have, well, it depends on when your parents are going to pass. Are they in good health? Right. They are. Okay. And how old are they? They are 72. So they could go to 92 plus at this point. If they're in good health at 72. Yep. Which means, does that mean you're. The portion you have to pay out increases as the land appreciates? Yes. And as the business grows? What I pay is based on the assessor evaluation on the land. So what if you owe them $10 million? Right. I don't know. You might not be able to save your way there. And even then, even if you got life insurance, it's going to be a moving target over time. True. If you got $2 million today, and it's worth $10 million later on. So I would just have them restructure what's in the will so that you're not on the hook for this day one. Well, it sounds like you're on the hook because you don't want them, your siblings to sell that plot of land, right? No, I do not. It's part of the business that we help run. Pretty much what my parents thought was if I was given something valued at 3.8, I could get a loan. And that's a good way to lose both plots. True. Yeah, let's take debt off the table as an option and explore some other ones. And that might mean you structure it differently. Even if you do owe them this money, maybe it's not day one. Maybe it's, hey, we're going to pay this over five years after they pass. I'll pay this out in equal installments. The earlier you structure that and have it written down so that they know that way, there's not somebody banging on your door year two. Like, give me my money and everybody's already, like, it's in the will. Like, this is going to get paid out over time off of earnings, not off of borrowed money. I'll tell you, I have an ingrained in me experience of talking to an aging farmer who wept in front of me. And you know what a big deal that is to have an old West Texas farmer crying in front of me because of the debt load, because of the conversation he had with a banker saying, you have to do this and this and this to keep this property. And he realized he'd signed a. Like, I'll never forget that. And so if you, and I know that debt just is crushing American farmers. If we tell people to sell their car and everything, I'm just, deeper roots than that. Please don't go into debt over a future potential maybe situation. And this has got enough zeros on it. I wouldn't trust two goobers on a podcast. I would contact an estate attorney that has experience with agricultural and have them drop a structure that makes sense, that's fair to everybody. Because currently, this is not fair to you to just owe that all of a sudden without being able to liquidate anything in the business. and flip it around would you borrow if if this plot just happened to be next to your farm would you borrow two million dollars and buy it yeah okay she loves this land i'm not gonna tear it out of her hands yeah so i mean you're gonna you're gonna do what you're gonna do i i just hate the thought how leveraged are you on your on your property um my my part of the business has paid off okay are you asking yes that works well you're you're free and clear on your three point whatever million dollars portion of this business right um so that is the part he would be giving me at that time okay what i currently have of my own me and my husband is 3.3 okay so if i'm in your situation i mean it's not george and i george gave me this um analogy off air about something else but y'all well the titanic sank so you're in a boat and you see an iceberg coming and right now that iceberg's evaluated two million dollars you don't know when you're gonna hit it but you know it's coming at some point you're debt-free you're operating your site as business debt-free i would just say choosing reality this thing's coming at us i'm going to frantically save so that if and when the day comes um i can write each of my siblings a check and now we've just expanded our entire operation we've doubled our operation um and we're free it's going to be a lot of money and we're going to be we're free it's ours it's free and clear and it's ours have you talked to your siblings about this yes we have we had a family meeting about it and what to expect and yeah and they're just like hey yeah day one when mom and dad pass we're going to get our share of this yep that was the expectation everyone agreed including you um so i had from the date of the last passing parent i have nine months to say yes or no i don't want this if i don't want this it just goes to my siblings if i do want this i currently owe the two but it's worth the 3.7 so even if i had to sell it it wouldn't i i need to make that purchase well i would you can invest your way there and attempt that based on your income but you might want to have a plan b in case you don't have all the money in full and in case this thing appreciates i would look at it from all the angles and talk to an estate planning attorney to help you structure that if you own a business you know what a pain it is to find the right people you don't just want a warm body who can fulfill the basic job requirements you want a go-getter who actually wants the job somebody bought in from day one but finding that someone buried in your inbox with 500 other applications that makes finding a needle in a haystack sound simple which is why i love what zip recruiter is doing for small businesses zip recruiter automatically puts the most qualified most interested candidates at the top of your list with their new feature that lets candidates tell you in their own words why they want the role so instead of playing resume roulette you're interviewing the right people faster and at ramsay solutions we only hire people who believe in our mission because someone who's a candidate who's a candidate who's a candidate who's a candidate bought in doesn't just show up to collect a paycheck they bring everything they've got every day zip recruiter helps you find that person faster and they make it easy for amazing candidates to get your attention in fact four out of five employers who post on zip recruiter get a quality candidate within the first day so try it for free today at zip recruiter.com slash ramsay or click the link in the description that's zip recruiter.com slash ramsay meet your match on zip recruiter welcome back to the ramsay show in the fairwinds credit union studio i'm george camel joined by dr john deloney taking your calls at triple eight eight two five five two two five misty is in boston up next what's going on misty hi so i'm sorry if i sound a bit shaky i'm a bit nervous that's all right take your time we're all good glad you're here so i just need help like what like what i need to do next step with my friend and i'm going to be talking to him about his finance and you know i just want to have a clear plan to pay off my debt i made some stupid decision at a young age so yeah we all did we did it's okay yeah it's okay we all have our journeys so how old are you now so i just turned 24 and recently i lost my job in july and i also do um like content creating so social media influencing on the side although they don't know anything about my personal life except fashion stuff so i get brand deals it's you know obviously you don't their net is 30 to 60 to 90 days obviously you don't get paid right away but since i lost my job in july i've been you know getting brand deals throughout since july until october and i haven't been able to get a job until recently i got a new job um that's going to be paying me 24 an hour but i will be working at a temporary job they're all starting late the temporary job is going to start in october 13 and the other one that's going to be uh permanent it will be starting in november 2nd and i have a lot of um you know like misdo bills and i also have a lot of debt with a lot of impulse spending and you know emotional spending and also i don't even drive and i have a car loan um that i co-signed from my previous partner my ex and now it's in my hand and now i'm trying to fix it to i don't even know what to do i don't even drive a car where's the car right now so the car is at my current uh boyfriend it's at his house and he's i've been giving him money to fix it with whatever he needs but you know he's he's been helping with other stuff i'm confused whose car is it it's my so the car's under my name but you said it's an ex yeah so it's co-signed but i took the car back okay so the car isn't technically in your possession i'm saying could you go sell this car today if you wanted to so the he didn't take care of it he didn't take care of the car when i got the car back the car he had he had crashed the car it didn't total it it's just the front like where the fluid's at it's you need a new bumper and the seat inside and he smoked so he he kind of destroyed where the gears and stuff like that he ashed on there how much do you how much do you owe on it so on the car i owe now it's like nine thousand five hundred and two dollars and fifty cents okay and what about your other credit card credit card cards from impulse spinning where are you at so i have two credit cards and i had uh it's now at sixteen thousand one hundred and seventy nine dollars okay so you owe 25 grand in total anything else um no that is it okay so one of the keys and i'm talking calm on purpose because i i feel your sense of angst as you're like starting to walk through this it's so laden with emotions this guy destroyed a thing y'all had a thing together he blew it like all that right i get it the path through for you i want you to remember this statement facts are your friends okay because really what you have you do have a lot of relational challenges emotional issues betrayal all that is real and you're gonna have to process that but right now you have a an emergency math problem yeah and the more we can focus on that the the more your body will sense itself getting back in the driver's seat of its own life even though you don't drive right and so i don't i personally don't think you can wait two more weeks to start a temp job i think you got to get on ride share tonight so i have i have some other money coming in which is good that's coming in so i have brand deals i know george and i both have brand deals and we both know that those things come and go and like that's not stable you know what i'm saying when is it coming and how much is it so i have one that's coming in um next week for two thousand and forty dollars but i also take put tax aside and i also put tides aside for ten percent and then twenty percent so total is like thirty percent so it'll be left me would um around one thousand nine hundred fifty two dollars okay and what's your next bills to pay what are you behind on right now i'm behind on my my credit card bill okay i'm behind my credit card bills and my utilities and the car loans and yeah that's the only thing and then that's the thing i'm gonna plan paying so let's get current on utility bills so that the thing you need to focus on right now is just one thing at a time right now it's your four walls that's food shelter utilities transportation so you get current on your utilities this is like all about survival right that's the base layer next let's pay the car because that thing's going to get repoed if you miss a couple payments and then you're going to be on the hook for the difference they're going to sell it at auction and still come after you you're going to sell for a thousand bucks and you're going to owe eight grand on a thing you're not even holding so then let's get current on that that's your next day one then we'll worry about the credit cards later those i'm the least worried about i want you out of it and we'll get you out of it but right now you need to just keep the lights on and keep that asset that you have in that car and there's a there's a there's a phrase we use in the in the brand deal world and that is mailbox money you've heard that before no okay it's it's just a check that comes and you're happy when it comes you just sort of woke up and money showed up but you don't live on that you have to live on You have to have a job where you're earning income. a check in the mail for two grand awesome it goes to debts it goes to savings it goes to that fancy guitar you wanted to buy whatever it's mailbox money but it is not we're not just going to sit around twiddling our thumbs waiting for it you've you have to go be hyper proactive so when is your rent due so my rent due this month and uh it's it's well i have credits uh towards it so it's $1,194 because i overpaid the last one okay so my my rent due this month is $1,194.82 which i'm planning to use the money i have i'm thinking i'm not going to take the tax out and 10 out yet and i'll do that with the next brand deals instead i would not recommend that that's a that's a recipe for waking up with a ten thousand dollar tax bill and and more importantly it's another sign that you're not you're not living in alignment with your values you're not living in alignment with your values and if tithing is an important value for yours let's live within our values because you've lived outside of them and you find yourself in a mess fair yeah so i would take that two thousand dollars check pay my rent make sure my rent is paid make sure my i've got heat for this boston winter that's coming i got lights on and then we're going to start worrying about the other things is that fair right have you ever done a budget misty where you actually put this on paper or in an app so i've done it before but i wasn't you know i wasn't taking it seriously i i are you ready to go i'm ready to go i'm ready to go take it seriously yes i am okay good i'm going to help you take it seriously i'm going to give you our every dollar premium app it's on the house if you actually use it and in that app here's what you're going to find in the onboarding process it's going to actually help you with personalized recommendations to create more margin margin is what you're looking for here the gap between what you make and what you spend and that whatever's left over we can throw with the debt so that will help you do that you're going to list your income at the very top then all of your expenses four walls come first we talked about that then minimum payments on the debts then we can figure out how much we actually have left over if there's anything to throw at the debts you're going to list those debts smallest to largest balances not the interest rates every dollar will do that for you you're just going to tack the little one make minimum payments on the rest focus on one at a time smallest balance first the next smallest the next smallest and if you can go make 50 60 70 80 grand this year you can pay off 25k in no time then you can worry about the car later if you can't sell it right now because of all of its issues but you need money so go start earning today today if you've ever been really sick or been the caregiver to somebody who was you know how broken the health care system can be man nothing is easy finding the right doctor sitting on hold for hours or gosh trying to understand co-pays and treatment plans and weird medical terms that no one really explains and so much paperwork but what if you had someone to do all of that for you someone to take the burden off your shoulders solace health pairs patients with a personal advocate whose entire job is to fight for you and these advocates are covered by insurance nationwide they handle the paperwork fight denied claims and they're not going to be able to pay for the insurance they're going to have to pay for it and make sure you're not getting lost in the system solace advocates are experts who average 16 years of health care experience and they serve people who are going through a health care challenge now if that's you or a loved one please reach out to solace so everyone can focus on what really matters getting better so remember the next time you or a loved one have a health issue you need solace in your corner they'll fight the system so you don't have to go to solace health dot com slash ramsey or click the link in the description below to find out more about the system check out the link in the description checking your eligibility only takes about two minutes that's s-o-l-a-c-e health dot com slash ramsey you must be 18 or older and remember advocates do not provide medical or legal advice we're headed to portland maine up next next renee joins us there what's going on renee uh hi good afternoon how are you doing i'm well so here's my question um my husband and i are very blessed we've been married for 26 years and we are still very much in love gross gross i love it i love it um his insane work ethic has allowed me to stay home and raise our four children which has just been an absolute dream um i took care of the kids he took care of all of the making of our money and managing our finances and our retirement um recently i went back to work now that the kids are grown and uh last week a co-worker was asking a question about a new withholding from the paychecks at our company because of a new benefit company that we're working with and she asked a question about my paycheck like was i seeing this withholding and when i told her that i told her i've never actually seen my pay stubs my husband you know gets them and takes care of everything she got very concerned for me and every day she's been telling me i'm in a vulnerable position and he has too much power um so my question is is it okay for the one person i trust more than anyone in the world to be a hundred percent in charge of our money or is am i being a little irresponsible i i agree with your co-worker but not for the reason that she is stating yeah so can i get dark for a second is that okay okay i've had multiple like count on two hands not one times when i've sat with young all the way to old widows whose husband just passed away yeah and there's a particular haunting look in their eyes when they say i have no idea where they're going i don't know where they're going i don't know where anything is i don't know where the banks are i don't know where our money's invested i don't know what the insurance is i even had one woman who was amazing her husband was a friend of mine he was uh it was a colleague of mine and um probably 30 years older than me great guy literally just passed away like suddenly and she said i know we have tons of money but i need groceries today and waiting for disbursements insurance checks all that like she she didn't have anything to do with it because he always just took care of it all he always just made sure everything was taken care of and so i do think you're in a very vulnerable position yes like the nature of my job and george's job is we get call after call of people saying i super trusted my partner and then i found out all the secret stuff let's don't even go there with you it's a matter of of safety quite honestly just if something happened to him what would you do yeah what would you do you don't know the logins the account numbers we do have files with all of the account numbers and uh passwords that he gives me and we keep it updated but i've actually never logged on to see them because so here's he's been raising kids and he's busy working let me tell you what me and my wife do and i won't tell you to do anything that we don't do once a year we get together and in our house my wife is the one who actually hits send on the bills right like she gets the electronic bills she makes the payments all that kind of stuff all of our money's in one checking account and i mess with all of the retirement investments and taxes and all that kind of stuff once a year we get together we make sure our our documents what you have is what we have is a document that says here's all the logins here's all the passwords here's the insurance logins all that stuff so if one of us just drops dead we got we each got that form but also we go an extra step and i pull up here's the retirement accounts here's the cash accounts here's what we have and here's our total net worth and i actually i'm a nerd so i get uh i have a friend of mine who's a ramsey real estate pro and she runs comps for me i just want to be able to say here's our net worth today and then we walk through here's how much it costs to operate the house this year from lights to like to water bill all that kind of stuff but i just for me and for her i want everyone to know where everything is and what state everything is in and yeah i have access to that information yeah but you don't have a partnership right and so there's and it was also wondering if i'm kind of being a bad wife like i don't know how big of a job or how stressful it is to manage all of the money he he does it wonderfully i'm not going to call you a bad wife but i'm going to tell you that yes it is an extraordinary burden to can't to carry it all yes so can you be curious tonight and say hey can you walk me through the financial stuff you've been carrying so much for so long and i'm just curious how this all works i know i have access and i just i just had a yeah a an epiphany that one of us is just going to fall over one day and right and nobody wants to think about that but a hundred percent of us are going to die um have y'all done a will together do you know where all that stuff is yes we we've we go to the lawyer every couple years and make sure it's updated so even you knowing hey where's our money what are the accounts what's our net worth like do you have also some real estate holdings that i don't that not that i don't know about them in an untrustworthy way but i just wouldn't know you know what i mean man i i think this is a way to bring y'all really close together and i will tell you right now So again, going dark for just a second. If he says no, that is a red flag. Okay. Well, I mean, he's listening right now. So I'm sure we're going to be doing that. Yeah. So far, it doesn't sound like he's doing anything malicious. It sounds like you just don't care. And so you're like, ah, I'm good. He's got it covered. But it's wise to have him explain what's going on in the pay stub. Explain to me what taxes are taken out, where retirement's going, what am I invested in? I think it would actually bond you as a couple if you both had that purview. And I think he'd appreciate it because he wants to nerd out on this stuff with you, but you've let him know, I don't really care. Right. And it may have been that y'all's marital arrangement is he has no idea what dentist your kids have gone to and when their school schedules and all. There's something about sharing that stuff. Even if one of you manages it day in and day out, man, there's just power in knowing we're both on the same team all the way through. Love it. Great question, Rene. Brandy's up next and Little Rock. How can we help Brandy? Hey, so I'm in a little bit of a pickle. I've done the every dollar. Long story short, I had everything set this year to pay everything off but my house. I was going to be debt free on all of my debts. And I am trying to figure out how to re-budget with not knowing what my income is and increasing my income. I'm trying to figure out how to re-budget with not knowing what my income is and increasing my hours at my part-time job and I'm still falling short. I'm like $200 over my budget. Okay. Are you working, so you're working part-time right now? Yes. Okay. Are you single? The part-time job, yes. Okay. What about your part-time job? So I had the part-time job to pay off debt. That's what I got it for. And now it is, my primary source of income, but I can't. What happened to the full-time job? I can't go full-time. I got let go. What were you making doing that? Doing that, I was making about $2,400 a month. Okay. And now what are you making with the part-time job? Well, I haven't increased my hours, so it's $800 a month. And what are your bills every month? I did not add all of them up. How long? How long ago did you get laid off, Brandy? I got laid off in June. In June. Okay. Are you scrambling like mad to find a second job? I have applied to over 100 jobs since June. And before that, over 200 jobs before that, since 2024. Okay. What kind of work were you doing? I was just, not an entry level, but I was in banking, just your basic banker. Okay. And you want to get back to that? Is that the goal? No. I want to stay in banking. I just don't want to do the role that I was in. But again, that's not the only thing that I've been applying for, so that I'm not limiting myself in just one field, because I'm open to learn new skills. For now, it's going to be just covering the basics. You might need to just make minimum payments on the debts, and those four walls come first. And that's your food, your housing costs, your transportation. So can you make. Well, that's. Can you make at least enough to cover that for the next month if you just hustle and do three jobs? It would depend on the job, because I'm physically limited. Well, currently, your life depends on it. And so we need to find work that you can do to bring enough income to at least cover the bills. And that just means the debt journey might be a little bit delayed. But every dollar is going to be your path forward. That is the facts. That's what you need on paper to make this work. Wishing you the best. 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? Those 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 you're a baby step, you're going to have to 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 at Zander 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 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. That's Zander.com. John, I'm already starting my packing list for the Live Like No One Else cruise. It's happening March 14th through the 21st, 2027. That's seven nights in the Western Caribbean with Dave and all of us Ramsey personalities and about, I don't know, 2,600 awesome Ramsey fans who have become debt-free. And we want to celebrate that. And so this kind of is a milestone marker for so many people. If you've paid off all the debt, but the house or even the house included, this cruise is for you. Come celebrate with us. All-inclusive pricing is available on Zander.com. Starts at 2,100 bucks a passenger. That includes your cabin, food, entertainment, taxes, tips, all in there. So click the link in the show notes or go to ramseysolutions.com slash events to book your cabin. It's going to be a good time. Calvin is in Minneapolis up next. Calvin, welcome to the show. Hi, how's it going? Good. How are you? Better than I deserve. We love to hear that. Uh, my question is, should I lower investing from the 15% and make it 8% so I can, uh, save up a down payment on the house or pay the house off because of how much I already have invested? So you don't currently own a home? No, but this is a question for the future when I get there. Cause it'll be about a year from now. So one year from now, you're currently investing 15%. Uh, well right now I am paying out the debt, which is about 15 grand, but I'm putting 3,000 a month towards that. Oh, so this is a ways away. You're in baby step two and you're looking at baby step seven. Yeah. I'm trying to figure out how to do that. I'm trying to figure out how to plan for the future here. Okay. Well, here's what we, I would say in baby step two, you're only focused on the debt. Of course. Then we've got the emergency fund and maybe step three, three to six months of expenses. Then you're in baby step three B that's where you would begin saving a down payment. And this is a choose your own adventure. Some people choose to invest nothing during that time and just save up a down payment aggressively for one to two years. Some people choose to invest 15% or maybe you split the difference, take the match from your employer and put the rest towards the down payment fund. So what's your plan? I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to plan for that. Well, I already have about 200,000 in investments. So my, that's kind of where this question stems from is because I already have that much in at such a young age, should I lower that percentage and actually try to hammer all this stuff out? How old are you? 19. Oh, wow. How'd you get 200 grand in retirement at 19? Uh, unfortunately an inheritance. Oh, someone passed away, huh? Yeah. Okay. So this wasn't like earned wealth that you saved up and invested? No. Okay. Well, here's what I would tell you. Investing is a muscle. And right now, even though you may not quote unquote need it, again, we don't know what the future holds. I would be flexing that muscle to go. I'm a guy who invests consistently, no matter what's going on, no matter what my income is, I'm comfortable putting that money away and living on what's left. Now you might do that after baby step three B. So that could be, you just save up aggressively, for that down payment. What, what's your income? Um, about $120,000 a year on my full time. And then I have a part-time. Amazing. Well done, dude. What do you do for a living at 19? Uh, I'm a conductor trains. Nice. Fantastic. Okay. So you're saying you're going to be debt-free in a couple of months? Yeah, that's the plan. A couple more months. You have the emergency fund? Uh, I have a starter one. I'm going to build that one up. Okay. So by, I don't know, spring, you're going to be starting to save up the down payment? Yes. And then by summer of 2028, you're hoping to buy a home? That's correct. Okay. Nice. I would continue investing 15% of whatever your income is until that house is paid off. I would not lower it to eight. I know you have a good starting point with that 200 grand, but I think that muscle's too important to not let it atrophy by going, well, I could invest less. I can go down to eight. I think there's something very wise about investing no matter what. And if you have too much money in retirement later on down the road, you can call back and send me hate mail. I'm fine with that. And I'll tell you this, Calvin. There was a year that my wife and I unplugged investing because we were so close to paying our house off that we just went, we basically baby-stepped to the house in four, five, and six. But we were well into the process. Do you know what I'm saying? Yeah. And so just doing it as a way of life over five, 10, 15 years, man, future you is going to pay the price having no investments out there um but as a momentary pause in action to aggressively do something else i that's what i did in my house but it's just not a a good long term you're talking to two guys who hate mortgages probably more than anyone in this building so we are all for you aggressively paying it off but in that case here's what i did calvin i kept investing 15 and i found other ways to pay off the house faster george is better than me so all that to say i'm better than john and i would encourage you to do the same because what you have working for you is amazing work ethic and skill and so just put that to good use and invest the whole time and on top of that if you want to pay it off faster i think you're going to find a way because you're going to make more money over time right yeah yep every year you get eight percent raise and once you pay off the debt and have the emergency fund all that margin can now go towards the down payment once you have the mortgage now we can apply that extra you to the principal on the mortgage so my guess is you're going to be debt free before you're 30 can we all agree on that i hope so yeah just make that the goal and you will be so far you're already so far ahead of america as a whole let alone 19 year olds so man if you can just stay out of debt and you you take on that mortgage 15 year fixed rate no more than a quarter of your take-home pay and then make a plan say i'm going to knock this out in seven years and it will also impact the the amount you are investing and it will feel like i've got a bunch of extra money i can qualify for a bigger house like just stay on the track man stay on the track i'd rather you have a be 30 and have a paid off house that's a little bit smaller a little bit more that it's yours it's yours at 30 man then you're you're way ahead of the game crushing it brandon is in louisville kentucky what's going on brandon you there hey so yes sir what's going on so my question is what's going on is i've accumulated debt i'm a recovering gambling addict um been clean for seven months working a program congratulations homie congratulations awesome thank you and you know that's the that's one of the biggest steps but um currently uh on a fifteen thousand dollar irs payment plan over the next couple years and also about thirty thousand in credit card debt um my wife wants separate accounts because she says she doesn't trust me with the money um and just trying to figure out the best way to attack all this you know while maintaining on the course how how long is she gonna going to do you have a plan for reunification there financially or is this just indefinite so hopefully we're kind of going through a trial separation right now you know everything still is joint um i'm staying with my mom oh so it's not just your it's just not not just your money that's separated it's your marriage is separated yes and so i'm going back and forth i'm going back and forth to our house um you know a couple nights a week to spend it with the kids okay um without you know we don't want to put their lives upside down well you know let me say this their lives already are upside down the quicker y'all can own that and manage the upside down this instead of pretending how um what are the parameters of this separation so honestly we're just kind of just going with like going with the flow you know it sounds weird but our kids have kind of gotten the routine okay of and so we're trying to keep it consistent with with our house you know letting them stay in the house sure so here's what i want to i want to i want to really encourage you okay yeah when you do a separation yeah put some parameters on it and here's what i mean in 30 days we're going to go have lunch together in 60 days we're going to x y or z because if you don't it what ends up happening is one or both of you are seeking this thing called it feels right and it's it's really difficult for that you end up making feeling-based emotion-based decisions and right you don't end up coming back together in a way that both of you are very clear about what coming back together actually means you miss each other so bad you just throw caution to the wind or she continues to feel not safe not trustworthy whatever and you get further and further and further apart and really a separation then just becomes a feelings-based trial divorce and so you brother gotta if if you're out on your own and you're separated and live in your mom's house george tell me if i'm wrong like bro you've got one plan and that is to work three jobs four jobs five jobs work exhaustively because you've got some debts to pay off asap you're doing this debt snowball on your own and i would attack that irs debt first because they can really screw up your life garnish your wages so i would just go ahead and knock that out maniacal then work on the credit cards and depending on your income this might take a year or two to three years or something like that so if you're in a situation like that where you're in the middle of the storm you're already in but man stay on the path way to go if you're waiting for rates to drop before you buy a home here's what nobody tells you when rates fall everybody has to buy a home and if you're waiting for rates to drop before you buy a home here's what nobody tells you when rates fall everybody has to buy a home and if you're waiting for rates to drop everybody has to buy a home and if you're waiting for rates to drop before you buy a home here's what nobody has to buy a home and if you're waiting for rates to drop before you buy a home here's what nobody has to buy a home here's what nobody has to buy a home here's what what's the nature of a sinking fund is what's the nature of a sinking fund is what's the nature of a sinking fund is it for it's not for emergency a new car it's for it's not for emergency a new car it's for it's not for emergency a new car someday or is it I'm gonna need tires someday or is it I'm gonna need tires someday or is it I'm gonna need tires because I for me I'll just put that in because I for me I'll just put that in paid annually. Well, you don't want to just try to cash flow that in the month that happens. A lot of people can't do that. So what you do is put a hundred bucks aside every month. You can transfer it to savings. You can let it build in checking. It depends on the way you like it. And that way you have that money ready to go. So the sinking funds and emergency fund are sort of yin and yang to me of, we know this is coming and we don't know what's coming. But where people get it with sinking funds is they'll have a car with 150,000 miles on it and they'll say, I know this is going to crash someday. And so I want to start a sinking fund now. And I would say in that situation, you need to get an emergency fund because your refrigerator can drop tomorrow. Yeah. That fully funded emergency fund is the priority. And if something happens in the meantime where you would have had a sinking fund, it's okay to use some of that if it's a true emergency. But again, if you know what, you're going to need a new car, let's just save up for that car. Yeah. And not call it an emergency. But that's a good question. I wonder if we even need to get more sophisticated with classifying sinking funds. One, for like you said, insurance, you know, it's coming every year. It's basically, if you couldn't cashflow this in a given month, then let's create a sinking fund for it. But you know, it's coming October 15th. You got to pay your life insurance bill or your car insurance bill for the six months or for the year or whatever. That to me is different than a sinking fund for a vacation that's coming in two years or one year. or a, I don't know, further down the road expenses. Yeah, not everything has to be. I mean, if it's 10 years away, we don't have to worry about it right now. Sure. But you can do the math based on your household income and your margin to decide how much can I put toward this while still hitting all my other financial goals and staying on the baby steps. And also, man, I know we've got to get to the next call. I want to double-click on this because you said something that's really important and it's just good for people to remember. Man, I remember these days so much. And, I mean, I still have them now, but not at the same acuity. And what he just mentioned here, it's so frustrating to finally pay off your last credit card and then start saving money and then immediately something happens. And you feel like you just went back and now you're, like he said, I feel broke again. I just want to cheer you on for a second. A, yes, you feel broke again because you're back to zero margin. True. And this is exactly why you saved money so you wouldn't go all the way back. Yeah, imagine if you didn't have that. Right, have to go knock on the door of a creditor and say, will you save me? So it is super frustrating. The feelings of frustration are right, good, and this is exactly why you save money. Because, not if, but when things are going to hit. And they always will hit. And that emergency fund, I call it the never going to debt again insurance policy. That's really what it is. It's a pretty dramatic way to. I like it. It's a long acronym, but. It doesn't have a ring to it. We're working on the marketing. We'll come up with a catchier name for it. All right, Laura is in New York City, New York up next. What's going on, Laura? Hi, thank you so much for taking my call. I started listening to you guys about two weeks ago, so I'm so grateful to be able to have the opportunity to talk to you guys. Welcome to the cult, Laura. We're glad you're here. Get some input. Thank you. Okay, so a little backstory. I'm 27, my partner's 26. We both separated from active duty in 2023. We've been. We've been long distance for a year and a half. And in November, I'll be moving across the country, and we're finally moving in together. He will be paying like 70%. 70% to 80% of the bills while I pay off my debt since I am in baby step number two. He was able to secure his big boy job right after getting out of the military. And right now, I'm using the GI Bill for flight school. I'm still in the reserves and, you know, trying to work part-time to pay off all my debt. And I guess my question here is, as far as moving in, like I know most callers here are married and already have combined assets, and joint accounts. So as far as moving in, like I want us to budget together. He has no debt. And even if, you know, we keep our money separate, I just want him to get on the right path since he has the advantage and the leverage to do so. But how do. You know, I want us to budget together and I want him to invest for his future and eventually it'll be our future. But how do I navigate this as a girlfriend and not a wife without coming off as controlling and overstepping? Yeah, I. I mean, you. I cannot. I cannot recommend enough. And I'm. I'm talking to you like you're my sister right now, okay? Yes, y'all are taking this quote-unquote next step in your relationship. And yet y'all have chosen to do that all. That's y'all's decision. But keep your finances separate. Your money and his. And if you want to encourage him to, like, begin thinking about the future and saving money and not borrowing money and following ramps, Ramsey principles, the best way you can influence him is by living it out. But what I've. What we see time and time again, I've seen personally time and time again, is people are dating, they move in together, they start splitting everything, and God forbid, and I would never wish this on you, but something goes awry and somebody. People have joined accounts as though they were married and there's no legal protection for you if there's a separation. And what that means is he may have paid off all of you, all of your debts, and then y'all break up, and he's like, hey, I want money back. Or vice versa. You've helped pay rent and you pay out way into his mortgage that his name is on the deed, and you say, well, I want some money back. And there's no legal protection. There's no legal separation protection for you. Right. So we actually don't plan on combining assets. I mean, combining any money. We don't plan on doing that. I just meant more so, like, us living together, like, hey, let's have a budget on how much we should be spending, you know, with our money separately, how much we should be spending on this. Okay. And we're actually going to be renting. So he doesn't own anything yet. Sure. Well, then if it's like we're splitting groceries, then it's kind of going to be a split budget. You guys are still going to do your own budgets, but you're going to then split the food bills that come in. So I wouldn't combine our budget and say this is our household budget. It's just going to be, all right, I'm allocating 200 bucks to food. He's allocating 200 bucks to food. So we got 400 to spend overall. Tell me this. My wife has, thank God, over the years, even when she was my girlfriend, was like, I'm thinking about when we were in college and we were dating and she was like, hey, here's an idea. You could study for that exam and actually pass it. I'm not going to go out with you tonight because I'm studying. And I was like, oh, because I could study. What is it about the conversation that you think he's going to blow you off that makes you feel like he's going to think you're controlling? If you sit down and say, hey, this matters to me. So actually, as someone with debt and someone who made financial mistakes in my early 20s, I see him as someone who lives so simply, has no debt, that I'm like, wow, you could be maximizing your money. And he makes over six figures. He lives simply and his money is just sitting in saving. So it's not even like. So he doesn't invest anything. I don't want him to do more for himself. No. He told me. Well, I brought this up to him and what he said was, I don't really like the idea of money just coming out of my account without me seeing it or knowing. I'd rather do it myself. I totally get that impulse. So I've been. Yeah. So I've been slowly talking to him about this, like planting the Dave Ramsey seed like every couple weeks. Every couple of days, what do you think about this? We're going to send you. We're going to send you both the Financial Peace digital course. Okay? And you can tell him. Hang on the line here. We'll send you a link to it. You can tell him, I want to watch this together and let Dave, me, George and others and Rachel and those on the videos teach you, here's why the principles work over time and in the short term. And here's the piece that you can bring to your future self by doing hard things now. I think that's going to be the best thing. And tell him, I want to watch this together. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fairwinds Credit Union Studio. I'm George Camel. John Deloney is next to me. We're taking your calls at 888-825-5225. James is in Atlanta up next. Oh, what's up, guys? Hey, how y'all doing today? Doing great. Thank you for taking my call. I'm a big fan of the show. Thank you. How can we help? Yeah. Yeah, man. So, well, my question is really how can I get a mortgage? How can my wife and I get a mortgage when we don't have a credit score? So a little bit of background. I'm 29. My wife is 27. I left my W-2 job to start a business last year and my wife left her job to take care of our little one, our little son. And so, you know, we've been going through the process now of trying to get a loan. My income is going to be right at $250,000 this year. And, our net worth is, you know, a couple hundred grand. And right now, the brokers are telling us and the mortgage lenders are telling us we can't get a loan because we don't have credit cards and we don't really have any, a credit score. So we don't, we don't really have any debt to date. And so I'm trying to, I'm trying to figure out why I'm such a bad candidate for a mortgage when I feel like we're in a great financial position. So I would just love to get some advice. I love it, man. Well, you guys are crushing it. I'm so proud of you. Just hearing your numbers and your story is so impressive. How long have you been making this kind of money? It's been probably about the last two years, two and a half years. Fantastic. And just so you know, you're talking to two guys who've both got mortgages with indeterminate credit scores. So you just, you've been barking up the wrong tree, as they say. There are lenders that do this and the ones that don't do it act like you are an alien from a different planet. So they don't know what to do except follow the broken system that they know, which is, can I just put your information in and pop up a credit score to then grant you the loan? So what you're looking for is something, they call a no-score loan and it's a process called manual underwriting. Have you heard of that? I have heard of it. I don't know much about it. Okay. So what it does, you know, back in the day, I'm talking like 1987, they didn't have credit scores. So what you had to do was go to the bank and you had a relationship with that bank and they looked at all your numbers, your tax returns, your income, all of that, your utility bills. Can you pay your bills on time? And they would grant you the loan. So it's a similar process. They look for proof of payments. They're going to look for verification of interest. For you being self-employed, it's going to be even more important. So they're going to pull your tax returns. Do you guys rent right now? Yes, we rent. Do you have at least 12 months of documented on-time payments for rent? Absolutely. Great. Do you have 12-month history of checking and savings statements? Yeah, for sure. Do you have proof that you pay your phone bills and utility bills on time? Insurance payments on time? Of course. Ta-da! Do you have a solid down payment? Yes. Yeah, we have a good down payment. Ding, ding, ding. So if you do this on a 15-year fixed rate where the mortgage is no more than a quarter of your take-home pay, how much house can that buy you today or at the time you want to buy this house? Yeah, I mean, we should be able to get at least, you know, $300,000, $350,000 at that rate. Done. Amazing. How much do you have saved right now for the house just on its own without your emergency fund? So you're telling me I don't have to rent and take out more credit cards to get this loan? No. - If you just, I just gave you the actual checklist that they would walk you through you called up churchill mortgage today which are the people that we've recommend in the space because they specialize in these no score loans while other lenders and even real estate agents have no clue how to do this or they just don't and james listen to me i got a no score mortgage from churchill while sitting in this seat okay it's possible because i've done it it's not because john's special although he is very special it's just because they they're willing to go through the work and most lenders just don't want to do it because it is manual it's not automated through a credit score so as long as you check those boxes a lot of people call and say whoa i didn't know well yeah you need on-time rental history you need proof of income that's stable you need proof that you've paid other bills on time but as long as you have that and you choose a good fixed rate mortgage with a solid down payment you're going to be a great candidate for this great candidate should be able to get 40 or 50 000 to put down that's awesome man way to go yeah so call up churchill mortgage today and you'll be able to get 40 or 50 000 to put down that's awesome man way to go churchill and here's what they'll do they'll pre-approve you and that will get you through the process to where when you actually want to go buy that house it's going to be so much easier than starting from scratch so call them up or jump on churchillmortgage.com and get in touch with them man great question yeah good i'm inspired by him good for you for crushing it in your uh personal business man that's a way to get punished for just not playing a stupid game of a credit score where you pay off your debt and your score goes down that makes sense i think people are are on something as big as a home purchase especially if you're a home buyer especially for a first-time home buyer i think it's a shock to people not only about the credit score thing but it's a shock that nobody cares about you you are a number in an algorithm in a spreadsheet and if you don't meet if you meet this number here you go if you don't meet and it's like no no i'm a guy i'm clearly doing a great job i've got a good marriage i don't care what's that number i'm going to plug you into a formula and i don't know there it surprises me still that it's so it's a great thing to do and i'm going to plug you into a formula and i don't know it surprises me still that it's so it's behind the scenes even though the commercials have smiling people and they're all shaking your hand nobody they don't care they just want a number to plug into a number to plug into a number and my experience with churchill it's it's yes they're a sponsor of the show but my personal experience is they're real people and they listen to me and they say i need this form i need this piece of paper let me let me see this but they're great they work with me they're humans they treat me like a human so that's right i love it and a lot of people think well it's going to take me so much more time it's going to be so much more expensive and that's uh that's a bunch of hope blah because it's not true yeah it's really not that much work if you find someone who knows what they're doing and who will actually do it and treat you like a human and not a exactly not a number the other pushback i find funny is people they get mad at us because they go wait once you get a mortgage you're gonna have a credit score so what was the point and i'm going the point wasn't the goal of a zero credit score the point was to opt out of a broken financial system where you have to stay in debt and keep all of your credit accounts open to quote unquote win right so it's kind of like saying i'm gonna i'm gonna drive the speed limit well that police officer over there just gunned me yeah but that's between him and his like i'm not playing the game i'm not worried about getting a ticket because i'm you know i mean it's like somebody's going to be scoring you over here not they can knock their lights out i'm not gonna i'm not participating in that that's right and if you follow our plan you're going to pay off your mortgage early and then your credit score will soon disappear once again so that's what happened to me again and now i don't have to think about it i don't have to download a stupid app to keep up with my credit score to then get mad and confused as to what's going on and i'm like why it's going up or down it just doesn't matter and i still get great insurance rates people also complain about that john they say without a credit score you're not gonna be able to get a job i'm like no they're pulling your credit report when you get a job not your credit score and that's to make sure that you don't have a bankruptcy or you don't have bad debts because they don't want to take that on there's that's a risk for them so that's what they're looking for and so all the angles like well it's going to affect all these parts of your life i'm going it doesn't and i would love to have a candidate who's coming to work for me that if i happen to work for a place that pulled credit score because i'm going to put you in a in a in a in a job with high responsibility where i need to see if you can manage stuff and the the business decides to pull your credit report as part of their fact finding on that and i was to say hey you have a zero score tell me about that and the the candidate smiled and said yeah 10 years ago i decided i don't want anyone to tell me what to do financially and so i don't owe anybody any money oh yeah i would hire that guy on the spot that's right on the last one we get is renting an apartment and having actually done this multiple times with multiple apartments some of them corporate complexes some of them landlords all they really want to know is can you pay do you actually have the income and are you a criminal outside of that you might have a slightly higher deposit that you'll get back once you move out but it was such a nothing burger after everyone told me you'll never be able to live anywhere without a credit score you'll rue the day i'm alive to tell the tale guys hey guys dave ramsey here every day on the show we help people work through real money problems and figure out what to do next now you can get that same kind of help anytime with ask ramsey ask your money question and get answers built on ramsey principles we use on the show whether you're making a decision or just want something explained ask ramsey is here to help it's fast simple and free to use go to ramsey solutions.com and try ask ramsey today that's ramsey solutions.com if you found value in the conversations we're having today pass it along sharing the show is one of the biggest ways you can help us grow so hit the like button the share button text a link to a friend you never know who could this who this show could help we appreciate it sarah is in sacramento up next sarah welcome to the show hi thanks for having me absolutely how can i help um so my husband and i are on different pages about using our investment that we have in crypto to pay off our mortgage wow now he he does agree that he would like to use it eventually but he would like to wait for it because he believes it's going to grow exponentially and it's too volatile for me and so i would rather pay it off now and have some peace of mind and then how much does he have in bitcoin um enough to pay off our mortgage plus some wow so we're talking hundreds of thousands of dollars what did he pay for all that bitcoin um that's part of the issue is i don't know exactly what his base price was but he you know the tax hit that we'll get on it so um part of my question today was um because i don't know if him and i will get on the same page right now but if there's any um any strategies with uh the tax hit that we'll get is that what he's actually worried about um well he's worried about that and also he believes that it's going to keep growing um and so he'd rather wait for it to grow more so he has to sell off less then why would you ever sell it if it's going to in grow indefinitely because that means your tax bill is going to grow too i know i i i understand and i agree here's the so what is your what is your main goal here is your main goal to pay your house off or is your main goal to get out of that that's your that's your main goal that's well my yeah that's what i thought this was for to like um like if if we if we were successful at paying our house off with this investment that would meet like that would be sufficient for me okay so i i i think that's the place to start because bitcoin is the is the proxy war here it's the third rail and it's it what it's not really about the bitcoin it's not really about the tax strategy he has a thing that's not yours that he's not including you on that was y'all's and now it's become his and the thing beneath the thing is i want i want to not have a mortgage i want to feel safety and security in my home so if you need to keep this precious thing and by the way i own zero bitcoin not one shred and do i wish i could go back in time and buy a whole bunch at nothing of course i do and i also didn't get into beanie babies and nfts and all these other things you throw enough darts backwards one's gonna hit great and it could go up a five trillion percent and it could go to zero because it's always gonna have to be traded for actual money at some point right but that's neither here nor there i i have crypto friends i've got bitcoin friends and i don't have a lot of money and i don't have a lot of money and dude there is there's just that conversation is just a a ship that sailed the real conversation in your home is i want the peace and security of having a paid off home if you don't want to use this a we need to talk about our shared vision for what retirement looks like and our shared vision for the future but i want us to come up with a plan right now for how we're going to pay off the mortgage in one year two year five years ten years etc because that's going to force you both to the table and say, okay, we're going to take separate jobs. We're going to take extra jobs. We're going to have to knock on vacations whatever what how much sacrifice is he willing to make to hold on to this precious bitcoin thing right so at the current rate if you didn't sell any bitcoin how quickly are you guys going to pay off the house oh a long time so are you even making extra payments on the principal right now no and why is that is there no margin um we're paying off some other we're paying off um a car oh okay you got other consumer debt yeah so we have a little not much we have like twenty thousand dollars um that's a lot to a little guy like me but you guys are rolling okay so twenty thousand a car any other debt um no okay do you have an emergency fund um we have about five thousand in the bank otherwise everything else is wrapped up in crypto like no retirement his is his is in there mine is a pension okay let's use real numbers here how much do you have in crypto we're not going to come steal it i promise i wouldn't know how um like today's value might be 600 how much of your net worth is in crypto all of it oh sister i'm scared for you yeah dude i i know exactly this man is addicted to this this is greed at this point sell off sell off a piece of it to clear everything if this was a single stock in a company wouldn't it worry you yeah i yeah and companies actually produce something like revenue and products and services and stuff that's the scary part i'm not anti-crypto i'm not anti-bitcoin but it leads to situations like this which then makes me anti-bitcoin because people get so so much tunnel vision they put all of their eggs in that basket going you're an idiot if you don't believe in this like it's santa claus or something and so you guys need to have a whole different conversation this is not about paying off the house this is about legitimate safety and security and diversification yeah you're incredibly vulnerable i mean bitcoin went down like 50 in the last 12 months like it took a huge nosedive and it's recovered a little bit but that's frightening to have half your net worth disappeared because a bunch of dudes decided i'm a little spooked i know it might yeah it's it might yeah exactly my point so have you have you had the conversation i don't feel safe in this house um he knows that it that it's too volatile for me to stomach no no no that's not what i said have you looked at your husband across the table and said i'm scared for my safety i don't feel safe in this relationship because we are a hundred percent leveraged on a very speculative thing no okay let's don't let's clear as kind let's sit down and say i'm i'm scared and i want you to hear me say you're choosing to have a scared wife um over this this speculative thing you got right and that's like i need you to own that as my husband and as a as a husband if my wife comes and says she's scared about anything that it stopped the presses for me even if i don't agree with it if i there's no book man outside if she says i'm scared about what's outside you better believe i'm getting a flashlight and i'm going outside right yeah but don't don't don't tell yourself well he already knows or he be very clear because you got 600 grand i mean how much would clear your mortgage four four so plus your 20k car loan plus let's fill the emergency fund and so how much would we have to sell to make this happen 500 of the six well with capital gains you're about to get rid of all of it and he's unwilling to do that i don't think he's going to do any of this i think he's made up his mind that's tough he yeah for right now he has and that that but here here's the things here that's not going to change because if he makes more he's going to say see i told you so we have more and also it's going to be a bigger tax hit so let's just leave it alone so let's just leave it alone and then what and then if it goes down 50 again it's gonna be like you gotta write it out you can't retire off of this because you don't know what's going to happen with it and he refuses to sell any of it is he still buying more no okay no what's your household income um take home is 170 a year fantastic do you guys have kids yeah we have three and you're both working full-time correct okay yeah i hate this for you because you'll have a free card i know you'll have one yeah this is some golden handcuffs if i've ever seen them yeah it's just you are so close to security and safety that it just boggles my mind but again i i think there is a level of selfishness and greed that comes along with anything this speculative anything that's done this well in a short period of time that i don't know that a conversation is going to convince him you might need a third party you might need to go to some counseling to get to the bottom of it but this conversation is not about bitcoin well that's what i say like if if it's about i'm i need and you're withholding that from me and he says i don't care that's that's the the foundational problem that's the smoking gun you listen your home is your most expensive asset and now you're ready to sell fast and for a lot of money but in this wackadoodle real estate market one mistake could cost you tens of thousands of dollars this ain't amateur hour you need a pro in your corner someone who knows how to price your home right market it well and negotiate the best deal that's where a ramsey trusted real estate agent comes in to find one near you go to ramsey solutions.com slash agent that's ramsey solutions.com slash agent everyone needs insurance but it can be hard trying to find pros who aren't just looking to make a buck and agents who know their stuff but ramsey trusted insurance pros are vetted and coached to make sure they're market experts who have your best interest in mind and they're not just looking to make a buck interest at heart so go to ramsey solutions.com slash coverage to find the type of insurance you're looking for and connect with a ramsey trusted agent alonzo is in chicago up next what's going on alonzo good afternoon you guys how you doing we're doing great what's up man uh okay um i was reaching out because i'm currently a college student i'm 19 years old and uh my first year of college i decided i wanted to start a business and i started selling cologne and perfume and i made enough money for me to uh well i made enough money thinking i could buy a new car which is what i did unfortunately i fell into that i succumbed to that oh i deserve it um i heard you mentioned the previous video like no like just keep grinding and uh i bought a new car right now the car payment is about 759 dollars per month the insurance is 180 um and then uh my phone bill so my every month expense is a hundred one thousand dollars and uh one thousand and eleven dollars i'm currently in the space where i'm trying to figure out whether i should continuously pay this or voluntarily give the car up i did complete baby step one i use the car every day for door dash and landscaping and also still do my perfume business here in college but it's causing a lot of stress yeah um because i have that feeling where i have to work every single day on top of a full-time you know college student so like it's kind of it's a little bit stressful and i'm trying to figure out whether i should continue down this road or pivot now and you know pursue something else yeah so dude a i'm so glad you're recognizing this at 19 i didn't recognize this till i was way older than you so you're you're ahead of the game just knowing like oh i don't ever want to be in this situation again and uh stress is real man i've i've made dumb car purchases too so i'm glad you're here um i took it to a dealership uh they overcharged me about five thousand dollars on the car because i was young and moving fast so he said uh i'm about five thousand dollars in negative equity he said they were willing to give me about twenty thousand dollars for the car is this the same dealership you bought it from no this was a uh same uh honda but not the same dealership bill so if you if you're if a dealer is telling you you're five under my guess is you you could sell it on facebook marketplace and and basically walk away even because have you looked up the private party value if you go to dealerships are going to lowball you every time because they got to make their profit so if you go to kelly blue book and look at personal sale and you're a hustler you know how to you know how to sell dude that's what you do for a living so you're good at this i can almost guarantee if they're if they're just telling you you're five under you can get real close if not even steven get somebody to buy this car from you take it off it but i know you do and you can walk away man okay so you said kelly blue book i haven't heard kbb.com it's it's it's basically the the the one publication that everyone goes to for the price of a used car a new car and it's got it's got little meter on it that says like what kind of condition is the car in and it has a dealer trade-in value a dealer for sale value but also has a private sale value and that's the one you want because you're gonna get more for it but it's also more hassle because you got to sell it yourself instead of just dropping it off of the dealership but your best way out of this is not a repo whether it's voluntary or involuntary because here's what happens alonzo they're not just gonna get you out of the loan you're gonna be on the hook for the difference it's called a deficiency balance they're gonna go sell that car at auction for ten thousand dollars and you're still gonna be on the hook for the other ten so it doesn't actually solve your problems what would solve it is coming up with the difference so whether that's your savings or even a personal loan from a credit union if you can come up with the difference to clear the title and get rid of that car you're gonna be on the hook for the difference so that'll free up that payment the insurance and get you breathing again and if you listen to the show very much or seen our videos you know that we are like one of our main reasons for existing is helping people get out of debt but i'm okay if you go down to a local credit union and show them how hard you're working all this and let's say you are able to find a buyer for 24 and you owe 25 for getting a small loan for a thousand bucks the difference plus three thousand dollars so you can buy yourself dude just an embarrassment sophomore in college car to get you to and from and always worried it's going to break down on you and now you've got four thousand dollars to pay off and you can hustle up some business because you you don't mind grinding you you can do that and be out of this thing in no time could you get by without a car for now uh definitely uh oh cool that's even better i definitely can i do use it like i don't really use it for personal use you're using it to make money to pay the payment you're using it to make money to pay the payment you're using it to make money to pay the payment exactly which is insane as it sounds right who's the lender who do you owe the loan to so i owe the loan to executor okay i want to ask a question because uh i know you said to sell it so i put about 22 000 miles on it it's and i just got it that's great that's nothing okay that's i mean that's basically a new car that's great man and it's a honda you said it's a honda i made sure to get um you know oil change and everything oh man yeah the honda with 22 000 miles is a brand new honda that car is going to last for somebody and great resale value on those cars great resale value so you got this man you got the work ethic please don't let it repo keep making the payments keep up with the payments no matter what it takes but the goal is come up with the difference that's owed and then you can sell this thing outright you go to kbb.com and alonzo can we make a commitment together yes definitely like i hear promise in you okay i don't know a lot of 19 year olds that are going to school full-time and also working multiple side hustles and the stress you feel opening your eyes before you feed yourself before you clothe yourself you owe the world a thousand plus bucks a month right that's a that's stress let's make a commitment now you're too valuable to the world that my kids are inheriting okay i need guys like you out there grinding pushing and changing the world for the better make a commitment now i will never be owned by somebody else again i'm never going to buy you a car borrow money again i would never be on i'm laying this down by the way but i would never ever ever in this world be owned by somebody else there you go because essentially like you said it's not about the money it's about the time that's it and the peace man you're 19 and i know this isn't cool to say i want you to enjoy college too right exactly right i want you to be able to go on a date and not be having to work seven jobs to pay for the car that's just get you more jobs right exactly yeah get on kbb just get that thing sold man and if you have to borrow a tiny amount of money from a local credit union to uh to cover the the difference between what you owe and what they're going to pay you great and get that thing paid off asap and and you be in the control of your life for the rest of your life it's good it's an honor to talk to you brother i appreciate you guys much and please keep doing what you guys are doing and i'll be probably listening to this show later on today that's awesome man can i also ask who's buying i'm just most impressed that you're able to sell perfume and cologne in 2026 man-to-man dude he's on college campus those guys smell terrible they don't bathe best place on earth i came down here and struck a gold mine yes it's about how you pitch it to the people and do you buy it like wholesale and it's just sitting in the trunk of your car or do you make it in your bathtub no you know it's so crazy i have a strategic method of marketing so i have like a bandana it looks like a army of bullets but it's not people get confused all the time uh and they be like bro what is that on your car and they be like bro what is that on your car and they be like on your chest and that's how i get them most of the times i walk around like oh you got like a visual cue that gets them talking and now you got a conversation starter i agree dude you're gonna crush in sales alonzo i don't know what you're in school for but you may want to just drop out and go full-time sales man you got it and yeah george few places where you're gonna find more people in one area that don't bathe regularly than yeah in a in a dude's dorm desperately looking for a date yes and now alonzo's smelling good over here here they're going what are you wearing dude exactly well and they're ready to move away from ax body spray or whatever to cologne that's what's up what's your favorite alonzo before we go give us your best cologne right now what's the one that's in the best cologne is kenneth cole black all right never go wrong listen that's from a cool guy john so now i know what to go by here's what's so funny i can almost guarantee between breaks george is going to be online buying kenneth your boy's going to be googling i might buy from alonzo at this point i feel like he deserves the mail way to go man you got this call us back if you need anything else people ask me all the time george what's your number one money saving hack i'm glad you asked nothing makes me happier than helping another frugal friend so here's the hack get on a budget seriously how are you supposed to save money if you don't know how much you're spending in the first place and that's what makes the every dollar budgeting app a game changer with every dollar you'll get a clear picture of your spending and from there it's easy to see where you can get more intentional cut back and save more money how much money do you want to save in the first place money are we talking well the average every dollar budgeter frees up 395 dollars in their very first budget and if you ask me i think you're way above average so why are you still listening to me go download every dollar for free and start saving more money right now so our scripture and of the day we've got ecclesiastes 5 verses 4 and 5 when you make a vow to god do not delay to fulfill it he has no pleasure in fools fulfill your vow it is not better it is better to not make a vow than to make one and not fulfill it mark twain said never argue with stupid people they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience that's awesome that's good that's a good one grace is in detroit up next grace welcome to the ramsey show hi thank you for having me so my fiance and i have been engaged for four years and we have two children and we are trying to navigate through paying off our individual debts and keeping things separate until we're married while also trying to handle medical expenses for one of our children and saving for a wedding so i'm looking for some advice on how we can work through the current debt and our financial responsibilities while also paying for a debt-free future when we also have some financial distrust involved in our relationship holy moly that's a lot going on tell me about the financial distrust yeah so about three years ago i discovered that my fiance had accumulated almost twenty thousand dollars of debt from a period of time that he was off of work um the field that he's in sometimes has influxes and thankfully he's moved on from that job but um that really caused like a huge amount of distrust in our relationship when it comes to the financial security of our future sure um so we spent a lot of time working through that almost two years actually where we got to a point where you know bills were being paid on time we felt like we were establishing a savings again um i got a little lax in some of the accountability on the financial side um and then i actually found out about six months ago that he had gotten into gambling um and some of those debt payments on his side had kind of gone to the side because he had started gambling with the extra money that he had and he had gotten into gambling with the money that he had um so we're kind of facing just this you know additional lack of trust that i thought we had resolved um and i'm thankful that there's transparency now but it doesn't necessarily take away the hurt that comes from that that distrust that happened again um so the words the words i use here grace i'll own them is financial infidelity okay he's cheated on you twice yeah and this time um it wasn't just scramble into cover debts and pay for dinners with credit cards this time he went a professional route right all right and so i don't want you to gloss over like it shakes the foundation of your relationship yeah 100 all right and so getting on the same page with money here that to me is a like if you're looking at a picture of an iceberg floating in the water that's above water below water you have to ask yourself about are you with somebody have you have you created humans with somebody that simply is more interested in doing what they want to do when they want to do it or dealing with their own demons and not interested in building a life with you because it sounds like like even the words you use like i i got lax in my accountability you're not his mom you're his you're his fiancee yeah right and and he's his not making bad decisions is not your fault because you weren't checking every every you know every balance statement and every you know i mean like you have to have somebody you can anchor into yeah and so i i mean i'm i'm worried about tell me about being engaged for four years yeah so um that actually is one of the biggest reasons uh that the engagement has lasted so long um so i found out about the debt about a year and a half after we got engaged initially um and that was just like way too big of a setback for me to be like yes let's move forward let's continue planning at that point you know we have to do this and that's what i'm hadn't even gotten to the point of selecting a venue or any of the vendors for a wedding. So that was like our biggest setback. And the other thing that really contributes to that is one of our kids has a pretty complex medical diagnosis. And so just the emotional side of that, a lot of our time and attention has gone towards our child's care. So it's kind of just been put on the back burner, which I hate to say, but the wedding and getting married, for us, it was just like, how do you come up with enough money or planning or emotional capacity to even think about getting married when you have so many other things that you're also trying to juggle? And then obviously the distrust added onto that. I mean, you're talking about marriage as though it is the party, as though it is a celebration. And that's different than I want legal protection for me and my children. And if you say you're in to the point that we've made a couple of kids, then let's go to the courthouse. We'll have a party later. We can't afford a party right now. Great. That's jillions of couples take that route. That's all good. Or we're going to have a tiny little ceremony with some friends. I've married somebody in my yard, right? Like you can do it. Man, I don't want to pile up on this guy because he's not on the phone. I don't like talking about people when they're on the phone, but how dare you take borrowed money and go gambling with it when you have a special needs kid that you're trying to get married to? Right. Right. And if you're my daughter, if you're my sister, I would tell you to run from this guy. And I know that's easier said than done because you've got kids with him. But how dare you do that? Forget him not honoring his fiance. You have a special needs kid. What are you doing? Yeah. Yeah. I do. And I think that's where a lot of my anger around it comes from. I think that's where a lot of my anger around it comes from. I think that's where a lot of is like not necessarily the betrayal to me, which obviously hurts, but it's like I've as a mom always worked to protect my kids. And one of my kids is actually from a prior relationship when I was young. And so it almost hurts more also because that was a position he chose to step into. He chose to step into a parent position before we even had our child together. So it almost feels like kind of a double slap in the face. Totally. But also- Man, you and I could talk for two hours on this. Here's the thing. I don't think your challenge right now is getting on the same page financially. The challenge for you is do I want to continue to pursue a long-term relationship with somebody that is willing to lie to my face, put me and my special needs kids at risk, and who is then going to take that and add to it the potential for addiction that George and I see are destroying men's lives and families all over this country in real time. Yeah. So we're not at the, hey, how do we budget together? We're at the, you have to do some soul searching and say, I'm going to call this thing. Or here is the 100% ironclad path for you to regain trust with me and for what this is going to look like going forward. And I can't be your mom and I'm not going to be your accountant. I'm going to be your partner in this thing. Otherwise, otherwise, you know what I mean? It's never going to work out that way. Yeah. Where is he at with the gambling addiction? Yeah. So after he had come clean about it, because actually he came to me and said like, hey, this is weighing on me really heavy, which was a really big step for him. He, we together sat down and ended up blocking him from like all of the sites. There's the way you can go in where if you re-enable it, you have to wait a year before you start depositing money. So it was all like online gambling. Has he gone to Gamblers Anonymous? Yeah. Is he seeking treatment? So that is something that he's working on. He's been doing it for a long time. And there's a service that his employer offers that he's doing for that. So yeah, he got to a point where, you know, he admitted that it was a problem. He recognizes that it's an addiction. But I, I, yeah, it's like the step after that I think I'm struggling with because, you know, I very much am the type of person that doesn't want to stay in a relationship. That's very unhealthy for me. That could impact, you know, my financial security in the future. You say that, you say that, and I say this with all love in my heart, you say that as a declaration, but you've done it for five years. Right. Yeah. I hear you. And so you're the one that has to look in the mirror and say, what am I worth? What's the safety of my kids worth? And what's the path to that worth? Yeah. And then if, if you want to, if this guy's all dude, I wouldn't, I wouldn't do this job if I didn't believe in redemption. I wouldn't. Right. I believe I've sat with people who've changed everything and it's why I do this job. But man, oh man, oh man. Yeah. You're in a vulnerable, vulnerable spot and you know that you wouldn't be calling, um, right now it's keeping the finances separate. You attack your debts, make sure all the bills are paid, make sure the kids are okay. And make sure, I mean, to the best of your ability that he's, he's doing what he says he's doing, right? That's all you can do right now until you guys get to the point where you can tackle finances and goals and life together and continue to give him a clear path about what earning trust looks like. That puts this hour of the Ramsey show in the books. Remember there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.