Don't Let Fear Drive Your Financial Decisions

Brought to you by the every dollar app,

start budgeting for free today. [MUSIC] Normalist broken common sense is weird. So we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Network and the Fair Wins Credit Union Studio,

this is the Ramsey Show. I'm Dave Ramsey, Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality, number one best selling author is my co-host today. Open phones at AAA 825 525.

“Jason is in Spokane, Washington High Jason, how are you?”

I'm doing well, how are you? Better than I deserve, what's up? So I'm 41 years old and I'm married and I have a family, and I have $0 for retirement. And I am looking for some guidance on how I might approach resolving that.

Wow. Okay, cool, how much debt do you have, not counting your home, $0? Oh, great. That's good.

And how much do you have in savings? A little north of 3000. Okay, good start. Good deal. So we teach something here called the baby steps,

are you familiar with that? I am. Okay, great.

So then you know that you're really a third of the way in,

and you're really at almost at the point where it's time to start investing. So just as a recap for those who don't know, baby step one is you get a thousand dollars saved. It's a cushion between you and life. After that, you pay off all of your consumer debt,

which is basically everything except the house. You've done that. And then after that, we save up three to six months of expenses. So you've got 3,000 saved.

“How much would you need to add to that in order”

to get it to about three to six months of basic expenses? Well, believe it or not, that's actually right around three to six months of expenses for us. A thousand dollars. For your entire living?

I know, I know, we actually in the kind of a unique situation. We do own a home, but it's paid off. And we also have a small, I mean, my life, and I have a small online retail business that got to float to us.

And so I'm actually personally right now. No, not if you had, not if you lost your job, that's not the point. The point is, what's it take to operate your household a month? It takes more than a thousand dollars to do that.

So $800 a month, $800 a month. That runs everything without any-- Yeah, but after you buy food, how much do you need? Yes. So we live completely off-grid.

We own some acreage. And I go to the house. We have no utility bill. We have no water bill. We have no garbage bill.

We basically just have to pay for the food.

So you're a wife. We're on solar. So what is your household income going on? We vary between one and two thousand a month to the business that we have.

So why are you so worried? No, no, no, no, one and two thousand dollars a month is your income? Well, that's just from the business. No, I ask for a household income.

That's our household income. Wow. So the only income you have is this business. Well, what I'm saying is that I'm actually have been employed.

I had a great job that I did for over a decade. And I ended that job to pursue the dream of building this off-grid property with me and my family. And I spent the last 18 months. I spent the last 18 months building this property

while the business flowed to us. And now I am a job surgeon. So I actually have several jobs off-grid.

“So what will you be making when you land the new job?”

The jobs I'm looking at are between 60 and 80 thousand a year. Great. Thank you. Okay. Good.

That gets ready to be. And we're making about 24,000 or so on the business. So you're going to make 100,000 give or take with the two combined and you have zero bills because you are completely off the grid. Wow.

Look at you. Okay. I'm going to raise the three to 1,000 up just to be called. It's just weird. Okay.

It's wonderful that you've done that. But I, you know, you ought to have five or 10,000 set aside and just liquid cash. Because the purpose is not just to cover monthly expenses. The measure is monthly expenses on how to build it.

But if your car transmission goes out right or one of your solar panels fails or whatever it is, where it happens in your world, the pump in the well goes out. You're going to end up needing more than three grand. So let's put set the target as soon as you get employed. Let's raise the three up to seven to ten somewhere in there.

That's still fairly low, way low on average, but for you, you know, it's going to, it should be sufficient. Very interesting situation. Now, having done all that, that gets you to what we call baby step four. However, your house is paid off.

So technically you're at baby steps seven, okay?

If you do that at good growth stock mutual funds and we suggest and Jade has done it straight in Sam, David Sharon, this is how we do it. We put across four types of mutual funds, growth growth and income, aggressive growth and international. And so if you start saving 15,000 dollars a year in a couple of Roth IRAs in good mutual

funds and you do that or more between 41 and 71, you'll have several million dollars.

“Oh wow, like not what I expected to be like three or four probably, okay?”

And so you got plenty of time and the good news is it's very easy for you guys to do because you're used to living in the land of contentment in a culture that can't spell the word. So you're very contented people and one of the indicators of, well, the ability to build wealth is the ability to be content and not need every stinking thing that Instagram pops up, which is not you, you're the other end of that spectrum.

I agree. And let's fill in those baby steps for anybody who is listening. So we left off on baby step three. He saved up the around 10,000 that Dave suggests, then baby step four, five and six, you do together.

And he really already had him done. Baby step four is like Dave said, investing 15% of your growth income. We would suggest doing that every month, most people, not this particular individual, not Jason, but a lot of us have employer sponsored accounts.

“We can throw that money right into a 401k, 4013b, whatever have you, TSP, whatever.”

And then beyond that, you can do baby step five, which is add to your kids' child's, you know, your child's college fund that can be a 529 and ESA. I don't even care if you put it in a brokerage, just put something aside for them. We don't give a designated amount. It's up to you, your budget, and what you think will look like the higher education for

your child. And then beyond that, yeah, we're paying off the house intentionally again, not a specific amount, but this is something you're being intentional about.

It's always a part of your budget.

Most people who pay off their house early, Dave walking our planner doing that and somewhere between the 7 to 10 year mark. Is that about right? Yep. And then from there, yeah, your baby step seven, this is where Jason was, living like

no one else, giving like no one else, and I can't stress this enough, Dave, this is the time you live like no one else, you give like no one else, three things you do with your money, give, save it, and spend it. Enjoy. Enjoy some of it, yeah.

But so if you save 250 bucks a month, which is 15,000 a year, and you never get a raise from

41 to 71 or from 41 to 67, you'll have 2.2 million.

That would be on average stock market returns. That's where you would end up. And so I was right, I just put it in the calculator, there's a retirement calculator. Any of you can do this at ramsysolutions.com and jump on there and run the retirement calculator and figure out different scenarios.

What would you have based on what you have now, how much time you have, what you think returns are going to be. I put in 11%, the S&P is average 11.8% since it began, which is a standard and poor index on the stock market. I think playing with an investment calculator is probably one of the most motivating.

It's like $1,250 car payment, just cost you two million bucks. Woo! Dave, we got a lot of calls on this show where life happens. One day someone's healthy, they're working, providing for their family, and then a curve ball hits.

We hear it all the time, a car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, and suddenly everything changes. Yeah.

“And that's why you've always said that having term life insurance from Zander is essential,”

because it protects your family if the worst happens. Yeah, that's right, you need 10 to 12 times your income, in coverage, no gimmicks, no whole life junk, just straightforward term life protection. But there's another piece that people often overlook, and that's long term, disability insurance. Yeah, it's important to understand the difference between them.

Life insurance steps in when you die, disability insurance steps in while you're alive, but can't work. So it replaces a large part of your income, so the bill still get paid while you get back on your feet. Now, if your employer gives you free disability insurance, great, take it.

If it's a discounted there at a better price, take it. But if not, Zander can help you find the right plan, whether you're single or married,

If you're going to be out of work for a while, then you need to make sure the money still showing up. And that's why Zander is our go-to. They make it super simple to get the right coverage at the best price, no pressure, no upselling.

Trust the Jeff Zander and Zander insurance for over 25 years and so is my family. To don't wait, it's fast, it's easy, and it could make all the difference. Go to zander.com or call 800-356-4282. Protect yourself, protect your income, protect your family. Sherry is in Richmond, Virginia.

Hi, Sherry, how are you? Good, how can we help? My question is, what to do with my blush fund? I was speaking to my husband probably like eight months ago and I was like, "Hey, how do you feel?

'Cause they have all these Ramsey envelopes and we have a vacation fund, but it's used for something else. It's kind of like a vacation. But I was like, "Hey, what is your vacation fund for vacation?" We do, but it's like sports trips and stuff for like, for the kids.

That's kind of... So we declare travel sports for vacation, okay?

Well, okay, so I went to the one I was like, "Hey, he knew I was always like vacations

and taking my kids on vacations either. She would be just once a year or planning a big trip every two years and saving for it." So I was like, "What do you think about me making this flush fund?" He's like, "Just to do it, you want with it?"

And I was like, "Sure." So eight months later, I've got about 9,400 in there and all for working over time, it's not for my salary, it doesn't take away from the family whatsoever.

“And as a kid, I want to say, "I think this is more than enough for all seven of us, but”

I think I can take us on a pretty good vacation." He's like, "Yeah, we don't need vacations." Okay. So I sat on it. Why do we not need vacations?

Well, because he wants to create generational wealth. And that's giving the idea. Yeah, but I thought we already had a budget that included saving for generational wealth. Well, that's like retirement and generational wealth. Are you doing the things, one of the indicators of being able to spend on extravagant vacations

is that you're doing the other things that make you a financially responsible adult, right? So if you're already out of debt, right, you're already a person who budgets, you're already a person who's saving for the future through things, like investing your 15% by having that fully funded emergency fund, if you're doing those types of behaviors you have life insurance, your generous, all those things.

Yes, you can turn around and take a $95 or $9,400 trip. But if you're not doing those things, you do need to go back and reassess.

“So why is it that your husband is saying, no, why do you think he's saying no to this?”

Put it back. He wants to put it back into kind of what we have going on with both of our salaries. He wants to acclude it and I might know it's not included, it's over time, so it doesn't take away from anything. But then I started on it for a couple of days, and I'm like, you know what, I think

I want to help myself out with college more. No, here's the priority thing.

I'm going to point to the problem, the problem is you guys aren't aligned, and you aren't

using our money as our money. You're doing something over here, then there's money over here, that's a lot for something, but it's not really being used for that, then there's money over here that he has a plan for. I think what will really help you guys is getting aligned and saying, first off, our money

is our money. It's going in one big pool. It's in one checking account and with this money, here are the things that we've decided our priorities. So if thing one is to his point, yes, let's make sure we're putting the right amounts

“for retirement, which is wealth-building, generational wealth, whatever you want to call it, right?”

That money is going there and that's been earmarked for that. Then after that, you guys can also say, look, there's money left. We've covered our 15% there's more money. What do we want to do with that? Do we want to take a vacation?

Maybe the answer is yes, we put a little money there, does that make sense?

Yeah, and we have all of that going on. No, you don't. That's what you want to call. No, you don't. You have your own little world over here that you created with overtime, and then you're

pissed because he wants to reach into it, you're not doing what she said. What she said is, all the money goes in one pile. We decide together before the month begins where all the money is going to go. His, yours, ours, overtime, nobody. And if you have a slush fund, it's because there's a line item in that budget that says,

we're setting aside a certain amount for Sherry's slush fund, which is perfectly fine to do. And by the way, it's perfectly fine to put $9,000 aside and go on a vacation in that budget.

on your overtime, and then we get to just fight over what we do with that later. That fight should have occurred when that money was in the pile with all the other money,

“and we say, are we putting enough aside for kids' college?”

Are we putting enough aside for retirement? Are we putting enough aside for a vacation? And you ought to be doing all three of those. Right. So I think the bigger issue was when I went back and said, okay, I've thought about it,

I want to help my son with more with college because throughout the years I haven't made as much money, and I've saved as much as I could, but it hasn't been a lot. And so he's like, yeah, let's put what number do you have, so I gave him a number, and I was like, it's not going to be enough. I want to put my overtime there to help my son, so he's not coming out and so much dead.

Yeah, I don't want you to. I want you to quit trading your overhead, except overtime separately.

This is the third time we've said this.

It's not a separate issue. Like, back while I wanted to, I wanted to do a different perspective. It's part of the overall pile of money in the household, and if we, you're income and his income, plus or minus overtime is not enough to fund the kids' college, we have a different issue.

Mm-hmm. You guys have a blended family? Yeah. Okay. So I think that's part of the, I think that's where the separation is coming in.

You're thinking this is my son from a previous time. I can put money on the side to deal with that issue, and I think you just have to view this again. I want to handle money. I want to handle money.

I want to handle money. And I think you just have to view this again. I want to handle money. I want to handle money.

Like the two of you, when he married you, he took on the responsibility of loving you

well, which includes loving him well. Right. And I want him to look at that, regardless of what you have made, or what is income is versus your income, all one big pile of money to live our life.

“Our life is I have a son that was with me when we got married, and you said for better”

for worse, and it includes him. And, you know, we are doing this together. We are loving this kid well. We are going to send this kid to school. We are going to save for retirement and have generational wealth.

I agree with that. It's a great goal. We are going to go on a nice vacation. I agree with that. It's a great goal.

So all of the goals are fine. The process you're using is what's causing your disagreement. Because you're still trying to run around over here, not making as much as him, but

going ahead and pouring on the hours to take care of your son from a previous marriage

because he isn't. Or you don't feel like he should have to. I disagree. I think he should have to. When he married you, he married that kid.

And this is, you better love them both, better love them all, just to like, treat them all, just to like. It's how the Brady bunch operating.

“That's why they stayed in their little squares.”

And so, you know, this is what we do. So you guys have all that you're both saying correct things. And neither one of your afraid of work, you know. So the correct things are. I want to build generational wealth.

I want to provide college for the young man. I want to go on a nice vacation. All of those things just need to become line items in the budget. Now, here's where the rub is going to come when you do that. You, Sherry, are the natural spender.

Your husband is the natural tightwood, the saver. And for him, your God sent you to him. So he learns to have fun. He sent God sent him to you. So you retire with dignity and don't have to eat dog food.

Because you're going to have some money saved because of this man. He won't let it be any other way. And you're there to make sure he has fun. Because this guy don't know how to lighten up. He's living a cave, collect lent and only come out on triple coupon Thursday.

You know, lighten up, dude. Let's go on a nice vacation. You guys make a lot of money. I can smell it. He does.

And when they're all combined, including this overtime. It's quite nice. And she made $9,000 and ten months. Yeah. They're doing all right.

And over time, that's great. None of your afraid of hard work. You're good people. So let's just sit down and say, OK, these are things we're going to agree on. And in the overall picture, what number are we going to put on each one?

And I want you to go on vacation. And I want you to find the voice college. And I want you to build generational wealth. And you can do every bit of that when you lay it out and use the baby steps. So quit living separate lives off to the side folks. It does not work.

It all it does is create strife, anxiety. And we're still measuring against the past. We're still saying, you know, I brought this child into this marriage out. But he was there. Yeah.

It was not a secret. It was part of the package. And you're worth it. You guys are worth it to go on vacation. So yeah.

And so everybody does get to win. It's just a matter of how much and win and in what order. [MUSIC]

They struggle because they don't stick to a plan.

And when your bank makes your money feel confusing or hard to track, plans fall apart fast.

“And that's why I love Fairwin's credit union and their mobile app.”

Because let's face it. Most banks build systems that make it easy to swipe and hard to stay organized. But with the Fairwin's app, you open it and you know exactly what to do. No clicking through 11 menus just to move your own money. Just tap, transfer, and done.

You can deposit a check from your couch by taking a picture. You can get real time alerts, so you're not guessing what's in your account. And you can add your Ramsey B-Wear debit card to Apple Pay and tap to check out. See a lot of banks leverage convenience to make it easier to go into debt. But Fairwin's offers convenience to help you stay in control.

It's a huge difference. That's banking that actually supports the baby steps instead of working against them. So if you want to bank some place that's both faster and riser, check out Fairwin's. Go to Fairwin's.org/Ramsey. That's Fairwin's.org/Ramsey.

Be sure by the NCU-A. [Music] One of the best things for you to do for your finances is to have a really good tax pro in your corner that you can trust. They'll help advise you on the best moves to make your situation or your small business,

especially if you've had some big life changes this year to make them the best, the least taxes. That's the whole goal here. Pay as little tax as possible. Go to RamseySolutions.com/TaxPro to find CPAs and enrolled agents who have been vetted

by the Ramsey team and they are Ramsey trusted. Raisin Nashville. Hi, Ray. How are you? Hey, Dave.

Thank you for taking my call. As long as the long time listener, thank you for your valuable advice throughout the years. Thank you, Sean. Reason I'm calling.

About 40 years ago, I was a pilot in Navy and I took out a $50,000 service men's group life insurance policy.

“It was about $50 a year, I believe, and back then, that $50,000 actually was a lot”

of money. Throughout the years, I kept the policy after the first call for. I got hired by major airline in 1990, and as the years went on, I continued with my group life. And when I was in my 40s, I picked up a 30-year term policy for $500,000, which will

hold me until I turned 74. This last December, I turned 65 and by law, I was forced to retire as an airline pilot. So I am now retired with a fixed income of my pension, Social Security, my wife took an early Social Security at 63, partly because she needed insurance policy, medical insurance policy to gap her until she gets on now Medicare.

So the status that I have right now, I have no loans at all, my house is paid for.

We are empty nesters school has been all the colleges behind us, I have about a million

and a half in my 401(k) and IRA, and I have quite a bit of cash, and so my question is, after turning 50, the group life policy, it seems like the premiums just go exponentially higher and higher. I'm sure you're very familiar with this, and then 65 is another tier that it hits. My question is, what I was flying, I felt so I wanted to have as much insurance as I possibly

could. I was doing international flying, things can take place overseas, and I wanted to make sure I was fully insured that my wife would have a good nest egg and he'd have to something happen. So now that I'm not flying anymore, I'm questioning whether it makes sense to continue

to a group life policy, it does not, it does not. And the reason is very simple, if you canceled both life insurance policies and you

died tomorrow, your wife's got a million and a half dollars plus a pile of undisclosed

number cash. I think she's okay, dude.

“Well, I'm here's the thing, she has longevity or family, and her mother is 97, and the way”

she lived, and she's going to succeed me by 100%. 75% of the ladies out there are husbands. That's not the point. The point is, I think it's a pile of cash you mentioned. It's about a million cash.

Oh, boy. So we have two point two, two point five million dollars, if that were invested in a decent

the principal, the 10% would be $250,000. I think Mama's okay, honey. Well, I'd say she's going to live to be 100, and I don't know if she can make it on $250,000.

“Even if she, even if she wins, can she make it on $250,000 a year?”

All right, sure she could. It's my point. You're self-insured because you've done an extremely good job, Ray. You know what? I've listened to your tutelage throughout the years, and we were debt free as early as we could, and that's probably the best message that you said.

Well, thank you, Sarah, appreciate that. But I just want to tell you, you're what you've been, you know, all these years, you've been living on less than you made, you got out of debt, and you've invested, and now you're

sitting on two and a half million dollars, you win the price.

You did it. You stepped a millionaires, you're incredible, very well-done, sir. And the point is, is that good financial planning that creates this kind of net worth with no debt makes you become self-insured. Okay.

I'll give you another example that's not in your on your plate. Okay. I'm 65. Okay. Sharon and I have it all written out, we have hundreds of millions in our case of net worth.

And we're not going to a nursing home. Everything happens. I'm just going to hire full-time staff and put them in my house. I can afford it.

“I can hire an MD and put them in the spare bedroom, right?”

It's not a problem, because I'm self-insured through this. I'm not being arrogant, but the point is the money creates enough money to cause you to be able to live out your golden years the way you want to live them out. And you're in that situation without ever touching the nest egg, without being irresponsible or rash.

What do you think that is, Dave, I feel like there's many times where we will present a mathematical equation of how someone will prosper. We can say things like, "Hey, you have enough money to be able to do this, this and that." And they're still like, "The light doesn't go on of, yes, that's true." What is that?

Where it's just, it's almost like, because even in this case, I almost felt like he didn't believe us and there's been many calls where we've painted out this elaborate picture of what someone's life can look like, and it's almost like they don't believe us when we say things like, "Hey, folks are paying their houses off, hey, if you do this, you'll

have a million dollars or you'll have $3 million."

Well, it's not a good, it's a grotesque metaphor, but it popped into my head. You've been fighting cancer for five years and they go in and do an operation and the doctor comes and it goes, "We got it." You don't need radiation, you don't need chemo. You we got it.

And you go, "Yeah, but I'm fighting cancer." No, we got it. You did it. You won. Yeah, but I'm fighting.

No, we got it. That's the conversation. Yeah. It's just take, because you're in a warrior mode and the battles over, lay this hard down. You know?

You've been living like no one else, now it's time to live and get of like no one else. And trust that the process works. Put the sword down. You won. Battles over.

There's no one left to kill.

Everybody's gone. You know? But you're still out there just swinging, but you're just in that mode and you're okay, but you're okay. But you're okay.

Yeah. But you're okay. And it's like when you run through the finish line, it takes a few seconds to slow down. You don't just suddenly come to a stop. Yep.

“And I think that's the only psychology thing, the only way I can answer the psychology”

of it. It doesn't arguing with his brain is just in saving, invest mode and make sure it buys okay mode. Everything he did was to take care of his family. I was traveling overseas, internationally, I wanted to make sure I had life insurance.

All of everything was serving his family. It was a wonderful spirit. Yeah. And he's like, I want to make sure. Yeah, but you're okay.

You have it. I want to make sure. Yeah, but you're okay. And that's a wonderful place to be. Because that's the kind of person who gets there is they get this.

The blinders on and they're not listening to all the outside world and they're able to focus and get out of debt and they're able to focus and put money in that 401k. I mean, that guy's star. Yeah, he is. It's what's interesting was we took the call earlier from the 41-year-old.

Yeah. And we told him he'd have two and a half meters. Yeah. Ray's got two and a half meters. That's true.

Yeah. And he's 65. I mean, yeah. There we go. Yeah.

Yeah. But proof text, right? Yeah. It really does work. That's just what we're doing.

And well, what if, what if you don't save any money, you're not going to have any money. Hello. There's a direct correlation between people to save money and people to have money.

And so, yeah, you know, I don't know anything in investments because you don't invest. Hello. Yeah. Look, yes. Ray's an investor, man.

He's stud. He's done the whole stud.

One million dollars cash.

Yeah, that's a little different. That's different. Ray, right? There you go. Yes, you do.

Yeah. Wow.

“I'm so happy I was able to continue doing the show so long that now I'm seeing these”

people who are asking me the question, I've got too much. What do I do now? Yes. I was not a question in the early days of the show. I thought I would ever hear.

Right.

They started with you and now they're finishing with you and you see they've probably

got it. Yeah. I'm a card got repoed Dave. That's the only question I got in those days. If you run a business, you already know this.

Bad information leads to bad decisions. And right now, AI is everywhere. And AI is only as good as the data behind it. The best AI is built on the best data. That's why I recommend NetSuite.

“NetSuite is the number one AI Cloud ERP and more than 43,000 businesses run on it, including”

us here at Ramsey Solutions. Their AI isn't bolted on, it's built in.

And it connects everything that runs your business, accounting inventory customer data

all in one place. Because when your numbers are connected, AI actually works like it's supposed to. NetSuite's AI helps flag cash flow problems, spot inventory issues, close your books faster and cut down on manual reporting. If your revenue is at least seven figures, go to netSuite.com/Ramsey for a free product

tour. That's Sweet.com/Ramsey. Sally is in Hartford, Connecticut. Hi, Sally, how are you? Hi, I'm good today.

Thanks for taking my call. Sure, what's up? So, my question is about debt relief in a low-income situation. Okay, what's your income? I get Social Security Disability, I've been on the 64, and I have been getting Social Security

Disability for two years, which is how much? $1,700. Okay. What's the nature of this building? I know.

A year, $27,000 a year. Or $27,000 a per year. Okay. So. And that includes a small pension.

Okay. And so you're making a $25,00, $2300 a month. Okay. And how much is your rent? It's about $1,700 a year, a month, rather.

And I live in New England, so it's just rent up here. Crazy. Crazy. I don't care. I don't know how that math works.

2300 minus 1,700 equals Sally doesn't have food. Great, so I have about $80,000 in between an RRA and an equity account, and I keep drawing off about, you know, to make ends meet. What's the nature of your disability? I spend everything, physical, a lot of physical stuff, heart problems, mental disability,

depression.

“I mean, I'm being honest, you know, so what keeps you in New England?”

I have one adult daughter, okay. Who lives in the New England area. Okay. You know, other family anywhere in the country? I'm sorry.

Do you have other family anywhere in the country? I do, I mean, my ex-husband is nearby, and he's been very helpful.

basically, you know, is there any way what kind of credit card you know, relief is there?

There's not, there's not any, you borrowed money on a credit card, and the only credit card relief there is is if you file bankruptcy, which is certainly not going to do on $9,000. There's no magic pill that says you're disabled, so they forgive the credit card debt. That does, there's no such thing. So, I also don't think that that's the biggest concern.

That's the biggest concern. That's the biggest concern. That's the biggest concern. That's the biggest concern. That's the biggest concern.

That's the biggest concern. That's the biggest concern. Yeah. But that doesn't matter, you make $2300, and your rent is $1700, those numbers don't last.

“How much are you pulling off that $80,000 every month, Sally?”

Sally? How much are you taking out of your savings every month, Sally? Well, a year, I try to keep it between $4,000 a year. But last year, I had to have my transmission replaced, and now we're doing $1,000 for that. Yeah.

How much are you paying another car?

Okay, so here's what I want you to figure out, and this is not going to be easy.

Okay, but there's three or four levers to pull, and everything I'm going to tell you is going to be hard, but they're not going to be as hard as the plan you're on because the plan you're on, you're going to run out of money, and you're going to have a problem. That's my fear. Yeah, I know.

I'm not trying to scare you. I'm just saying the plan you're on sucks, we need a new plan, but the other plans aren't going to be without pain. Okay.

“So plan number part part, there's three or four things that you need to do somewhat of all”

of them. Okay. I want you to come up with some kind of a self-employed idea that you can do with the limitations that you have to create some income. That's thing number one, just write that down.

I don't care what it is, and I don't, as long as it makes you smile and makes you $1,000 a more a month. Okay.

The second thing is, you've got to move.

You cannot afford a $1,700 rent period. And the third thing is, we're doing those two things, so we create a monthly budget that is sustainable, meaning it will last, okay. And so if you had $3,500 coming in, because you had a little bit of side income, and if you had no payments, and if you had a rent that was half of what you have now, you can do that

without touching your savings, and that is sustainable, that will last. With the numbers you're giving me won't last, and you know that that's why you called and it's terrifying. I'm sorry you're there. I'm sorry you're there, but if you don't act on it, it's going to get more terrifying.

And so we've got to do those three things. We have to create a sustainable situation that the income minus the rent, minus living expenses, doesn't need savings to be used. And then number two, we're going to do that by getting affordable rent, and we're going to do that by getting, you may mean moving to another area of the country.

I don't know, but $850 rent is available out there in America somewhere, okay. It might not be in Hartford. I don't know Hartford that way, it's an expensive little town, and Connecticut is a highly taxed state, so it's very possible. I don't know, but I want you to think in those terms, we have to get rent.

And income added to this equation, better rent price, better income added to this equation, so we don't have to touch the savings, and then you're okay. You can be fine. Then you can write a check out of the 80,000 and pay off the stupid credit card and card on it.

And it goes away. That's number four is when you've created a sustainable situation. But today I would tell you just pay off the credit card, but if you stay in this situation with this income and there's rent, you're still going to burn up your savings. And credit cards are not your problem.

“Your problem is your income versus your life, the way your life is set up now.”

Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I agree. $1,000 we changed. I don't want you to worry. We're scared with you.

We want you to win. And what I'm telling you to do is to move to an 850, that's painful. What I'm telling you to do to get it, come up with some kind of side hustle where you maybe sit dogs or you do whatever you iron people's shirts or I don't care what you do. Whatever it is you're going to do for 1,000 bucks a month, okay?

It doesn't take a lot.

They're painful things that I'm asking you to do for you.

But, you know, you've got to, if you don't address this, it's going to unravel on you. Absolutely. Yeah, that money's going to run out. Yeah, this is going to be a major move out of the comfort zone, major.

“And you know, I think the other thing is, I, I sense that you don't have a large, strong”

community group friends. And so I want you to search out a good local church there and hard for it. And I want you to sit in the pastries office and introduce yourself to them and tell them your story and ask them to help you plug in with some of the other ladies there in the church. But so they give you money, but so you get some people that hear your story and that you're

seen and you feel good and you feel whole connection, connectivity to community when you're, especially when you're battling something that's having to do things that are uncomfortable is necessary. Well, and there's opportunity there. The more people you're around, people get to talking and somebody says this and it

sparks an idea and you go, oh, I could go do that, right? Yeah. Maybe you're comfortable with our house and live in our guest house and baby set our dogs. Yeah. And you do that for 600 bucks.

But we didn't introduce ourselves trying to get something from them, but those things happen when you're in community. Yeah. And people know your need and they know you and they know your, your trustworthy. Yeah.

Your transmission goes out. Oh, I know a guy who can fix that or, you know, my uncle, what a 8,000, it's 4,000. That's right. That's right. Yeah.

Yeah. So I want you, that's number four. Oh, church and sit down have a meeting with the pastor. Again, not to ask for things except to connect me into community. I need more friends.

I need more connection and connection is valuable. If you're looking for a more budget friendly way to save on medical costs and stay true to your values, Christian healthcare ministries is a great option to think about. CHM is not health insurance. It's a health cost sharing ministry, a biblical community-based way for Christians

to share each other's medical bills. That means no enrollment deadlines and you can choose any doctor or hospital you want. That kind of freedom is big, especially if you're self-employed between jobs or you just need something that fits your budget better. CHM has been around for decades.

She's fully serving the Christian community and many members save hundreds of dollars a month compared to traditional health insurance. And that margin gives you breathing room when you're working the baby steps and trying to stewards your money well.

And right now, CHM's offering new members a 50% credit towards their first month of membership.

Get started at CHMministries.org/budget and use promo code Ramsey. That CHMministries.org/budget and promo code Ramsey. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show and the Fair Wins Credit Union Studio. I'm Dave Ramsey, Jade Wash all Ramsey personality. Number one bestselling author is my co-host today.

“Christine is in Cleveland, Ohio, high-Christine, how are you?”

I'm well, how are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, so I wanted to get your advice and perspective. My boyfriend and I, we want to be married and we're not running down the aisle tomorrow,

but we're working towards it and having conversation is good. And one of the more in-depth conversations that we do still need to have is financial. But before we even jump into that, like I want to make sure that I'm coming at it from

a really grounded mindset and perspective within myself first, so it makes absolute sense

to me that when you get married, you combine your finances together with your spouse. But I'm noticing in myself that I have this little nagging fear of don't become fully financially dependent on your partner because what happens is everything goes wrong. Like that fear gets even louder when I think about potential future scenarios where, like, if I decide I want to leave my career and stay home with the kids, like that's something

I'm open to, but at the same time, like, this fear gets a little bit louder.

“And so, like, I don't want that fear to be in the driver seat for these really important”

conversations, but like genuinely I'm excited to have. Well, you are very wise and you're approached to this. I love your wisdom. I love that. I also think it's valid.

go out and it may be it's never been your mindset to be like, oh, I'm going to be home

and maybe I'll stay home with kids, but you like to go out and you like to be doing your thing out there. I tend to do in those situations is I really go back to the facts of it because it really is somewhat of an emotional argument because if you think about it, let's go back to what you said, well, I'm afraid I'll lose my independence.

What if basically I stop working and he's the soul income earner, right? Right. Yeah. That can be a good thing. That can be a good thing.

That's a fear. Yeah. So, what you would be worried about is you're at home and what he wants to get a divorce and you're out here and he's been, you've exited the workforce for however many years, right? So now you're struggling to get a job, right?

Is that the, I like to play out the scenario to as much detail as I can. Is that right? Yeah, yeah, that or like you hear about like financial abuse where people are like, well, all the cards are in his name and he's cutting me off. Okay.

So those are two different things. No, they're, but I think they're the same thing.

“Well, one of the most cases you have to have a voice.”

Yeah, you both. That's a preventative medicine. Right.

And one of them is I have a hard time seeing the second scenario, which is any sort of abuse

because the fact that you guys are talking about this ahead of time, the fact that you're being proactive, the fact that you're not the type to shy away from being a part of it, I don't think you're going to worry about that at all, right? You know, the first time something smelled funny, you would raise your hand. Yes.

You're not going to be a much latering guy when we kind of felt bad. You're not that person. You're like, wait a minute, Baba. That's you. Yeah.

Definitely. And then number, the first one that we're going to reverse now is the idea that, okay, what if I exit the workforce, what if I'm out for 10 years, you know, and something goes wrong with the marriage, I'm left, you know, having to create this whole new world for myself, right? So that's when I would go in and I would really think about it, I'd say, okay, well, what's

the job that I'm leaving is there any way that I can continue to stay connected to that. Maybe you're in health care, you keep your certifications up. There are certain things that you can do to remain relevant, but there's also this idea

that you can always, if you're the same person, you're smart today, you'll be smart

10 years from now, right? You're resourceful today, you'll be resourceful 10 years from now. So the assumption that you will somehow go down and value over time, and you won't be

“able to get a job, and you, do you see what I'm saying?”

And of course, you're well aware, you get half everything. Yeah. So there's a million dollars in this 401k, half of its yours. If there's a million dollar paid for house, half of its yours. But the scary party is not going to be without as long as you've had a say in our aware

of and you're both voting together and you both are emotional owners of all the decisions all the way through. So my wife Sharon's been a full-time mom since Denise was born 40 years ago. Talk about vulnerable, except that she has an equal vote and has had emotionally practically and legally the entire time.

I can promise you if you interview her, she will not say she's ever one time felt vulnerable. Quite the opposite. Yeah. That's so beautiful, and so I guess coming back to like, when we're just starting to have these conversations, I mean, what are some advice that you might give to how do we

start these conversations, like, I have full faith and confidence in him. I don't expect him to have a girl. That's great. You wouldn't be dating. Oh, wow.

Right. Right. Right. So I guess how do we step through those kinds of conversations just to, you know, do the groundwork to make sure that we are on the same page and cutting ourselves up right

for we have the people vote, you know, that sort of thing.

“I think that you do exactly what you're doing, which is you lead with your heart and”

what you want for the future. So you start by saying things like, you know, I want our marriage to last forever. And I want us to have full transparency. I want to be able to be, because completely vulnerable with you and you start that way, because who can argue with that?

Yeah. And I want both of our votes to count, and because two is better than one, and, you know, all that. And then you go, okay, let's talk through some of this, because the number one calls up marriage problems and divorce is money fights and money problems.

So let's go ahead and figure out if bears kill people in our neighborhood, it's the number one thing they die of, then we need to figure out how to keep the bears away. Right. So, you know, what are we going to do? What are we going to do?

Well, okay. Let's look at that. Let's look at savings. Let's look at the way you grew up, the way I grew up.

Are you a natural glass half full, glass half empty abundance or scarcity?

And you start to go through some of those things and generally opposites attract, so celebrate the differences and not one of you's wrong, one of you's right. But if you're the natural saver, my wife's the natural saver, we celebrate that at our house. I'm also the natural spender. We celebrate that at our house.

She gets to do stuff because I'm there, you know, and so we celebrate that. And so, you know, Rachel and Winston, Rachel's the spender, Rachel and Winston is the saver at their house. And so on. Anyway, you just start working that through.

And, you know, it's almost a part of pre-marriage counseling to go in depth on, what

“do you believe about giving, saving, spending, fun, retirement wealth, insurance?”

What do you believe about these things? And let's talk about that and talk about the feelings that come around all of those things. And then start to go, okay, I'm going to have to come some your direction from my natural tendency. You're going to have to come some my direction from your natural tendency, and we're

going to find a really cool, strong point at the third point on the triangle from there.

That's better than either one of us were by ourselves, so that's we're getting together. So, you're going to be great. You ask a question so well, and you ask the right question. Yeah, you're going to be intentional. Your brain is going to remain turned on.

I'm not concerned about you. You're going to send you a copy of Rachel's book, "No Yourself, No Your Money." Both of you could read it and help you with the discussion. And Mary, it changes something in you. It's sure it didn't mean.

When you say I do, all of the sudden life isn't just about you anymore. It's about we. And one of the most grown-up things you can do for that we is to make a will at MamaBareLegalforms.com. See, being a grown-up isn't just about jobs and splitting up the chores. It's about having a plan, so the person you love is protected, and a will isn't about

dying. It's about deciding. Put your wishes in writing so no one has to guess, and judges don't have the final say.

“That's why I recommend MamaBareLegalforms.”

With MamaBare making your will is easy. It's completely online, no lawyers required. You can get it done in about 20 minutes. The price you see at the start is the price you pay with MamaBare. So if you're serious about being an adult, do this today.

Go to MamaBareLegalforms.com, use the promo code Ramsey, and save 20% on your will. That's MamaBareLegalforms.com, promo code Ramsey. Well we love hearing people's stories about other winning with money, and we got a great review on the every dollar budgeting app. This app allows me to keep my budget and goals organized.

I love the projection on when we will be dead free, and my estimated net worth. It gives you something to work towards, gives you a light at the end of the tunnel. Boom, it's exactly why we built this. Perfect. That's great to hear.

Hey, really?

“Good things are happening over at every dollar.”

You live like no one else later. You can live and give like no one else, and you will learn to work, not only a budget, but the whole Ramsey plan will be us holding your hand while you're using every dollar. Start every dollar for free today in the App Store or Google Play. Brian is in Los Angeles.

Hey, Brian, how are you? I'm good, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up?

Hey, so I was just calling first on the advice, because I'm kind of at a crossroads right now.

I've kind of achieved my most immediate financial goals, and I kind of don't know what to do moving forward. Okay. What do you mean? Yes.

So I got about 350K liquid. I have two healthcare businesses that are grossing about 750,000 a year, and I have a wife and a kid, and I'm paying about $60 to $80,000 in taxes at the end of the year. I have about 300K equity on my house with 900,000 left on the mortgage. I don't have any credit card debt or anything like that.

I was just wondering, like, in my situation, you know, with this 350,000 sitting in a

checking account, you know, Chase, and the people who I'm banking with, they're kind of calling wanting me to move the money around, but, you know, I worked hard to save it out of not sure really what to do with that. Yeah. You're Chad Clampett, Mr. Drosdale's calling.

That's funny. You only know what that is. Look it up. Okay. Yeah, I'm only 30.

Oh, yeah. You want to look it up? It's the Beverly Hillbill. It's just an old show. Okay.

Anyway. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

I immediately become irrelevant.

No. I was with you. I was with you. So, why to go? So you're making your income off the 750 gross is somewhere around 250, right?

Okay. Yeah. It's about 15 to 20 k a month. That's about after taxes, including now I'm talking about your growth, your taxable annual income from these businesses is around 250, isn't it?

Yeah, something like that, 250, that's about 20,000 a month. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That's after tax.

I've pulled in about 20,000 a month with distribution. Actually, I'm taking 7,000 a month and W2 for myself and then my wife is about 2.5,000 in that W2.

So I don't even know if that is--

None of that matters with what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about, what you're real taxable income is. So we know it's 10 on W2 and then you have profit on these businesses that you own. You know what profit is and that profit is also taxable and the total of all of that is 60 and in a 30% bracket, that means you're making around 250, maybe 300,000 a year.

Someone in there. Yeah, my bracket is 37%.

“Okay, then you should be, yeah, you're probably making 300 then.”

Okay. So that's good. Way to go. Congratulations. I do want you to get more on top of your numbers, on your businesses, scares me

that you don't know what you make. And then you somehow barricaded that under what you're doing on W2, I don't have that problem here and I make a lot more than that on this place. So I know exactly where my income is coming from and how much it is. So I want you to know that.

Then I want you to take a whole bunch of this 350 and pay down your mortgage. I want you to get your house paid off. Fast as you can. Okay. Your instinct on not listening to a bank who was trolling you was very wise.

The last thing you want to do is listen to Chase, our J.P. Morgan for anything, our fifth third. You don't want to listen to them for anything. This is just where I deposit money and where I run my checking account in my debit card. That's the only place I use them for.

Okay. They're not using a bank for investment advice. They don't have good investment advice. They give you bankers. They give you good banker advice.

“So you need to sit down with a good broker to do your long term investing.”

But we teach people at your stage and way to go, you're doing extremely well, Brian. Obviously you're a bright guy. I mean, idiots don't generally make 300k and so you're doing really really well. What's the purpose of the 350 set aside in cash? How is it your mark?

It's just, it's just what I've been saving and I'm not the stage now where, you know, I ran everything to charge U.P.T so the kids are doing, you know, and everything came back that I need to interview some CPAs because I really don't know. I'll say that. No, you don't need to listen to CHAPGP-T, they're about investment advice.

But I do want to know is that your personal money or is any of your business retained earnings part of that? How is that? How is it? It's a different, you know, mutual, mutual checking account that me and my wife have access to.

Good. And then that's not including the money that is in my business is that we'll hold it for six months. Very good. Very good. But I don't include that as my money that's good.

Good. Very good.

“That's why I need retained earnings in the business.”

So what we would teach you to do is to get a good investment advisor that is the heart of a teacher. And we'll sit down with you and your wife and teach you about some good ways to put some of this aside. You need to get some 401(k)s of some kind going, some Roth IRAs going of some kind. And there are several things you can do in your situation depending on how your companies

are set up. And then, and then we're going to have an emergency fund of three to six months of expenses set aside. So some of this 350 still be sitting there. And you could call it 50, you have a 900,000-dollar mortgage, I think you said.

And then I'll throw 300 at that. And then I'm going to say how fast can I pay off that 600,000 have a paid for house out

And you're living very frugally, so you're doing a great job.

And so let's pay that house off in three or four more years. And I mean, in the meanwhile, start some investing for your retirement plans. And you're going to become very, very wealthy. And you're not going to become very wealthy, just dumping 350 in a high yield savings. Let's talk about why, though, because somebody listening is like, well, that sounds pretty

good to have $350,000 and just sitting in cash. It's not bad, it's better than not having it. But I mean, there's somebody listening going, well, why do I need to invest that? I'm afraid of investments, I'd rather just have it sitting in my account. It's not losing money, is it?

And so that's the person that I want to speak to, because I do think that it probably feels

“good to have money there, but you have to think about what that money is doing over”

time.

And if it's not in a high yield savings account, and it's just in a regular savings account,

then you're really earning nothing on it. Even if it's in a high yield, maybe you're at 3.5, but if you invest it, you can have a better rate of return over time. I think you said earlier, 11.8% has been the average return in the last 30 years. The average has been north of 20 years.

Yes, but that's not normal. But let's just say for instance, he took the last three years, 20% of 350,000, and you made three instead. So but 20% would be 60,000 dollars a year, right? Yes, 70,000 dollars a year, and it could have made 70,000 dollars a year for the last

three years. That's a lot of money.

And so that's another two-ten, but instead, we made 3.5.

Yeah, I made 3% on it, and so, I don't know. It's like more than half. Yeah. In other words, you lost tens of thousands of dollars per year by not having it invested.

“And that's what financial people, like I was trained, call opportunity cost.”

You missed the opportunity to make an average of about 70,000 dollars on that for the last three years. Not to mention if you'd left it in there, you would have made 20% on the 70, and then 20% on the 140. On top of that.

But we're not even talking about that. And that's not normal. That's not every year, but it's actual facts in the last three years, that's what it would have been. And so, instead, you made 3% which is like $9,000 per year.

Yeah. And so, it's a big deal. You know, that's the missed opportunity on your money, because when your money is one place, it can't be another. It loses the opportunity to go to work.

.

“Trying a home is one of the biggest financial decisions you'll ever make, but too many people”

base the decision on opinions or what the market is doing that week. Churchill mortgage has been our trusted partner for over 30 years, because they do things the Ramsey way. A lot of people think buying a home starts with going to a bunch of open houses. But if you're buying a home the right way, you start with a budget and a trusted guide,

like Churchill before you even think about house shopping. Churchill will show you the real numbers, not what a bank will approve, buying before being ready is how people end up house poor and stressed out. Churchill will tell you the truth and they won't push you into more house than you need. And once you understand what you can actually afford, you can move forward with clarity

and confidence. So if you're ready to buy a home, choose the right guide and stick to a plan, go to Churchill mortgage.com and get started at ChurchillMorgage.com. This is a paid advertisement in the MSID 159-1 in the MS Consumer Access.org Eagle Housing Lender.

And Nicole is in Tulsa, high Nicole, how are you? Hi, good. Thank you, how are you? Better than I deserve. What's up?

Thank you. I have listened to you guys since I was about 17 and almost 38 now and you guys have just changed my life just tremendously so I just imposed a grateful. My most basic question is, I am currently working on my doctorate at program, I work full time and I just have very little margin between my schedule and my budget and I'm getting

to keep staying the course and to just keep out it.

“How much time do you have left in this situation of what you paid the MSD?”

How much percentage of the doctorate? Sure. So I have about 16 hours after this semester, I'm pretty close, but just pull the teeth to get there. And then dissertation, right?

That includes the dissertation, but I have it almost completely written. Oh, okay, but you have 16 hours of class work also? Yes, sir. Okay. Cool.

So what are you going to do once a semester or how long does that take? The trajectories about a year and a half just how the course work falls within this school than I'm at. Okay. So it's not a real heavy course load then.

It's not. Okay.

And so you're running a full-time job 40 hours?

Yes, sir. Yes, sir. What do you make? Right now, I make about 50. Okay.

And you can't live on that? I can. I've got a very, very tight budget, but I have about probably 15, 30 bucks much over at the end of every month. Is it just you?

Just me. Okay. I want to know more about the money. Okay. You said you've only got 15 or 30.

Do you have debt? I don't know, son. And maybe that's four. So and I've saved up already for the school, so I have just about why I need to finish that.

About my six months emergency funds. Probably my biggest hurdle is just my rent is, it takes, I'm sitting at about 12 hundred and months for that. That is a thought you were going to say.

“So you said four, you're putting 15% of your income away in retirement?”

I'm not right now. So you're not a four. Okay. Okay. So there's a couple parts.

This is the first part of your question.

How do I stay motivated, which just sounded more like a emotional space of staying motivated till the end? And then it sounds like there's also a financial component, which is also my budget is tight. Right.

Correct. I mean, in this case, let's talk about the budget first. In this case, it sounds like every square inch of your time is accounted for. Am I wrong or am I right? You're beyond right.

Okay. So then the next place we can look is, is there anything that you can cut out of your budget? Is there anything that is worth changing for the next year and a half to make this thing better?

I'm looking at your rent, but I think to myself, you're probably in some sort of least you've got a year and a half, I don't know that that's worth shaking loose. So what are you doing? What are you doing for living? Sure.

So I've been working in a mental health field for the last eight years or so and then working in the health field. Doing what? Right now I'm doing case management. I have been doing therapy.

I shifted that just to have a little bit less stress to be able to kind of keep myself going. And your PhD is in counseling or what? It's actually in ministry. So it's merging the Christian fields with therapy, trauma and all of that.

And what are your plans to do with that? Sure. I'd like to merge it with in therapy as well as shift into ministry as well. So I know it's not a role. High pain, you know, degree, but I know with therapy going shifting into that I can, you

really double my income. I don't know why you couldn't do therapy through the lens of ministry and make excellent money. Mm-hmm.

“I don't know why you have to take a back seat just because you used the word "ministry"”

in the sentence. Sure. And that's especially part of my goals to be able to do that. Yeah. And with a PhD, you can teach as well.

So that's part of the goal as well. Okay, we want to make sure we monetize all of this hard work off the back and don't in the name of saying, "I'm holy or I'm doing ministry except less than your worth in the marketplace." Instead, go be worth that in the marketplace and that is a ministry.

So you're serving people in the counseling or mental health space with a faith-based element is hugely valuable and solid after, by the way. So that's not something that you have to make, you know, 60,000 after going to all this work of doing a PhD. Don't do that.

So anyway, I just want to pep talk you there. I think you can do a lot with this and I want you to go, I want you to go make a

Okay.

When you're done with this PhD.

“So I think that there's the motivation to continue right there.”

It's worth it. Mm-hmm. It just push on through, but you know, you've gotten this far and the light is at the end of the tunnel, layout a detailed track that says, "On this date, I will be done. Dissertation will be reviewed and completed.

The classwork will be completed and they're going to put doctor in front of Nicole's name." Okay. On this date, lay that out and then you start to go, you can almost put that on the wall as a thermometer and then just every month you check it off and work your way through,

you know, like you were in kindergarten or something, but it's good for you to visually

see the feedback that we're making traction, we're hitting in the right way.

We're going to be okay, that helps. If there's, the reason I was asking about all this is because you're doing your coursework and you're working casework Monday through Friday. If there's anything you can do on Saturday to add 1,500 bucks to a month to this situation, it's probably going to make your life a lot better and you're not going to die from

fatigue because you're young and you've got the ability to push through these things. Nothing we're doing here is out of control and it's not forever. And if you're making something, if you can make it a side hustle that you enjoy doing, like if you're flipping furniture, right, if you enjoy arts and crafts, that's a great thing for you to do.

“Flip a piece furniture and make 1500 bucks off it, right?”

Or if you enjoy, you know, working with your hands, do something that also feels like

a little bit of a hobby that you enjoy while you're making money, I think that'll make

it easier for you. Self-employed idea of some kind. Or you can stay right in the middle of the field and do some kind of freelance casework of some kind. I don't care, but a 1500 bucks a month would be a good trade for your Saturday. And would give you some breathing room in the budget which also helps you fight through the fatigue.

And go, I'm going to make it. I've only got this many more months. I've got eight months. I've got seven months. I've got six months.

I've got five months. I've got four months. And you start to, but you've got to put it down in detail where your mind believes that this is going to be over, because it is going to be over if you plan for it to be over. You don't want to be a perpetual student, no one, well, some people do, no one should.

No one should. Yeah, that's a better way to say on that. Wow. Yeah, you got this. It's sacrificed to win.

Yeah. It's just, you know, the other thing I would do is make sure someone else in the PhD program knows your story. What you're doing, sit down, share this. Even if you just share each other's tears for a little bit or whined together, we're

going to whine a little bit and a little whining session here. This is hard and I'm tired. That's fine. You need somebody to be able to talk to you about that. That's okay.

There's nothing wrong with that. That does give you energy because if you're, you know, fighting the dragon all by yourself, you can get burned and you need, you need the other people speaking into you and speaking over you. Good things, that is.

“So, I mean, that's what you do all day long for other people.”

You know, that's what a case worker does. You speak life into the, into the case, into the situation. You bring wisdom to the situation, perspective, into the situation and keeps it moving. So, hey, I got a feeling you're going to do great. I want to hear how this whole PhD thing works out with your ministry in quotes.

Yeah, quotes, that's where it belongs. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) Today's question of the day is brought to you by why refi, if you fall in behind on your private student loans and if stop making payments, it can feel like every door is closed.

But why refi helps borrowers, explore low, fix rate, refinancing options that fit their budget. Go to yrephi.com/ramsy, that's the letter y, r-e-f-y.com/ramsy might not be in all states. Okay, today's question comes from Rachel in Louisiana. She says, my husband and I have five kids between five and 15 years old.

We have baby step four in place through our jobs, but saving for college seems overwhelming

The husband and I are in our 40s with over 600,000 in retirement. Would you recommend reducing retirement contributions to 10% for a season to throw more money at college? I wish I knew how old the others were. I wish I knew how much they made.

I wish I knew how much they made too. It's we're missing some valuable information here.

“I think at first glance, and I wish I knew how much you already had saved.”

(laughs) But I don't think you're going to make it. Okay, here's why. Let's say you make $200,000 a year. If you reduce your retirement contributions by 5% that's $10,000 a year for five kids, that's

$2,000 each, and you've only got three years before the first one gets there.

That's $6,000. You've got eight years before the next one gets there. That's $24,000. So this 5% does not fit in the problem. Unless you make $700,000 a year, which you wouldn't have been running this email.

So you've got, you're going to have to skin this cat another way, because you've got this idea that retirement is blocking it until you've actually put the real dollars to it, not the percentages, and then you can say that. If you completely stopped it, it's not $10,000, it's $30,000. That would help, but it's still not going to get you there completely.

So what I'm doing is I'm going to begin having a training sessions with the children on what college looks like. You want some help? You ready to set? Go.

Number one reason people take out student loans is not that they went to college. It's that they went to the wrong college. One, they could not afford. Love a community college. Love a community college.

“Free in most states near free in the rest of them for the first two years.”

What's your basics out of the way, live at home? Love working. I do the college experience. Well, you had to have other parents, because we don't have the money for you to have the college experience.

We're not financing college experience. We're financing education here. Number one, go get the education, not play beer pong. But you can work. Oh, that's number two.

I love work. After college. Choice, we could work. Love it. And guess what?

You can earn a lot of money while you're in college working. Everybody that work while you're in college raise your hand out there. All of them just raise their hands in the lobby. Okay, come on. I mean, seriously.

I work 40 to 60 hours a week. I was so glad to get out of school. So that it was so that all I had to do was work. It's easy. So I had to work and go to school.

Shut up. I wanted to graduate. I want it out. I know that's right. So it's not a pleasant experience.

It was something I was getting done. And there's time for scholarships here.

“They've got time to, I mean, they got a five year old and through 15, there's a lot of”

money there for scholarships. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So where you go to school, work while you're in school, get scholarships. These are the three big things.

By far, the biggest is where you choose to go to school.

Because that first two years is anywhere between zero and a hundred thousand dollars a year.

Yeah. Oh, gosh. Thank you, Father. I'm mad because I did not take our advice. And I understand.

And you ended up with $200,000 in student loan. But yeah. $25, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Is that right? I'm not a member. No, no. I'm just saying most of that was from Sam.

Oh, okay. I wish we'd got in a hole in Sam. Yeah. Okay. That's fair.

We'll throw him under the buses. Yeah. And Sam. Next time I'll see you. I want to see the bus tracks.

Okay. He's used to it. Yeah. Either way. It's what you signed up for when you married him too.

That is true. That is true. The thing is this. You can get a college education. If you work while you're in school, apply for every scholarship insight, go to a school.

You can afford, which includes probably the first two years are in a community college.

And certainly after that, you're doing in-state tuition. And by the way, let me help you people with this. No one cares where you went to school. They really don't. No one cares where you went to school.

If someone is hiring based on where you went to school, you don't want to work for those people. They're not smart people. 78% of the Fortune 500 companies, the largest 500 companies on the stock exchange, eight out of 10 of them, their CEO went to a state school.

Hey Harvard, home a beer. I'm not paying Princeton, MIT rates because it puts me into a job. There's no research that shows not one out of data that shows your successful based on where you went to school. None, you can't find it.

It's all BS.

Don't get caught up in prestige and telling you, it's not worth it.

Now if you've gotten extra half million laying around and your kid wants to go to Vanderbilt,

find, if you've got an extra half million dollars laying around and you want to put your kid at MIT, I'm okay with that or North Western, I'm okay with that. But you've got to have the extra money laying around, this lady doesn't. This lie that we have sold to people in America that where you went to school is equated

“with your success is absolute database bulk rep.”

It does not exist. So choose a school, you can afford and you will get a good education. You don't believe me. Last time you hired a lawyer, did you ask him where they went to school? You don't believe me.

Last time you hired a cancer doctor, did you ask him where they went to school? Did you ask your dentist where they went to school? No, you didn't. You asked them if you're going to hurt me while you clean my teeth. That's all you wanted to know.

You did you ask your veterinarian before he gave your puppy a vaccination where he went to school? No, you didn't. And you don't have any freaking idea. I rest my case boys and girls. All you care about is do they have the expertise.

Did they get the knowledge at the school that they went to to do the job I'm asking them to do? That's the only thing you care about. When I'm hiring, I don't care where you went to school.

I've never hired a person based on where they went to school and we got a thousand people

working at Ramsey. We hire them based on, can you do the freaking work? Do you know what you are doing on the thing we hired you to do? That's all we care about. I don't know if any of the people sitting in the booth even have a degree much less

where they went to school or even if they got out of high school. One of them might not have. I'm kidding, not much. I'm serious guys, this is a deal. Can you do the job?

Are you a professional? Do you have the discipline, do you know the stuff in your discipline?

“If you're an accountant, you should be able to do accounting and you can learn to do that”

at a school no one ever heard of.

Just as well as you pay a hundred thousand dollars a year for. So it's bull crap. So this is the message we gave our kids. We had kid training. But then you have to add in the point that you're making this decision when you're 18.

You don't even fully know who you are yet, which is where you get to the point where you're spending this crazy amount of money for a degree that you don't even know if you're going to end up working in that field. 50% of folks don't even work in the field that they got their degree in. Yeah.

Also, Rachel, last thing, I'm going to give you one more piece of advice. Download and watch tonight with the whole family, five years old and beyond. The YouTube documentary, borrowed future, award winning, we did it. When you're five year old, remind you when they're 25 that you showed them this when they were five, and they said, oh, I'm not going into debt to go to school.

Then nobody cares where I went to school. All I care about, getting an education to do the thing I want to do. When they remind you of that 20 years from now, because they watched this documentary and you didn't think they were watching it because they're five, they were watching it. You believe me, they were watching it.

Grams and kids will tell you, they learn stuff like this growing up.

“Where you go to school, doesn't matter. What matters is the person in your mirror.”

Are you going to go out there, leave the cave, kill something, and drag it home. Your perseverance, your integrity, your tenacity, your raw intellect, your ability to pivot in the marketplace. These are the things that cause you to be successful. Your character, not freaking where you went to school.

Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. In the Fairwins Credit Union studio, I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality. Number one bestselling author is my co-host, Sydney is in Augusta, Georgia, hi, Sydney, how are you? Hi, Dave, thanks for taking my call.

What's up? I'm wondering how I can help my husband finish paying off our debt and become the baby set millionaire as a state home on the tube. Good for you. What's he make?

He makes 80,000 years. Very good. Very good. How much debt have you guys got? We had about 67,000 and we paid off 30,000 in the last year.

Wow. How'd you do that?

“By a lot of couponing and scrumping and budgeting.”

Wow.

So you were living on 50, 45?

Yes. Holy smokes. Way to go. Good for you. Good for you.

That's how you do it. You want to know how to get there? That's how you do it. You know, the only difference is you're probably going to dial back the intensity after you get out of debt, but all it is is you're intentional.

Doing this on purpose, how old are you guys? I just turned 30 and I just turned 33. He just turned 29. Okay. Very cool.

What's he doing for a living? He's in the army. Very good planning to be career or what? We're not sure at this point. Officer, I guess.

He's hoping to make what is the best search and pretty soon. Okay. Good. Good. All right.

Well, good. Tell him thanks for serving his country, you too, because you get to go along for the ride and so well, your number one, you've obviously been listening to what we teach. Your number one wealth building tool is your income and if from age 30 to age 60 or 70 you

invest 15% of your income, you're going to be multimillionaires.

I don't know how long before you reach the first million, but you could get on the

Ramsey Solutions.com website, click on the retirement calculator and play with some numbers to give you the assurance that you're going to be able to do it. But as a stay-at-home mom that coupons and his tight on the budget and knows how to watch and make everything squeak, you're a home economist, you're cooking from scratch. The kids' clothes aren't wearing out, they're not sick all the time, and you're saving

tons of money by operating your household, the way you're operating it. You can continue to do that without putting a huge strain on the family. You all have been very intense, but when you get out of debt, I want you to lighten up the intensity a little bit, but I want you to just run the numbers. The two of you sit down with that retirement calculator tonight, and if you invest 15%

of your income from the time you're out of debt, until you retire, it's at least $2 million right now. That's where you'll be, maybe three when you put it in I'm not sure, but yeah, I want you to do that, and then as far as being a baby steps millionaire, when you get the house paid off the value of the house, plus whatever you've got saved, I predict you're going

to be there in about 10 years. So you'll have your first million dollar net worth in about 10 years.

“That's what it sounds like based on the math.”

Yeah. Is that okay? Yeah, we hope so. I mean, because we're also going to be looking at if he does not stay in the Army moving back home, and we know that's going to selling our house here, which we're not attached to

it whatsoever, and then buying land of back home. Where's back home? In Texas. All right. So not unaffordable, I hope, okay, very affordable, good.

Okay. So, and of course, he'll need an income, a career for what he does after he leaves the military, right? Yes. He's gotten several job offers that are very high thing for us, so.

What's happening? What, what? Kind of income. Um, making it probably about double from 160 to 180. What?

That's awesome. You sound worried. What do you worried about? Uh, I'm not so much worried. I feel like I'm not really pulling my weight right now, because I just take care of our kids

and my husband is just, wow, yeah, you're rising the next belly gram, and you just took care of your kids.

Yeah, but think about, hold on a second, think about four a second.

Don't tell Sharon Ramsey that she just raised Rachel for us, okay? Think about four a second, all the tasks that you do inside the home, and think for a moment what it would take if you were to, if you were to go away, and you had to pay someone to do those tasks. Yeah.

Wash all, wash all the clothes, wash all the dishes, keep the house clean, keep the kids clean,

“get them where they're going on time, pick them up, you have to hire a live-in full-time”

need to do that job. We're talking Mary Poppin, sure. Yeah. That is real, economic, and financial value. It is 100%.

It's just baked in. You're just going to do it. It takes two around 50 or 60,000 a year. Maybe more. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, my husband wants five someday. Listen. Chitching. Yeah.

Well, that's a different discussion, but the point is you guys are fine. You are not a princess, you are a person who's content, you're adding value, tremendous value to your family, economically and emotionally, so that when he's at work, he's

Yeah. That's what he does. Exactly.

“Homecourt advantage, you know, when a team plays on their home court, they've got the”

home team cheering for them, they have an advantage of several points over the visitor. You know what I'm talking about, right? Yeah. When you take care of the household, you're providing a home court advantage. And you're playing a key role.

Huge. Key role. It's huge. Let me tell you, the fact that Sharon Ramsey was there and was a solid rock, and wasn't a high maintenance allowed me to go do this Ramsey thing.

Ramsey thing wouldn't be there if I had to run home and do maintenance all the time.

She never said, "Wait till your father gets home."

They were hoping he was going to get home. Yeah. It's a relief. Yeah. Maybe he'll save us.

That he'll save us. No, I'm serious.

“I mean, there was no need, you know, I guess I did my part as the dad, but I'm telling you,”

that the value that she did there is the thing, and I'll leave you this last one thing, and that is, Proverbs 31, who can find a virtuous wife for her worth, is far above rubies. Wow. And her husband's safely trust her, and he will have no lack of gain. So I want no lack of gain, get you a Sydney.

I'm telling you, if you get a Sydney, you're going to have no lack of gain. You get a Sharon, you're going to have no lack of gain, and we just cannot say that enough. And the problem, and Delonie's talked about this before Jade and you and Rachel have done

a great job of packing it as well, the problem is that in our culture today, guys can

just go win. It's okay. Gowls. They don't win even when they win. No, they're skillful.

If you go in the market place, you've abandoned your children.

“If you go at home and you stay at home, you've wasted your life.”

Right. And you've got guilt, and shame coming from the stupid people in the culture, no matter what you do. No matter what. There's no win.

So, or there's a win-win, whatever it is.

I know I can be a great mom, and work can be professional, and produce in the marketplace. Or I can be a great mom, and that is producing, or I can be in the marketplace a lot and produce. And, and Bob, I'll be changing some diapers. Hello.

Yep. You know, I mean, this is all very nothing wrong with any of these scenarios. No, you just have to be confident in the one that you select. Listen up, folks. If you've got a complicated tax situation and you're putting off filing your return,

it's time to talk with a Ramsey trusted tax pro. Not next week, not April 15th, right freaking now. Ramsey trusted tax pros know the tax code front to back, so they can do the heavy lifting to help you file on time and explain things to you with the heart of a teacher. But they can only do that if you get on their schedule before they book up.

Go to RamseySolutions.com/TaxPro to find a full-time tax advisor who serves your area with excellence. That's RamseySolutions.com/TaxPro. Well, we wish we could get to every call and question here on the show. So if you have a money question and one answer for your situation, head on over to our

website and use AskRamsey. AskRamsey is our free AI tool that's built and trained only on proven Ramsey principles. If you don't know how AI works, it's artificial, it's not real. It's not intelligence, it's artificial intelligence and it can only regurgitate the data set that you put into it. And so if your data set is skewed or screwed up or has bad information

in it, it's going to produce bad information out the back. So this has not got that problem because we own it. So there's nothing no data set has been put into this except three years of calls off this show and how we answer the calls. And all of financial peace and diversity and all the articles we've written and all the books

we've written, the Ramsey personalities and me and they're all dumped into the data sets from all of those to answer your questions. And then the AI tool generates the answer and it sounds really close like exactly like you're listening to the show.

I'm trying to get them to add my smart Alec in there a little bit or my mean side, like if I've had too much coffee, but so far it's a little nicer than I am, but that's okay. We can go with that. Rachel's a little nice over it and I should version of me anyway so and Jade is too. So there you go. So ask your question at RamseySolutions.com or click the link in the description if you've

been listening on a podcast or on YouTube. Ask Ramsey the new AI tool free completely free. Give it a shot. All right, Troy is into Lido. Hi Troy. What's up? Hi Dave, how are you doing? Better than I deserve. How can I help?

Great. My wife and I are self-employed. We're in our mid sixties and we're approaching semi-retirement. My wife there's all the financing and has put us in a very good position of life. I would want to, I want to process an RV so we can start adventuring out.

She wants to pay off the mortgage first.

How much money do you have that's a good position? Well, we probably, we have like 1.25 in real estate. We have about 550 and mutual funds. As far as our investment does. And how much is the mortgage balance? About 425 and a 1.7 house.

Okay. We just built three years ago. And what's your income?

“About between, we're self-employed. Anywhere between three and four hundred, a year?”

Two to us. So, you know, pal, the house are like two years, right? No, we're on a good track that we are approaching three to four, so you want to push a little bit harder. Okay.

How much is the RV? We're looking anyway between two and three hundred. Okay. We're putting a hundred down. Okay.

Oh, financing. Yeah, I would not buy it if I didn't buy it if I didn't pay cash for it. I would buy a used one instead of a new one, because they really go down and value. Like unbelevable, go down and value. What was it used?

And so, and I would pay off the mortgage first.

In the meantime, though, I don't mind scratching your it. You have a great income. You've got a great net worth. You've done a great job. You're just not quite across the finish line.

And I would scratch the edge just by renting one for the few weeks or weekends that you wanted to. I mean, you can rent that same 300,000 for nothing. Yes. We have one days.

It's just not the one that... Oh, you already own one. Interesting.

“So would you be selling that one taking the hundred?”

Is that where the hundred was coming from? That's part of the hundred. Okay. And our concern is we're both relatively healthy. And yet we have some concerns that if we wait for five years, we may not

get it. Oh, you can take the one you got and go on a road. Shut up. You have one. You're the only difference is not that you don't get to go while you're healthy.

The difference is you don't go to go in the style you wanted to go. How old are you? 65 or 66. 67. 66.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. You're doing great. You're doing great.

Do not finance stuff. Period on what might happen someday.

“And all you're talking about is an upgrade here.”

It's like I have a boat, but I want a bigger boat. Yeah. And I might die someday. Yeah, you're going to die for sure. And you're going to get sick before you die.

It's usually how it happens. So, but yeah, you don't go finance a boat to celebrate that idea. No. No, no, no, no, no, no. Now she wins the argument.

Yeah, I agree.

Definitely pay the mortgage off first.

Throw the flag. You're going to have to do that. Don't finance it. Victoria. Yes.

In Washington, DC. A Victoria, what's up? Hello. And that's you guys. I just kind of started tuning in not too long ago.

Cool. Which I regret for some financial decisions I've made in fast. I thought you said you regret tuning in. I was a part of work. Yeah.

We all feel that way. I regret not tuning in sooner. Yeah. Well, I guess about a year ago, I was kind of drowning in minimum payments because I had a good amount of credit card debt because I bought my house.

When I was 22 and I didn't understand the cost that comes with owning a house. Yeah. And so I, about a year ago, I was looking through options. And I chose to do a debt settlement. Which I didn't fully understand what that was.

But they promised a little bit of payment that I could maintain. So I did it. And I'm currently on babysept two. And I should have all the two loans paid off by the end of this year.

But there's no interest on it.

And then I'm finishing grad school. And I finished grad school at the end of this year. And I will have to start paying on my student loans, which are about 70,000. And that includes undergrad and grad.

“What will happen to your end when you finish grad school?”

Um, unfortunately. Well, I'm also getting, I'm an engineer. So I'm getting my professional engineering license. I'm not exactly certain what they're. Um, what I'm going to get.

I'm hoping it's not going to be a much of a large party. A big jump. I make 90. Okay. So why are you getting all these licenses and graduate degrees if they're not causing your income to go up?

Uh, the graduate degree is more of a long term. Hopefully get my income up. Uh, it's just that I'm so young and I guess an experience that it doesn't necessarily help me now. But it'll help in my career trajectory. How old are you?

And then I'm 26. Hmm, don't know if I believe that or not. I want you to investigate. I want you to investigate that because one of the things we found is engineers have the highest probability of becoming millionaires of any career threat.

So that's really good. I do, I am civil. So we do make less than some. But there, that's another question I've been battling with is there's opportunities out there that I could leave my current job and make 70% more than I do now. But I love what I do so much.

I don't love it that much. That's part of it. I could learn to love it a lot for 70% more. You're talking about an $80,000 year raise. Yes.

That's kind of a no brain. Even if it was three or four years. Yeah, definitely. So I am applying to that position. You never told us.

You never told us how much the first consolidation loan was for.

Uh, that originally was for.

“Um, it was for 40,000 and I think I owe 35 right now.”

Okay. So you're in my student loans are 70 and I guess my question is I know that the snowball effects are supposed to pay off the smaller loan. But my student loans are going to have a 6% interest. Don't care about the interest. I care about you getting out of that in 20 minutes.

Take the new job. Make a lot more money. Pay off that quickly. Uh-huh. That's what I would do.

And list them smallest largest. If you pay it all off any year, it's not going to matter. Yeah. Especially if you take the job, the job where you're making double, you're making 180 instead of 96 or, you know, 160. And then you live off 60.

You're just, just you. Yeah. Just clean up the stink and mess. And if you pay it off in one year, the interest rates don't matter. Very relevant.

Because they don't know. There's no actual monetary creation by the interest rate. They're done creating actual money. Um, if you're going to, if you're going to keep it around like a pet for five years. Now we worry about interest rates.

“But yeah, you need to get in a tax zone.”

You are being classic engineer. You're over analyzing. Hit this with an atom bomb between the eyes. Hey guys, Dave Ramsey here. Every day on this show, we help people work through real money problems.

And figure out what to do next. Now, you can get that same kind of help anytime with Ask Ramsey. Ask your money question and get answers built on Ramsey principles. We use on the show whether you're making a decision or just want something explained. Ask Ramsey is here to help.

It's fast, simple and free to use. Go to RamseySolutions.com and try Ask Ramsey today. That's RamseySolutions.com. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the Dead Free Stage. Patrick and Tiffany are with us.

Hey guys, how are you? Our fired up. So excited. Welcome. We're good to have you.

Where do you live? We live in Rock Springs, Wyoming. Fine. Welcome to Nashville. Nice.

And how much debt have you guys paid off? $566,700. Wow. And how long did this take? 93 months.

93 months. And you're a range of income during that time.

I always started at 190,000 and we're now at 300,000.

Cool.

I'm a maintenance manager and the oil and gas industry. Ah, okay. You open. I'm in health care. Good for y'all.

Well done.

“So I'm guessing with that period of time and that amount of money you paid off your house.”

You got it. Look at it. Where people? Yes sir. 100% debt free.

Yes. Way to go. You guys. So what's this house worth? About 650?

All right. Cool. And how much in your retirement estate? About 525. So you broke the baby steps millionaires barrier.

We got her. You're in there. I like it. How old are you two? Both just turn 40 about a month ago.

So you're 40 year old millionaires in Wyoming. Paid for house. The retirement is underway. You're making 300 grand. Took 93 months to get the house and everything paid off.

So how'd you get connected to Ramsey? What's your Ramsey story? So Christmas of 2017. My dad and step mom.

They always get their kids.

Theme gifts. And that year was finance books. So I received financial peace revisited by Dave Ramsey. I'd never heard of you a day in my life. So January.

Crack the books. Or read it. And man, it just made sense. Yeah, you weren't trying to sell me anything. You were just laying things out.

I knew my sister got another book by Dave Ramsey. And it was the total money makeover. So I asked her, "Hey, can I borrow that book?" She said, "Oh, yeah, I'm not going to read that." So I read that in like a week.

And there's the plan. It's just laid out. And man, I couldn't believe it. I'm just so excited. So I approached Tiffany.

And she's was a little red ascent. But took her a little bit to get on board. And March 1st, 2018. We started the plan. You know, from reading the book.

I found out you had a radio show. Started listening to that.

“And I remember the very first week I was listening,”

a couple from Connecticut called in, with a death free scream. And I was just like, "What is this?" I was so confused. But continued to listen to the show.

And about three weeks in. I listened to a death free scream. And afterwards, you said, "Proverbs 227. The ritual over the poor and the borrower is slave to the lender." And you repeated the borrower is slave to the lender like three times.

And man, it hit me like a ton of bricks. It took my breath away. And I was just -- I was just got so angry because I didn't want to be a slave. And I never realized I was.

And so from that point forward, we were on fire. Started coordinating FPU. I took financial coach master training. And just, man, we just -- I need slept and breathed this stuff in.

It's an amazing program. And I just love what it can do for people.

I never thought a million years.

I'd be in this financial position where I am today. And I'm just so grateful for your teachings. And I just want to spread the word to everybody. And everybody that I meet. Yeah.

It's always -- I always make sure it comes up in conversation. Because I just -- I can't believe what this is done for us. It's been amazing. Thanks. Well, Tiffany, one more through with your husband.

We'll send him back. Okay. Yeah. Right, just. Yeah.

It is -- it's a daily conversation. The body's natural. Yeah. How did you get into it?

“How did -- how did you intersect through all of this?”

So, he sat me down and was like, hey, I want to do this. And I said, hold on. You're putting me on a budget because you spend a lot of money. No, no, no, no, no. And so he was like, just give me three months, three months.

And so I said, okay, so we went through our first 90 days.

And after that, like, I found that I wasn't -- You know, like, I wasn't affected much. I was still doing what I was doing because I'm not the spender of the family. So, it didn't really -- I mean much. So it was like, hey, we're going to do this and put --

You're going to put yourself on a budget. That's cool. And then it just kind of worked out. And, you know, there were a couple of kinks at the beginning and trying to figure out how -- because we did --

We kept a pencil box and our closet with envelopes that said, gas money and grocery money. Yeah, no. I can tell you, I was very frustrated the first or second time I was out needing gas and had to go home to get money together.

Yeah, I got to the gas station. But I mean, slight adjustments. And it worked out really, really well for us. And it's got us through some really, really hard times in our family. And we're just very, very grateful that --

Yeah. You was turned on to you guys. Yeah, it's lived a lot of life in eight years. You know, we've -- Carly was one, our daughter. When we started the program, our son was born March 20th, 2020,

or March 14th, 2020, about eight months in. He was diagnosed with a real aggressive form of leukemia. And, you know, he's been a 10-month battle. And, unfortunately, he lost his battle in September of 2021. But he was such a -- such a battler.

And we miss him. Wow. You know, so we've been through a lot. But this, you know, was a good distraction after that, just something to pour into and to keep focused and keep going.

I've ever -- since I heard the first one,

it's like, man, we're going to get there. We're going to do it. And we're here. I can't believe the hard break that goes with the process. So the highs are high and the lows are low.

Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, it's very real. And we've felt them both. Yeah, it makes us real, bittersweet.

And all those words, right? Absolutely. Wow. I'm so sorry. Thanks.

And I'm so happy for you. I'm so proud of you. Thanks. I'm going to be a family with you. I'm at the parents some minute ago.

They're happy and cheering you on. Who were your best cheerleaders? Who were your best cheerleaders? The one that gave you the book? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

“I think they never thought I'd ever, you know,”

because I'd take it to extremes, obviously. Yeah. Did your sister ever come around? So I was going to ask. Not yet.

Yeah. Okay. They're David. I think. Okay.

Well, they'll get there. They'll start seeing it. What your life looks like. Oh, it'll happen. Yeah.

Now it's just amazing. You know, we spent the past eight years getting out of that. And now we're excited to be able to live and give.

So what's the first big thing you're going to do to celebrate with all this money?

Cause you're killing it, right? Well, we went to Lego land last week. Woo. Yeah. What is celebration, right?

We get out of debt and go to Lego land. I've so excited. It's all about who wants to go. Absolutely. We told our daughter once we hit this milestone.

She could pick her on vacation. And she did. So she did. So what's the one you're going to do? What's your next vacation?

How we want to do maybe go on some cruises. We did one for our 10th anniversary. And that was really fun. I think we'd like to do a couple of them. Go to the Caribbean.

Yeah. So good. Yeah. You live like no one else later. You can live and give like no one else.

You're 40 or oh millionaires. Wow. You know, 100% debt free. You ever think you'd say that? No.

No. No. No. Not even close. Yeah.

Nope. I love it. I'm so proud of you. Way to go. And I know the family is now getting aside.

They're, they're, they're beaming when I came out there in the middle of a while ago. And so absolutely incredible. So very well done, you guys. All right. You're coach.

And Tiffany, you're on board. And partner in this whole thing.

“What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt?”

There isn't being a millionaire by the time you're 40.

You know, the key like they always say is definitely the budget.

But I think you get that fire in your belly. You get that anger and that drive. And you can change and do anything. So I think you just got to get mad enough and you'll change. You know, just like you always say what you focus on is what you went out.

And that's, that's so true. Simple advice, but it, it works. Amen. So nine years grinding it. Was it worth it?

Oh, yeah. So yeah. Yeah. Anybody listening to this? Just do it.

Like Dave always says, just start, just go. And man, it's amazing what it'll do for you. We can't argue with the fact of work. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Because you worked. Worked your tail end off. All right. Bring Miss Carly up. You said she's nine.

Yeah. Come on, Miss Carly. You join in on the debt free screen. Way to go. Legoland.

I love it. That's a good suggestion. Well done. All right. Patrick and Tiffany and Carly from Wyoming.

What was your son's name? Paxton and Paxton. A hundred percent debt free house and everything. Baby steps millionaires by the time they're 40. Count it down.

Let's hear a debt free screen. Three, two, one. Learn debt free. Yeah. Whoo-hoo-hoo.

This is how it works boys and girls. Watch 'em. This is it. ♪ ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

When I talk to people on the Ramses show 90% of the problems I hear come down to one thing. Not having a plan. They're not living on a budget. They have no idea where their money's going. Money is just happening to them instead of them happening to their money.

And guys, that is so normal. But it doesn't have to be normal for you.

“And that's why I want you to go download our every dollar budget app.”

Every dollar not only helps you tell your money where to go with a budget. It also builds a plan to free up extra money so you can pay debt all faster and start building wealth. And the best part. Your plan is completely personalized to your life. It's the same advice that you would get if you call the show.

So don't keep living normal.

Go download the every dollar app.

“Answer a few questions and get your plan today.”

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Our scripture that I promised 1430 a heart at peace gives life to the body.

But envy rots the bones.

Theodore Roosevelt said I've never in my life envy to human being who led an easy life.

I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well. Hmm. He would. He would. That's cool.

Very neat. Jeff's in Austin, Texas. Hi, Jeff. How are you? Good day, Harry.

Better than I deserve. What's up? Not much. So this calls mainly about my mother. She is on limited income. She makes about 1,600 a month from Social Security. And she hasn't made any after-life plans.

And we went to the funeral home recently. And they quoted us about $25 to $26,000. [laughter] Well, I'm sorry. It gets better.

So obviously, you know, we don't have that kind of money. So they say, well, we could do this on a payment plan. Yeah, about $2600 for the next five years of your life. And I don't even know, yeah, I don't even know if my mom has that amount of time. So I'm torn because I'm not.

I'm not. I'm not. Well, that's my call. They don't want to hear your opinion. No, I mean, I listen. I love people in my life.

“But the deal is, it's not hurt. She doesn't have any money, right?”

She does not have any money. She's not talking about paying for this. She's asking you to pay for this. Well, she hasn't put it that way. She hasn't explicitly asked for it, but in a way, yeah. But I mean, that's the expectation. Like, she's not got a house that's going to be sold to pays for it. She does own her house. It's in pretty bad shape, though.

And honestly, I don't know what kind of money we're going to be able to get out of it. Well, you're going to get $25,000 out of it? I hope so. I hope at least that, yeah. She wants to spend her money on her funeral. I don't mind that. Okay. I wouldn't do that.

But I'm not going to pay for it out of my pocket if I'm you. Okay. And I think that's absurd. I think she got sold by salesmen. Yeah, they wanted $400 for a video that they were going to make with some of her pictures. Like, there's a bunch of add-ons and ridiculous things that they wanted to throw in there.

Mom, you did not live your life in a Mercedes and you shouldn't die in a Mercedes. And if she doesn't want to sell her home, then that's just-- No, no. When she does, it's no question. Okay. But she does sell a home.

So I would pay for it upfront. No, no, no, no. You don't prepay a funeral ever. You prepay in a funeral.

But you never prepay a funeral.

You're saying that it's going to take some time from the time that she passes to get the money from the sale of the house. Yeah. Because her house is a horrible condition. So it's going to take over a year, probably. Can you say how we don't know that?

You can auction it the next weekend. I mean. Yeah, that's true. Because it's junky. Just having auction here come out in a cell, stay put thing and pay for the funeral.

Yeah. But I really would advise her to spend a money on the funeral. Appropriate to her situation. There's no gain spiritually in what you spend on the funeral. There's no gain for the people that are left behind that are grieving over what you spend for a funeral.

“Also, no, I really, I think she got sold.”

Yeah, I think that's it. I think you, I mean, I would use a completely different funeral operator. I think this person is a slicker. Okay. Because if I own that funeral home, I don't sell that lady to a $25,000 package.

Because this lady broke. And so I'm not, and asking you to put on payments. I'm not doing business with this guy. Okay. I would go to a different funeral home and say, I want the cheaper casket.

You can buy casket at Costco. You know that. Yes, I do absolutely know that. And there are 1,300 bucks or something. I saw it the other day and believe it.

That's crazy. That's crazy. That's crazy. Everything. I mean, it should get a deal.

No, I'm kidding. This is getting worse and worse. But truly, the average funeral cost is somewhere between $7,885,000. That's the average nationally. Yeah.

And that just gives you an average. Including rich people. Exactly. That's, thank you, Dave. Yeah.

So it just gives you a clear indicator that you were being. I would set a budget of five to six grand if I were her. If I'm you, I'd be willing to pay that and be reimbursed when the house sells. I would not, and oh, and that's after she dies.

Yeah, I'm here. I'm here. I guess I'll drop. Okay. That's okay.

So after she dies, we're talking to funeral home and see how long you can wait to pay the bill.

A lot of times they'll wait till the estate gets some stuff cleaned up. There may be a little bit of money in her checking or whatever.

“And you should have your emergency find in place.”

And if you want to pay the six grand under the condition, you're going to be reimbursed when the house sells. That's fine. I wouldn't do any more than that. That's plenty here. And I wouldn't do business with the people you did that to because that just creeps me out.

That's such a year 100% right. That is such a hard conversation to have. That sounds like a terrible conversation. Yeah, but I mean, she can choose to do otherwise. Yes, she can choose.

But she doesn't have the choice to prepay it. Uh-huh. Because she doesn't have any money. Prepaying a funeral by the way, people's really dumb. Never prepay a funeral.

Preplan your funeral. That's wonderful. That's a gift to your loved one. You mean, like buying the burial plots that you wanted? If you want the burial plot, pick the casket, pick out how the service, write everything down. How you want it to go and set the budget on it.

And they can just write the checks when you die. And that's a gift. People that are grieving don't have to make decisions. Yeah, it's already been done. Your mom went to Chevrolet, coffin, or did she want the Mercedes coffin?

I don't know about mom. What would mom really want? Oh, brother. And you're right at all down. Don't bury me in the diamond.

Wear it. You know, whatever. Write it all down. Tell people that way when they're grieving, it's all planned. But do not write a check to the funeral home.

“Maybe by the plots, if you want to do that.”

But do not write a check pre-paying the funeral. The funeral home. Because from that point forward, you make zero return on your money, except for the inflation rate of a funeral, which is about the normal inflation rate, about four or five percent.

So you're making nothing on your money. The funeral home's got your money for what? 5, 10, 15, 20 years. I don't know. That's a good thing.

And don't prepay. When they pre-plan it is fine.

So I would say mom, here's what I suggest.

I love you. I think a $6,000 funeral is fine. The average funeral in America is seven. And you don't have any money. And I got to pay it when you die.

And it's got to be reimbursed out of the house. And I need to see the will that says that. And we can set all that up. And I'll go to a different funeral home with you. And we can pick out everything and plan it.

And you're going to be just fine. And I'm going to make sure you're taking care of with dignity. And we will all be sad either way. Please, don't spend the last $25,000 you have on this earth for a funeral home to have a profit.

Now, does your your thought process on that? Does that play out the same if you're like, if you're wealthy, the opportunity cost on them. Oh, not money. For sure, never prepay.

I haven't prepay. I don't recommend you prepay. If you want by the plot, that's fine. But don't prepay if you enroll. It's the worst deal ever.

The younger you are, the number that he'll is. Well, yeah, 'cause in their whole neighborhood. Yeah, yeah, I mean, if you took $6,000 in your 30, what's that going to be? It's going to be $300,000.

Yeah, $600,000. Yeah, $600,000. If it were invested, it's a good point. And, you know, what do you King Tut? I mean, who needs a $700,000 funeral?

I mean, come on. Okay. So no, you don't need that funeral. That's a bad deal. No, you just, you opportunity cost a big deal on this stuff.

And this is how these people make a living. And they do really well. The margins are, as you might guess, based on this discussion, pretty incredible. Yeah.

Oh, boy, yeah, 'cause he was about to get sold. Man, this is all right. Mama done got, Mama done signed up for the whole thing for her son to pay $600 a month for five. Just a measly five years.

Easy, 60 payments. Oh, boy, boy. That's like a car payment on a cash case. It's a vehicle. A horse.

Can't even drive it. Can't even drive it. We're making too many jokes. Well, I mean, you got to have some fun with this stuff. You do, I know.

People are dying everywhere. That's right. That's right. That's right. That's right.

Some fun. All right. So we've learned something valuable here. Don't prep out your funeral. That's right.

“And if you want to pay a ridiculous sum for your funeral,”

you need to have that ridiculous sum in the bank. Don't ask your loved ones to pay for that. That's unfair. That is not right. Mama, you should not be doing that.

And the funeral home sales guy ought to be smack silly. That's just irresponsible at a minimum. And moral at a maximum. And so don't sell people stuff. They can't afford people.

It's not a good way to make a living. You should just make a living otherwise. You should do something completely different from that. So, wow. Interesting question.

Let's have that question. It's a very fun. That puts us out of the Ram's issue in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it.

In time, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace.

And that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace. Christ Jesus.