[MUSIC] Brought to you by the Every Dollar App, start budgeting for free today. [MUSIC] >> Normal is broken, common sense is weird, so we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Network and the Fairwinds Credit in your studio, this is The Ramsey Show. I'm Dave Ramsey, Jade Washall, number one best selling off the Ramsey Personality is my co-host today. Chris is in Phoenix, hey, Chris, how are you? >> I'm doing good. >> Better than I deserve, what's up? >> Hey, so I'm in a good deep situation, so it's kind of a serious thing with me and my family right now. So I have a mother, single mother, I have three other siblings. We are from Wisconsin, and my mom, she does pretty good financially. She's a doctor, but she wanted all of us to go to college. With us going to college, she took out multiple parent plus loans in order for us to go to school. She moved us out to Arizona, so she kind of took care of us, paid for my rent for two years, while in school, graduated, now I'm in a good financial position. My mom is in Arizona and she want to purchase a $800,000 home. They won't let her purchase the home because of her debt to income ratio from the parent plus loans that she took out for us in my siblings. I'm kind of the more financially responsible one, so she asked me if I could be a co-signer on her $800,000 mortgage. Keep in mind, I'm only 22 years old, I have my own place, I have my own car, I don't really have much debt outside of the parent plus loans that I'm helping my mom with, but she's kind of guilt tripping me and saying, "Hey, out of everything I did for you, this is the least that you can do for me." So it's kind of a fight with the family at $800,000 mortgage that I'm scared to co-sign because one, I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to get off of it. And two, I don't. My mom is pretty smart, like, she's not like bad financially. Well, there's something really important here that can easily be missed, which is just because something turned out okay, doesn't mean there wasn't a mistake attached to it, right? You guys ended up in college and you guys are okay, but there was still a mistake that she made in co-signing all those loans. Otherwise, she would be able to buy her house no problem and there would be no debt to an income ratio issue. So you've got to go to her and say, "Here's the thing, Mom, I thank you for everything you've done for me, but co-signing is not a good thing." And the same way that you're having problems because you co-signed, if I co-signed for you, I'm signing up for the same set of problems. I'd rather do this and I'd rather you find a way to do this in a way that there's no mistake attached to it. Agreed. Got him. Yeah, but she's not going to accept that because she's already gone into throughout travel, like real trip modes, but so bad. So let me ask you, how much parent plus loans did she take out in total? Do you have any idea? For me, all four of my siblings probably around $200,000. Okay. And you said she's a doctor. She's a doctor. And what does she make? She probably makes around that. I would say $1.60. Okay. All right. So I'm going to gift her a total money makeover book from me. And a year's subscription to the every dollar app and suggest that she decide starting today that she become financially responsible for the first time in her life, because what she did was very irresponsible. It was stupid, okay? What she did was stupid. It was of good heart and she was intending good things and she was putting herself on the line for her children, which sounds like a good warrior, princess, single mom. I appreciate all of that. But then to turn around and ask a 22 year old to help you buy a million dollar house. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, lady. Right. That's ridiculous. Okay. Right. And as a dad of children that are grown, they're not children anymore, adults, generation two that are responsible. I would never do that to people that I love. And it's just wrong. Okay. So no, you don't get to buy a house because instead you chose Dr. Lady to go into debt to send your kids to school. I don't agree with your decision. I agree with your motives. Your motive was sweet and kind and noble, but your decision was stupid. And now you have to work your way out of stupid so you can buy a house. So for the next two years, you get to live on 60,000 and put 100,000 on 200,000 dollars worth of student loans for two years and they go away. Boom. And then you have a life instead of screwing up your own kids' life that you set out to help originally. Now you want to screw it up. So that's my message to her. You can play this for her. Quick guilt trip in your kids. Pick it up, buttercup and clean up your mess and instead of dumping it on your 22 year old. Yeah, that's right. Now I love you mom. I'm happy for what you did, but that's my message to you from an old grandpa to assume to be hopefully old grandma. And you clean up this mess and then you don't saddle your own children with this. And so here's what's going to happen though, Chris. Okay. She's not going to do any of that probably. And she's probably not going to accept your know. She's probably going to. You're going to feel blamed. She's going to blame you. Yeah. She's going to be mean. She's going to be nasty and she's going to get her feelings hurt because boundaryless people when you put up a boundary always resist the boundary 100% of the time. Well, and she's saddling her responsibility in the deal on you. Yeah. You didn't sign up for this. She did. You didn't ask her to. She did. So you're set free, my brother, do not do this, whatever you do. But also do not expect it to come without consequences of her whining and rolling around in the floor, foaming at the mouth or whatever she's going to do. Okay. Right. And my siblings are also. It's like a whole family thing. Well, I'll tell your siblings to bite it. You know, they don't get a vote anymore. You're like a free 22 year old man that gets to do what he wants to do with his life. You are not required to do this. And your siblings, by the way, are irresponsible to hello, which also nullifies their vote. But here's the other part of this. You're young and the more that you establish your boundaries in this way and the more that you draw online in the sand and say, I'm not going to participate in behaviors that I know are stupid choices financially over time, the less you'll be pulled into that orbit of stupidity. Here's what you're, here's the message you're delivering while you're doing this and you don't even mean to them and didn't the consequences. Your siblings' wife now knows she can't call you for money because Chris has got one big answer. It's that magic ancient word. It sets you free. No. No one says the word anymore. It's ancient. It's a sound that has disappeared from our culture. You're not allowed to say it anymore. But I've taught people all the time. Be defiant, not compliant. The answer is no. You press your tongue towards the roof of your mouth. You release, make a kissing motion. Yes. No. That's how it looks. It's how it sounds. It's an interesting word. We don't hear it much anymore. You're not allowed to say it to people because you're, you get, you get labeled at least things and you say, no. That's foolish. No. That's wrong. No. That violates my ethics and my values. No. I'm not going to do that. No. That's not helpful. No. At the end of this story, we'll all be pissed if we do this. So no. Because that's what's going to happen. You're going to get married and have a kid and you're not going to be able to buy a house because your co-sign to your mother who's still going to be chained to parent plus loans in a $800,000 mortgage and can't get you off because she can't refinance it. And then probably the house is going to get run down and can't even get sold because she can't keep it up because this is a pattern, dude. This is what's, you know, there's nothing good going to come of this. These endure the pain of everyone not liking your answer because 10 years from now, they'll be happy you answered this way. The kids call it standing on business. Oh, there you go. Yes, stand on business. All right. There we go. What's the one that Deloni says he says except regret more than art? Oh, boy. I'm not going to get it. I can't make it come to my head either, but it's perfect for this. Yes. 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How old are you guys? I'm 34, new 35. Okay. All right. And we are very blessed to be financially stable. I pay my phone bill from our joint checking account. It's prepaid. It's great. He and his three siblings, they are still on his parents phone bill that his parents pay. Oh, that's sweet. He says if it's not broke, don't fix it. It's broke. It's broke. You're a 35 year old man. You should have been off your cell phone, but your parents' cell phone plan 10 years ago. Yeah. Yeah. You should make fun of him at length. Okay. This is exactly what I thought. His mummy fold his underwear too. No, surprisingly not. This is the only thing that I just think it's crazy and he thinks it's normal. No, it's not normal. It's not normal. It's more normal than it should be, but normal kind of sucks in our culture. We've gotten people all confused about, you know, we got 35 years living in their mother's basement still playing, you know, call of duty because they've never actually figured out what duty is. And so, um, yes, crazy. So he probably, he hasn't paid the bill in 15 or 20 years. He's never paid the bill. So he probably wasn't even thinking about it. Let's be fair. He probably wasn't even thinking about it. Then you brought it up. That was his opportunity to go, you know what? I forgot about this. You're right. I shouldn't believe it. I'm like a grown man and stuff now. I should pay my own bills and stuff now. Yes. Because that's what adults do and stuff now. Wow. Yeah, it wasn't. That's fun. Yes, we should all make fun of him. On behalf of all of the 35-year-old mama's boys out there, we should make fun of him mercilessly mercilessly. Yeah, you win, Lucy. You win. Touchdown. That's funny. Uh, it is very funny and it's cute and, you know, we'll have some fun with it. But it does bring up something that, I mean, we did a show yesterday on real estate. And the number of single ladies buying a home is now three times the percentage of single men buying a home for the first time in history. Which is interesting because women tend to earn less dollars. In general, yes, not always. But they also tend to want to make a quote home. So to speak a nest. But what we're seeing is that we've got the numbers vary depending on who you read and who you believe. But somewhere between 40 and almost 50% of the male, single males under 30 are living at home still. Well, this goes back to a lot of the content that you were talking about earlier in the year because there's data that's attributed to that, right? Yeah. Well, it's the, you know, there's a couple of things. A couple of things we're seeing that are causing that. Those guys are not, they don't feel like they are winning in the marketplace for various reasons. And so they are further trapping themselves by being the generation that has sold their soul to draft kings. The sports betting is through the roof and that and it's killing them. They're losing like hand over fist. They've made sports. They've made, you know, draft kings and whoever else just unbelievably billions of dollars in a very short period of time. And that's where the crypto bros live. Because they're swinging for the fence. They don't think they could hit a single and get on base. So everything they do is a desperate move. It's a bet on a football game or a bet on crypto. And that's the only thing you're going to get me out because I can't do slow and steady. It doesn't work for me. I'm too scared. I'm too stuck. I'm too whatever. And I blame mom and dad. Because, you know, in my 20s, there were times as I got married at 22. But in my 20s and college and as a young married person, there were times I was terrified. But it was really good for me. A lot of wonderful things happen out of a healthy desperation. Because I knew if I didn't do it, it wasn't going to get done. Well, that's what I was going to ask. Do you think it's a low expectation of, hey, it's not even we don't even expect you to do this. Or do you think the expectation is scaring them? And it's like, hey, I don't think I can meet this. I'm not even going to try. Well, it goes all the way back to early childhood. Teach your children to do hard things. Yeah. And then at some age, early 20s at the latest, like when you come home from college, you can't come home. Be a man, my son. Oh, yeah. Get a place to live. Moms and dads are not doing a 28 year old favors when they're spending their evenings on bingeing Netflix. They're betting on sports with draft kings. They're buying crypto. And they're excellent at video games. You have done them no favors. You're a child abuser. Because who wants to date that guy? And that's the problem. Who's the problem? Who? What father wants his daughter dating that guy? What? Daddy, he's a dreamer. Oh, God, they're going to live in the basement. You know, I want to see that you can go out and make a life before you add me to your life. You know what I'm saying? Like, I want to see that. I want to see it happen. I want to see that you can get a place. The addiction here is the only place the success comes before work. Everywhere else work comes before success. And so it, you know, moms and dads, an eagle that is not kicked out of the nest pretty quickly becomes a turkey. And so we need to kick the little eglitz out and let them have some terror. Oh, it sits, it's hard out there. It is not hard out there compared to when you did it, moms and dads. It's the easiest and best time in the history of the world right now. The stock market's freaking booming. Jobs are everywhere. Now, not $150,000 are your jobs who people who got a degree in left handed puppetry to follow their passion. No, people who actually are working at things that the society needs. It's out there. And if it's not, give them a lot more. Run down to home depot by a leaf blower. Rich people are afraid of leaves. You've got a job instantly. Instantly. It's the sound of success. Shacks. You know, get it. Maybe get it. So the whosification of America is beyond belief. We have killed a generation of young men by not teaching them how to throw their shoulders back, lean into the harness and pull something. Now does that sound like a bad joke? I don't care. I'm observing the socio-economic data. I'm also talking to the young women who wish there were some more men out there that they could date instead of a mama's boy living in their mother's basement. And it's just ridiculous, you guys. It's out of control. And I got to tell you, I got a whole bunch of good ones. It's not the entire generation. We've got 750 in their 20s working at Ramsey right now. And they're incredible. Their eyes are shining. They're passionate. They're talented. And they can balance a checkbook. And they can pay their own light bill and buy their own milk. And you know, this is a, I mean, Lucy's calls fun and we couldn't have fun and joke around with her about winning her argument. And yes, you need to get off cell phone bill. But it kind of points to this whole other rant. Yeah, it does. The whole other issue that we're running into. It's affecting the housing market. Okay. So twice as many women, single, 30-year-olds are buying homes as men, 30-year-olds. First time in history. Why? I don't know. Other than they're maturing emotionally, relationally faster. I don't know. They don't want to wait on someone else to, if they're waiting, they're waiting, waiting on, uh, you know, don't look. What is it? The night? Yeah, and shining armor. Shining armor. Thank you. Because his armor is pretty tarnished because he's been playing video games all day. He needs some WD 40. He needs to get him a little stainless steel rubbed that armor on that. Callie, you guys, come on.
The great news is for you young men that will decide you want to shoulder up, you're going to be so rare that you're going to have your pick of the litter, baby. I mean, you got a guy that works and pays his own bills and is walking around in his kind and gentle and has integrity, you can have anything you want out there, man. I'm all about practical ways to save time and mental energy, especially during the summer when life gets busy. Between vacations, camps, deliveries, travel plans, online shopping, and trying to keep everyone organized, my mental load can get pretty full. It's one of the reasons why I love "delete me." Most people don't realize how many data broker sites have their information online, like old addresses, phone numbers, and even family connections. And that can put you at risk of being a target for spammers and scammers. But removing all of it yourself can turn into a giant project. That's why "delete me" is amazing because "delete me" handles it for you. Their privacy team of experts removes your personal information from hundreds of data broker sites and they keep monitoring it throughout the year. So far, "delete me" has saved me about 90 hours. I would have spent myself removing my information. And honestly, it feels so good knowing that someone is in the background helping me, and I don't even have to think about it. So this summer, give yourself a vacation with one less thing to manage. Get 20% off annual plans at joinseleteme.com/ramsy. That's joinseleteme.com/ramsy. Scott is in Chicago. Hey Scott, how are you? What's up, sir? How are you doing today? Better than I deserve. What's up? So, as a travel tech, it's really hard to stay on a budget as far as food and staying with decent nutrition. What do you recommend? I'm sorry. The nutrition is the problem, or just the impulse influence. So, it's really, I'm not at home except for two days out of the month, three days out of the month. So, when it comes to homemade meals, stuff that has good, and it's actually good for you, and it doesn't cost an arm in the leg, that's what I'm really struggling when it comes. I'm on baby stuff number two. I'm under 10 grand left in debt. There's kind of two questions built in if I'm understanding. Number one is how do I not go over my allocated amount that I have to spend? And number two is how do I literally physically create food that's acceptable for a human being to eat while you're on the road, which that's really hard, but Jake could help us with that. Yeah. What is your budget? How much do you, can you spend a week? 40 is what my per dem is. That's odd. You have a per dem. That's wonderful. Yeah. Well, that's wonderful. And you also, because that, you know, that's plenty, I think, for one human being. And then the other thousand dollars a month. Yeah. If you can't do that, we got. We got other problems. 200 for 200. 200 for 240. Sorry. For the month or the week, for the week, 240 times three times four is a thousand. Yeah. It's a lot of money. Yeah. Okay. I would take most of that and put it towards the death, though. Okay. So you've cut it down. There's the problem. Okay. So how can we eat for $240 a week or less healthy on the road, Jake? Yeah. I think you need to find healthy meals that are already prepared. If your hotel room doesn't have a little kitchenette where you can do some things on your own, then you're going to the grocery store and you're going to the deli area and you're picking up salads and you're picking up grilled chicken and you're picking up grilled tofu and you're picking up things that were made fresh that day. You're not filled with all. You're not going to. You're not going to. You're not going to pick up tofu on purpose. I've done it before. Oh. That's pretty scary. But my point is you're not going to pick up. You're not going through McDonald's. You're not going to Sonic. No. You're not going through the drive through. You can do something just as quickly. You're just popping in the grocery store, picking up something that's pre-made. What would keep you from doing that and what has kept you from doing that as a question? Because I think you know that, right? What I said is not. Yeah, I work a minimum of 10 hours a day, often goes to the 14-hour day. That's kind of where going to the grocery store is kind of like, are you saying it's closed by the time you get there? Is that the problem? It's something not always, but also it's like by the time I get done my last job, the closest grocery store is like a 30-minute-old way. Okay. So here's what I hear. There's what I hear is there's pre-planning that needs to happen. So what's happening is the time is happening to you. You haven't thought about it at all and it's time to leave work and you're like, oh crap, it's eight o'clock, what's open and now you're having to solve the problem on the fly. What I would suggest is solving the problem ahead of time and saying, here's what my rhythm has to be. I have to go to the grocery store on X-Day and I grab five meals and I keep them in the refrigerator in the hotel or I keep them in my cooler. That's refrigerated in my car and you just solve it ahead of time. This is just a pre-planning thing. I don't think it's a money thing, I don't even think that it's a, you don't know what choices are available to you. I truly think it's just a getting ahead of it and planning ahead because how long do you spend in each city or in each location? Normally a week to two weeks and then they kind of give me different regions in that area. So you take your flight in and you're flying on Sunday usually? Oh, I drive. I have a work truck because I have tools and I'm a fiber technician. Oh cool. Even better. Even better. Okay. So you're scheduled to get there two hours earlier than you used to on the first day and you go the grocery store and you go the grocery store and you load your cooler for the week. With things you're going to make when you get back to the hotel room. That's the only thing you can do. That's what I can do. Because otherwise, you know, if you and you can take your lunch with you during the day, go up in the morning, make you a lunch, take it with you, we've all done that just about. Always. How old are you? I'm turning 30 this year and I'm going to get free by 30. Good for you. Well done. I'm proud of you. You're killing it, man. It's a great question by the way. Yes. When my husband and I, we used to do musical tours around the United States and sometimes a tour could be 14 or 21 days. So that's what you do and you could be in a different city each day and so that's what we had to do but our hotel was kind of in a central point and so we would. We'd go to Whole Foods or we'd go to Publix, load up on the things we want. Just like Dave said, some things would be quick and prepared that we can just pull out of the refrigerator and heat up and other things because we had a kitchenette. We could go in and say, okay, well, I am going to go ahead and grill this piece of tofu or I am going to go ahead and slice up this salad myself and that it truly is just getting ahead of it and that's all there is to it. So pre-planning in detail helps you do two things. One is it keeps the thing from happening to you. You're happening to it. You're being proactive in terms of the nutrition and the food selection and you don't ever see the inside of a restaurant with what we're laying out and you're going to spend less money. You're going to spend a lot of money and you're going to get the stuff from nutrition and health standpoint that you're actually looking for there and you'll learn about that. Maybe that you like, you know, like I think probably one of the best things on the planet is ripe tomato personally because I'm from the south. Tomato sandwich? And I'm just saying. So if it was me and if it was my wife too, we would probably figure out where the closest farmer's market was to where I'm getting ready to go to work for two weeks and I'd probably hit that puppy on Sunday afternoon and load the veggies up, the fresh veggies like that and my mouth is water. I was going to say, what's I need to know? I don't make any. No, what's your go to meal? If Sharon said Dave, it's on you tonight, what are you making? We would starve. Reservations. Not even a steak. Not even a steak on the grill. Oh, okay. I can throw a filet on the grill. Okay. I can throw a hamburger on the grill. I'm really good at a, yeah, that's it. I believe that. I believe it. I believe it. I'm lame. But I'm really good at washing dishes. That's good. You got to do one or the other. With that, but I'm not completely a couch slug. I don't mean that, but, yeah. But you bring up a good point because there are a lot of jobs that over the road truckers. You have to be careful. You can't sacrifice. You'll end up very unhealthy if you live on fast food. I mean, what was the super size of me? You remember them again? Well, yes. I do remember that. Documentary. I cannot eat a big Mac because of that guy. That guy passed away. You do? Yes, he did. You're right. Oh, that's awful. I shouldn't laugh. But yeah, it's the irony of it. Oh, man. I mean, we all saw it. Yeah. But it's true. That was about 25 years ago or something. Poor McDonald's. It killed their sales. Even. Let me take it around this way. Even in baby step two.
when you are sacrificing everything, which you should, you should be sacrificing, cutting everything down as much as it can. However, I'll be the first to tell you. Number one, beans and rice, rice and beans is not literal. If you like rice and beans, you should eat it. But Dave, people think it's literal. - It's an example. - I know, they send me cookbooks. - They think it's only beans and rice. - I get at least two rice and beans, cookbooks in a month. - But let me just say for the people. - Thank you, people. We thank you. But it just means guys, cut it back. If you can, a grilled cheese sandwich is fine. You can have grilled cheese. You can have a peanut butter sandwich. You can have, God forbid, a tuna fish sandwich. But the point is, you're cutting back. It's not an excuse to eat fast food, to eat the cheapest thing, to eat the crappiest thing your health matters to. And you can eat healthy food very inexpensive. - If you follow Jade's Instagram, you put up a bunch of good stuff on that. - I do sometimes, I do, from time to time. - And you're quite the cook as opposite of me. - I do. - You're very, and you like it. - I love it. - You enjoy it. - I do. And for the people who don't enjoy it to struggle, 'cause they're the ones that wanna, you know, it's tough. - Well, what I wanna do is do something efficient and really good food is not efficient. - Right. - I mean, I'm not talking about nutritional food. I'm talking about gourmet for-- - Gourmet. - It's ridiculous amount of time to create that one bite. - Uh-huh. - Yeah. - Yep, that's why they can charge for it. - And they do, yeah. It's my favorite sport. Now there you go. - Gotta find a spouse who's good at it. (laughing) - I could have made it money, one of the two. - One of the two. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Hey guys, it's Rachel Cruz. 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That's CHministries.org/budget and promo code Ramsey. (upbeat music) Logan is in Denver. Hey, Logan, how are you? (upbeat music) Just the same, sir. How can we help? So my direct question is, when it's time for me to eventually make a cash purchase on my first pure rental property, if I should look at town homes and condos or single-family homes, doesn't even matter. I can give you more depth of my scenario if you need. Doesn't matter. I would do, if you're gonna do a town home, I'd do a single-family, I wouldn't do a duplex. And so I'd do a single-family would be my first purchase, whether it's a town home, a condo, or a standalone. And if you're going to do something that involves an HOA fee or a condo fee, be careful around that, because that's obviously going to affect your resale later. And it's also gonna affect your cash flow, even though you paid cash if you got a huge HOA fee, then it's gonna eat your cash flow. So be looking at that, 'cause some of these condos, if they've not been managed well in the past, they had to catch up on their maintenance and their hammering the current occupants with high fees to catch up. And so deferred maintenance problems. And so you just look at the budget on the condo, you can get a copy of the budget, you can find out about the HOAs and see if you get sticker shock on that or the condo fee or whatever they're calling it in your area. I would always stay in the bottom half of the market for sure. - Yeah Logan, what do you plan to spend? What were you thinking of spending? - So I'll try to give you a 30 second long story short. I just bought my first ever home, and I'll have it paid off, 'cause I'm renting out both bedrooms, and I'm 24 years old. So my goal is to sell this place, and then with that, by two things, one is a cash purchase on my count on condo in the amount of about 230. And then with my leftover money, I'll buy my own primary resident house. - Good for you, well that's fun. - That's cool, that's a good plan, and all with cash. - Well that's my goal. So I bought my place, I got quite lucky. I've been a long time listener, so you guys have helped me out with it. And fortunately, I rent out both rooms, and I don't have to have bump tenants, because whether they're there or not, I have my mortgage under control. - Well done. - So I'm trying to plan in advance. This question isn't an intelligent one. - Understand. - Interesting. - So really what I'm trying to do is just not have my first ever rental property, give me a bunch of headaches, and I don't know if the type of property matters. - It does, and as long as it's a good quality neighborhood, and the lower the price of the property, the more headaches you're gonna have. Because that's the type of tenants you're gonna have. And so before I went broke in real estate, I owned a bunch of super low-end stuff, trashy stuff. But the return on investment was ridiculously good, but the hassle factor was ridiculously high, because we're constantly dealing with some kind of criminal element, you know? And so it was a real problem. And not 100% of them are obviously, there's some good people there, don't misunderstand, but it's a lot different when you're renting something for the cheapest possible rent in the market or double that or triple that. So in terms of who you're having to deal with. And even that goes even so far as to say, if you left residential someday and own a piece of commercial property, now you've a lot less hassle, 'cause you're dealing with a person with a business acumen that you're tenant, it's not a residential situation, the drama level goes way down. And so anyway, all of that to say. Now that, so Winston and Rachel, they bought their first property. Winston loves real estate. He always has, even before he knew me, and he manages all of our real estate now. And his very first property, he bought was a small, I think it was a two bedroom condo. And I think they held that about five years and they made bank on that thing. I think it doubled in five years. It was a great purchase, you know? So I don't mind condos at all. But you buy them like, you buy them like you're gonna sell them. And so if it's an ugly house, and you get a good deal on it, when you get ready to sell it, it's still gonna be an ugly house, and you're gonna give somebody a deal, because it's ugly. So, you know, that kind of thing. So just keep that kind of thing in mind. Everything that's a deal is not a deal. But if you can buy a good property that you're gonna be proud when you're selling it, you can throw your shoulders back and be confident, and kind and good on your price and all that kind of thing, then there you go. That's the good thing. Jake is with us, and it's a good question, by the way. Jake's in Atlanta, hi, Jake, how are you? - No, well, sir, how are you? - Better than I deserve, what's up? - Good, so my wife and I, when we got married at 27, we made financial goals. We really got serious about age 30. And we've been on baby step seven for about four years now. - Why'd it go? - Yeah, yeah, so my question is, and it's sort of a two-part question is, how do you stay motivated once you've hit baby step seven being that there's not necessarily goals you're working towards? - Well, there's no desperation anymore. - Correct, yeah. - But you still need to have goals. - You still have a goal, it's just a different goal. - Yeah, so I think our main goal now is retiring at 55. That's the main goal. - Yeah, okay, have you got, have you got shoulder abuse? - Yes, so we've got an eight-year-old. - Okay, so the framework that is biblical that I've teaching, I'll send you a copy of the book, The Legacy Journey, it's in there, is what we call now, then us them. The first stage of money is now. I have to eat now, I have to pay the lights now. I have to deal with Friday now. - Right. - And when you get that under control, that you get to start getting your debts paid off, you start having some savings, you start living on a budget. Now you're not living what we call hand-to-mouth. And when you're in the now, your head is down, your eyes are on the ground, you're grinding. Now, then, then is when you get everything kind of under control, you notice this, you start looking up and further into the future.
future to then where there is no vision that people perish. And that's what took you all the way to baby step seven. You started saying, I'm gonna start putting money into my retirement, my kids' college, I'm gonna get my house paid off. That's all into the future. You're paying into the future, you're thinking into the future, your goal setting is in the future. Then when you got to baby step seven, it moves from now then to us. And us is, I want to change my family tree. A godly man leaves an inheritance to his children's children. I want to change my family tree. And so I want to make so much money and I want to teach the children so well and their character and their emotional intelligence, their spiritual walk and their financial acumen that they can't mess up what we're going to leave them. And it's not gonna mess them up because they're solid. And that's the us step. And then the last step, once you know you've changed your family tree, which I knew I did 20 years ago. I'd already passed that one. The last one is them. And godliness with contentment is great gain. And every time you read about someone who helps the poor, helps a widow or helps an orphan in scripture, you're making God smile. And so them is the community. And whether it's the community right off your fingertips or the community around the world, where there's a hungry kid, where there's someone being abused in sex trafficking and you start to go for that. So I got a buddy of mine that the other day dropped 12 million into a sex trafficking interdiction ministry. And they're gonna stop. You know, there's a certain number of people that are not gonna be able to do that anymore but the time he gets through with them. I mean, it's big deal. And so he's not thinking about his family anymore. He's not thinking about his family tree anymore. He's now setting goals for girls that have been kidnapped and are stored in a warehouse in ex location, including your neighborhood. And so whatever it is, whatever your thing is, right? And that's his. - Yeah. - Okay. And, you know, he's got a lot of money. His kids can't mess it up. He's, he's done that to worry about eating Friday and you know, and he's got his 401k, just finally. - His stuff is settled. - He just dropped 12 million just like that. And instantaneously, this thing is born and you drop that kind of coin on it, it'll happen, you know? And so what's the thing you need to move a needle on? Well, what's the thing that your heartbeat out there that when you see it, it makes you cry. A social thing. And that's a good reason to work. The reason I work now is just generosity. I mean, I don't, our investments would provide us with whatever lifestyle we want at this stage but now I keep working 'cause I love doing this and 'cause I get to hang out with guys that drop 12 million into something. (upbeat music) As your business grows, everything becomes more complex. There was a time when Ramsey Solutions had too many disconnected systems and not enough visibility across the business. We wasted too much time chasing information instead of making decisions. That's why we got NetSuite. NetSuite brings your financials, inventory, CRM, and more together in one place. More than 44,000 businesses run on NetSuite, including Ramsey. And now they're taking the next step with NetSuite next, making it easier to put AI to work across your entire business. NetSuite next helps you make the most of your time, automating routine work like forecasting demand and following up on overdue accounts. With NetSuite next, AI is built into everything you do so you can ask it questions just like when you're talking to a member of your team. And right now, you can try NetSuite next for free. If your revenue is at least seven figures, go to NetSuite.ai/Ramsey. That's NetSuite.ai/Ramsey. (upbeat music) Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fair Winds Credit Union studio. Abby is with us in Cedar Rapids. Hey, Abby, what's up in your world? - Hi. - Hi. I just wanted to call in today to get some advice. - Okay. What's going on? - Like, so I'm married. I don't want my financial stress to hurt my marriage and I wanna become more financially stable again until I have a future if I lost my job about a year ago. - Okay. And how long have you been married? - Since 2013. - Okay, and how old are you guys? - I am in my 40s. - And he is? How old? - Yes, yeah. - Yeah, in his 40s. - Oh, okay, all right, cool. And what'd you make at your last job? - I was only making around 56. - Okay, and what does your husband make? - Like, I think it's around 180. - 180. - Maybe 160 a year, maybe potentially. Like, it's around that. - So why do you have financial stress if he makes $180,000? - Like, we had one of we first set up our marriage. Like, we didn't set it up. Like, where everything was like totally together. - Does that mean? - I mean, so for the last year you haven't had a job, I assume out of the 180,000, he's feeding everyone in the house and paying the bills, correct? - Yeah, like, we've had a couple of changes. Like, as we moved to a different house, so that helped a lot. But there's still a lot of things that I noticed that when I had a job, we're easier. And then like, now it's a lot different. - When you say that your money is not together, does that mean you're on the hook for a certain portion of the mortgage? And you're on the hook for a certain portion of, the bills, how does it explain how it works in your house? - Like, right now I can't pay anything because everything's gone from all of my money. Like, everything I had saved up is like, it's gone, but there's nothing left. - You've gone through all of it. - Yeah. - And so then what happens when you don't have your share of the money, what happens? - Okay, like, I just don't buy stuff. I just choose not to, like, buy the things I used to. - God, and you have zero access to his money. - Pretty much, yeah. I mean, I can talk more with him about having more access, but I don't, like, both conversations don't grow well 'cause like, my power, I feel like it's less from not having income right now. - But explain it clearly. Do you get an allowance? And it's just not enough, tell us, give us more detail. What does it look like? Do you have a checking account card and you have access to the checking account or you don't even have that? Tell us in detail. - Yeah, I have a checking account. I mean, like, I guess I could say it has maybe five grand in there, and I'm just scared to use it because I don't know what's gonna, like, happen. If I use that up, and then really, like, have absolutely. - Well, I mean, you have used everything up, except the five grand, and he's been paying the bills. That's what's gonna happen. You make it sound like he's not paying the bills or he's threatening you or something. What's going on for real? - No, like, it's just that our income was not set up together, and so-- - I understand, but your household still has $180,000 coming into it, and you're not hungry, so what is the stress? - Like, buying things, what I use to buy, like, I guess it's like, I just wanna feel like more secure in the future. Like, I really feel like, I don't know what, is there the financial solution besides that? - Have you gone to him and said, hey, here's a deal. I feel like we're living two different financial lives, and because I no longer have a job, I feel like I don't even have a vote anymore. I feel like I don't have a life anymore. I would love for us to get to the point where our money is completely shared. There is no more yours or mine. It's just ours. How would you feel about that? Have you said anything like that to him, and if so, what did he say in return? - I don't think I've been maybe that specific. Those are work that we really use for, I think. - Okay, good. Now, when I say that to you, do you have any concern over how he would react to that, or do you have a concern that he might, that might be volatile? Do you have any concerns? - I mean, we've talked about it a lot before, but those would be maybe better words to use, to try to stick out for myself, maybe a little bit more. But I feel really, I just feel really, I guess maybe insecure because of no income, and I just feel like. - Okay, have you had, while you've been ill, while you've been off, or have you been ill? - A little bit, I have. I have not felt the best.
Like, it's affected me, like, yeah, with my health a little bit, yeah. In what way? Like, my mental health for sure, like, seeing friends and then seeing, like, family and feeling like, like, feeling stable. I don't know anything about anything, I'm just listening to your voice and it sounds sad. Yeah, because, like, I feel like, without having, like, my job, I feel like I lost a lot of, like, freedom in a lot of ways. I understand. But that's because you haven't done anything about it because you're sad. So I think you need to do two things. One is I think you probably need to sit down with a good therapist and there's a possibility you're dealing with something like depression or something like that, I don't know. But you just sound very, it's dragging and sad and slow and low energy versus someone who's bright and sparkly and sits down with her husband and goes, hey, Bubba, we are now sharing the money. You remember that part for richer for poor? This is the poorer part and we on the same page, starting now, ready to set, go. And I don't hear that coming out of your voice right now. I don't and I, I don't want to project onto this, but I have an inkling. Some of that is coming from a result of this marriage. Yeah. Whatever this guy is to you, it doesn't sound like it's in a healthy place either. I agree. I agree. I think you need to see a good therapist and possibly a good marriage counselor as well. And then that will solve all of this. This is not a math problem, it is not a finance problem. This is a relationship problem. You have a freaking $180,000 in your household, the word panic should not even be in your vocabulary, ridiculous. Okay. So the way he treats you is ridiculous, the way you treat the situation is ridiculous, the thing you've gone through and the way you all set this up is falling apart. And so yeah, you need to sit down with him and say, uh, this plan is not working. I can't exist this way, I'm going to go see a therapist, I feel like crap. And um, and we're going to start sharing our finances, ready, set, go. And if you don't think we are, then I'm going to have, we're going to see a marriage counselor and if that doesn't work, I'm going to have to see a divorce attorney because this is not working. Yeah. So that's where I feel like a worm crawling around and you with a whip in your hand because you make the money and I don't. That's bulk wrap. So and by the way, my wife Sharon Ramsey has not had an earned income for 42 years. And yet she has a lot of money. We have share everything, passwords, her names on every account, as a matter of fact her names on more of the accounts than mine because I don't own anything anymore. So it's gone the other way, but you know, you don't have to earn an income to have an equal vote, equal standing in the marriage. It's absurd. When I wrote my first book and launched the radio show, things looked a lot different. I was out selling books out of the trunk of my car. If you wanted to build a business, you had to figure out distribution, inventory, payments, and a hundred other things on your own. Today, there's Shopify. There are still plenty of challenges that come with building a business, but Shopify helps you build your online store, manage your business, and start selling without knowing how to code. Their world class checkout makes it easy for customers to buy from you and Shopify's AI assistance sidekick can help answer questions and guide you as you grow. Millions of businesses trust Shopify because it brings everything together on one platform. So you can spend less time figuring out the technology and more time serving your customers. All you need is the idea. Shopify handles the rest. Start your free trial today at Shopify.com/ramsy. That's Shopify.com/ramsy. One of the biggest mistakes people make is thinking they can skip having a will because they're too young or too healthy or they don't own anything. A will helps protect your family and it gives clear instructions that can keep your loved ones from having to guess what you wanted to do during a difficult time. If you're ready to create one, go to momabarelegal.com. If you're not sure where to start, text quiz to 33-789 and we'll help you figure it out. The Ramsey Show question of the day is sponsored by Why Refi. If you've gotten behind on your private student loans every month can feel like you're standing still because you are. Why Refi helps borrowers explore refinancing options that can help you start making progress again. Go to whyrefi.com/ramsy. That's the letter. Why are EFY.com/ramsy? Might not be in all states. Okay. Today's question comes from Savannah in Colorado. She says, "I'm having trouble getting my husband on board with buying our first home versus buying a rental property. We have 25% saved up for a down payment, but my husband wants to buy a rental first and use the income to pay itself off while we're saving for a home of our own. The problem is we have a 10-month old and a three-year old and we need more room now. Would it be smarter to buy for ourselves first and then buy a rental? I'm not opposed to buying rentals in the future, but I feel like the family should come first." Savannah, what you said there at the very end is exactly it. This is really a values conversation, more so than a right or wrong thing. So for instance, we had the guy that called in earlier. He was a single guy. He said, "I'm going to buy this house the proper way I'm going to rent out two bedrooms and I'm going to use that money to pay off the house quickly and then I'm going to turn around and take that house and buy a rental property." To him, I say, "Great, great idea. He's in a different stage of life and so he can value doing a rental first. For you guys, you've got two little ones at home and that's not on your set of values list right now. It's not a high priority. To have a rental property, property number one is, let's have a stable place for our own family since we have a family." So in that case, I actually think that I tend to agree with you. The hard part for you is going to be sitting down with your husband and saying, "Here's what I value today. Here's what my values are probably for the next five to six years and it's not having the rental property." So one of the top real estate experts in the nation was with us yesterday and he gave us the statistic that a married couple that owns a home has 40 times the net worth of a renting couple. There it is. There you go. That's simple. So your husband's what's known as wrong. That's what that's called. It's not a matter of choices. It's not a matter of values. It's wrong. So establishing your personal residence and getting it paid off as a part of building wealth is a primary tool and it has unintended consequences, unforeseen things that when you're simply looking at the math because your husband's spending way too much time on the internet, looking at stupid butt stuff where they're telling him to buy real estate. And his tick-tax hours are way up there. He's getting all the nothing down crap fed to him and all this stuff and how you get rich and rental real estate and all this garbage. Real estate is a good investment. I own several hundred million dollars of it. I love real estate. That's not the point. The point is when you own a home that the landlord cannot call and say, "I'm doubling your rent this month." When you own a home that the landlord cannot call and say, "We're going to put the home up for sale. You're going to have to move." When you own a home, the stability that is represented psychologically and spiritually in the family results in a calmer situation. There are medical implications for the family. That children aren't as ill because there's a stable, calm, protected, safe environment. The anxiety level of the entire family is going down. And guess what? Dad and mom are better at their jobs because they're not having to look over their shoulder for an incoming arrow or spear or bullet that the landlord's getting ready to throw at them. And so these are unintended consequences that an unforeseen that you don't realize. That's why that's some of the reasons. Not to mention the home goes up in value and not to mention you've stabilized the largest expense and locked it in in your budget, which is housing. It's not going to go up every year and if it's a rent, it goes up every year. Meanwhile, he's trying to outpace that by raising the rent somewhere else on a rental pre-bought because he watched too much tick-tack and get off the internet, dude. You're being fed trash. your wife is a woman.
wiser than anything you have read. Who can find a virtuous wife for her worth as far above rubies? The heart of her husband safely trusts her, and he will have no lack of gain. Hmm, Savannah, your husband married well. He should listen to you. That's where that's the end of that. Samantha's in Rochester, New York. Hey, Samantha, how are you? Hi, Jade. Hi, Dave. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? I just have a question. My husband has an annuity. And there is about two thousand dollars between like the cash out value and the guaranteed value. So how much is this thing? About six hundred and forty thousand. And it's paying what? It's guaranteed six percent. We haven't annuatized it yet. Okay. But the cash out value is six twenty. And the annuatized amount is six twenty two. Okay, I don't care about that news. So you can get, if you cash it out, your pastless surrender period? Obviously. Yes. Yes. So you could just cash it out and walk out with six hundred and twenty thousand dollars. Yeah, but then we'd have to pay tax on it. Correct. Yeah. You may have some gain on it. That's possible. Yeah. However, you understand that the market since January through today, when you call here in August, is up 18%. Well, I mean, that's why it's only two thousand dollars difference because the market has done so well. I thought you said it was making six percent. No, it's guaranteed six percent. It makes what it makes. Oh, it's a variable annuity. Okay. So what is it making? I asked you that. Oh, it's making a lot of money. I don't know exactly. Okay. Well, maybe. All right. You need to find out what it's making. And then the question is, can we invest it better? And the answer is probably yes. But how do we do that? Because if we take it out and invest it, then we're going to pay all that tax. It's going to be sure. I'm not sure there is all that tax. I mean, how long have you had this? Oh, he's had it for probably almost 20 years. Okay. Do we have any idea what the basis and the thing is? I don't know what that means. I'm sorry. That's how much he's put into it in total. The initial amount, the monthly amount, whatever it is, how much of the 600 money he put in, the difference is called the gain. And that's all that's taxable. So I think I need to get you to somebody that can help you unpack these numbers. I can almost promise you it's going to be worth taking the tax hit and reinvesting it in a better thing. I can almost promise you because you're getting you're getting all kinds of fees on this that are ridiculous that you don't need to be paying. And so net of fees, net of everything, you know, what are you ending up with? And then compare that with what you could be putting it in and how long with the difference does it take to recoup my tax problem? Are there ever situations where you could do like a direct transfer rollover from an annuity to an IRA? Only if it was in an IRA. Through there. Okay. Which this one is probably not. I don't think. She never mentioned that. And I'll be shocked if it is actually. So go to RamseySolutions.com and click on Smart Vestor Pro. Found a Smart Vestor Pro in your area. Sit down with them. So I've got a $600,000 annuity. Let's pull the numbers out. Let's untwist this barrel with fish hooks and figure out what we should do with it. Hey, I want to talk to you for a second about love and not love like in Titanic or something. I mean responsible love. The kind of love that moves you to take care of the people closest to you. And one of the most important ways to show that kind of love is by having term life insurance. If you have anyone depending on you, a spouse, kids, anyone, you need term life insurance. Term life insurance gives your family real protection if the unthinkable happens so they can spend their time grieving and not worrying about how the bills are going to get paid. Zander is a broker who works for you, shopping the top companies to find the right coverage options for your needs and your budget. In many cases, there are options available with no medical exam and instant approval. My wife and I had term life insurance through Zander for years long before I worked at Ramsey because we trust them. Getting term life insurance is a way of saying I love you when you can no longer say it yourself. Go to zander.com or call 1-800-356-4282 to find the coverage that fits your family. Any one can become a millionaire. It's not that complicated. George Campbell and I are going to show you how at investing essentials, our two-night virtual event. This is not get rich quick, don't misunderstand. But we're going to unpack my personal playbook on investing in real estate and what I've done, how I pick a mutual fund and why I don't do some investments that some of you think are cool, stuff like crypto. We're going to unpack all that. All kinds of new content this year. It's only the third time we've done this. But if you've been to the other two, it's a virtual event. You didn't come, you watched. But if you watched the other two, we're going to change it up a little. We're going to get into a little bit of things on wealth planning and how to deal with family as your wealth builds and all that kind of stuff. These are questions we get all the time. It's only three weeks away at September 1st and 2nd. Tickets start at 199. Get yours at RamseySolutions.com. Slash events or click the link in the show notes. If you're listening on podcast or YouTube, Gina is in San Diego. Hi, Gina. How are you? Hi, I'm doing well. Yes, so my husband and I have almost a million dollars in total debt. That's two mortgages and about 75,000 in student loans. We do have a rental property in Baltimore. It has great cash flow and we have a lot of equity in it. And that income helps offset our really high primary mortgage in California. But my worry is that it is a hundred and twenty-six year-old row home. So one major repair could wipe out all of our profit and put us in the red. What is that home worth? It's about 275,000. It's worth 275,000. And what do you owe on it? About 130. Okay. Spoiler alert. It's not cash flow in that grade. Okay, yeah. It's cash flowing some, but not enough to offset the other. So you have a seven hundred thousand dollar mortgage in San Diego, is that right? That's right. Okay. So if you sold the house that you owe 130 in Baltimore that you is worth 275, you'd make a hundred and forty-five thousand minus the expenses. Does that sound right? Yep. Okay. Let's call it for fun, a hundred and twenty thousand bucks. Okay. Let's pretend you do not own a home in Baltimore. Mm-hmm. And you have a hundred and twenty thousand dollars stacked on your kitchen table in cash. Mm-hmm. With the two of you go buy a house across the United States in Baltimore for as a rental property with that cash. No, thank you. No, it's assinine. Of course you would not. The only reason you kept that is because you used to live in it and you moved to California. Yep. This was not a strategy. It was an accident. It was by default. Yeah. Sell it. Okay. Thank you. For the same for the same reasons you wouldn't buy it again. Right. Is the same reasons we're going to sell it. Does that made that logical? Yeah. It is. And we do. Yeah. Yeah. I think I just needed some clarity because but because of the extra monthly income. Yeah. But if you take a hundred and twenty thousand dollars and invest it you'll have extra monthly income and that the roof won't go out. Right. Four thousand miles away. That's literally my fear. Your fears are accurate. They're accurate because that's what happens with your own rental property. And that's why that's why I know you're not cash flowing a lot. Net. I mean you're monthly rent minus your monthly mortgage payment is a good cash flow.
But then you have to deduct from that, repairs, vacancies, tenants that don't pay and have to be evicted, times it sits empty while you're waiting to re-rent it, redoing the carpet and the paint or the hardwoods and the paint when the renter moves out. - It's traveling to come check on it. - Yeah, all of those things come out. So net, net, net, you don't have a lot of real cash flow here. - True. - That's how real estate really works. And so all of my real estate is paid for and yet I'm amazed at how little of the actual rent still gets to the bottom line. And I have no payment. And so when I look up and I see you've got a payment that's half of your value, then I'm guessing you're probably renting this thing for $3,500, give or take. And you probably got a $1,500 payment. So there's $2,000 spread. That's $24,000 a year. On a $300,000 property, you can cough $24,000. It's just gone. Just like that, right? I mean, it's just that way. So what we just did, Jade, we talk about here on the show a lot, which is called a sunk cost analysis, which is reverse engineer it. - Yes. And then you can look and see if you would do the decision again, just from a, it's like a different view, a different point of view. - You can do it with your boat. You can do it with a car. The only thing you can't do it with your spouse. I mean. - What I do this again. And you can't give back a kid. So you can't do with kids either. But what I do this again, not with that one, maybe with that one. But the stuff you purchase, the stuff you own, the stock. I'm waiting on this stock. The famous one is, I paid $50 a share for this stock. It's selling for $10 a share. I'm waiting on it to come back up before I sell it. It ain't coming back up, buddy. You got a long wait. And while you're sitting around waiting, you're going to turn your $10 into $5. - That's true. - And so, and then I just ask and say, okay, that stock is worth $400,000 right now. If you, would you go buy this stock at $10? Because you think it's going to come up. No, then why are you holding on to it? Same exact thing. Same exact thing. So I do that for myself, occasionally, too. I reverse engineer it. If I didn't own this property, knowing what I own, no now, would I buy this property? Would I buy this thing? Would I do this thing? And the answer is no. Would I go on that trip again? No. That one worth the juice, wouldn't worth the squeeze, all that. So all those kinds of things. Matt is with us in Seattle. Hi, Matt. How are you? - I'm good. How are you folks? - Better than we deserve. What's up? Hi. I'm new to the Ranze system here. And I'm just not sure where I fit or what to go next. We don't have any debt, and we accept our mortgage, excuse me. But we are currently putting the 15% in a retirement and have been for some time. Wow. That's awesome. And I have, thank you. We've always been cash savers. Just, you know, we're going to work into some of this. So you should have done a pot of cash. You could have made a lot of money. I don't know. I don't think I got the heart for that, but thank you. But we're not sure of it. Just a couple things if you don't mind. Number one is, we're putting the 15% away, but we still have some leftover cash each month. We've just been saving it and cash. I'm not sure if that's the smart thing to do. - Is your home pay for? - Not yet. - No, it is not. - Okay. All right. - How much cash savings do you have? That's like non-invested money. Just cash. - Well, not including the emergency fund. I have 100,000, and then we've got 30,000 in the emergency fund. - Okay. - Very good. Matt, you have done incredible. You've done incredible. - Well, thank you. I'm not sure what to do with 100,000 or the extra cash each month, but my last part is we've also got a baby on the way. - Yay! - When she gets here, and if I should change what I'm doing with my extra cash, etc. I hope that makes sense. - I mean, you're doing a lot, right? You have no debt. We would definitely say, pay off your debt. The next thing would be to stack up an emergency fund, which you've done. It sounds like that's probably somewhere between three to six months of your expenses, which is right on track. You're investing the 15% beyond that. Yeah, you can do 15% along with that. You can start a college fund for these kids. A $5.29 would be great. And then you can start putting extra on the mortgage. What do you owe on the mortgage? - We owe about $4.30. - And your household income is what? - $220,000. - Okay. So what we teach you to bring you up, you ask what you're not familiar with. So we teach to do exactly what you've done. And the methodology, we call it the baby steps. But baby step one, save $1,000 while you're getting started. Number two is pay off all your debts, except your house. Work on the smallest to largest. You've done that. Three is build an emergency fund. Those three things are done with intensity. Then you did baby steps four, five, and six simultaneously with intentionality. And that's four is 15% of your income into retirement, five is kids' college, six is going to get the mortgage paid off. When the mortgage is paid off, then you are what we call baby steps seven, which is debt-free completely. And now it's time to just invest and give out without registered generosity. You've done a really good job. I'll send you the total money makeover which outlines all of this for you. Health insurance is confusing on purpose. You call one company, get transferred three times, sit on hold for 45 minutes and end up more confused than when you started. That's why I recommend health trust financial. They're health insurance advisors who actually get to know your situation and help you find the right coverage for your life and your budget. Health care needs change as your life changes. Maybe it's a job change, the birth of a child, a new diagnosis, or you're just trying to have more margin at the end of the month. No matter your situation, health trust financial shops multiple top rated insurance carriers and helps you understand what you're actually buying. I've trusted health trust financial for over 20 years because they help ramsy fans make smart health care decisions. Go to healthtrustfinancial.com today and talk to a real person without pressure or confusion. That's healthtrustfinancial.com Bob is in Los Angeles. Hey, Bob, how are you? I'm doing very well. How about y'all? Better than we deserve. What's up? I am a retirement age collecting full social security benefit of about three grand a month. I get a grand a month in a pension from a union and debt free houses paid off in a medical debt, no credit card debt, no car payments. Way to go. The only thing. Well, thank you. I was doing the debt snowball before I ever heard of Dave ramsy. Hey, man. You had common sense before it was cool. Yeah, smallest to largest and then you get a win, you get a hit of dopamine, and then you go for the next one, taking what you paid on the last one and adding it to what you did on the next one. It works. Absolutely. Very cool. Anyway, only expenses are groceries, utilities, and property taxes. And how much is in your retirement accounts? That's that's where I'm getting to next. My 401k is sitting with a grand. I put in a $1,000. No, excuse me, $100,000. Oh, okay, $100,000. Okay, I feel 100 times better. Okay, $100,000. All right. I've had coffee in the adrenaline kicked in. It's okay. And it's nervous being on the show. I understand. And then my salary, it split up into a per diem because I'm an over the road trucker in the entertainment business. That is not taxed. That goes into my checking each week at 500. I have 50% of the remainder, which is considered taxable income going to my 401k at 500 a week and about 500 a week after all the taxes and things goes into my checking account. So at the moment, I'm currently putting 8k per month into interest checking and savings accounts. And I'm wondering, is this a good time since I'm at and beyond seven to just put the maximum legal amount into my 401k. How old are you? You know, go 67. I hit social security at 66 and 10 months. Yeah. I'm getting, you know, so, and my life is getting 18 a month. I didn't even add that in. And then I've got some other oddball investments like 5k in a week called arrived that was started by Bezos. So if you get along, how long do you intend to drive? The goal is another year or two. So the house and do a direct swap and buy for cash on the Oregon coast and retire there and go Sam and fishing and repair and restore musical instruments. I love it. So just to get clear right now, you're
investing 2,000 a month, how much more of the 8,000 that you bring home do you want to invest? Essentially another 2,000. So bring it up to 4,000. 2k a month to 4k a month. Yeah, if we're if we work 24 more months, another 2k is another 50 grand give or take. Before, before things compound, etc. Yeah, but I mean, they're not going to compound a ton in 24 months. But if you put extra if you add an extra 2,000 to what you're doing now in your deposits into your 401k, you're going to add over the next 2 years, you're going to add approximately an extra 50,000 dollars, which is great. And you're putting how much in retirement today again, one more time. 500 a week, 2 grand a month. Okay, so we're doubling it. We're talking about doubling it. Yeah. Okay, so instead of 50 in the next 24 months, we're going to put in approximately 100 in the next 24 months. And you've got 100 in there and that'll have you 200 in there and you're not going to touch it. And it'll continue to grow. Yes, I would do that. Absolutely, I would do that. And then add to this, I've got 25 grand at a high interest savings account or a checking account, which I just need to be home to transfer some of that into other accounts. I've got another 18 grand in what's similar to your credit unions fund, my credit union calls it common sense, started with five grand automatically 500 a month comes out of my checking and goes into that file. No, you need to stop. You need to stop all that. Okay, we need to be systematizing. You need your operating budget to operate your household. And then you need to be loading up your 401k above your emergency, above your emergency. And anything in that 401k that you can put into Roth, if they have a Roth option, I would put it all in Roth. So that's simple. So yeah, that's what we're going to do. Joe's in Albany, New York. Hey, Joe, what's up? Hey, it's an honor to speak with you both. You too. How can we help? So me and my wife just got married in May. And we combined our finances. And we realized that we're kind of, we disagree about one part. Well, actually, I disagree, I should say. She believes in tithing 10% of her income, where I'm more of a, I'm more of a person who likes to just give when I feel compelled to give. What is the question? What is the basis for your decision on this? A feeling or are you trying to be following a faith? Are you, are you Muslim? Are you Christian? Are you Jewish? So we're both Christian. Okay. I believe even. I don't care what you believe. Evangelical Christian. Okay. So you go to an evangelical church. I believe it's even Evangelical. Okay. All right. So, um, well, are you Catholic? I know. Okay. And you're Protestant. And so you're probably evangelical in Albany, New York. Okay. That makes sense. Yeah. Now, and so then your guideline wouldn't be not what Dave Ramsey says or Jade says, but what the Bible says or not what you're feeling is. Not what my opinion is. Your opinion doesn't matter at that point because you said, I have submitted myself to Christ. He is the Lord of my life and his instruction manual is the scriptures then. Okay. And so let's use that as the baseline. Then if you want to, I mean, if you want to have the argument, but if you want to say, um, the basis for us making the decision is I don't, it's whatever I want to do. It's my feeling. Then you can use that basis. That's okay. But if you're, if you're going to say, I'm going to, the basis is my Christian faith and you would use the handbook. Is that logical? Yeah, that's logical. Okay. You thought about that. Yeah. So I don't really, I'm being smart. I like, but I don't care what Dave Ramsey says. I don't care what your wife says. I don't care what you say or what you're feeling. Yes. At that point, because at that point, I'm saying, this is what God says to do. And then I get to decide, do I want to do it or not? And it's not a sin, by the way. If you don't do it, it's just this is his guideline. And the scriptures are very clear in the old and the New Testament that the tithe, the word tithe in the Hebrew literally means 10th. And evangelical tradition for the last 1500 years is that the local church represents the Old Testament storehouse and the Old Testament storehouse took care of the Levites, which were the priests and the pastors. And it took care of the widows and orphans, the poor and the struggling in your community and your church should be doing both of those things and you tithe to your local church. That's evangelical tradition. And that's the teaching that most evangelical churches would go off of and that I adhere to and that I personally do. And Jaden Sam do the church that they used to minister in. Jade was part of the worship team. That's what they teach. That's what David teaches the pastor there is a friend of mine. And so, and it's what we've taught in financial teaching university all these years. Now again, we never tell people, Joe, that it's a sin. Okay. Or that God hates you or something like that. That's not what we're talking about. It's just an instruction manual. And God teaches us that when we give a tenth of our income as a standard part of the rhythm of our life, we're resetting who's in charge of our life. Okay. It's a reminder. It's a weekly or a biweekly, whatever your paycheck is, reminder that God is in charge and that this is his stuff that I'm taking care of. Now I'm looking, I'm talking up to a Christian through a Christian lens here. If you're out there listening and you're not, that's okay. Then you don't have to do all that. That's not just completely different thing. And if you're, if you're Muslim, you would have a different guideline from the Quran. That's right. And you would go, you should go by that because that's what you believe. And so, but again, in the Christian world, sometimes the tie that's used as a whipping post or it's used as a guilt trip when it's in a toxic environment. And we don't want to do any of that. Well, yeah. And I like to think that it's not about the money at all. It's about the posture of your heart. God really doesn't need anything that we have. Yeah, that's laughable. It's about your heart, which is one of the reasons that I don't put tithe on direct deposit. It's something that you ritualize and do every month so that you're aware of the money that you're giving so that you're letting it do the work in your heart. It's one of the reasons I miss passing the plate. Most giving in Christianity is not done online. Yeah. And I miss passing the plate because it's there's a censure bowing when you're doing it. And your kids see you do it. Hey, man. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Hey, my friends at BetterHelp just released their annual state of stigma report. 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[email protected]/ramesy Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Fair Winds Credit Union studio. Jade Washaw is my co-host today Ramsey personality bestselling author and is with us in Sacramento. Hi, Anne, how are you? I'm doing well. Thank you. Good. What's up? Yeah, so my husband and I were in our 40s. We just got married last May and we are having some challenges with deciding how we should handle our blended family estate planning. Essentially, you want his seven children from his previous marriage plus my one child from my previous marriage to split everything that we have now and build together eight ways equally. And to me, it seems a little bit like that somewhat disinherits my one child because he has to share with the seven others. And so we're just looking for some advice as to what your thoughts are on blended family estate planning. Well, my first thought is that what you've discovered is what we most often see it's hard. It's very hard. It's complicated because there's not a smooth one-size-fits-all answer. It always helps me with these things and it helped me even, I mean, we're not a blended family, but it helped me when I was explaining our estate to our children to first start off with, there's no ethical or moral rights that any of them have. It's your money and your husband's money that you both brought in and the money that you build from this point forward. And if you leave them zero
hero that's not traditional, but it's perfectly moral, perfectly ethical. Okay. And it helps me to just kind of take it all away from them to start with in my mind. And then when I start giving it back, it feels different. I can say that. Right. And so instead of like, this is mine. It's mine. It's my rights. And you know, I had a good inheritance. And then my mother got married and it got split seven ways. And it's like, no, it wasn't yours, you little twerp. It was mine. How old are they? How old are the kids? Yours and his. So minus the youngest, he's 10 and they go all the other seven go up to 24 years in age. Okay. In my mind, first and foremost, then I would establish what happens while they're minors. Right. Okay. Cause I want to make sure my minor children are cared for if we both die in a car wreck today. Okay. That's paramount. And that could be a lump some into a trust that's formed upon death of both of you. Okay. Statistically, you're not going to actually execute that. But one or both of you will live till those children are grown. Okay. So statistically, you're not going to have that. But probability. But anyway, that I had. So if I set that up, I set that up differently, then I would set it up for adult. Gen two. Okay. Generation two adults. Now, when we get the generation two adults, is when the question you ask and starts to come into play is what's fair? And you make a valid point that, you know, let's say, for instance, you brought in even more the other day when you all got married than he did. I don't know. I haven't asked that yet. I will in a minute. But then you're so really your kids getting a short end of that stick. You're your point is valid then. I think it is. But there's here's where my mind is. And I've never been in your situation. So I cannot claim to know for certainty what the answer is. So let me say that. But what my my mind goes to how old are the kids? Because if the kids are home aged, the age where they're in the house, and the understanding is, I want these children to look at me like I'm, I'm their mom, like mom and dad. And we want that family unit to feel like a family unit. There's part of me where I go, okay, well, I no longer have one kid. Now I have eight. Yeah. And so that's where my husband's at with it. He feels like we are one family unit that we should treat all the children equally. So mom's not in the picture. And my ex husband's not in the picture. So we're the only parents to these children. Oh yeah. Okay. Then you signed up for that. That's what you signed up for when you got married then. That makes sense. Okay. So Jade makes a valid point then in your husband those two. So it's an interesting discussion though. Cause it's there's not a absolute slap your hand on the table. This is dumb or this is smart kind of thing. It's just a it's just kind of feeling it through. To me, I'm going to draw a line between when they're miners and when they're not. Okay, when they're miners, absolutely, your husband wins. Okay. Cause the the babies at home need to be taken care of. And one of them doesn't need to get $300 sneakers in the other one has holes in their shoes. I need to feel like they're equal. This is not this is not Cinderella. Okay. With the with the step sisters and all that, you know, we know it's not that thing. And so. But but once they're out of the house, which is really what we're probably dealing with. They're all grown. Then let me ask this. What how much net worth that he bring to this equation? How much net worth did you bring to the equation? Great question. So he brought in about $400,000, $300,000 of that is equity in his property, which we are living in and paying down half a million dollar note together on. And then he had about $100,000 in his 401K. And I have a what's now rental property that I brought into the marriage that has about 200,000 in equity. It's worth about half a million. The tenants are covering 100% of my mortgage property tax, etc. And then had about 200,000 in 401K in my H YSA. And then when my husband retired in 10 years, he has a very juicy California pension for 30 years of service with one of our local. So your net worth were fairly similar? Uh-huh. Yeah. We were pretty equal. I mean, it wasn't like one of you had $4 million in the other one out of 100, you know? No. Yeah. And he does make $100,000 more than me. Of course, you know, there's one, you know, we have six kids in the house right now. Yeah. Hello. So it goes a lot more than just me and the one. Try hiring Mary Poppins for this. He won't be making any more than we offset that. But yeah, um, wow. And so neither one of your spouses are involved. Expouses. No. Correct. Yeah. Wow. So it's just the two of us and the kids. That's against the world. Okay. So fast forward. If if our contributions given that your income as being offset by your child, by you being the child primary caregiver, um, and his income as if your contributions are fairly equal coming in and your contributions are not that far apart, um, really when we get into this, somebody's not making a million dollars a year and somebody making nothing. So we got a fairly equal contribution. I think you guys got married with young enough children that I'm gonna. My part, I'm just trying to think what I would do. I'm not, again, I'm, we started the conversation with it's an interesting conversation. I'm probably gonna go a little bit more on his direction because the kids are young and the contributions are fairly equal. Sure. Um, as they become adults and really as their children too, that's just a, just a, I'm just feeling this out though. I might wake up in the morning with a different answer. So I'm not going to hold you, you know, don't slap your hand on the table and say, Dave Ramsey said because I'm. Well, if they were, if they were adult children, which two of them are, but if they were all adults, this would be a totally different conversation, I think. But they're in the house, but there's not nothing that worth it. It's, it's not that much money. Even what it grows to, it's gonna grow equally. So, um, you know, I mean, if it's 30 years from now, do I want to bait one child to get half and the other six get hat? No, I don't, not 30 years from now. You spend hours researching before making a major purchase like a home or car, but it's also a good idea to put in the work searching for the right insurance coverage to protect your biggest assets. I recommend using Ramsey trusted pros, whether you're looking for car home or any other type of insurance, Ramsey trusted providers have been coached and vetted to serve you like we would. Find what you need at RamseySolutions.com/Insurance. Are you sick and tired of being sick and tired working so hard, run, run, run having nothing to show for it? Well, that's normal. Normal's broke. Normal is 78% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. There's too much month left at the end of the money. It's not a good plan. You need to tell your money what to do instead of wondering where it went. Give every dollar and assignment. That's how we named the world's best budgeting and financial app called every dollar. It helps you find extra money every month, builds you a personalized plan to get out of debt, build wealth in just 15 minutes. You're going to find thousands and hidden margin and you're going to feel like you got a raise. Do not live normal. Normal sucks. You want to be above normal. Look around you. Look at what normal looks like. No, thank you. No, you want to live like no one else so that later you can live and give like no one else. Not every dollar for free in the app store or Google play. Nicholas is in Columbus. Hi, Nicholas. How are you? I'm right. You're so better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, guys. So I kind of wanted your two cents in this, facing a career change and I guess it easily. Is it worth moving from tax public accounting into industry, financial accounting at the cost of no longer working from home, giving up a lot of PTO and giving up good parental lead benefits for the purpose of moving into a career direction I want to go on because it's just kind of tough to make that transition from tax to financial and I have that opportunity but it just comes with all those downsides and it makes me feel somethings up a way. All the things you said just simply mean that you have to work more. That's true. Everything you put it in a whole bunch of different buckets but it all means you just work more. Basically, I guess. Yeah. You want to work more to get ahead. I guess that's yeah. Yeah. And doing the work that you say you want to do, work you'd prefer to do. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Definitely that is that's why I was trying to get here to begin because I've just been there in time for a while, and I don't want to be doing it.
So now and so then you're gonna have to work. Yeah, there's always a trade off. There's there's almost always a trade involved with making steps forward. Let me give you another let me give you another equation. Okay, just for the fun of it. Let's say that you decided my dream is to open my own business. I'm not saying it should be. I'm not saying it is. Just giving you an example. Okay. You're gonna work more. You're gonna work harder than you've ever worked in your life. When yourself employed your boss is a slave-driving jerk. When I started this is 16 hours a day for two years. My wife was a single mother. We didn't talk about PTO. We talked about PTA that I missed but we didn't talk about PTO. All right, we were getting crap done to get this thing off the ground. And so there's a price to be paid just like Jade said to go do whatever it is you want to do and it's called work. And you're you're not a horrible person if you don't want to do that but you're making a Values-based decision that says I'm gonna be putting in more hours because by the time you outline all those different buckets that you just put in front of me, you're not working 40 hours a week. And so, you know, and you're about to start working 40 or 50 real work, not just at an office with other grownups and stuff, you know. That's gonna change and it's gonna change your career by the way. So I would encourage you to go do it. But most of the good things that have happened in my life came from hard work and doing hard things and pushing through to hit a goal. And level up. You may end up on the other side of this with more freedom than you had to start with because my guess is if you're doing the work you really want to do. But now your potential for income probably goes through the roof because you're better at the work. There's tons of data out there that the work at home people are screwed on when it comes to promotions. Because nobody knows you're there. You're at home. And so the data's out. I mean, your chances of getting promoted are like 10% of those that are in the office. Just that one thing alone. And you know, if you take a job based on, you know, if I have someone come into Ramsey and they're interviewing with us and they in the first thing out of their mouth. Now they need the information. I'm not talking about that. But the first thing out of their mouth is how much time off do I get? But you're coming here for the wrong reason. You're looking for a J.O.B. And I'm looking for a crusader, baby. I'm going to give you a water pistol and you're going to charge the gates of hell. That's what we're doing. We're taking on freaking visa master card and Samuel L. Jackson. I mean, you know, we are not screwing around here. So, you know, you better not come in here figuring out how little you can work in this place. Now we don't work 80 hours a week and we don't work you till your fingers are bony fingers and all that crap. We go home at five. You know, you walk through this place looks like a ghost town at 5.45 and it should. These people have little children go home. I'm not saying that. But while you're here, keep your butt off a Facebook and work. You know, get your stuff done, man. And so, and that's who I am. If you don't want work here, that's okay. But that's how this place operates. We work. We go home tired. You know, so, but those are the people that excel. And so, what it costs you if you don't do this is you're not going to get to do the thing you think you love. You're going to continue to do something that you hate. And your prosperity factor is probably going to be cut somewhere around 75% of what it should have been. You're going to be 25% of what you should have been. So, I want you to go be all you can be, man, Superman. I mean, come on Clark Kent. Let's go, baby. Get the phone booth. Let's go. I agree. Everything we're going to tell you on this show is probably going to require you to make a trade-off. Every little thing. Well, because everything does. We're just, we're just the people that admit it. Yeah. And you get to get rich quick, doesn't tell you that there's a trade-off. Yeah. Get rich Ramsey. There's a trade-off. Yep. You're going to be on beans and rice, man. You're going to cut up your stupid credit cards. Your friends are going to think you joined the cult. I mean, because we're actually living on less than we make when nobody does in America. Yeah. Yes. And, you know, we're going to teach you stuff that's hard, but it gets you to a place that you want to go faster than anything else will get you. Well, and it's your perspective. You can either look at it and say, "Man, I'm trading. I'm trading the free time that I used to have for working more." Or you can look at it and say, "Man, I'm trading a dead-end job where I was really going nowhere to doing the life in the career that I really want to have." There we go. That's up to you, how you trade. Like no one else, so later you can work like no one else. That's right. You know when I work, dude? When I want to. Why? Because I used to work all the time. Because you did it on the front end, yes. That's it. I paid a price to get there. I mean, nobody wins a Super Bowl on accident. It's an intentional act. A lot of detail, a lot of practice, a lot of work. So, that's not preaching at you. It's inspiring. That is inspiring. The question you ask is a great question, especially in today's world. And so, yes, I would tell you to go do that for all of those reasons. But you are going to give up the things that you have to quickly identify the price to be paid. And I think the price is worth it. And you're not a bad dad. And you're not a bad husband. I have eight grandkids. That means there's 73 sporting events this weekend. I will not attend all of them. I promise you, I have no desire to attend all of them. I'll pick out a couple of them, but I'm not a bad grandfather because I miss them. I miss some of the kids stuff growing up. I didn't miss all of them, but I miss some of them growing up. And so, welcome to being grown ups. I don't want to miss the children's sports. By God, I do. I don't want to go to 83 games this weekend. I promise you, I don't. I do want to miss some of them. So, I mean, this is the stuff we, you know, we don't say out loud in America anymore because it's uncool or whatever. But welcome to the Ramsey show. We do. And we think it's worth it. Because the vow, whether my grandchildren are loved by Papa Dave is not measured in whether I attend their games, they have a different way of measuring my love. It's, I actually pay attention to them when they're in front of me instead of my stupid phone. You know, there's that. That kind of stuff. I mean, you know, there's ways to do this stuff. That's life. So, Nick, I'm proud of you. It's a good question. And I think you're going to go be somebody. I'm proud of you. [Music] Listen up. If someone you love owns a business, you've seen how much work it can be. The late nights, the weekends that disappear. You can't put in the hours for them, but you can point them to something that can actually move the needle. The free Entry Leadership newsletter gives business owners practical strategies to grow their business and their leadership in just six minutes a week. They'll get expert advice and real life tools they can put to work right away. If you're interested, you can find out at www.bamseysolutions.com/businessowner or share the link in the show notes. Rod is in Durango, Colorado. Hey, Rod, what's up? Hey guys, thanks in advance for your advice. Here's my question. I've got a 401k that's got about 700k. My wife's family has a very strong history of Alzheimer's. Her brother got put into a care center for about 10 grand a month when he was 68. She's 67. My question is this, we're redoing our wills and I'm wondering because I've talked to attorneys, they didn't come up with good advice. Can I set up a trust somehow in or outside of that will that if I die before her, my 401k goes in or is in that trust pays out approximately two to three grand a month to her. So she gets some from it, but at age and there's three trustees, but at age, let's say 82, 85, if she doesn't show any signs of Alzheimer's, then every bit of the fun balance goes to her. And the reason I asked this her brother two years before he went into care center, started giving away money. He thought he was a billionaire and gave away about $150,000. And so now he's somewhat strapped. So does this make sense? I was about to say no, never do that until you give me that last thing and I don't know how to prevent the last thing. That's why I'm hesitating.
- So attorneys don't either, that's what you have to go to court. You have to judge months and everything else. - Yeah, I mean, you don't have to take away some ones. You have to, I know how to stop someone that's lost their faculties from giving away all their own money. You have to take them to court and have them declared incompetent and a guardian at light 'em is appointed. I know how to do that and it's not that hard. You just have to have a doc go in there and go, hey, this guy, you know, he's not thinking. He's got a really on set and he's not capable. He's not medically capable. - It's very hard. Well, we had to pay, we had to pay two police to come and get him just to take him to a doctor. He would never go to court. And he also could talk his way out of it. - What does she think about this? When you spoke to her about it. - I think she's up for it, but then she said, we ought to do it for each other. And I said, yeah, sure, that's fine with me. Let me rattle this off. Her 401(k) is 900. We have a house paid for, it's one five. We have cash of 100(k). We have assets that are sellable for 250(k). - Yeah. - We have a brother. - You're in great shape. - You got plenty of money. - Right. - I mean, you're multi-millionaires. Way to go, by the way. Congratulations. - Thank you. - Okay, I did not know this and I just looked it up. And so I've not had time to dig into it. But Harvard Health says that 75% of the people that get Alzheimer's have zero family history. Only 25% of the people that get Alzheimer's have family history. Which was interesting. I thought it was a lot more than that to look it up. - Yeah. They're wrong. Her dad died of it. It's twin brother died of it. All in care centers, uncle died of it. Grandmother died of it. - Well, I don't know that this one family offsets the body of evidence though on a big study. - Family history. - And this family, and this family may have some kind of a gene issue or something. I don't know. So I'm not as worried about, I don't like your structure because it's too controlling. If I don't wanna leave that much control on my wife, on the off chance she might lose her faculties. So I don't like that part of it. But I don't know how to solve for if she does lose her faculties other than good family relationships with her children and so forth. Do you all have children? - No. - Okay. - Been married 39 years. - Okay. All right, so there's nobody to step in other than a brother or sister like with her brother. And it was by then it was a pain in the butt 'cause he had gone completely off his rocker and would have fought the police, you said. So yeah, okay. Yeah, I don't know how to watch over her in the event. She does get something. - You never heard G-Star? - Yeah, I don't, because I don't like control. I'm fighting against some of my internal principles. One of my principles is I don't like controlling stuff from the grave, I wanna set the table and then the humans do the human thing. But this is a human that's out of control and I wanna protect them from themselves. But we also don't know that that's going to happen. - Right, and so do you do something like the president where you have to go in and be declared competent every year to get your money released from the trust for that year or something like that? Oh God, that's so gross. - I just, that feels like no way to live, you know? - And not having access to your money but $2,000 a month or something to your 80s, no way either way. - That's no way to live. - Yeah, $4 million, the two of you have built together and because she might not be a, she might have this thing happen. You know, her life is severely limited if you die today. - If, okay, I don't like that. - Not that I'm in the interest of wasting money but let's pretend what happened with her brother had the ability to happen with her where she's got access to let's say $900,000 and she starts giving it away like she's a billionaire. Is there a way, you don't have errors so nobody else's well-being specifically is on the line for the loss, if that makes sense. Is there a way that you can separate it but do it in a much more generous portion to where it's like maybe half of the ass, like half of what it is, not just a certain allowance? - I think a different structure of the trust, I think you might have been onto your way of doing it. I don't, I don't have the answer. I'm gonna wake up in the middle and I think it about this one. 'Cause it's just a brittle, I like a good riddle. I'm probably gonna lean toward, if either one of you die, your stuff is left in trust to the other one and now what are the terms of the trust? I didn't like your terms because they're too-- - What about the monthly amount of control? - Well, no, I would rather hurt it. I would have, I would want the trust, I would leave the trustee with clear instructions about medical competency that if the trustee suspects that there's medical incompetence of some kind, then they cease distributions until a medical report is brought in. And so if she had to come to the trustee to send some catfish false lover that's actually a Russian bot that's got her on the hook, which happens all the time, right? If that was the case and she wanted to send them a half a million dollars, she'd have to go the trustee to get that released and that would raise a red flag and he or she would say, not until we get a medical. - So it's almost like she has access to the full amount, but if she goes beyond a certain amount that creates a suspicion. - So the trustee needs to have some moral ties to this, more than just the-- She's got full access to the trust unless a weird pattern develops at which case the trustee has the ability to stop that until he gets a medical. - Right, every month she's pulling out $100,000, what's that? - Yeah, I see a pattern or something weird, okay. The woman's never bought a car over 50,000 and she wants to buy a 250 Lambo, okay? I want to see a medical. - Okay. - And if the medical school she gets the Lambo, it's her freaking money, okay? But you know, something like that, if something breaks pattern and isn't, to keep them from going down the way of her brother, I would do that rather than saying, if you make it to 80, then you can get your money. No, I don't like that. - But I mean, I don't want to say this in the wrong way, but with family or a rounder, is she just going to jump to that? - She doesn't have a ton of family rounder, that's the point, there's no kid. Like my kids would completely interfere with their mother. - Sure, yeah, one of their friends. - They would get all up in her business. It wouldn't happen, okay? - They'd be going, "Mom, that is a focused crap. Get off the internet, you're not doing that." - You're seeing signs before it's gotten to, right? - And they would relationally interfere. - Right. - But they don't, you don't have that family structure around you guys in this situation. And neither did her brother, for that matter, y'all weren't close enough to him to catch it early and intervene, right? - That's correct. - It's so interesting, Rod, it's a good question. - It is. - I appreciate you wrestling with it. It's an act of love to wrestle with it. Yeah, if you both left it 100% in a trust, and you had full access to the money through the trust unless a pattern evolved that was an unhealthy pattern, in which case the trustee has the ability to throw a flag on the field and say, "Time out, I need a medical." (upbeat music) Dave Ramsey here, for more than 30 years, I've been talking to folks on the air, and I can tell you that most people are broke. Not because they don't make enough money, but because they don't have a plan. You need to give every dollar you earn a job, because when you do that, something changes. You stop guessing, you stop worrying, you stop stressing. Our every dollar budgeting app will show you how to find extra cash, pay off debt, and finally start winning with money. But most people won't do it. They'll keep living paycheck to paycheck. Keep hoping things will change without making a change. It's time to say, "Enough is enough." It's time to take control of your money. It's time to start your every dollar budget for free today. Go download it in the app store, or Google Play. (upbeat music) Our scripture of the day is Proverbs 22, 3, "The prudent see danger." All this is one of my favorite. "The prudent see danger and take refuge." One version says, "The wise see danger and take refuge. The simple, keep going, and pay the penalty." Another version says, "Are punished." When I see danger, don't you know when you know, when you know when you're nowhere? - Yep. - When your bell is ringing. It's like, "I knew, I knew that girl wasn't right." - Exactly. - I knew that girl wasn't right. - I knew there was something wrong with that mustache. You know, I just knew, you know, Mr. mustache. I just somehow, I knew that guy. - You know what I'm talking about? - Yes.
I went forward anyway. - Come on. - And I was simple, I was a fool. - And I was punished for it. - Yup. - The wise see danger and take refuge, the simple, the fool keeps going and pays the penalty. And we all been both. - I know, that's right. - But it just tells you to trust your instinct. Trust your gut, and one pastor said, don't, one pastor said, don't call it your gut. It's the Holy Spirit. Don't call it the Holy Spirit your gut. But trust your instinct. Trust your, trust what God's Spirit is inside of you to say, don't do that, don't do that. Don't walk over there, stay away from that. That one's trouble. Stay away from that one. You know, you just know. - You do. - And you go forward anyway and you're punished for it. That's just one of my favorites. Milton Barrel said, it's amazing how fast later comes when you buy now. (laughing) - That's funny. - There's a good one. Nina is in Tampa, Florida. Hi, Nina, how are you? - Hi, I'm doing well. Thank you. I'm 65 years old. I have no debts. My house is paid off. My car is paid off. I have $150,000 in the bank. Planning on buying like a rental property, one or two. I don't know if that's good planning and that's my whole retirement. Is this with planning? - Only if you like landlording and you're doing this 'cause it's something you want to do, not 'cause it's something someone told you you should do. - Yeah, that was my question. - I'm doing it for the income. - I know, but do you know anything about real estate? If you always wanted to own real estate? I mean, the 650 can be invested in a mutual fund and make you about the same kind of money. Net net net. But would it grow as much as real estate? - Not quite, but it won't have anywhere near the hassle. Let me tell you something. It comes with income producing real estate. Tenants, renters. - Right. - That's the necessary evil to make this formula work. Not all tenants or renters are evil. I don't mean that. You people stay off the comments. But- - It's the people doing what they screw up. And then your little plan is screwed up when they screw up. So I'm not telling you not to do this. I'm telling you to go in, go in eyes wide open and go, this is gonna be a pain in the butt, but it's gonna be worth it 'cause I love real estate. Now, I've been on landlord for 40 years. So I'm unemotional about it. And I'll just toss your butt out when you don't pay. I mean, I don't think anything about it, you know? And I don't have a bunch of qualms. I don't sit and ring my hands and worry about the ethics. No payee, no stayee, it's pretty simple, you know? And so, but if you're gonna go through all of that, the drama and your mind and stuff and you're gonna have to be tough or all of these numbers don't work for you. If you wanna do that, I'm in for it. Go do it, but don't just go do it 'cause it's a better investment in air quotes. What if you started with just one instead of two 'cause I think I'm gonna say you're gonna do one or two. - Yeah, that's what I'm gonna do. I'm thinking of getting like one for now and invest the rest of the money. - Good. - And if I like it, I'll get another half. - I like that. - My question also is what if the house is in a like nice desirable area? - Is it gonna be a nice desirable area? - That helps 'cause your tenants are gonna be nicer and desirable. - Right, it's gonna be a different quality. - Yes, yes, yes, this in quality, okay. - I mean, not always, but you have a higher probability of a higher quality interaction with someone that makes $200,000 a year than somebody that doesn't. That's not because money makes people's character don't misunderstand, but just overall, you know, it's a lot easier. You know, if you bought slum property and you're dealing with criminals as your tenants, that's the other end of the spectrum, right? - I agree, right, right. - And not all slum property or criminals as tenants, you people, good God, I can just hear you people out there slum of you, but anyway, but yeah, I mean. - I'm in a good situation, and I'm in a good, like. - I think you're okay, but I really want you to talk to someone that owns rental property and let them tell you the underbelly of the business. - My daughter does, my daughter does. - And she tells you it's not all, it's not all Skittles and Rainbows, right? - Yeah, yeah, she said, for your age, you don't need the hassle. - Ah, wow. - Okay, we'll ask her what hassle means. - The other hand, my son on the other hand, he said, "I'll be there for you if anything." - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. This is, it'll rip your soul out if you don't go in with your body armor on, okay? - Yeah. - So go hang out with your daughter and watch her deal with tenants so time or two. - Dave, are you talking about real estate on investing essentials? - I am, we're covering it in detail. And a lot of it is that right there. - Yeah, we can get Nina some tickets. - Yeah, absolutely. - We're gonna do 'em, and then thank you. You take care of it. - Yeah, you know, we're gonna hook you up. Dave and George are gonna be talking about investing but real estate specifically. And so I think that'd be good for you to log on. Check it out. And then by the end of it, I think you'll have a clear picture on whether it's right for you, if whether real estate's right for you or just gone ahead and investing all your money in the stock market. - Yeah, I'm a big fan of real estate. I am not a big fan of all this stuff out there telling people to buy real estate and they have no idea what they're getting into. - That's true. - It makes it sound easy, like they're making it sound easy. - Yeah, you know what collecting the money on my mutual fund sounds like? Bing, an email coming into my inbox. You've got, man. - That's easy. - That's it, you know? - Yeah. - Never had a rent check do that. (laughing) Okay, not yet. - That's true. - Not yet, there's no auto plan in real estate. So it's, you know, that's why I always get just, I just get hysterical when they say, oh real estate's passive investment. There's nothing passive about it, moron. It's active as it can be. It's the most active thing you could possibly do. So it's hands on, baby. All hands on. Gary's in Charleston, South Carolina. Hey, Gary, what's up? - How you doing, Mr. Ramsey and Mr. J? I'm a huge fan. - Thank you. - Taking my call. - I'm a little short on time. Go straight to your question. - All right, my wife and I just moved for my first big boy job and our car started having problems. Again, a little bit of history on the car. My wife first sit in 2020 for 11,000. Now it's probably worth around six or 7,000. I was quoted the other day for $3,500 by a mechanic to fix your car. So I'm wondering if we should spend the money. - No. - Fix the car or if we should look into selling the car. - If you sell the car, buy another one with that money. Do you have any money to your debt? - I have $220,000 worth of debt. - And no money. - We have a student debt and we have $71,000 saved. - Okay, well, we're gonna work our plan. So we're gonna buy her a five or $6,000 car after we sell this car for three or 4,000 as it sits. And we're gonna put a little bit of money with it and get her a little bit better hoopty that's gonna last a little bit longer. And then you guys are gonna tear into your student loans and use the rest of the 70 to do that. That's what I would do in your shoes. - Yeah, absolutely. If you've got that kind of cash sitting around, that's the money that could be used to pay off a debt. - Sounds like they're just getting started. So yeah, we teach people not to be sitting on $70,000 or they got $200,000 owed to Sally May. - Yeah, I feel generous. So let's give them the total money makeover and every dollar. So they can understand what we teach. They can understand the baby steps in that system and they can have a budget, which is gonna be the foundation of them working the baby steps and paying off this debt ultimately. - Y'all are gonna be waiting for Jade to be on the air 'cause she gives everybody something. - And you get a car and you get a car and you get a book and you get a seminar ticket. Thank you, Jade. - You're welcome. It's easier to spend other people's money. (laughing) - I've heard the rumor. I've heard the rumor. You're gonna make it out of this, but you're gonna be really focused and this is not an excuse to go buy her a $20,000 car. You guys are broke. You have $200,000 freaking dollars in student loan debt. You need to be in a wild panic. That puts this hour of the Ramsey show and the books will be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace. Christ Jesus. (upbeat music)
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