If Nothing Changes Your Money Won't Change

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start budgeting for free today. [MUSIC]

“>> Normal is broken common sense is weird,”

so we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Network and the Fair Wins Credit Union Studios, this is the Ramsey Chef. I'm Dave Ramsey your host, my co-host today, Rachel Cruz, number one bestselling author,

oh host a smart money happy hour, Ramsey personality in my daughter. Open phones a AAA, 825, 5225, Banas in Charlotte, North Carolina. Hi, Ban, how are you?

>> Hey, Dave, how you doing?

>> Better than I deserve, what's up? >> I was calling to get some input on combining finances with my wife, James when I when we bring it up, it calls as arguments, and I guess hacking take the baby steps to the common attain.

>> Show them what is it across an argument?

“>> I think just the, I guess, the oneness, not being in control”

of her finances for herself, but combined is one. I think that scares her a little bit. >> Yeah, you know, she doesn't think she has a vote? >> It's not that, I think it's she's scared when we set up,

because I've talked about doing a budget every month,

possibly causing argument if something doesn't go as planned, but I've reassured her that no, that's not going to happen. >> How long have you worked together? >> How long have you been there? >> I don't think you're telling me everything.

>> I mean, we've had planned conversations about it. I've tried to open up about it. We have a joint account, and all my money goes into that, or our money, but her paycheck stays. >> Well, one or two things is going on.

Either she's a selfish princess, and she wants to control her own life, and doesn't want any accountability for anything, or she doesn't trust you that she will have a vote in this process. >> Or that you're not going to miss me with money. Has there been anything in the past been of something that you've done

that could have broken that trust? >> Not for more relationships, but her childhood, her mom didn't. I guess she took the selfish act when they got a divorce. So that kind of scares her. >> I'm sorry, she took the what?

>> So she tried taking over her dad's money. >> Yeah, but there's laws that dictate who gets what in a divorce. And if the reason we're not going to combine our finances is because I'm planning my divorce, we have other issues. >> So we are planning divorce.

I'm just making assumptions, but I'll know definitively. >> Okay. Yeah, I don't either. So, I don't know, we're not sure why this lady doesn't want to do this. Other than her parents got a divorce when she was a kid, which is really not a reason to not combine finances with my current husband.

If I'm deeply in love and we have a high quality relationship that we both have a vote in, and there's communication on and full transparency. >> Do you all -- unless she thinks you're trying to control her or she is doing a bunch of crap that she doesn't want you to know about.

“>> Do you guys make a significant difference in salary, Ben?”

>> No, just she brings home around 3500 every month. And I bring home around 4,000. >> Okay. Yeah, I don't know. I would dig into more of her why, which I don't know if you've done that of understanding. >> If you have, you can't -- you're not having trouble verbalization.

>> Yeah, so I would figure out what is really going on with her, of her hesitation and her refusal. And yeah, depending on what -- I mean, those are two extremes on the spectrum is what Dave laid out, which is true. So, she falls on one end of the spectrum and not.

And out of that, then, is what you're going to have to talk to her about, and you guys together get a plan where you're both comfortable. And the why is the motivation is so that we can work together

And our money is a tool that we use every day in our life.

And so when we see that as a household and we see that togetherness, it helps so many decisions and the logistics as well, like fall in the place.

“So, yeah, I think you need to do some more digging bin on what's going on”

on her, her fears. And then you need to be able to verbalize that to her on why you're wanting to do money differently than you are now. And that's going to be important, too. Jack is in Houston, hi, Jack, how are you?

Hey, how are you all doing? Better than I deserve, what's up? I saw the question, I'm young, I'm about 20. I have my own business, and I am also a full-time college student. I'm kind of trying to decide if it is better for me to invest in myself

than set a set amount to put into like savings or stock accounts. I know you have a rule of about like 15% but for me, I'm about to transition to maybe, I guess another question would be, is it okay to go into debt for a business property kind of like a house,

as long as it's just that, like not like corresponding or keeping like that. I'm sorry, I house as a business property. What's that?

“I mean, if like, if I took out a loan for a business property,”

would that be bad necessarily? Yes, so you're going to debt over that. If 20 years old you're in college, it'd be really bad to be dumb. Why would you settle yourself with that?

So what are you studying in school? Business management. Okay, and when will you graduate? Two years from now, but I'm kind of already phasing out to possibly just not finishing my degree.

I'm making about $100,000 a year and I only work weekends. And so the amount of income I make for the, How do you, what are you doing? I build shirts trucks. You build what?

Like big lifted trucks, like audio systems, lifted trucks, etc. Are you bringing home 100,000 jack? Is that like what you paid yourself or is that What the business brought in? So I'm the sole owner.

I only pay myself. That's what the business provided. Okay. But I mean, there's, there's taxes and I still put money into, I put at least a $7,000 in my Roth IRA.

That's like my goals. I'll always do that. But I'm also like, I have a lot of cash stacked up. And they'll debt. And so I have a lot of cash.

Like, hey, I could maybe get a $80,000 piece of property, build a $50,000 shop on it. I could pay for half a front. And would it be a bad idea to necessarily take out a loan on something that I'll own instead of renting?

No, I always stay right where you are until you can pay cash for that.

So just say, save up cash completely. Yeah. We own real estate that our businesses are in. We pay cash for it as we go. We move at the speed of cash.

And that'll keep you from getting your pinched later when something turns down in this business. I also think that if you're studying in a good business curriculum, you're probably going to learn some things in the next two years that you will use in your business for the rest of your life.

I have a four year degree in business finance. And I use some of the things I learned 40 years ago, almost every day. [MUSIC PLAYING] 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 curveball hits. You know, 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 discounted there at a better price, take it.

Whether you're single or married, it's not optional.

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. I've trusted Jeff Zander and Zander insurance for over 25 years. And so it's my family.

To don't wait, it's fast. It's easy and they could make all the difference. Go to zander.com or call 800 356-4282. Protect yourself, protect your income, protect your family. If you have a simple tax situation like you have an NA major life changes are big investments.

Use Ramsey Smart Tax. It's really affordable. Makes filing super simple. And it has built in support in case you need a little help. Ramsey Smart Tax filing early means you get the best deals.

And you get that tax dress off your shoulders.

So as soon as you get all your tax documents, go to RamseySolutions.com/SmartTax and file quickly, easily and affordably. Oscar is with us in Orlando. I Oscar, how are you? Hampton, good, how are you?

Better than I deserve, what's up? That's good.

“So our currently have $2,000 in debt, me and my wife.”

That's her credit card debt. I also have, that one's out of 17% interest rate. I also have $3,000. This D3 is out of 30% interest rate on one of my credit cards. And then $1,200 on another credit card at 0% interest rate.

And $2,800 in collections currently. And I also have my wife's card with $0,000. And we currently are at $27% interest rate. And I have $8,100 cash. And when you have how much cash?

$8,800. Wow, okay. So I don't know what I should do with getting rather pay off the card, because they're not to pay it off within a month.

And we've been making payments on our first three years now.

And we already gave $8,000 towards the original $13,000 debt courses. So I kind of just want to get rid of it. That we don't have those extra $500. I could put to which my savings and then pay off the other debt. So how old are you, guys?

I'm 20 in my wife's 21. Wow, okay. And what's your household income, sir?

“Um, right now my take home is $1,300 by weekly.”

Okay. All right. Say that how much again? That's $2,600 a month. Okay.

And does your wife work? No. Why? She says I don't want to make it. Oh, how many kids have you got?

I got one. Okay. And $2600 a month is your income. Correct. And you're working 40 hours. Yeah, sometimes 30 seconds, sometimes 40.

Once I get my promotion, I'll be working at 60. And then my income would jump off. When is that? Because I just got a new job. That's probably in about two more months.

What do you do in Oscar for work? Um, man, as well as a bully. Okay. Because you're not making any money. Um, yeah.

All right. Are you guys able to pay rent? How much is your rent? Or mortgage. Currently we're living with her parent.

Okay. Because my collection is on the other apartment I have. When I used to sell cars, I used to make like $4 to $5,000 a month. But I got another job. And I'm trying to like change my career path and just get more steady income.

I don't mind if it's not steady. If you're making twice what you're making now. Yeah. I didn't like it either. Oh, okay.

There's that. Um. Yeah. So, have you kind of, I mean, just listening to your situation and your story. Your 20 years old with a baby.

You live with her parents. You make $2,600 a month. And you apparently don't read anything before you sign. That because you've got some of the worst debt products on the planet. I mean, everything you had was north of 20%.

Like, do you like say, come over here. I like getting screwed. I mean, you like signed up for everything possible. It was horrible. How do you do that?

So, you know, so my credit card that I got. I paid the rent from my last apartment that I had with it. It wasn't my last month.

And that kind of messing up. So, I just used my credit cards to pay it. And then as far as the car, I told her not to do it. Because I was working out the card delicious. And I was able to get her better deal.

But it was, it was a real time. Yeah. I mean, like you guys need to figure out a different way of looking at life. So, you don't sign up for anything ever that looks like this again. Because you're getting tattooed by everybody on the planet.

I never sign up for anything like this.

This is a mess. Okay. So, the bad news is you don't make a lot of money. And you've got some debt. The good news is $20,000 makes you debt free.

Yeah. Completely debt free. You need $20,000. And you have $8,800. So, really $10,000 makes you debt free.

Yeah. And you're only working 40 hours.

“So, you need to be working in additional 40 hours starting right now somewhere else.”

In addition to what you have now, you need two more part time jobs. And you need to pile up some money. So, you can get out of your mother-in-law's house. Yeah. Make it a goal.

I'm going to make an extra two grand a month. Whether it's Uber Eats or whatever it is that you're just doing something.

Now, I would list my debts.

That's a large estimate. Usually, a 7,800 will clear off almost everything except the car. And leave $1,000 in your emergency fund. And I would list these debts. Smallest to largest.

So, the $1,200 gone. The $2,000 gone. The $2,800 gone. I think the whole $3,000 gone. Right at it.

I'm going to knock out all of those. And all you got left is the car. And then $2,000 a month. Extra. And you start throwing everything you can at that car.

Maybe $3,000 a month at that car. And you'll be done in two or three, four or five months. Five months. Max.

“But you need to create some extra income until it's too salty.”

And promotion comes along.

Because you guys don't make any money. You're starving to death. Okay. And. But yeah, you could clean this up with the money you have in the bank.

Everything. But the car. And then go get three extra jobs. And work like a crazy man. But the two of you need to look at each other and go, okay.

We have done our last stupid thing. We are not signing up for any more debt. We suck at picking out debt. I mean, 27% on a car. Good.

God. I mean, really. And we can't do this and survive. We're going to live at your mothers the rest of our life if we do this. So never again.

And the next time I can't pay my rent. I don't put it on a credit card. We have to work with the landlord instead of the credit card company. Yeah. You choose your poison.

I don't. We don't borrow money anymore, Oscar. You guys have you stepped in every bear trap known to man. Yeah. And you guys are young.

But honestly, I would sit down with her and look out in five years and say, hey, when we're 26 years old. Where do we want to be? Yeah. What's it? What's a dream scenario?

What kind of career do I want to be in? What kind of house or area of Orlando we want to live? Like, start actually creating some of this like future thinking. And that sometimes does help when there's like a crisis right there in the present, right? We're like, nope, that's not getting us to where we want to be.

And so it helps you stop. But if you if you're still on the line, Oscar. We'll have Christian pick up and get you Ken Coleman's book. Find the work you're wired to do. And there's an assessment in the back.

And it's very helpful just to start thinking through what you want your career to be. So that you can up your income long term throughout your life. Yeah, if you're making $4,000 a month and you hate it. If you're not doing anything illegal or wrong or unethical. Keep making $4,000 a month until you find something making $5,000 a month that you like.

You don't just go, I don't like doing this. I'm going to quit and move in with my mother-in-law. Bad choices. You keep working until you have something to move to. You don't stop the income flow.

And so yeah, these are the mistakes you've made that have gotten you here.

“And so what you need to do is assessment.”

I went broke all those years ago when I was 28. I had to look and say, okay, what was the stupid butt decisions I made? And there were plenty of them that put me in this situation. So I don't ever get back in this situation again. And that's all I'm telling you to do is the same thing I had to do.

And you can do it. You can do it. But if you keep doing what you've been doing, you're going to keep getting what you've been getting. And could try to figure out the interest rates on these things other than stay away from them. That that's a good plan.

So wow. Well, I was just a lot of credit cards. And cut up all the credit cards tonight. You listed out three of them for us. Just get rid of them.

Just say, we're going to do something totally different with our money. Yeah, we're going to be on debit cards and a budget on every dollar. Christian will get you a copy of kids book. Because I don't think you chose Chipotle, because it was your dream job. Whatever you say it.

But I don't think you picked that place. I think you just fell into that.

Instead of going, I always wanted to manage a restaurant.

I don't think you said that out loud. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. I am right here because some extraordinary women in my life. Mentors, friends, my wife, my mom, because they're all amazing. And one of the common themes I've heard from all of them is that between the responsibilities

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[Music] Matt is in for Worth Texas. I'm Matt, how are you? Good, how are you doing today? Better than I deserve, what's up?

I'm so I've been trying to help my mom get out of debt for her past three years. What's higher in three years? You're kind of breaking up.

“Can you get with where your phone is still and is working?”

Try again.

Yeah, I've been trying to help my mom get out of debt for three years.

And she's retiring in three years as well. As you want to, I can't get her to become gazelle and intense. Okay. She's broke and staring down the barrel of retiring broke. But, you know, fix it, why?

Um, I have no clue. I've asked and I've prodded and I've tried to get her to see how scary it could be. Um, retiring with nothing but a hold on you. I can, I'm a 25. Hold a few.

Uh, turning 60 this year. What's she's not going to retire at 63 because she's not going to be money? Yeah, she thinks she has a pension plan that that's, that's, I've already looked in. I've been helping her with her finances and I don't see it working for her for covering all her expenses and still her debt. How much debt does she have?

Uh, currently 40,000 total. Okay. What's it in? Uh, 20,000 student loans, 16,000 in personal loans from credit cards. And then 4,000 in remaining credit card.

Okay. Would she go to school?

“The student loans are that hers or was it a parent plus loan?”

Well, she was going to school, but she, she didn't finish her last class. And so these are just the remaining student loans from her own degree. Okay. So when you sit inside mom, this is serious. If you don't fix this, you're going to be up a creek without a paddle.

What does she say? She kind of latched it off. Yeah. Um, and, uh, and we've gone through the baby steps and, and, no, we have. You have.

Yeah. You haven't done anything except why. Yes. Yeah. My wife and I have done it and, and I tried using that as, look at, we look at what we've kind of been able to do.

You could kind of live like this as well. Yeah. I don't know. It's not clicking. Yeah.

It's a hard reality when you realize you can't. Forced people to do anything. You can't say the right thing. Well enough to get them to see this or that. I mean, like, there is a point in an adult's life that they have to make a decision on what they're going to do.

And she's telling you through her decision making of what she's going to do. And so there's a part mat that I hate to say.

“I think you've done everything that you can.”

Possibly do. I probably have one closing conversation.

Unless you bring it up. If you need some help. Yeah. If you want some coaching from here.

“I'm going to be giving you zero money when you're old.”

So you probably should figure this out. But I'm not going to beg you to do this stuff anymore. I want you to win with money more than you want to win with money. And I'm through talking to you about this and you laughing when I do it. So we're not going to talk about this subject anymore unless you call me and say help me.

And I will help you by teaching you.

I will never help you by giving you money.

Period. And then end it. Just drop it. Because you're not making any progress. You're beating your head against the wrong.

And she's not changing. She doesn't want your advice. And so one of the things I figured out when I started doing this show years ago is I quit answering questions that people didn't ask. Yes.

I quit coming into someone's life and presenting myself as the answer to your questions. They are not asking. If you ask a question, I'll help you. I'm obligated then to answer your question. But I'm not going to just walk up to somebody randomly in my life and go, hey, that's stupid.

I know.

“But if you ask me, I'll tell you that's stupid.”

I love you enough to tell you the truth. And what's frustrating Matt is what you've experienced, you and your wife at 25 of going through the baby steps and doing this. And probably paying off debt and having an emergency fund and retirement. And you're seeing the progress and you look over it.

Someone you love, like your mom. And you're like, you could be doing this exact same thing. And so the motivation is totally understandable where you're coming from. But you have to understand. The result is not.

You have no control over that at all at all. And so there's a part you have to go. When you start winning, it's something you want it for the people you love. But you can't make them do it. You know, I've got a friend that lost a hundred pounds and his wife didn't.

And he's frustrated with her and I'm like, too. You know, that was you just a few years ago. So you decide that you had to make the decision. You have to make. You can't.

Your wife's not going to lose weight because you wanted to. She's going to lose weight when she wants to. Nobody got you to lose weight until you wanted to. Same thing. You got to make a choice as you can, but he feels so much better.

And he feels. He's a dignity coming back. He, you know, it's clothing fits all this kind of stuff. And he wants that for somebody that he loves and he can't. But you can't make somebody else do want something.

You know, you can only present to them is what it's done for you. This is what's worked for me. You've done that. And then I would. I would have one closing conversation and say, I'm not going to bring this up again.

But also before warned, I will not be writing you checks. Because I've tried to help you. And I'm not going to be writing you checks at any point in your life. It's not going to happen. So you should figure this out.

This should scare you. Where you are is scary. And if it doesn't, I can't help you. If you want some coaching, some advice. I'll be happy to show you what we did.

I would be honored. I'd be excited to show you what we did. But I'm not going to bring it up again unless you do. And just drop it. That's what I would do.

And then move on to the next thing. You can't, you know, the problem with most of us is we love somebody. We see them doing something as hurtful to themselves. And we want them to be healed more than they want to be healed. Yes.

And we want them to have a quality spiritual walk more than they want to. We want them to lose weight more than they want to. We want them to get out of that more than they want to. And that's not unusual. That's most of us have had that experience.

We want something for someone we love more than they want it. And you just kind of stand back and go, "Dad, gum, I just can't." Well, and it's a weird feeling, too.

This is always funny saying next to you saying this.

But Matt, as a 25-year-old, is doing better financially than his mom. And when you become an adult and you start to outpace your parents in any level of life, that is a weird feeling. So Matt, you're kind of grappling with this, like, I'm more of an adult. I'm like the parent in this situation, right, is how you're probably feeling.

And that's a weird role reversal. And you don't have to do that. But that's part of growing up, too, is seeing that. I mean, like, that feels so strange. But I've passed my parents in whatever the category is in life.

And so that's part of adulthood, too, Matt, with your mom, sadly. Yeah, that's just part of the thing. So...

“And I was trying to think what category if I passed you and Dave, then I think you've...”

I think you've raised better kids than I did. [laughter] It's an insult to me, unbelievable. You're better parenting than I was. No.

[laughter] No. I laugh all the time though, because sometimes my kids, if they say something to me, I've used this line multiple times. Every parenting expert's probably, like, that's terrible.

But I always am, like, if I ever had said that to pop and meet me growing up,

That would not have gone well for my health.

Yeah. You all... I'll scoop it away. Yeah, they do. They...

We discipline.

“But also, y'all ran a tight ship from that.”

Probably tighter than what I do. But yeah. I'm so funny. There's all kinds of ways you've passed this up, Rachel. So it's all good.

You just gave me an underhand bitch. Oh, that's good. Oh, that's good. So... Yeah, the thing is...

When you're trying to convince someone in your life that you care about,

about all you can do is not tell them what they're doing wrong. Instead, just show them what you've done. And I can't tell you, you know, how many ways things you can do to fix your life. But I can say this is what I did and I feel this way now. I had this experience.

No one can take your experience away from me. No, it's just tell people your story. And in the marriage context, Dr. John Deloni talks about this all the time. And you're trying to get your spouse on board. Use eye statements versus you.

Well, you're doing this. You're doing this. Yeah, it's so much about your story and what's going on inside of you. It's going to be the thing that's going to possibly move someone to a different action. But also it puts the self-responsibility on you and not that you're trying to implement and change someone else. Because at the end of the day, you're not going to be able to.

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Get started at CHMministries.org/budget and use promo code Ramsey. That CHMministries.org/budget and promo code Ramsey. [Music] CHM is in Atlanta. Hi, Jimmy. Welcome to the Ramseyshire. I appreciate to tell you my call.

Sure. What's up? I'm going to say my own name.

“Remember, not as turned 65 about two weeks ago.”

When self-employed most of my life, semi-retired to last year, I owned five houses that are paid for. He set for mine. It still has about a hundred things about the whole house. And I'm falling a quarter. We have no debt to speak.

We have income, approximately a year. That doesn't include the rentals with the five houses. Two of the houses I've got to remodel completely. And I've already remodeled two out of my pocket. My question is, it's all about two points.

I have just under 400K and a money market. And I've bought two houses. That's two I've paid cash for. And I remodeled out of my pocket. My question is, it's all the only DSDR loans

that I'm consider doing all the things. And a lot of other things. Yeah. Well, I wouldn't, I don't teach people to borrow money. Jimmy, because I have found that the fastest way to wealth

is to get out of debt and stay out of debt.

“And that's why you've worked so hard to be out of debt.”

And so you have 400K that you can do the remodel with. Yeah, but I've seen that one down from about seven to four. And because you've been doing remodels. Correct. And your net worth didn't go down.

Your net worth went up because the value of the property went up because you remodeled it by more than the cost of the remodel. Well, the last two houses at four and a thousand dollars. I was about to take one, twenty four and one, sixty four. And I've got two more that I could possibly pick up too.

And that's why I wasn't hanging on my cash. Yeah. And you don't have to remodel the--

I'm not going to tell you to go into debt for anything.

“I own several hundred million dollars for the real estate.”

And a hundred percent of it is paid for. And we remodel a hundred percent of it with cash, or we don't do it. And even if you were going to go into debt, the DSCR loan is not a good loan. Because it's a higher interest rate than a standard loan. What?

Well, I've been quoted six and a half, six and a half, six and a half, six and a half quarter. Yeah, it's a higher interest rate than a standard loan. That's what I just said. Yeah. And so, yeah, it's not a good bargain.

So why-- why you want to pay a subprime rate to borrow money when you have the cash in the bank to do the job? Absolutely not. I wouldn't do that. I kind of think you're going to, but you asked me and I wouldn't do it.

I would pay cash for the remodel, or I'd dump one of these properties and take the cash out of that and move it around.

If some of these properties are not fun and you would rather be in a different property,

that's fine. I've got a couple of up for sale now. I'm going to do some 1031s on. I do some tax deferred exchanges on some of the properties. We've got to resituate some of our portfolio of real estate.

You could do some of that, but definitely not going to borrow money. Definitely not. And you don't need to either Jimmy. It's not like you don't have anything, right? I mean, it's not like it's okay.

Well, we have no money. You have money. So just pause on buying a new property and use that to remodel and up the other ones, or sell them or dump them or dump them and use that money to buy the other ones. So I don't care.

But there's no way I would tell you to go into that. It's not going to bring your dreams come true. It's going to make your nightmare come alive. Lee is with us in Leah, is with us in Cincinnati. Hi, Leah, how are you?

I'm good, how are you? Better than I deserve or what's up. Yes, so my husband and I, we have secured Boy Girl twins. And when they were born, I cut back. And I currently only work very part-time.

And he's a breadwinner. And we have term life insurance, as you recommend, for his salary. But my little boy is profoundly autistic. Well, he requires lifelong care. If anything were to happen to me, should I also have a life insurance policy.

But the same amount that we have, my husband's for, because he would have to take on that caretaker role. And he would no longer be able to do the work that he does. Yes, all stay at home moms should have, that have do not create income. Should have life insurance on them to replace the duties that they have.

Yours is accentuated with the autism situation. But it's still just the same when Sharon had little at home. When Rachel was small, we had life insurance on Sharon because if something happens to Sharon, I got to bring Mary Poppins in so I can work. And I have to pay her.

And so then you figure out what the actual marketplace value of a stay at home mom is. Because they do a lot. They tutor. They keep the home friend. They make supper.

Laundry. They do all this stuff.

“I mean, there's a huge number of things if you have to pay.”

For someone to do all of these things. You're going to find out that it's, you know, it's a 40 or a $50,000 in your job. Would you have a special needs trust for him? Would you? Yes.

We have all of that. We've got everything taken care of. Okay. Yeah, we have the only, we only have our mortgage. That's the only debt we have everything.

We have set up the 529s because I have two other children as well. But my life insurance policy is only $25,000. Yeah, you need 500 on you. Okay. Or more.

I mean, maybe more. 500 or 500 per hour per hour per hour. And you're young. How old are you? 36.

Yeah. It'll be, it will be so inexpensive. I almost would get, I mean. Well, 500 would create a $50,000 income stream. That would allow him to hire Mary Poppins to come in and help.

Thank you, any more.

“But if you, if you want to spend more than that, or if you wanted to replace his income,”

then you would have that amount. And have him not working outside the home at all. Which is probably not what's going to happen. But it could be, it could be what's happening. Yeah.

You know, again, if everybody, if you're, if you're not overweight and you don't smoke, term life insurance is unbelievably cheap. Yeah, that's why I, I almost would just, just for out of safety. Because it's not that much more expensive.

It's good to touch the standard and price it out, price out 500, price out a million.

And just go, okay, what do I want? It's, it's the cost of a pizza for you. It really is. It's, it's, it's zanderinsurance.com. Just call them.

And we've been advertising for him for years. Yeah. People are blown away at how little life insurance costs.

to take care of their families if something happens to them.

Yeah. So, yeah, you're, you're very wise to ask that question. It's a very valid question. And by the way, it's works for anyone who's got to stay at home situation. Yours has got an extra twist on it because of the extra challenges you guys have.

But, but it, it doesn't invalidate the other ones either. So, yeah, do, do, do all of that. Every bit of it. Very cool stuff. Very cool.

Open phones here, a triple eight, eight, two, five, five, two, two, five.

Jessica is in Kansas City. Right quick, Jessica, what's up? I don't know. So, I just found my taxes for 2025 and we owe the IRS about seven grand. Do you have seven grand?

We do not, and we also have a baby on the way. So, do you have any money? Um, yes, but we're saving that for, like, when I'm off work and not. No, honey, you owe the IRS. You don't get to choose between, but you pay the IRS.

And then you figure out how to not do that.

That, no way. You do not want them on you. They pat penalties in the interest you're getting ready to take on. Make you wish you'd done a payday lender. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

“So, how much do you have saved for when you take time off?”

Um, about, uh, 2400. Okay, and what's your household income? It's about 120, and why did you miss your taxes that far? Um, they didn't. Apparently, they went, my job went off the new tax table.

I don't see that. I could see, like, 3,000 being off, but not that much. So, um, and I was just trusting that I was getting enough taken out. And I didn't. We'll get my pay.

Okay, yeah, so what I would do is pay whatever you have towards the, uh, towards the IRS. And then I would pay the IRS off as fast as you possibly can. And then very quickly, I was starting stacking up money for you to take some time off. You make it up money to do all of that. But you're going to do nothing else.

Don't talk to me about going out to eat, don't talk to me about vacations. And don't talk to me about a $10,000 nursery for the new baby. You have a freaking tax problem, and a savings problem you've got to fix before you do any of that kind of stuff. When you've saved up and paid cash for a reliable used car, you want that thing to last.

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10% off up to a $250 value, see store for details. Welcome back to the Ramsey show and the fair wins credit union studio. On day ramsy your host, Rachel Cruz Ramsey personality number one best selling author and my daughter is my co-host today. Abby is with us in Oklahoma City. Hi, Abby. How are you? Better than I deserve. How are you?

Better than I deserve. What's up?

“I know that you say bankruptcy is very, very bad, but I was wondering if there's any situations where maybe the only way out.”

I am 34. I'm a single mom of two kids and I am over $90,000 in debt and I bring in about 64,000 a year working three jobs.

And I just don't see you like a way out and I found out recently when I went to try and get out of my car alone that I'm $17,000 upside down.

So I just don't know what to do. I'm sorry, you're scared. I'm very scared. I have a 13 year old and a one year old. And my one year old has very complex medical issues. So the how much do you owe in your car? 37,000.

And so you bought a car that you can't afford and it has made this whole thing happen. So my car loan is $850 a month. Good. God.

“And what is the rest of the day at the other 50,000?”

So I have 30,000 student loans, 13,000 medical, 65,00 to my grandma, 22,00 in a payday loan when I was desperate and I owe 2,300 to my lawyers. For what? Child support for my baby. Is the child support coming in? Yes.

Okay. We're just still going back and forth because he owes me 26,000 in a rear. Do you think you'll get that? Yes. You do.

Okay. When will that come?

Do you know? Any time between the next 10 days and if we have to go to trial over it up to a year. But I will 100% get it. It's just so he has it. Okay.

He just doesn't want to give it. He wants to be told he has to give it. Okay. Yeah, we'll tell him. That's good. We'll help him with that. Yeah.

All right. So you owe 37 on your car and someone told you your car is worth 20.

“Like the dealer said, that's what they would give you for it.”

I went to 13 different dealerships and the highest I was quoted was 22. Yeah. Okay. Well, that's because they're all buying it at wholesale. England does not pay retail for a car or they sell cars at retail.

But they buy them at wholesale.

And so who do you owe the 37,000 to? Sand hander. What is that? It's a bank. A local bank?

No. It's one of those will finance anybody. Yeah. Yeah. So your interest rates 15%. 15 and a half. Yeah.

Okay. I'm sorry. All right. So. And I tried. I had good credit when I got this loan. So I don't really know what happened. I know what happened.

You signed alone that you shouldn't assign. That's what happened. You screwed you allowed them to screw you. Oh, my gosh. You got to take into the cleaners.

I did. My engine was dying on my other car. And I knew born baby. And I went in. And they saw a helpless. Yeah. And he got me.

Yeah. They got you. They got you. They got you. Come on and go.

Okay. So. Number one. And the answer to your question is bankruptcy is not really your problem. Okay.

“Because the only way the car goes away and bankruptcy is if the car goes away.”

Right. Okay. And the student loans are not bankruptible. Right. Okay.

So that's the two of those things are most of the debt. Oh, and by the way, you're not going to bankrupt your granny either. No. Okay. So that's the time we had those three things together that you're not going to bankrupt on.

Or, you know, then you really have an accomplished anything by filing bankruptcy. Because you're going to have to pay the student loans and grandmother. And you're going to get the car repode. Um, what you could do without bankruptcy, that's not a problem. Just quit paying it.

They'll come get it. Um, you know. So it's okay to let it repode. But before you'd file bankruptcy, because you're going to lose it in bankruptcy anyway, right? Okay.

I didn't know if that was. Have you just Kelly? I don't want you to do that. This is not my suggestion. But before we file bankruptcy, my point is bankruptcy is not doing anything for you.

Right. Because the car, the student loans and grandma. You know, so you're going to bankrupting on $2,000 worth of stuff for something here. That's silly. No, we're not going to do that.

All right. So let's try to, let's try to get you out of this mess. So, um, you know, I'm going to look up on Kelly Bluebook, kbb.com. What private sale is on that car. And you're going to find it's more like 28,000.

But you're still 10,000 in the hole. Hmm.

And I don't doubt, what kind of car is it?

24 for dead. No, cheese. Okay. Boy, do they get you? Um, soldier piece of crap car on top of it.

But anyway, um, it's not a 70. Oh, it's just powerful. No, it's, there's a lot of shooting is better than that. Um, anyway, the, um, yeah. So we need to get rid of the car.

Let's try to figure out how we can sell it to an individual for 25, 28, something like that.

“And where are we going to come up with a 10 difference?”

Any ideas? That's praying that this check comes in. Any ideas? Yeah.

I've just been hanging on to getting that payment.

Yeah. So if that comes in, you sell the car the next day. And you ride a check for the difference. Yeah. And then you free it.

And almost $900 a month. Yeah. And that, that takes care of that. And then you use some of the money to buy you a five or six thousand dollar car that you pay cash for. Okay.

You're student loans are on hardship deferral anyway. You're not paying them right now. Anyway, right? Um, I've been paying like $50 a month on them. Yeah, I would.

I'd call them up and I'll have a check deferral. Let's just put them on hardship for for six months unless we're consuming this other stuff. So, but we need the, the primary thing we got to do is figure out where to get out of this car sooner rather than later. So if it's going to be a year, I don't want you to drive this car a year. It's going to be a year for you to get the child support money.

So if you're not going to get the child support money in time soon, then we got to find $10,000. Any other places you can get it? I mean, I could go into more debt with my grandmother. I just don't want to. No, I don't want to do that.

“Any chance you could borrow $5,000 from the credit union?”

No. You shut your shred of joy. I lost my job when I was seven months pregnant and it, I couldn't get another one until recently. And so I used my entire savings, everything. And so my credit is now not great.

Okay, Abby, you're not bankrupt. I don't know how much pain you're going to be in with this car before you get out of it. But that's going to be the answer. And that's the way through because the car is the problem. You hang on, I'm going to have Christian pick up, I'm going to get you with one of our financial counselors.

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Results may vary and no specific outcomes guaranteed. [Music] Actually is in Dallas. I actually, how are you? I'm good.

How are you doing? Good. How can we help? So my husband is a business owner and when we got married, I sign up for an optional agreement. You know, saying what's his and what's mine is mine.

Since then, I've had our daughter, I'm going to stay at home on. And I get told, you know, this is not mine. I don't have any say in the finances.

But I get asked to do paperwork to do this for the business. Do this for the business, do this in this. But I am not included in the business. What do you mean paperwork? Like, whenever something needs paid,

“it's they put it on me like you need to call and pay these bills.”

Or you need to get this insurance updated. Or can you fix this for the store?

We're like constantly I'm getting told to do work for free basically.

Okay. Well, you're obviously not okay with this situation. So what has happened to make progress so that it's not this way anymore? I assume you've had a discussion with your husband like I'm not okay with this. Well, in the beginning, I didn't have anything to do with any of the stores at all. I wasn't helping with anything. I just kind of stay home with our daughter.

Or not at the time we didn't have her daughter. But I just kind of stayed home when I was pregnant and when we had her daughter. But over time I'm getting dragged into it. I'm being asked to do a lot of stuff. When I get asked, cannot be added into anything in the business.

So I have financial security for myself. Or if I can know any of the details about the bank accounts or anything like that, I'm told no. That this is not my business. And it's theirs and it's online.

Okay. Outside it's who's theirs. My husband and his partner. Oh, okay.

“Outside of the business, Ashley, do you have access to money at home?”

Do you know what's sitting in your money to pay bills?

There is never money put in our personal checking account.

Everything they use money from the business checking account for everything, which I do not have access to. To pay your home bills, your husband is functioning out of the business account. Yes. Do you like some sketchies going on?

No. No. I mean, it's a small business. It's nothing big. They have a few locations for your husband.

It's kind of a jerk. Do you agree? Yes. Okay. Probably work on that opportunity.

Yes.

Yeah, like one for noptials are involved at what point, because I know when you all say,

like, when you get married, everything supposed to be confined. At what point is a pre noptial in that in a disagreement? Well, here's the thing. It has nothing to do with the pre noptial. Pre noptial dictates what happens at divorce.

It doesn't dictate what happens during the marriage. Okay. It just says, upon divorce, he gets his business. You don't get it. That's all it says.

Okay. But the pre noptial is not a thing that says, Okay. You are now a woman that's not allowed to ask any questions about her husband's business. That's not what a pre noptial does.

That's not how it functions. Okay. So the pre, he had you do a pre noptial because he's a jerk, not because he owns anything of substance. Okay.

And so he doesn't own enough for this business is not that big a deal. It's not nearly as big a deal as he thinks he is. He's, you know, so, you know, you don't have a pre noptial problem and you don't have a financial problem. You have a desperately bad marriage problem.

So should I leave because at this point it's getting a very questionable because it's putting too much amount of mental toll. Yeah. No. I'm not telling you to leave.

I'm telling you to work on your marriage. But quick defining it is a pre noptial problem or he's got a control problem at the office. No. He's got problems.

And we need to be in marriage counseling, working on him treating his wife and child better. Okay. Because number one from a business perspective, I quote, we coach 10,000 small businesses.

We tell, we tell everyone of them do not pay any personal bills out of your personal, out of your business account ever. It's bad business. It's bad accounting. Your home electric bill is not deductible as a business expense

“and so you should not be paying it out of your business account.”

You take money from the business that's profitable home and you pay home bills with that. That's just good business practices. So he's not real good at business. Either.

And you're not signing your name personally to anything Ashley, are you?

Good.

“She just wants hard to do some of the accounting.”

No. I just listen to too many podcasts. Yeah. There's money. No.

That too, but money being sent in the camins and Ashley's names a lot of it. And then the law comes after her. That's what I didn't want.

I want to extreme for a second.

But she seems cool. You seem cool. It's going on because no, you have no information. So I just want you to sign it stuff. Yes.

They're telling you too. Like for instance, if he's not filing his taxes properly and you sign the joint return. You're on the line. You just signed up for the tax problem.

Yeah. We filed separately this tax season. Yeah. And the season before that. We did not filed together.

I don't think. We've only conceded the married.

We've only been married one year.

Okay.

“But we've been together three or four years.”

Ashley, you have a tremendous marriage problem. That's what you've got. And we're not able to work on that in this setting. Effectively. We're not able to help you with that.

But we can just help you identify that. So the situation you have, you're not crazy. It's weird and it's wrong. I can tell you that. Just as a dad.

Just as a grandpa. As a husband. As a husband. I, you know, a friend. I would tell you to go to a marriage counselor.

You need to go see a pastor.

See a marriage counselor. And I don't end. I don't tell people in marriages on this type of thing alone. But if this is the way you're going to be treated for the next 20 years. Yeah.

You shouldn't be there. If there's no change. I would not, I would not ask someone to be in a abusive toxic environment for 20 years. And I'm not, I'm not going to tell you to do that. And that's what this is.

This is abusive toxic environment. So, and you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. And you already knew that. But what I would do is say, I'm going to a marriage counselor. Are you coming?

Because I'm considering ending this marriage. I'm not going to be treated this way anymore. So, and then go to a marriage counselor. Even if he doesn't come and get some coaching and have someone in that kind of a setting. Not some, not a couple of people on a podcast telling you to leave your husband.

We're not, we're, we're not going to sign up for that responsibility.

“You should sit down with someone that guides you through this and gives him every chance to turn around”

before you end this. And then you systematically bring it to an end at some point. If there's a zero change and zero hope that it's ever going to be any different. Yeah, because the picture of health in exactly what you're explaining. Like we have friends and he does real estate deals and she helps and does the books.

But they pay, you know, like they pay a salary out of their company to them. And she doesn't necessarily get it because they're keeping stuff in the business and all of it. But like they're, they see it as one. We are, if we are a household and when we make money out of the business, it goes into the home. And whether you choose to quote unquote get paid or not, it doesn't matter because you guys are bringing home an income together

that you're both in on. You're both working out of the same account. You're both doing this together. And so there's a healthy way to do everything you've just explained. You guys are just doing it completely backwards.

And the way you're being treated is just horrific actually. I hope a counselor can help God get a hold of his heart because the heart that he has right now. And the way he calls you to sign a pre-nup says, "I like my business more than I like actually." That's what he's told you on the front end. And you went, "Oh, I'm okay with that."

And you signed up. And I'm not okay with that. And you aren't okay with it anymore either. So I wouldn't marry a guy who likes his business more and likes me. (Music)

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“Samantha is in Cincinnati. Hi, Samantha. How are you?”

Hi, Dave. I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I have a boyfriend with a one-year-old.

And it's always when I make more money, we'll save more money.

But now he's making three times the income that he was. And we're still not saving money. I mean, money burned the whole, and it's pocket. It's gone. That seems to get to it. I don't know how to help.

Because I would be crunchy. So we did not get married. I mean, honestly, taxes, insurance. I get data insurance for the kids. And then I know, like, the account has income towards the bankruptcy.

So we were trying to pay that off before we considered it. Well, I'm sorry. You're in a bankruptcy now. Yeah, I'm in a chapter 13 where I pay it back. Yeah.

And how long have you been in the chapter 13?

Maybe like six months. Okay. And how much money do you owe? I think it's like, I think it went down to like, $47,000 that I'm paying back. Okay. And how much do you make?

So I had a high risk pregnancy and took off work. And I just actually started back. How are you paying a bankruptcy? I don't call you. He's he pays it.

“So that's why he didn't file bankruptcy.”

I make sure that. Yeah, so he could see the money for it. Well, he gives you the money so you can pay it. Yeah. Okay.

So why didn't you get married? Because he's giving you the money for the bankruptcy anyway. As if you were married. I think there were, I think more so we've worried about them taking. Because they take it if you make over so much.

Like, you know, they tell you if you make over. No, that's not true. Not if he doesn't file only if you file. You're in a bankruptcy and you need to get out of the bankruptcy and get it paid off. And he makes enough money to do that.

You shouldn't have been in bankruptcy to start with. Yeah. Okay. You got bad advice.

“And he's looking for an excuse to not get tied into this.”

So you said kids, I thought you had one kid with him. I have a kid prior. Okay. And is that child with you full-time? Samantha both?

Yep. I have both full-time. How old are they? 11 and 1. Okay.

All right. Well, so the answer to your, the reason I'm asking all these questions is the answer to your question. Um, uh, is that when you are married, you're husband and the husband and wife joined together and they do life together and they clean up debts together. And that, that way they don't, they don't have a reason to, they don't have the freedom to blow the money

because we have a mess to clean up. And so right now he's acting like he's dating you, not having children with you. Which is way different. Right. You know, if you said my boyfriend who I date, not who I have kids with, but a guy that I date

is blowing some of his new found-in come. I would say, well, you have a boyfriend that's irresponsible or darn. But you don't have a boyfriend. Uh, you have a husband and everything except legally. Right.

Yeah, and I'm never, I feel nervous to get married because, uh,

Well, if he's not worth marrying and he's not worth living with and doing life with.

Because it's the same stinking thing.

The only difference is you put a piece of paper in place and then we decided we're going to be to grown-ups that do life together. But if he-- Yeah, I would recommend that the two of you start seeing a couple of couples counselor and make plans to get married and then make plans for the two of you to combine your finances

and get your bankruptcy dismissed and clear those debts working together and raising these two children together and build a beautiful life together over the next 10 years. But right now, there's this disconnect in his brain between his responsibilities and his realities. He's acting out. He got a huge raise and he goes and blows it all.

He's acting like a single guy.

Do they single anymore honey? Right. But the hard thing is there's no major leverage to pull because he's not married. Yeah, exactly. That's the messiness of--

And here's the problem. Here's the problem. The number of couples that do what you all are trying to do that succeed financially and relationally is very close to zero. The data is in.

The statistics on shacking up and playing house are horrendous.

It does not work. The number of people who become millionaires shacking up is almost zero. It's almost zero. It's not even the money piece, the relational piece, man. It's just-- because there's no-- he doesn't have to commit to anything.

He could choose tomorrow to walk out and there's no legal recommendations. It should possibly somehow amounting. I mean, it's child support. Child support, yeah. But yeah.

And you'd have to go after that in a weird way because it's not a divorce and not a breakup.

“So I think the two of you need to sit down and go, okay.”

We've been acting like a couple of 16-year-olds in heat and we're going to have to change that. We're gonna have to actually be too grown-ups now and go and build a grown-up adult like life where we are responsible to and for each other and we have to and for these children and the girls gonna say and there's a part two of like we've created a human together We're not we don't have a choice on whether we're gonna choose to be adults or not. We have a child in this world. So we made that decision. Yeah, and so we chose to do that

There are three x-rays which you used to make your and your wife sits in bankruptcy That's these are not even things that should come out of someone's mouth But it does because of their arrangement you all have allowed yourself to get into and so what I would advise you is to go see a couple There's a couple's counselor and start working through some of these issues in some time in the next 30 days Go see a judge or a pastor and get married and then let's let's put to our finances together

Let's put our incomes together. Let's put our problems together. Let's put our dreams together and let's go live this life in a prosperous and fun Yeah, wealthy, healthy Relational way and these children are gonna grow up in a much better situation than and They're gonna be much more functional. Yeah, unless he's just a horrible person if he is why are you there? That's right. Then we then you got to you got to call it Samantha then go the other way. Yes, yes, but I don't I didn't hear of that

All I heard is irresponsible child. No, I know. I know that she's got three kids

“That's what I heard. Yeah, so but that bless your heart. I mean, but that's what I would tell you to do and so I went places”

You didn't think you were gonna go you thought I was gonna tell him how to straighten up and not overspend But the hymn not him overspending is a symptom of the situation you all put yourselves in with the choices you've made And so that that's what I would tell you is to fix that because again The data on millionaires the 89% of them nine out of 10 millionaires did not become millionaires because of inheritance, which means they did it

And so you study how they live what their habits are what their processes are if you want to be one of them Okay, and one of the things that keeps coming up over and over again is we saw all most zero I mean, there was less than 4% were not married And we're living with someone they were married took they're all married and 84% of them that are married

Some of them are single but 84% of them that were married said I have a cooperative aligned

“goal-setting spouse that I works with me not against me and that's how we got here. Yeah, we didn't get here by”

dragging a princess or dragging in irresponsible 16 year-old a little boy along the way against his will We didn't get to millionaire doing that and so there's this the data is in on this It's ridiculous the net worth of a part of a single lady The shacked up as compared to the net worth of a lady that's married at 35 years old is 13 times less

You

Well, we wish we could get to every call and every question here on the show and if you have a money question

And you want to answer for your situation. Here's a quick easy way to do it Go to our website ramsysolutions.com and click on ask ramsy ask ramsy is our free AI tool that's built and trained by Proving ramsy principles see if you don't know how AI works AI is going to re-gurgitate spit back out What it has in it so it's only as good as the data set that's entered into it and so if AI is researching everything in the entire web It's got a bunch of junk in it

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“It's very popular a lot of people using it. All right Jason isn't Atlanta Jason. How are you?”

There you go. Better than we deserve sir. I can we help Oh, but eight months ago We probably want to be a stay home mom And that's about the same time that we heard about the baby steps and We're looking to your podcast and so forth we pray all about 53 thousand and did good for you

Where did go when didn't step to but I want to put your and She clicks and may They're telling us that we can take your retirement out No penalty because she's no longer an employee, but we also can't put any money back into retirement

That's not true. I don't know why it stops up. That's not true You misunderstood what they said or they were just an error or one of the two you can not take your retirement out with no penalty You can take your retirement out without them with holding but the IRS has a penalty

Okay, just paying taxes on it. Yeah, and 10 percent penalty

“Okay, yeah taxes and 10 percent so no no we're not gonna do that how much is she got in a retirement?”

Um, I'll be 10 thousand. Oh, not much. Okay. Well basically if you cash that money out and use it It's gonna hit you about 40 percent 30 percent tax bracket plus a 10 percent penalty so it's kind of like borrowing 10 thousand dollars at 40 percent interest Oh, wow. Yeah, wouldn't recommend it We should just move that to my retirement now. I'll just move it to an IRA with a smart vester pro

Get on ramps the solutions to find smart vester pro in your area and roll it any time you leave a company We tell you to roll your retirement into an IRA so you can control it and pick the Lampic some good mutual funds So you have 8,000 left and you've already paid off 53 and you've got until made of finish up Yes, sir. Wait a minute. Oh, man. You've done so good. Well, Daniel. What do you make?

“Um, 170. Oh, okay. So you guys can live on your income and finish up the 8,000, right?”

Yeah, okay. Good. Good. Way to go, man. What do you do for living? Um, I'm alive. Oh, wow. Good for you. Excellent career. Excellent. Okay. Cool. And so you How many babies have you got? Um, we've got two along the way. All right. So you're gonna be home with three babies. Very cool. And she's been a teacher, but she now wants to be home with the babies. That's awesome, man.

And you're bringing home the bacon as alignment and so y'all can afford to do that and you cleaned up the 53 grand. Great job. Proud of you, man. Go get 'em. Hero. Yeah, just knock the 8 grand out and roll the 10,000 over into an IRA.

I still, if it's 100,000 you'd really never do it, but at 10,000 you're like, man, whatever, but it's still

4,000 bucks you're giving up for no parent reasons. So no, I would roll that and um, let it grow. Into an IRA and let it grow. Very, very good question and again, congratulations and proud of you.

“Tanya's enrichment Virginia. Hi, Tanya. How are you?”

Hi, Dave. Hey, guys. Hey. What's up? Hey. So I am a mother of three and I have a faith driven hunter. I am a faith driven entrepreneur and I have a business that's a baby. So she's only about two years old. I am a confier therapist. And I am trying to figure out my question is, how can I can can you to grow my business successfully with also trying to get out of debt personally? I feel like I'm using my business money a little too much for our personal debt.

Our, we are married. Yes, sir. And what is his income? So he works for the government and he makes approximately about 7,000 a year. Cool. And what are

you making profit on your concierth therapy business? So last year with my second year and profit was

was approximately around 34,000. Not so much. Okay. And so it's just like a concierth medical where you get an annual or a monthly fee and then you're just like on college their therapist. Yes. So what I do is I do fitness and wellness. So I go to people's homes, but I don't have the brick and mortar, so I don't have a lot of overhead. So that's the concierth mark. That's the

“concierth mark. Okay. Okay. So yes. All right. And so where are you getting your clients?”

Where to mouth? I do a lot of networking. Like I network all the time. I have been doing my best to grind. Like I said, I want to be a sewer of what I'm giving you. Yeah. And that's awesome. And so how would having more money expand that part of the business? How would the business grow if you had more money in the business? Because you're not spending money, you're spending hustle. Yes. My goal is to eventually get a brick and mortar. So I would love to grow the business

financially, so eventually I can't get a brick and mortar. Yeah. But my goal now. You asked, if I'm taking all the money out of the business to pay debt, I feel like I'm not growing the business, but you're not growing the business with any money costs. You're growing the business with your sweat. So you're not starving the business growth due to the money coming out to pay debts at home. But you're just not making much. I mean, 34,000, you're not, you're not making any money yet.

“You need to be making three times that to start being to justify being a therapist, right?”

Yes, sir. Yeah. So I assume you're licensed. Yes, I am licensed, but I don't, I do private pay. I don't take, I understand. But you and I know marriage counselors that make $150,000 a year. Yes. Okay. All right. And so that's my point. You have a unique take on this. And I love the new onset of it. I think it's cool. Tanya, is there? Because you said you have three kids. Do you,

do you have the time to have more clients? And that's the problem is that you're not getting more clients?

Yes, that's exactly. Okay. So you have the time. Yes. Okay. Okay. And how much debt do you guys have at home? So we did have, we have a home that we've about two grand. I think we don't feel about two 10 on that. And we did actually just take a hey lock out to pay off to consolidate the debt for my student loans because the interest rates were extremely high. And I felt like every year I was just paying off interest and I wasn't able to actually pay off the student loans.

We did combine a few of our credit cards. And what you've discovered now is you can't borrow your way out of debt. So, you're going to have to earn your way out. And so this is you're going to, if you're going to create more income, you're going to have to arrange your life in such a way that it allows for that. And so I would love for you to be booked up enough that you're making 100,000 instead of 34. And then you're not calling me because you're starting to plow through this

debt then that's been consolidated. You're starting to see a way through it. But, you know, so what you're dealing with is you've got three kids and 103,000 dollar income in a pile of debt. And you're underutilized in terms of what you could be making in the marketplace. But because there's not much overhead, I'm okay with that 34 saying, okay, all my job, all my work is going to go for us to pay this and then his is going to go to debt.

Like, you didn't even mean like you could kind of slice it that way.

with she feels like it's all going to the debt and the expenses. But that's okay because you're at least paying off debt. Exactly. Which is helping.

Exactly. It's not costing your business. Other things are. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fair Wins Credit Union studio. I'm Dave Ramsey, Rachel Cruz, Ramsey Personality. Number one bestselling author and my daughter is my co-host today. Michael is in Little Rock. I Michael, how are you? You're at how are y'all doing. It's a pleasure to speak with you. You too, sir. How can we help? So I am a 24 year old father of Warren. I've got a few

on say this is stay at home mom. When I was born, I was born with some disabilities due to a medical

and I actually sued dead company that calls these issues you would say and that settlement pays out in two months.

And I'm really lost on where to start. It's about $400,000 total that I will be getting. Wow.

“And I think my main question is should I immediately clear any debt and use my income to build wealth?”

The data tells us that that's the most sure way to build wealth. The downside of that is the guy in your mirror. You have to follow through. So if you blow them, I mean, if you pay off all the debt and you don't take care of your income and use it to build wealth, then you're going to have just blown the money, right? Yes, you're very, very old. Then can I ask how much debt do you have?

How much debt do you have? Oh, a debt is roughly 70,000 and that's between cars and medical bills

only. Okay. I don't do the whole credit card and schemes. I think that's all just a scam. Okay. So when are you getting married? We haven't set a date in Stonia due to this trustee payout. Why, what's the trustee payout of the do with the getting married? I'm not really sure. Honestly, it kind of comes to do we want to spend money on a wedding. Do we just want to load? I want to load my life once we're my fiancee wants to have a wedding.

So we're kind of stuck between the two. Yeah, you're having a wedding.

“I know, that's what I want them to say. Yeah, you lose. You lose. So how much are we going to”

spend on the wedding? I didn't want to stand over 8500. Okay. What is the nature of your disability? I was born with bilateral club feet at birth and I've had over 32 surgeries on my legs. How are you doing now? It's a struggle of P.T. twice a week exercise, but it's definitely something that I don't know. What do you do for work? I'm a lot manager for a card dealership. So much odds, pretty late back. Okay. So what do you make? I'm 18, 15 hour and I don't make less than 45 hours a week.

Okay. And you're able to live on that. In a way, yes, comfortably, no. Right. So what's your long-term career plan? I am very big on wanting to start investments. I'm not sure where to start with that. I've looked into mutual friends. That's not a career plan. That's investing. What's your career plan? I think my career plan is to stay in a dealership life, potentially a financial

okay. So I want you to start moving towards something that doubles or tripals your income on purpose.

“And I don't know what that is exactly. dealership life is fine. I have no issue with that at all.”

There's a lot of money in the car business and a lot of people make a good living, a great living in the car business. But I want you to start thinking about, okay, what's the 32-year-old version of you look like? Because you've got a 10-year-old in a wife at that point. In 1850, you ain't going to cut it. In my fear is that you think this 400,000 you invest in, you're going to live off of the rest of your life. And I just wouldn't be good for you,

Michael, just for everyone. What I want to do is create, it's not enough. What I want to create a life where you don't need this money. And then the money will explode and do fabulously for you.

I think you're going to spend 20,000 on your wedding, not 8,500.

“No, that's way less than the average, by the way. But maybe 15. I don't care. But you two put together”

a budget between 10 and 20 that you can both agree to and set that money aside out of this money. You pay off the rest of your debt out of this money. And I want you to also think about is there a class or a certification I need to take to move towards what I need to become to be a great dad, a great husband at 31 years old that makes a lot more than 1850 an hour. Okay. Awesome. I swear I know that would you immediately max out your off account. If you were

handed $400,000 today. Yes. And I would immediately pay off all those debts and I would immediately say the side 15,000 or so for a wedding. And then I would build a life that doesn't need this money other than that and just let the money grow. So and sit down with a smart vester pro and learn about

“mutual fund investing. But mutual fund investing is not a career and 300,000 will not produce enough”

for you guys to live on. So it sounds like a lot of money because you've never had that much money,

but it's not going to create enough money for you to get the life I want you to have. Not yet. It will in 10 or 15 years. So if we can leave 300 of the 400 alone, which is about what it sounds like we're going to be doing. Okay. If we leave 300 of the 400 alone and put that in investing including a Roth IRA and some good mutual funds. In seven years that'll be 600 and 14 years it'll be a million too. And so when you're 35 years old you'll have a million dollars in that account.

If you keep your stinking hands off of it because you build a life without the money, you build an income, a career track without the money that feeds your family and then you let this thing do let this money go over here and cook. So money is not microwavable, but it is does

“really good in the crock pot. And so that's what we're setting up here is let it leave it alone.”

Let it cook. And but if you keep screwing around and buying cars you can't afford and put them all in the market but you just buy them. Yeah well you pay cash for whatever car you buy. Yeah if you take that 300 and start going on vacation buying cars and living on the market. It'll be done. Yeah. Yeah. And it won't have doubled if you take the interest off of it. If you take the income off of it you don't let the let it alone pretend like you don't have this money and it will set your life up and your

children's life up and your grandchildren's life up. But you're going to have to leave it alone and go have a life of your own and build out the career side of things. So hang on I'm going to send your copy of finding the work you're wired to do. But I can call him and it's got a great career assessment in it to get you to thinking. And you and your friends, I get the wedding planned and get married. You have babies get married and start your life off. Do the stuff that the

data tells us is going to cause you to succeed. And Michael goes to down at the smart best or pro. Don't go to someone who's explaining stuff that you don't understand and put it in a boring mutual fund or an index fund or something. But like look, make sure what you're putting that money into is boring. Has a good track record. And again, just setting it aside. Don't talk to someone who's like, oh, you can invest in this business over here and do this and that.

Yeah, I'll make sure you lose all of it. Put it in something boring with a great track record and leave it alone. I'm telling you, that's going to be your best. That's going to be your best

bet. And then you get to look up at 50. You got a couple million in there at that point. You're

like, well, what do you want to do with our lives? 50. It'll be 10 million. Then you get to make some great decisions. But don't let 24-year-old Michael do that now. Just wait. And you're very wise to ask this question. And you got a whole lot more of an answer than you were looking for. You spent hours researching before making a major purchase like a home or car. But it's also a good idea to put in the work searching for the right insurance coverage. To protect your biggest

assets, I recommend using Ramsey Trusted Pros, whether you're looking for car home or any other type of insurance, Ramsey Trusted Providers have been coached and vetted to serve you like we would. Find what you need at RamseySolutions.com/insurance.

Hi Dave. Hi Rachel. My husband and I are finally combining our finances.

Yay. There's a couple charges that we're not quite sure where to put them in our budget. And my initial thought was to put them straight into what would be our personal funds. But I'm unsure if that's good. And I want to set a strong foundation for the future. Good for you. So I'd love your opinion on that. Thank you for phrasing that that way. What are the charges? What is the category?

So the categories are like a subscription to a deodorant company. An alcohol budget for my husband. For me, I set aside a little bit of money a month to go out with my mentor or my co-workers and my boss for drinks or for coffee or something that kind of be there with my co-workers and build relationships. And essentially you could you could just have an individual line item for each one of those things and just call them what they are. That's fine. And we are

agreeing to the deodorant budget. We are agreeing to the mentor budget and coffee budget. We are agreeing that you know we're allocating this much for you to have a cocktail after work or whatever it is that he's doing. And we're agreeing to that and doing it very individually. And or you could do what you're talking about and that is just increase your personal by that much and you just take care of that within your personal. He could in his quote, his fun money and you could

in your fun money, right? Either one's fine. Here's what's interesting. Here's what we did as an example

at our house that ended up being weird. We originally separated food and restaurants and I recommend that when you start budgeting. Yeah, groceries and restaurants. Because otherwise you'll go to the restaurant and eat your groceries. Yeah. And you want to be money for the grocery store. Okay. So we separated them initially. After doing it for several years we got disciplined enough that we were able to just call it food and forget it. But when we first started we needed the individual detail.

“We still keep it separate. You do. Okay. That's good. Yeah. That's what I was going to say. And then”

we have Cassandra. I don't know if you all have other subscriptions. We have a subscription line item in our budget that like Disney Plus Amazon product like these. Yeah, that's not the yogurt. Well, it's a subscription. I know, but I'm not. I would count it as a subscription. Okay. It's just an Amazon button. I mean, that's yeah. I mean, almost that's almost in like, but that helps me just to find out putting too much in my personal. Yeah. I try to avoid this. Yeah. Then I

might be a good exercise to just make them line items for the first year. And then over time,

you'll go, okay. I get comfortable with just melding them all together. So what we have ended up doing is we have, we used to have a bazillion line items and hours are now very broad buckets. Okay. Because but I've been doing it 35 years. Okay. So, you know, it's different, right? But when we first started, we needed the like the the emotional shock of looking down and seeing my mentor, call fees cost that much or his drink, his his after his happy hour cost that much,

“you know, and he needs to see that and go, yeah, and you need to see that. And it's good for”

everybody to get all that. So I would run it out. It's just individual line items and you can do that in every dollar you can add customized line items very easily. Just because just for visibility. And it's just kind of a reminder, I spend that on alcohol, I spend that on the odourin, you know, and it's just that that's okay if you do that. I'm not right, but at your about any of that. But I think the line item is just like staring you down every month and going,

making you make a value choice is that really how I want to live, is that really who I want to be? Yeah. And you might decide, I'm spending too much or I'm not spending on that from that. Yeah. Yeah. And then if you feel comfortable with it, then I would probably lump any time we go out to a restaurant, even if it is for co-workers or if he goes out with friends for lunch or whatever, we just dump everything into the restaurant category. Like if we go out to a restaurant, that's where it is.

Regardless of reason. And then I'd probably move, yeah, a deodorant subscription to your personal

“line item. That's what you're choosing. So that's what you're on. Yeah, yeah. So that's probably where I”

would go. But for the first, yeah, a couple months, six months as a deodorant. As detailed as you can be, I think it is just a good rhythm to be and to be able to see those charges and just see, okay, that is, that's the transaction for that. It kind of folks for those of you thinking about

place in your brain that doing the budget at all. When you wrote down everything, you're like, holy crap. Yeah. Yeah. You know. And so that's the, that's the thing you want to have happen. You'll feel like you got a raise when you do a detailed monthly budget before the month begins

and you tell every dollar what to do before the month begins. You always feel like you got a

raise. Because you always have this experience of, we spend what? Yep. And we don't have to do that. We can lower that category. Yeah. And you also have the experience of, where's all this money going?

“I mean, the chaos and the disorganization in our life is eating half our salary. And so you have that”

experience and the shock effect of that starts to modify your behavior. We're now you're controlling your life and your money instead of your life and your money controlling you. And this is what she's talking about is a brilliant question because it's not only did she phrase it properly. I want to lay the right foundation. But she's recognizing that I'm setting new grooves in my brain. I'm setting new rhythms in my thinking and the way my behavior is acting, acting out in this. And so I want to be

careful how I do that. That was her, her indirect comment, but it was a great comment. So really good question Cassandra. Thank you for doing that. I appreciate you calling Rose is in Phoenix. Hi, Rose, how are you? I'm fine, David Rachel. I appreciate you listening to me and answering my questions. Sure. How can we help? Okay. Well, just quick scenario. I'm 72. My sister whom I live with is 70. We share our property together. She has, my sister has owned this property. She's the one who initially bought it like 30 years ago.

I have moved on to this property and been here for about the last 10 or 11 years. I mentioned the her at the beginning of the year that this year that I was thinking about paying off half of the mortgage because I've been saving and saving. I've been listening to you for

several years, David. You guys, I appreciate you so much. But basically, she got mad at me.

For doing that and claiming that I did it behind her back. She also had the flu last month, sometimes she was sick for three weeks. She self-employed. I retired. I did get myself security and I do get a house is in both of your names. Correct. Yes. Because we do not want you to pay off. Why don't you not want you to pay off half the mortgage? She claims that I paid the mortgage off. This isn't early February. The first second to the fifth. While she was sick with the flu

and that I took advantage, she says of her being ill and doing this without consulting with her. And I said to her, well, Teresa, you're my sister, but you're not my parent. You're not a spouse,

“and you're not my boss. Is it hard for her in some way? Are you to, I'm sorry? Is it going to harm her in some way?”

No. We're going to stretch. We went from 237,000 to 355 dollars. Down to, we're now, well,

we both paid half of the mortgage February the first, of course. Excuse me, March the first.

So with that payment, which a monthly payment is 1,510 dollars and 4 cents a month. So we split that in half. So now where I'm going to get you down to, come April 1st, our current mortgage payment, or it totally is. So I don't understand what you mean. I don't understand what she's mad. How would she hurt? How would she hurt? She was mad because, well, okay, I forgot to make that point. She, once she talked with me the other day about this, she said, now, me paying off half the mortgage

is screwing up her being a trust placed on our entire property. Now she can only do half of a trust.

“You did such a thing, it's half a trust, that's it. And I said, is that what you're attorney told you?”

No, there's no such thing as a trust on a property that you don't own all of. She can't put it for this property in a trust. She doesn't own at all. Even if there was a mortgage or not a mortgage, doesn't screw it up at all. So she's got bad information. And she's just assumed to add about something she doesn't even understand. No reason to be mad. But it is where you're continuing to pay the payment when you don't know you're half anymore.

Hello. 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.

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and coaching for your situation. It'll help you free up more money and work the plan faster, which means you're going to get out of debt, build wealth, faster, be aligned with your spouse, faster, which means you're going to get out of debt and build wealth faster. You see how this is working now, right? Start every dollar for free by downloading it in the App Store or Google Play.

“Donnie is in Richmond, Virginia. Hi, Donnie, how are you?”

Good. I was going to. Better than I deserve. What's up? My question is, I started a side hustle about 13 months ago with my son,

basically a TikTok shop. It's done pretty well in my opinion. I'm kind of thinking about leaving my job

my way of saying, hey, go all in, do this full time. Sounds crazy to me. I feel like I said, leave my career. You would TikTok shop. What does the TikTok shop? So TikTok is, I'm sure you've heard of the apps. You know, I don't know what a TikTok shop is. Gotcha, gotcha. So it's a marketplace on one TikTok where we go live and we sell things the other to business. We sell stuff. Oh, okay. I gotcha. Okay. So selling things on eBay or selling things on Facebook,

marketplace or selling things on TikTok. I gotcha. Okay. And what are you selling?

“We're selling sports cards. So we do live selling. So we'll open the cards for people they buy”

and then we'll open them on the on the screen for everybody. And everyone's excited. We had a big card. Gotcha. Okay. And what are you making? So last year was our first year really hit in hard. We did it every night about $200,000 and 60 of that I gave to my son. Profit? Profit, yes. Profit in overall revenue was over 700,000. Okay. So you had 500,000

invested in the cards. And in other things, yeah, we could probably be a little more efficient this year. It was our first time. We didn't really know we were doing. So we had to buy things a couple times. Didn't really know exactly. But yeah, mostly cards. The cards are very expensive. But sure. Yeah, you're buying in them and sell, I mean, you're buying them for 500 and selling them for 700 and profiting 200. So your cost to good sold was 500. Okay. So I sound right. Yeah. Okay. Roughly. What

do you make at your day job? About 100,000. Okay. So you made twice as much at this as net profit as you did at your day job. Correct. And you did it at night. But I'm guessing at night is when you do this, right? Well, there's people on there doing this all day long. And yeah, but I'm thinking for a time is prime time. Well, it is. That's all. That's all. It's all concerned. It is. It really is because when I see them all during the day, they're doing just as

well during the day. I see people doing, you know, having six or seven of these guys streaming at a time all day long. But I was with you. Prime time seems like night time, but it seems like

when I go in the mornings on the weekends is also prime time. Okay. All right. I don't know. I've never

“done it. So I just was guessing. Okay. What kind of job do you have? What's your career?”

So I work in finance. Okay. Well, that's pretty vague. What do you do? So I do, I work for a military contractor company. We just, we do, we do, do you work during the day? Okay. Cool. So how hard would it be to replace that if TikTok falls up? I mean, I wouldn't think very hard. I was a blue collar worker in my former life. So if I need to go back to work and do stuff that I think I could probably do pretty much anything and get a job.

Okay. I would do it. Really? Yeah. Definitely. Okay. Well, you have a year track record. There's no reason to think it's not projected into the future reasonably. I think you'll make 300 or 400,

not 200. But with the caveat always with the social media world as you know, Donnie. I'm like,

it's just, it's ever changing. AI's changing everything. It's just just knowing that this may not, it may be long term, I pray it is for you. No, it won't be. This will not be around in factors. You understand, you, this will sunset. And so be watching for the next way that people are selling stuff. Okay. This is a very cutting edge early adopter process that a small percentage of the population

a mainstream thing. Like you, you walk into a 57-year-old or 67-year-old grandmother. She's not going

to know what you're talking about, right? And so it's not mainstream. And because it's technology and social media based, 100% chance it's going to change dramatically between now and five years. So be looking for the next way to do something similar or just close the thing up when it's done. Don't, don't, don't be looking up and going, oh, well, what happened to my business? Well, it changed. You can 100% because I mean, think about five years ago, nobody could spell TikTok.

Yep. And, you know, and it feels like 20 minutes ago, the internet wasn't even real. Very true. And so it's not. It's just some caution, but I do it.

Yeah. But if I had based the things that we do at Ramsey on a single platform, we would be out of business.

“Make sense. And we're trying to pivot to other avenues. What not is reached out to his eBay live?”

Do it. I don't have the time to do it unless I leave my main job. Yeah. I would be, I would be investigating eBay live. I'd be investigating anybody that's doing something similar where you're on multiple platforms accomplishing the same kind of tasks. Okay. And that way, you're not married to one platform and when it has an issue, you know, like there was a moment in time that TikTok was completely in jeopardy of shutting down

all the way like the US government shut it down, right? And so, you know, you don't want that to happen

and be standing on one leg. Exactly. Yep. No 100%. So, yeah, if as long as you keep that kind of a mindset

in your business acumen, then yeah, go make 3 or 400K for the next two years while you're discovering

“the next thing to do. Okay. And bank all of it. Don't spend it. And that's what I've been”

trying to do with just put it all to the side. That was my, my other caveat is, do I pay off my house? Or do I keep just loading up the bank account? Yeah. That's very cool. Don, it's very interesting. Anyway, good for you. He goes from blue collar to finance at the DOD to TikTok onto maneuver. It's guys flexible. It's good. He's flexible, man. He's able to do just about anything. So, yeah, that's the good thing. Yeah. And so, yeah, you don't ever want to base your career or business idea

on something that probably has a fairly short shelf life without having a plan for moving on to the next thing. And, but, bam, what a great cool. I'm glad you're making it so much money. That's awesome. Very neat. Chris is in Rono. Kai, Chris, how are you? I'm good Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can we help? Well, we've ended up unfortunately in baby steps seven. And now we have five 29 accounts

that we don't really need. We're able to cash for the college. And we're debating what to do. Don't cash for the college. Here's the five 29s. Again, if we want to do additional investing for the kids, we should just do that. On the side. Yeah, yeah. But use the five 29s for college. It gets some money out of there. That is cash flowing it. And then use the cash that you're going to use for college to do.

“If you want to build an account to the side, just an Uttma, uniform transfer to Miners Act,”

which is simply a mutual fund in the kids' name. And then they can buy houses and weddings and stuff without having any issues of the five 29. But don't cash flow college and trap five 29 money. Well, I've asked the kids about it. They're both in college now. One of them was interested in leaving the five 29 intact to use it to pay for his kids' college. And I didn't know. Did an idea that would be? No, I wouldn't do that. And then the other one wanted to,

we talked about putting half of it in a, a whole world IRA and putting the other half just in a brokerage account. They're both, you know, they're not Miners. They're college students now. And we could certainly pull out the same amount equal to their tuition and then just use that for for anything really as opposed. Yeah, yeah, but that's using it. I mean, so I mean, we get the money out of the five 29 as the answer to your question. And then whatever you guys want to choose to do with that money and how

you... There's leftover. He can use the rest for the kids or... Yeah, but I would rather have a pile of cash for your son's kids in mutual funds. That's not in a five 29 that have it in a five 29. 'Cause I don't know what 20 years is going to do to five 29s.

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 off 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. And it's right in your pocket, so don't keep living normal. Go download the every dollar app and answer a few questions and get your plan today.

[Music] Our scripture today, Luke 1428, suppose one of you wants to build a tower,

won't you sit down first and estimate the cost to see if you have enough money to complete it?

Mitch Album said one half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it. Ooh, there it is. Our question today is brought to you by Y ReFi. If private student loans are into fault and it's not true off track, this is how you reset. Y ReFi works with borrowers and that other lenders won't work with, helping you refinance defaulted private student loans with low fix rates. So you can get back on the plan and move forward visit yreFi.com/ramsy. That's the letter

yrefi.com/ramsy might not be in all states. Today's question comes from Joe and Pennsylvania. I at least a new car every three to four years because I'm retired and I don't want to deal with breaks or tires or any other maintenance issues. I'm not hurting for money and can afford to pay cash for a new car if I wanted to own one but I don't. So what's your opinion on having a lease in my situation instead of a paid off car? A lease is the most expensive way to operate a vehicle

mathematically. Period. You're getting screwed. And so if you simply don't you want to buy

you want to keep a new enough car that you never after buy a set of tires or buy a set of breaks.

“Then you're just going to be trading cars every time that you need to do that every three to four”

years and pay cash for your cars. That's going to be the least expensive way to do this because the lease is capitalized on MSRP, meaning a stupid payments that you're paying are based on the full sticker of the car. But if you walk in and buy a brand new car and I'm assuming of a million dollars or more and it can afford to do that and you're going to walk in by brand new car. You can buy them at invoice or 500 over invoice or 1500 over invoice if it's a premium vehicle. And so

you're getting the best possible buy paying cash. But you got money the throw away is what you're saying and you're throwing a lot of it away. It's just being wasteful at that point. But if you've got you know if you've got $10 million dollars I don't know we don't know where you're in gum you just said you got plenty of money and we have to take your word for that. I'm not sure I believe you but anyway because usually people that have plenty of money don't think this way.

This usually like broke people think this way. But anyways no don't lease it.

If you got $10 million dollars and you want to waste some money so you never buy breaks or tires

“then buy a new car never so often and pay cash for it and you'll get a better deal. Do what?”

It says just so funny to me. Like the breaks and tires thing. It'd be one thing like I am a car person. I love new cars and my thing is cars and I just want to buy a new one every four years and drive something new but I don't want to deal with the maintenance apart me. It's like I don't think that's the truth. I don't know like that's just like a funny I'd rather him be like I just like cars. It's not what people say that are wealthy usually. It's just not it's not it's not it's not

if you're that wealthy you have someone to go and take the car in. It's not it. Do it for you. Hello. I just call my guy. John is in Reno. Hey John what's up? Hi. Hi Dave. Hi Rachel. Thank you so much for taking my call. It's real pleasure. A long time let's nerf first time caller. I'm looking for some pop-a-dave advice on if a pre-map makes sense for my situation. Maybe I give you a little bit of background. I'm 28 years old.

I've been dating to Piazza that I love to that for five years now and we got engaged last year and we have a wedding scheduled for next summer in June. Awesome. And yeah definitely awesome. There's I know all the like previous call that you said that there's a it only seems to

It's usually like someone has a million dollars and those person has a hundred thousand.

So my situation is I have 230,000 of a net worth and she doesn't have she has zero. No debt. I have no debt and no you don't need a pre-map. Okay. She's worth a quarter million.

“Okay. I think she's been hanging around five years. Yeah yeah that's fair and then yeah I think”

the reason outside of like that gap I was contemplating like the idea that like I liked that we would both know like the terms of if we were to like end the marriage and something bad to like that was to happen. Well you do know the terms that the laws have set them in place. Typically the judge is gonna split the baby in half. Oh my gosh what a horrible example. It's from the Bible from Solomon. Okay. Look it up. All right anyway the um oh my gosh it's an oats ritual you're okay

you're okay calm down. I know I just feels very good. You're gonna turn whatever whatever net worth you guys have grown together and your life together is going to be split down the middle. That's the

“terms typically. With rare exceptions with rarex. And your 230 is not enough to tip the scales that”

much. She may out earn you through the next 10 years and so you know that could come up that way too. So now I wouldn't in this case. I want you to fight for working together, fight for alignment,

fight for shared goals and vision and serving each other and having a wonderful marriage and never

worrying about whether we have to split this down the middle again. Okay so. Okay thank you. Thank you. Yep. All right good question. All right Rachel you don't know the Bible story. Well apparently not it feels very Moses. So well Solomon the wisest. Yes I got that he wrote from his sitting in judgment and a lady brought her baby up and two women were fighting about which child it was and he said we'll just cut the baby in. Oh in whichever one the mom said okay.

And whichever one the mother was. It feels like an old agreed agreed and said and so the saying is split the baby that's where it comes from. No one literally knows one literally. No I know I know but it's just such a sad. I don't know. Oh my gosh. I don't like it. Paul's in Philadelphia. Hey Paul. Solomon. Hey David Rachel I was going great we're short on time go straight to your question boss.

Well they get easy so mom died last year of 55 I'm 28 she left about half a million dollars in debt

that's 30k business debt to $2,000 more than $180,000 in medical debt from a heart attack. 50,000 in personal debt. Well she also left the business. The business is a home care business. Non-medical you know not nurses or anything just caregivers coming in to take care of grandma. Yeah. Business makes about 800,000 a year profit. 47% I wish. Now 47% grows profit. What's the net profit? Yes. Nuts. Nuts under 50k.

Oh it's not worth screwing with okay. You're going through a million dollars to get to 50k. Oh my god what a horrible thing. All right. I know. Can you sell it? That's when the business I'm in. That's the question. Do I sell it now? Yes. You know walk away. Yes.

“If somebody will buy it and here's the thing. Here's the thing you're not liable for her debts.”

Her estate is liable for her debts and her estate does not have a positive net worth. Her debts are not going to get paid. So she didn't leave you $180,000 in debt. She left that in her estate. Now if the business brings a million dollars, then you got to pay off her debts out of the million dollars before you get anything. So what you own stands good for what you owe when you die. As such minus liabilities is your net worth.

You do not inherit debt. Did you know that? So even with the business. If the business has a positive value, then yeah, you're going to have to use that value to first clear up her debts, which would include her medical bills. Okay. But if it does not have a positive value, you are not personally responsible.

You wouldn't know. You wouldn't go up and buy that business. If any idea, what do you can get for it?

“Probably four to 500,000. Good. And that'll clear up that clear up all over debts, right?”

Yep. That's the plan. Yeah, that's exactly what I do. I got two headaches,

creditors and a business that didn't want the done making money. This is all happening for me. I like it.

I put this out of the ramsy show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it.

“And the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace. And that's to walk daily”

with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.