It’s Time to Face Your Financial Reality

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“Common Sense is weird, so we're here to help you transform your life”

from the Ramsey Network in the Fair Wins Credit Union studio. It's the Ramsey Show. I'm Jay Horshaw next to me Rachel Cruz. Taking your calls about your life and your money. So give us a call.

>> Jennifer's done that. Jennifer is in Las Vegas with that on the line right now. Hey Jennifer, how can we help today? >> Hi. >> Thank you for taking my call.

>> You bet?

>> Okay, so basically I wanted to get some advice.

I thought I was doing pretty good financially. Now I don't follow the baby steps or do any of that. But I watch you guys and I know it's good solid advice that you guys give. But now that I'm getting older, I realize that I don't know, I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to retire.

>> I am 53 years old and my husband is about saying 52, 52, almost 53. And we bought a house, probably five years ago and you know that was our dream. And we had a lot of debt but we've been tugging away and we were almost there. Like to me I was like, hey, I'm almost there. I have a little bit left, I have six more months left on a car payment.

I have maybe one credit card that I have like a couple hundred bucks on. So that's like almost done and then just recently my husband had an issue with his

teeth like we've always known that he I mean, he's going to have like kind of issues with

his teeth but we just kind of put it off, put it off and so finally it was really bothering him. He went to the dentist or like sorry buddy, we've had to get rid of them all of them all of them. >> Oh my gosh.

>> How much of that cost? >> So about 40 grand with like root canals and like the whole deal. >> No, no, no, no they just took all his teeth out. >> And so 40,000 so that was that your wake up call financially of realizing, oh my yes, we don't yeah and the part is you're 53 and it's like the hour glass sands you're

seeing them running out yeah yeah yeah yeah, you know and I mean like to me health is sometimes it's a little bit more important than just how many things you have and collected you know sure yeah. And so we thought about it for a while and we kind of know it was coming but we can't put in it off you know well I mean let's be honest the the dental thing in the health

part of this you're right like there are certain things that take precedent and it's like if it's healthy you want to lean all the way in but that wasn't the cause of what you're feeling now that was one of the many dominoes that started tipping over and when you have you know 10 or 12 dominoes in a row you feel the weight of all of those tipping

“over on you okay and so I think that's what's taken place into your own point it sounds”

like it's kind of just been years maybe even decades of kind of knowing what you need to do but not leaning into it and I think that's what you're feeling right now yeah yeah

I feel that you know because and the thing is I'm I've always been the one in the

marriage who's taken care of all the financial stuff you know paying the bills all you know all all that kind of stuff and we've always been on the same page it's not but where's it let me wear you guys today like what's the picture yeah how much do you have in retirement okay so this is the sad part um I have an eyebrow and I have a rock and I have a statement account all of them all together are about 24,000 okay not that what about him he had the

he it where he works he just um he just been there for five years he just hit his five year mark or he's been working and so he is eligible for the pension okay but I don't I don't know what that's gonna be you know what I mean like sure but just he had the money saved so but basically what you're telling me is he got saved by this pension because there's nothing

“else there that's what I took away from what you just said yeah because we've always put”

everything together so like yeah the ira and I mean yeah the um the retirement it's like it's under my name but it's both of ours you know the total is 24,000 for all of you between for the both of you between IRA Roth and savings so how much do you guys make a year Jennifer so he just got a raise right so now between the both of us we both make the same amount about 15,000 a year okay so 100,000 total and how much consumer debt do you have um other than like my car and

out something here because this is gonna help you off of this call um what you're doing on this call

“as I think what you've done for the last uh for your working career from age 20 probably when you”

got your first major job until now age 52, 53 is you look at something and your first instinct

is oh this kind might be kind of bad and so instead of looking at what it is you kind of say oh well it's not that bad we just did this and you kind of cover up the negative thing with the the the the the most recent positive oh it's not that bad I mean after all we did just go out to eat last night oh that's not that bad after all I did just get a raise oh that's not right and so even with the questions at Rachel and I are trying to get you to answer we can't get the answers because you're

trying to cover it up now's the time like put the chips on the table so we can help you how much

is the debt let's just say well now it's about 43,000 okay and that's between car credit card

dental loan anything else student loan he luck anything else no so you use some money that you had saved for the dental procedure because you told us that was 40,000 dollars now that it was told that

“was all and 40,000 dollars that's how much the loan was for yes okay well we didn't we didn't”

happen to our savings okay so how do you have 43,000 dollars of debt well it's 44 the dentist it's 3,000 dollars for another dental bill for me and then I have a consumer debt it's about a thousand what about the car the car hearts oh the car I'm sorry the car is 3,000 for the car okay what about the credit cards no that's it the credit cards I owe credit cards I owe seven hundred on one

and I owe 300 on another okay so let's really really can we just can we level set for a second

level set it right now that what you've been doing is not worked do you agree I mean it I mean we're not like homeless but yeah well it's not like we hold on hold on hold on stop right there is the standard because the standard is not homelessness that's not the bar that we're trying to be in life the the bar that we're trying to be is your best self and feeling like when you go to work nine to five and sacrifice all that time and effort that you're actually building

something that's kind of what it just I love it Jennifer if you're in front of me I think I would just grab your shoulders and shake it and be like Jennifer Jennifer you got you got about you got to solve 15 years left let's let's move yeah let's do some stuff right let's do it don't sugar coated don't sugar coat this you know we're not you're to judge you we're here to be your friend we have to put you on a plan yeah to get you out of mediocrity

into a thriving situation financially where you're not having to cover up anything that it's like this is when isn't I'm proud of my situation so if you stay on the line christian's gonna pick ever and give you total money make over the book because what we're gonna start to do is we're gonna start to pay off this debt sorry with the credit card the car you're gonna go down the list we're gonna save some of this money so this money and savings that you have it's not invested

it's me throwing at the debt and you're gonna go through the baby steps at the beginning of the

“calls she said I don't really do the baby steps well yeah you do I kind of feel like you should”

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well back to the phone lines where we have Andre and Los Angeles California Andre you are on the

line buddy hi guys are you doing doing great how can we help so I had a question I'm a bit worried about my dad and the way that he uses his money I'm looking to get married maybe middle of next year and I'm just kind of worried about his financial habits until I want to have a conversation with him about it but I don't know how to go about what are the habits you're seeing that you're concerned about what's he doing

he so just to get some context my mom is like no longer around so he

for example he does not cook from so he orders out a lot he eats lunch like he buys lunch every day

he buys dinner every day and sometimes it's takeout sometimes it's delivery it's just a lot of money on food overall on top of you know he's got a mortgage he's got a mother expensive as well do you know how much he makes Andre do you do you have a pretty good grasp of what's going on or it's just more of a feeling and you're seeing a pattern happen at your nervous about well I know he I know he can sustain himself I just I just think maybe the money that he makes

“him be allocated towards other places as well but I think for the average person he's spending”

like a little more than the ideal amount is it mostly the money that's bothering you or is it just the unhealthfulness of kind of the way his lifestyle is looking or is it both it's a bit of both actually and how old are you I'm 23 23 okay and you're are you living with him are you home or are you on your own yeah I live a hell of a home with him yeah and this is new is this new behavior you said your mom's not in the picture did they get divorced like did something trigger this

behavior that you're like man this is new this is unhealthy this is not good for his money no um she passed away um coming on five years now in December I'm sorry so I thank you um you know so I guess to him it's like well I have no one to took for me so my only option is to you know by food and how much does he make a year do you know maybe like 110 okay and has he complained about money to you in general about not being able to do x y and z and I don't have enough for retirement or

anything is there any other anything that she's worried about she has mentioned about like money strange before so he's got the mortgage she's got a car payment on a car that he rarely uses which even to this day I'm still that's myself like why do buy that car if you don't even use it yeah okay so yeah so it's these it's these small habits that you feel like are adding up and you want his money to be best used for him not being wasted basically is that is that your main

“question yeah that's kind of about it you know what I hear what you're saying I think there's a lot”

of grief that's at work and what you're seeing it sounds like oh you know mom has gone she used to

cook the meals and he never figured out how to start doing that on his own and you're there like

watching firsthand like do this is draining your money very very quickly there's a car that nobody's using anymore but we haven't sold it we haven't gotten rid of it those sorts of things I might um Andre approach this from that side of it more so than the financial side of it and just say gosh dad I I'm noticing some things and you know what would really make me how like happy I miss mom cooking and I feel like I would love for us to just make some meals together a couple of times a week

and it would make me feel a lot better would you do that with me and I think that that's something that both of you can benefit from without attacking this from like hey dad you're spending too much

“money on going out because I really don't think that's the root of this problem I think it's”

a grief thing and a gender roles thing that he's just missing his wife cooking the meals yeah and and there's a bigger picture to it too of you know it's not the delivery food stuff that's kind of probably like take a mile probably probably not but long term of you saying to him dad I want to I want to see you thrive I mean you're coming up on how old is he as he and his bit sixties he 50 okay okay great so I think you can just say hey dad I know that this is coming

I would love just to look at some of your expenses because I just want you if you can actually

put a little bit more away every month that would really accelerate where you want to be in five years and we can look at some expenses and what those could be right and I'm sure food will be a glaring option the car payment will be a glaring option right and so it's more of a a discussion and a suggestion for something bigger right as Jade's talking let's solve and let's press into the grief let's solve for in five years right if you kind of just nitpick every little

thing for him especially as his son he's probably gonna be like what are you talking about like the powdered but syndrome yeah yes that's right that's right so I would go out at more from those angles than dad you're spending too much on over eats how do you think he would respond

“to that what Rachel said I have tried bringing about to him but I think since I'm the youngest”

of the three kids he kind of looks at me like I mean I'm sure he respect me as an adult but I think he I have to older brothers so I think he would they could better from them but I want to get better having those conversations with him I mean there is a piece of this Andre we touched on we set it quickly but like that powdered but syndrome that just that feeling of hey I I was here when you came out of the womb I changed your diapers you don't know more than me about this

that really and it's it's not even a pride thing it's just like a it is what it is and so don't take that personally you'll probably feel the same way with your kids when the time comes I just think it's it's very hard to bridge that gap and do what it is that you're trying to do I think that if you can just say things to him that are more curious instead of you trying to say you need to do this that could help that could help you open up the conversation not so much that he'll

have the conversation with you but you never know what he'll go back and think about and you know start

putting in place so if you're if you just say out of curiosity dead are you still planning to retire in the next five years okay I was just thinking about making you know I was just thinking about a you know making sure that you have everything ready oh okay cool you know and just say things out of curiosity not telling him that could really help and part of becoming an adult is realizing that you can't change people so you make it to the end of all of this which is a very real reality

“that he's just not going to listen and so you have you have to be okay with that as well right that”

the that you saying these things is out of your own concern for him and it can't be hung on the hat of like this is going to change him and if I say it this way then help for sure get it all of it right like I think there's wise ways to go about it but at the end of the day too I mean and this is true for for adult kids to parents parents to kids friends to friends I mean all of it that you just if you have an opinion about something yes and you see someone who may be hurting right

and you're like I want to be able to help them and you present them with what you think is the solution God willing they hear it and what what a gift that would be that you change course but then there's also that really harsh reality that at the end of the day they may not and it's not up to you to save them either like you know at the end of the day too so it's it gets so it gets so messy but I so appreciate Andre your heart for your dad you know you see you see him and you're

like so bad and I think you're right to Jade of it goes deeper than just the food delivery it's like he's hurt he's probably hurt yeah I think there's some grief there and I think in those moments

“the best thing you can do is kind of lead by example like I said whether it's the meals being like”

man I really miss mom's cooking I would love to cook some of the food that she used to cook for us like I feel like that'd be it'd be really good for me if you do that with me even um you know I feel a little stuck in a couple areas ever since mom died I think I'm going to start seeing somebody you know yes saying those things out loud instead of keeping them to ourselves yeah it really does help the people around us go oh gosh I okay that's not so yeah that I'm feeling that

way or maybe I need to speak to somebody so there's some healing in it yeah they're really really is so anyway we're pulling for you Andre like this is this is something that's going to

take some time and you're a good kid but to Rachel's point we can't always change the people we love

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description if you're listening on podcast or youtube all right candy is in arc and saw hey candy how can we help today hey so we recently sold our farm and our cows and it's a good bit of money you know for us and we actually closed on the land next week but we sold our cows and I have my 401k with Edward Jones so we went to the guy that I used for that and we opened up a money market account and we we talked about when we closed next week you know putting got money in the money market account

and because I told him I really don't know that much about you know the the market so I don't want to put on money somewhere we're going to lose it are you planning on using that money for anything in the in the near future to buy more land or to we're going to use yes we're going to use part of it to buy land and build another house we built our last house we just had it black

“in we did the rest of it so that's what we're planning to do again but he was talking about putting”

money in in several different banks in cities and staggering you know the maturity of the

home and I just want to make sure that the land we sold for 1.6 million and we sold our cows

for 102,000 so 1.7 million how much will of that will you use for the new land in the build I would guess probably 500,000 because we're just going to buy a little a little bit of land because we have so much rain it was just too much okay gotcha so you have 1.2 left after that projects complete right okay and how old are you candy I'm 60 miles and 65 60 miles I'm gonna work my last year and a half you know second retire it's 602

yep that's great and how much do you guys have in retirement now I have like 60,000 in my 401k he doesn't have 401k or anything nothing for retirement so this is with this be your retirement would you say 1.2

“what you guys will live off of yes and he draw a Social Security I think like $1,200 a”

month okay and then he draws an annuity for $700 a month till because he has a can you disease and so when we put it over into that they he'll draw it for a lifetime till he passes away hmm and then but it won't continue after he passes you won't receive that benefit

and after that it will stop under the law for his last time okay I want to go back to something

“you said that I thought was interesting so you have the money from the sale of all of this”

and you were saying that you're accountant or you're is it accountant your tax professional who is this person that is sorry all this money for you he's the guy that we that I used for my 401k here where I work he borrowed it and we're going okay so we just went to him now why did he say that he was putting in and all that those different accounts is he trying to like make sure you've got FDIC coverage so we just like limiting it at 250 per account is that what he's

doing yes okay and what's the horizon on buying the the new place the new land in the new house I don't know it's kind of we've been looking for land and it's kind of hard to find it yeah but but yeah the the house that we've built that we sold we're going to run it from him

for like 200 dollars a month for the first year 500 dollars a month for the second year and then

we'll go to regular rain if we're still there the third year so you know we're not just like in a rush to have to do it sure sure which is good I think that's smart to have some patience for sure so candy if I were you I mean yeah you're 65 I understand you're a little nervous about putting money in the market I would not put any money in the market that you're going to use to buy this land and build this home so I would not touch 500,000 of it I mean I would keep

“that where you want to if you want to do CDs you can or a high yield savings account of my”

market account but the rest of the 1.2 I would highly consider what your options are here and the fear of the market I would want you to to research I want you to do this yourself because we can sit here and tell you and talk through it but I want you to look at how the market has performed and you will see some down months in 2026 you're going to see some up months you're going to you're going to see it all but it's around the average right now is probably 14% in 2026

let me check it and so when you look and again when you invest you want to be for five years or longer so that it can the ups and downs can you know equal out and then hopefully it's continuing to grow and so just the power of the interest rate is really important can if you keep this money 1.2

million in CDs it's going to grow it about 4% okay so in five years that'll be that 1.2

really just grows to about 1.4 but if you have invested it and not in like a single stock okay when I say investment I'm talking about a mutual fund or an index fund and so it's spread out over 90 to 200 companies or if it's the S&P 500 it's 500 companies right like it's it's you're putting your money in a lot okay not just a single stock in hundreds of stocks literally and on app and I just plugged it in so it is at 11% which again the past couple years have been way higher than

that not every year will be like that but 11% for the past couple years is a little bit of a conservative number to use it would grow to over 2 million dollars so the debt would be in five years and five years and then if you just want to do rough math that money will double every seven years so if you didn't touch it which I know you might because of this which you guys are going to live off of but in seven years that 1.2 is 2.4 and then so on and so forth so the growth that you guys

can get and live off of is something that I would highly highly consider and CDs and you know things like annuities and all of that they're just very conservative I mean I would say quote unquote safe but they suck as an investment like your money can be doing so much more and I know that probably isn't going to change your mind completely but I want you to talk to your advisor and if you continue to tell you to put in CDs I would look for a smart investor pro you can find one of those

on Ramsey Solutions dot com because these are trusted people that are in this world of investing

and and there's something powerful about saying yeah you're you know you're a young 60 candy

young 60 you're not 85 if you're 85 and you're like I'm scared to death and that girl do what you got to do to sleep well and yeah right on to the sunset but you still got some years ahead of you a lot of years that this money could be working for you and it to for it just to sit and CDs yeah

“and I mean I feel like I think go ahead candy I think the reason he suggested CDs was because of”

us were like you know yeah we're not ready to put it into anything because we don't really know what

that would be the right thing to do I mean he shouldn't invest you in something you've said no to

“or don't understand and so I think I can respect why he did that but let this be the jumping off”

point for you guys to really dig in and even sit down with him or like we said another smart vester pro and just say help me understand because I I do know that I'm missing out on returns and I don't want to keep missing out but I want to understand it I don't want to just get in because the people that I listen to the radio told me to or because you know whatever his name is because Bob told you to and it is scary I mean if you're watching the news and you know we got on my

ran and it's like oh my gosh the market's got right like I mean like it's just like it can it can seem scary and that's the frustrating thing is if you're if your investment advice is coming from the news either side of the aisle yeah absolutely you're not getting you're not getting the the the wins they don't they don't promote that because it doesn't give ratings what gives ratings is scared doom and gloom moments that they could point the finger and blame the person

“across the aisle so you have to really look at the facts when I come to this and it is so much”

more positive than I think you realize candy but I want you to do that research and figure it out and ask a question and hopefully he has the heart of a teacher.

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“that's the best way to work the plan that we teach all right Tyler is in Minneapolis minnesota”

what's up Tyler hey guys how's it going my aunt and uncle have offered to do a contract for guild with me for their house and i can't tell if this is with my income and debt if this is something that i should consider or if i should just kind of pass on my opportunity tell us more about your income and your debt so i make about $23 an hour and then i graduated college with about $75,000 in debt i paid i have roughly 35 grand left on that and so great yeah good job so 35 grand

left in student loans any other debt that we should know about no that's everything and how much money do you have saved that's kind of where the i feel like i'm looking for help is because i've been kind of throwing everything that i've had i graduated four years ago and so everything has gone towards the debt i haven't really saved up anything and then i feel like you know without health insurance or you know something comes up with my car of just like i have about four grand probably

between savings and checking okay and you feel like it's a good idea to be a homeowner well i move back in with my parents and back to my hometown and so i just don't know to me it seems pointless to go and rent when my parents houses an option and then on top of that my aunt and uncle were offering me the house they go to Texas every year for the winter and so i've actually been living there on and off for the last four years just taking care of that property

yeah so i would say that if they were just to sell it on the market it'd probably be

“four fifty to five hundred thousand in that area now i would say that there's sort of you know”

pretty good um so i don't know if they necessarily be looking to make like a whole lot of me you know as i pay into it um so if there's no deal there's no deal they would they're doing this for market price well i haven't like talked to the details of the what that contract for dude was looked like i would assume that bid probably would probably be you know as low as possible or i just get that was the road i go like what would i be kind of looking for in that deal

so Tyler what happens um when the h-fax system goes out after you've bought this home

and it's gonna cost you eight thousand dollars and then there's some mold uh in the basement

that's another five what happens yep that's a great question yes so i mean the the point i want to make is that your your broke you don't you don't have any money and so people who are broke that by homes become broker and it's not it's not a good thing it actually adds to a lot more stress and a lot more debt because you can't keep up a home i mean one of the cheapest days of a homeowner is the day you buy the house and everything else the rest of the cup next

couple of years is you putting money into it and when you don't have the money for it there's no emergency fund you still have this debt you're just not at a financial place um and i say of it's because i want you to become a homeowner and it sounds like you have some some good living situations that you can live there for a little bit and take care of it i mean there's time there's no there's no rush i mean you're what twenty twenty six twenty five twenty five yeah um so i would

i would highly suggest continue to do what you've been doing you've paid up forty thousand dollars

which is amazing Tyler so um i wonder if there's a way you can up because i you still have 35

left and i don't want that to take you another four years right so i'm wondering if you can do some some extra work do something on the property you know they pay you i don't know what it is but if there's some extra flexibility in your time to get this debt paid off ASAP i mean and extra you know thousand bucks a month you know you're getting this paid off in more like two years yeah two and a half years versus four years and if you do an extra you know if you do

two thousand dollars a month like you can start to see it actually you know see a lot of progress but it's going to take you changing and being a little bit more intense because after that then saving up some money um you know for an emergency funds it having some money set aside for a down payment at least five percent like all of that is the order at which i would do it which is going to take you probably all of that another four years before you have a hundred but that's okay

“because you'll be twenty nine and and there's no there's no rush i mean i think you would regret this decision”

a whole up faster and then the whole thing with the deed is is that like um like the seller finance is what it is saying that they would become the bank which i would not do that either i'm i'm just curious do you have money saved that you were even considering this do you have a chunk of money at all four thousand dollars right so yeah and they've kind of just proposed that to me as we're coming in to them leaving again known to Texas and so i'm just we try to save up

whatever i could drop the winter and then yeah but just if i put this in just to put this in fair terms what you're talking about if if anybody on the streets we're going out to buy a four hundred fifty to five hundred thousand dollar house and let's just say they gave you a deal and they did it for median list price what what median listing prices right now let's say they did it for four hundred twenty four thousand dollars most people in order to get that payment at a fair part of their

take on pay they'd be putting down like fifty percent of their income in your case making twenty three an hour you'd be putting down like sixty three percent in order to make this a fair amount and we haven't even talked about do they own this property free and clear or not because if they still owe money on it depending on their interest rate they're at least going to want to like cover that do you see what i'm saying so what they're going to be able to offer you would be limited in

anyway i do know that they own it hundred percent and we also know that's good that they own it one hundred percent but we also know that you don't have any money to buy this hundred percent so

“and honestly i was kind of hesitant you know about it it just seems like such a good deal”

and not that they would be mad if i if i turned it down or anything like that i just want to look into it so yeah no it's totally fair no i so appreciate you calling and and asking the question

ant nungle a parent and they have this home and they want to they want their child their needs to nephew their granddaughter to buy it and you know and and again i think it's because it's that family tie it feels like okay i'll get a better deal with this family and just because it's a good deal doesn't mean it's a good deal for you and so you really do have to separate and take the emotion out of it to think cally i'm gonna miss out there's gonna be other deals there's going

“to be other houses that you can buy and that may not even be the house she wants so that's what i was”

gonna say is like that's that's the whole thing is if if they had not come to him and said hey we might have a deal for you i i i don't think that he was like you want to know what one day i want to buy a house you know whose house would be great my aunt and uncles that's the house i want to buy yes that probably wasn't on his list of things to do it just presented itself and it was like oh this isn't front of me maybe i'll do that you know that's right exactly and

that's how these deals happen and for a lot of people they walk right into them and then they get two years in and they're like oh my gosh i have no money and then if you're the seller financing and you'll lose your job then you can't pay the mortgage so i'm happy you have to go to aunt uncle yeah and say sorry you know and if they had a bad situation which doesn't sound like they do i mean it just it just can be a domino effect that's not clean and the cleaner something is

the more peace agree there's going to be there's going to be more control because we do want you to own a home like that is part of the baby steps like we want you in the in the markets but not when you're broke yeah and you have no money broke people don't need to be owning homes because oh my gosh like it is so expensive it is so expensive to keep up with it and there's time you know i think the most recent data said that people are not buying homes until their forties like that's

when they're making that first purchase and so i think that's i think that's okay you know it's very

different from what we're used to um because real estate's just more expensive now it's not expensive for people but i think it's okay you know i tell people all the time salmon i waited 10 years to buy our first house and we're still here and you're gonna be okay yeah yeah i'm gonna be okay i know i'm just happy and and the house doesn't fix your problem so if you really are a paycheck to paycheck you don't have savings you have a lot of debt owning a home is not going to make

your situation better no it's not it's really really not and so have the patience have the patience so should may take you longer than it did six years ago but it is so worth it to have that piece of mind hey George camel here a few years ago someone stole my identity and let me tell you that is not a quick fix it takes hours on the phone piles of paperwork and a whole lot of stress trying to

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i help today hi i have spent like the last minute just jotting down notes and stuff because i know that i'm gonna be a jumble mouth but um right now the biggest thing that i am crazy about is my husband and i um last year she was making over a hundred thousand dollars and we lived you know if some look cushiony like like we had our finances you know we lived with in our means like if we wanted to buy something we could go buy it so up until February last year

he had lost that job and i would say home mom and so i'm in Rosen to see up the moment living my parents and so i had went back to work um which is fine like although it's hard

“with the child um you have to do it you have to deal so i did that he got a job as a car sales man”

for children um he is only making about three grand a month which is not really that great um

the way they do things there's just so weird how they pay but they basically essentially pay you

to sell eight cars and after eight cars is when you start getting like the commission okay and i was making like for a month as well but we so i don't live in Portland i live in sweet home

and we have a child and i had someone watching my son but that babysitter had to be dropped

and so now i'm working and i'm making a thousand dollars a month um i am trying to find ways

“to like clean people's houses and stuff i guess my biggest thing that i'm slowly i think i'm”

learning is like our mother and come right now is 4,800 our total bills are 3,900 and although that isn't what we you know used to have since cost me a life but i'm i'm i think i'm worrying about stuff that is out of my control right now is what i think i'm realizing and it's taking a toll on my marriage like the financial piece um i have spent on it we just can't see i die it's not that we're fighting but i'm just like top tier stress what what are the biggest stressors that

you're feeling just not having the margin are you stressed that you're having to work are you stressed

that you don't like his job what what's the the number one thing that's eating your lunch so i think the biggest thing right now is because we only have my husband's family to rely on and child cares it's really hard especially with the location that we're in and i am afraid at some point it's gonna be like okay like we have no other people to watch her child and i will have to be a stay home mom but i am choosing this one thing i did learn i'm choosing to deal with that when we get

there so as of right now we do have child care but it doesn't give you the hours that you need to be able to work it's limited right okay and and tell me again is that because the the tone is so small and there's just no one to rely on or is it strictly are you strictly going to family for child care so i'm strictly going to his family i don't have family here i don't want to say too much but we did just have a babysitter but found things out about her please spot involved and

so this town is just not a good place to have find disrandom people off these well maybe maybe

“maybe let's not go straight to that and i think that could be i want to say this you have a bad”

experience it will put a horrible taste in your mouth but i don't want that to turn into the first

girl that we used ended up being bad that means everybody in this town is bad i i don't want it to go to that because now you're putting yourself in a corner and you're really limiting your options how old is the child that needs child care uh three okay three and i just wonder i'm wondering about his job Nicole yes how long has he been doing this um he has been doing this for about five months now there was a couple months where he did bring in like a three thousand six

hundred dollar paycheck alone okay which was nice well maybe um i wonder if that's part of it too of you guys agreeing on kind of a timeline to say hey can we reevaluate you know give him nine months or i'm making a time frame nine months in this role to really get the cycle and to and to know how to do it well right you need some reps you don't want to just like pull the polygon ninety days in but i wonder if you both could agree because your uneasiness is that

“your income is having to supplement what he was making and i think a goal of yours i'm assuming”

i may be putting words in your mouth is that he would bring in an income that was to stay in the household and you don't have to work because you don't want to worry about child care anything that would be like the ideal situation right right yeah so i do wonder on on his ends of hey can we reevaluate our situation every couple months every couple of months just to give you an outlet to for you to reevaluate to Nicole and to say okay it's been ninety days and we've

done this we've survived like what is working is working right now we're okay nothing's on fire or for you to have a place to be like no no that's not working as horrible it's horrible and and you didn't mean like i don't know if for him to be able to have an out to in this specific job if there's something else that he could plug into he may not make a hundred grand again i don't know what's he in sales when he was making a hundred grand what was he doing he was a supervisor for

like Georgia Pacific what's Georgia Pacific it's a truck and hold you know it's in the holiday organ it's this can sound so funny but it's where they make toilet paper and paper towels and they make it for Costco and also like a factory manufacturer is there have you guys considered looking outside of your area because it feels like just from listening to you it feels like you're in a very small bubble and you're limiting your options because of this bubble

can he look for management jobs at manufacturers across the country and can you guys open up your scope and if you say oh well what about childcare there's childcare everywhere like everybody Emily do you guys want to be near family um so right now we own our home so we can't

the biggest problem for me right now it's like it's just been nothing but like excuse effort

she's like oh I don't want to go back to manufacturing job oh I don't want to do physical labor oh I don't want this oh I don't want that and so it puts me in a spot of like okay well I'm just going to say it out flat but it puts me in the headspace if like okay well you just want things handed to you that is probably the biggest thing right now so he learned like the job that he was doing he doesn't want to go back to that that's good to know does he like this current job does

he like it or he loves it and I I love that for him like I love that she has found a job that he really loves so it's when the handed to him part he loves this job do you feel like he loves it but he doesn't work hard at it what do you feel like is happening there um I feel like in a point in time in life and although maybe he doesn't see our finances away I do and maybe he's not

“freaking out about it because honestly it's not really that big of a deal but for him like I'm sorry”

what was the question is first what part of it you said he just wants things handed to him and I

said you said that he really loves his job does he love his job he's lazy at his job is that what you're sensing or does he love his job and he's working really hard he's just hitting a salary cap like what's happening um I mean he loves his job a lot um I would say that I know that people he works with and he's been working hard I mean there has been months where he's sold 14 cars then I think I think there's something else at play I think you're perceiving something

that may not be true because you don't like the situation I think that's it I think she wants out yeah yeah and I think that's fair I think you're feeling like hey I didn't sign up for a situation where I was gonna have to leave my kid with a sitter and work and but yet that's where

“you find yourself that's the reality for now and so that's why I think some check-ins”

periodically so that you can you you don't hold it in Nicole and the resentment builds on your end right and to have a place even if it's like a council you know council or a therapist a place to be able to talk about this freely I think it's gonna be really unifying for you guys

most people spend years changing their money habits but never think twice about how their bank

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that in the majority of the calls we love the solution of every dollar because it's the budgeting

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about it's the best way to work the baby steps you have to have a budget in order to work the baby steps and so it's for you if you have been listening and you have not downloaded every dollar you need to start for free today you don't have to live paycheck to paycheck you don't have to live feeling broke our every dollar budget app helps you find extra money it helps you every month it helps you build a personalized plan that's just for you so that you can beat debt and build wealth it takes 15

minutes you'll find thousands I'm telling you in hidden margin you'll feel like you got to raise don't live normal when you can live like no one else start every dollar for free in the app store or Google play today all right Diane is in Raleigh North Carolina hey Diane how can Rachel and I help today hi thank you for taking my call I had been following Dave's program since 2019 I'm out of debt down to retirement I've had an old car that I'm trying to hang on to a bit longer and find a

get it what get another car into I'm closer to retirement and hopefully it'll be up to her double the mile it's got a hundred twenty seven mile double the mile that's now it's a 2019

maintenance repairs and I got some really good new tires I have spent eight thousand dollars on this

“car and I'm not just a myself that I should have kept it this long what's it worth what's the”

cost probably around nine or ten thousand you took a route and in two hundred twenty thousand all those pretty happy with it do you have the money saved today do you have money saved up yeah you can just upgrade car well I do it would kind of wipe out my savings on my emergency fund and I have a I'm going to have to get a new route from my house here sometime soon but what's your margin every month part what's your margin after you guys pay your bills what's the margin that you

have available oh I have lots left over I'm making double payment to my house right now because I'm listening to 11000 on my house so could you just could you just slow it down a little bit and start

stacking a couple of thousand it sounds like you got a lot I don't know how much a lot is but if you

could put you know half of that aside for a car and in six months trade up does that is that workable I probably could like I'm trying to get like another huge car and I was looking at yeah definitely car with only fifty thousand miles on it would still be like around twenty thousand dollars yeah but if you sell this for ten can you save up another ten can you save two thousand dollars a month if you slow down on the house yeah just make your mortgage payment for five months

could you save ten thousand dollars yeah I could do that which actually I could take some

“thousand on my accountant still have my emergency fund that's what we're saying do that yes I”

like it still do that I think you're just like only fast you you're like I got to get this mortgage paid off this is like cramp in my style right now I don't want to deal with it so close to and I'm doing better my retirement than I originally had thought I was doing and it's like to reward myself too which was another question I wanted to ask but not this time but so my car though can I get a car it's just it's costing all right now it's worth nine thousand and you've

put eight thousand in it this year and the year's not even finished it's it's time to upgrade and you have the ability to yeah so I would and sell it while it's all fixed yes maybe for the for the eight thousand that you've put in with the new tires and everything else happens I mean seriously I probably would because it's something else breaks you're going to be like oh my gosh that's going to cost two thousand as a worth putting two thousand you know you're back to the same

conversation so while it's going well go ahead and sell it and get as much as you can out of it

“because you put a good investment into us you know that's what's one good thing to highlight you know”

here we we do teach a lot of people's potential is lying in their vehicles when people are trying to get out of debt we're telling them to sell off their cars and drive a beater we we don't like car payments we want you to own your car Scott free but there is a moment where you can transition out of driving like that beater car and she's definitely at the point where it's like sure I can upgrade my vehicle it's at no detriment you're making double and triple mortgage payments heck yet it's time

yes absolutely yeah it is yeah we don't want you driving a crappy car for the rest of your life people that is for a season while you're getting yourself in a place where Diane is Diane Diane upgrade the car you're saying do it all right thank you so much for the call Diane let's go to Marie who's in Los Angeles California again hey Marie how's everything out in Cali hi Gaden Rachel it's actually starting to finally cool down but I'm 27 years old as of today happy birthday thank you

so much I work full time and I'm going to school part time I'm in baby step four and five but technically I'm not saving for my kids college I'm saving for my own and so I'm preparing to cash will veterinary school in about three years wow my question is where do I store the cash while I'm

saving for the three years well a good place to always keep short term money that's not you know

less than five years is and a good high yield savings account you'll get probably maybe close to three percent so you're not trying to make a ton on it because you're gonna be using it and and you want enough time that like if you had invested it there may not be enough time for it to have the ups and the downs of the markets actually get some pretty good gains so really anything less than four to five years a high yield savings account is great and fair winds credit union we've

been partnering with them and they're amazing there's something called the smart bundle if you go to fair winds dot org slash ramsy and you can get a no fee monthly checking account and then up to ten high yield savings accounts not that you're gonna need ten but one of those can be earmarked for vet school and then if there's any other savings you're doing like to upgrade a car something else you can open up more but yeah say answer your question simply a high yield savings

in the height yeah I mean at this point for a 529 I don't think it's probably gonna be worth it because it's only three years and you're waiting for that growth again that money will be invested in the 529 and so back to that you know point that it's it I don't know there's just there's there's some risk there if it's that short term in the market but if something does go down and genuinely I think about the election time you know like these years like they

that can get a little unstable and if you needed some of that money and the market was down

“and you feel like oh my gosh you know it's gonna feel like you lost some money if you have to pull”

it out there so so yeah so 529s are really good for long term planning for college but for this short term three years I think I would just do a high yield savings yeah I think that's a really good question and I think that's one that the broader audience wants to know about you know it's like when it's a good time to throw the money in a high yield versus investing it and that 5-year mark really is you know the way it's calculated is from inception if you take a

snapshot at any 5-year point it doesn't necessarily have to be consecutive like these specific years but if you take any 5-year snapshot you can see that there was enough time for the market if it dropped to fully recover and then and then some so that's kind of where that comes from

“and I think that that's a really good smart rule of thumb yes yes and I say all this and then you know”

Marie if you do look at the market the last three years have been amazing it's like oh my gosh

I could have taken a video but you just don't know so leaving some time is usually wise because the worst thing is putting money in and having to take it out in two years and you know and it's at a low and you know you're thinking oh my gosh I'm gonna it's gonna I am losing money if you pull money out of that point you really are yeah so keep it up to have it have it right right now that love it so much alright a couple of questions you guys sometimes send us questions from Facebook

from the baby steps community keep doing that because we like to get them this one is Tim from Instagram we have a team that will be driving soon what are your recommended car brands that we should look at that will provide safety and still be economical oh that's a kind of question yeah I'm gonna be honest I'm not very knowledgeable on every car brand and safety no feature and everything but yeah I would say obviously a used car yes and if there's anything that they can

contribute financially it's always a good thing especially for car because they are so invested

in their car at 16 so like that's a good place for them to put in some money so they feel they feel some of that purchase and responsibility yeah anything anything you I mean at that point and I'm looking at what's been on the road I'm like when I look when I look out on the horizon give me a Toyota I give me a Toyota a Honda I don't see a lot of jeep compasses anymore you don't have you like those certain cars like don't get that yes you do not get that do not get oh gosh

there's a lot of my guess I can't think of them because they don't exist anymore they didn't stay on the test of time they didn't hey guys it's Rachel Cruz if you're working the baby steps

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in the comments we would love to hear from you okay guys Cindy is in Louisville Kentucky she's on the

“line next hey Cindy how can we help today I don't know if you can but I figure if anybody can”

make you guys we'll do our best okay I have no debt whatsoever all right I have I've never had

credit cards I don't believe in them if I can't pay by something I don't buy it my problem is I want to get equity out of my house to put on a new roof and to do some floors in my house I adopt seeing your dogs and cats and my carpets are shot I've only been here two and a half years I came from Maryland I've only been in my house two and a half years but my carpets are shot and I want to get hardwood floors how much does that cost I have a figure about 30 thousand dollars total

“for everything all right I have no credit I don't have good credit I don't have bad credit I have”

zero credit good so Cindy you said nobody will give me money well you're in baby steps seven

you have a fully paid off home you said you've never had debt you've never done what have you done

with your money haven't you saved it up somewhere or invested it somewhere now because my husband was very sick for 30 years he got sick very very young and we lived hand-to-mouthed our whole life and so we weren't able to save money when I sold my house in Maryland to move here I put it right back into a house there was no there was no money to save we lived on his social security disability

“our whole lives what am I doing now your social security okay and how much does that every month and”

of 1780 okay and I pay my bills everything's automatic because I don't want to you know I don't want to forget anything but but there's no nest egg no savings anywhere no cash now now there's a couple couple of $1,000 that's it like how much is a couple of $1,000 and where is it it's been savings account it's like $3,000 okay okay and that's you know that's it and I but I did was I got I had I got um I have a harmonious to that got for a bit of something that'll pay to fix anything okay what did you use

that for the roof no no no no no it's just something it's just something breaks you know the furnace the dishwasher the washing machine for appliances okay okay so you know just moved though two years ago how much equities in the home if you just went from yeah I don't know 300,000 dollars to that I know I know but but I'm saying if you how much is your house how much is the worth 240 okay so you had 240 in Maryland you took the 240 bought a house here so then

for two months or so it's a little bit more in Maryland but the problem was I had a I had to pay to move and right we're saying how much I'm just saying you do you have a lot of equity in the home to pull from in the first place yes but nobody will give me the money because I have no credit how much equities in the home 240 the half is 100% paid off okay okay I got you I got you I got you yep yep so I bought the house I just with cash yes I just want to get you at some of

the 240,000 dollars of equity and you're trying to get some of that to I'm trying to get $30,000 to put a roof on because my roof I'm not sure how old my roof is the people I bought it from were slippers and made it to how old the roof was I'm a little before I have a problem before I

have a problem I just don't want to have a problem Cindy here's what I'm thinking I'm a little

concerned at with your situation because to your point you've just got the social security you can't afford home repairs you can't afford if the law if something happens in your yard a tree falls you can't afford that I wonder if a better purchase one second one second I wonder

I couldn't buy a condo I had a buy a house because I adopt I adopt senior dogs and cats okay so let me let me speak to that because if there's a lot that's true here you've got senior dogs and cats you want to provide a sanctuary for them that is that tail is wagging the dog and that's where

the problem is because the math here that was a pretty good punty the math doesn't lie here you

don't have any money and I'm not saying that in any judgment against you whatsoever it's simply true and the longer you live in that house there are things that are going to come up that need maintenance the AC is going to go out at some point it's going to need maintenance the roof at some point is going to need to be repaired and you don't have them the monthly income coming into take care of those things I realize you just purchased this house but if I were you Cindy I'd be

thinking about a condo or a town hall or a town hall yes that's that's one 75 yes and you know you

“bank you know 75000 you have to yeah to have some buffer because you're very it's all real estate”

heavy at this point and that's not a great plan long term you need cash for things that are legitimate

like you're saying a roof and everything and so if you go to ramestyitions.com and check out our

our trusted pros and find a great real estate agent and have them run some comps in the area and hopefully you get you know 240 out of it or maybe a little bit more if you've been there two years maybe it's gone up four percent I don't know yeah a little equity to pay the commissions on all of it and and find something that would fit your situation like what you're talking about in a town home usually is probably the best bet but it's gonna be smaller but that's okay because

you will have margin financially that I think is gonna cause way less stress and that you're not strapped for cash where you're having to go pull equity out of your home and that's the really hard part about this conversation I want to pull that out no one is saying that we don't care

“about pets we're not saying that we don't care about the things that you want but the truth is”

sometimes there's forced priorities on our list and for you cash and having a little bit of diversity

which is what Rachel was talking about not everything in real in real estate is a number one priority for you whether you like it or not it is the best thing for you to be have a better foundation going into your later years yeah and you got to think Cindy if if you're going to be doing this with all these pets more carpet is gonna be destroyed so you're have to replace it again in 18 months and you need cash to do that right so if you want to cash flow this lifestyle which is

fine it just has to be realistic to your numbers and it's not been so and maybe you can go volunteer at a shelter like find other ways to scratch that itch if you end up living somewhere where you can't have as many pets I just there's more than one way gosh almost did it again there's more than one way to skin a cat oh no that's wrong isn't it that's not right my tail tail wagging the dog

“no it's gonna catch over here I know I do in the best I can we love you and the best thing is”

with all of it Cindy is that you do have a paid-out last your hard work intelligence has allowed you to maybe make a different move where you have cash in the bank and you own you own something still right yes yes that's a that it's a positive where you're at it's not a mortgage you know that's what I was thinking of my dad as it was trying to pull the equity I'm like you have I think there is a mortgage so yeah you are free and clear which is that's a gift so

so you use that to your advantage and you've you've lived a a long life with a with a six spouse and you know that month to month feeling you're used to that but we're saying change it up do some different where you do have some buffer I think it's gonna give you a lot of peace and a long run yeah well thank you so much for the call and what she's accomplished truly is it it's a part of what we teach we want people to go into the later years of their

life we want you owning your home for most of us that line item the rent or mortgage is the biggest line item on our budget and if you can have that solidified by having a paid off mortgage it's one of the number one things that you can do to really solidify your financial future and she's done that yeah and with retirements along saving for retirement that may be set for 15% so you're having both in tandem so you're not in a situation where all all your assets are in one thing and there's no cash

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to help you carry the load go to better help dot com slash ramsy for 10% off that's better help a glp dot com slash ramsy all right let's head back to the phone lines we have Allen who's in Jackson, Mississippi hey Allen how can we help today how are you I'm good thank you you

“that I've got a problem with my home hi I've had her in the market since the first the year”

I've actually gone through two real kids on it the home is worth two sixty five of course I will owe one seventy seven uh that little house a pricing I've had listed on it comments nobody's biting advice made an offering hey and we moved out of it before we put it on

the market we were we were suggested to move out we were told we moved out it was so fast

or so my wife decided to move us out hi yeah I still pay the mortgage still pay the water electricity you're still hey you're got to go buy there every two weeks it's a nice subdivision the credit I don't know what to do with it I'm paying on it and nobody lives there are there it's in a subdivision or the other houses in the subdivision selling um they are here and there they like they've been kind of running to the same problem I have been with them being on the market for

a long time what are do you know the average days on market in your area your realtor should be that I was told be 90 90 to 90 to 110 days yeah national average median right now I should say 60 days in the market that's national I so depending on where you are that could be different so for Jackson Mississippi could be 90 or but not uh but not nine months okay so when you're area we just pulled it up it's actually 70 days on market in Jackson Mississippi so that I'll be

honest Alan that's telling me that there is something it's either the price it's either the location what it's next to what's in the backyard the house it's a house it's a house it's a house it's a house a home if you had to be bored or you have a terrible realtor's and you're just getting you know people I would go to ramsysolutions.com and check out our trusted agents because these are really high driven individuals that that we recommend so I would look and probably interview one or two

of those in Jackson and I I would switch realtor's yeah if there's not a percent there's nothing glaring that's super obvious that some is wrongly what Jade saying mm-hmm no I know I see back

that I've gotten because my first filter yeah I did the right communication job so I just kind of

cut that one loose and just moved on and we we went back to the realtor to the use we bought the house to begin with but it's the only feedback you got was to empty the house out my next thought would be let me finish no the biggest feedback I've got is nobody likes that all the bedroom trip stairs that is the biggest complaint I'm seeing they like it they love it you know price is great it's not you know so my price is not as comparable I'm not looking to make you chill and I don't

need to have a list of what it's worth well I really I think that what Rachel said I think is the

“exact thing that you need to do I think you need to talk with one of our real estate pros and they're”

going to be able to crack the code for you because there's there's plenty of houses I know that all the bedrooms are upstairs and so when I get them and I'll be everyone's preferences but also I don't know how many showings mm-hmm I mean I bet out of 50 people you're not getting 50 of those comments right I mean so yeah there's something's going on there's not enough activity happening is what I would say and they can help you actually pull some cops because maybe in the area I

don't know of Jackson it's maybe values of stayed you know consistent and you need to drop it alone I don't know so you yeah they'll be able to pull some cops and help you absolutely thank you for the call island let's go to Allison who's in Harrisburg Pennsylvania hey Allison how can we help

will be homeschooling them don't feel like I will ever be going back into public school teaching but I have a pension that's sitting there and wondering if I should pull that I'm only 42 so I would get you know ding in that area but if I should pull it who reinvest it in our retirement that we have which we get a better rate of return or use it to pay off our house just kind of wondering if the ding that I would get would be worth you know the value of those things I would not use it

to pay off the house since it's retirement money I am interested if you pulled the lump some to

“reinvest it a 10% penalty what what was the penalty I think it's 10% I don't know the exact number”

I didn't look that up okay yeah so I I would look at that I always hesitate to pull out

long-term investments that have that penalty because but but pensions depending on where your investments are within the pension is gonna make a difference because sometimes some you know districts they do it great yeah and it's well invested yeah and it's fine but if you pull the numbers and see the investments and they call my gosh I could be getting so much more because they put you in a really conservative type of investment that's not making a ton and you run the numbers

because you are so young that that ding now you could make up for it you know in the market or if it's doing fine um apart we say you could leave it and then pull it all if you have that option

at retirement age and reinvest it then do you know what the return on it is they target seven

percent oh yeah that's not great and I like I said I'm not playing it's just kind of like sitting there we're not contributing to it since I'm not working right and I don't plan on going back and we have other retirement investments that we have on the side for my husband's work and then private things that I had invested in the four or three b we had rolled over to an IRA. What's the lump sum of it right now that you would receive?

“It's 65 right now I don't know what the penalty would be on it but that's what's sitting in the”

account. You know I might sit down with a smart vester pro to see what their thoughts are on it because I agree with Rachel seven percent I'm kind of like I don't know if you if you pulled that out you would take a tax hit the ten percent penalty I'm sorry and but then after that you'd be invested in making ten eleven percent and so you would make back the loss you know pretty quickly I think I just I'd want to sit down with somebody who knows more of the ins and outs on that but that's what

I'm leaning towards I can tell you I would not pull out that money and put it towards paying

off my house because the truth is that money is your marked for retirement and that would be like

a sign somebody to cash out their 401k to pay off their home and we just wouldn't you would it recommend that you need you need that diversification going back to one of our previous calls you

“want you want that money there yep that's a very good question was there anything else?”

No that was it all right then we love you guys we love listening to you guys you guys have helped us out in an increase. Thank you. Oh I love that. Thank you so much for the call I love that. All right let's take one last one Renee is in Nashville, Tennessee. Hey Renee we're a little against the clock but I think we can do it. Hello hey. Hey so my question was if that's it need my husband takes a $89,000 he log on our home and you 45,000 of it to

pay me and his debt off does it make sense and we have 20 we have like 23,000 stays in our savings but we didn't want to take such our savings. The total debt that you guys both have is 45,000? Yeah. So why would you take out an $89,000 he log what's the rest of that money going towards? So I didn't want to do another he log so the plan is to pay the debt off and eventually pay down on the on the 45,000 dollar debt on the he log but still have the extra money because we want to

eventually rent our current home in Nashville out and move to Dallas and buy another home and you some of that he log to put on the down payment. Oh gosh. Oh Renee you guys are doing way too much and I think if you do that it's actually going to cause you to go backwards. If I were in your shoes today and I've been in your shoes with $460,000 of debt I would take the 23,000 that you have saved. I take 22 of it and I would throw it at the debt. Cut it in half and then you in your husband if you

be completely debt-free and you will have not borrowed it. It's true. That's good. Yeah the problem

“with that Renee is you start to move when you move debt around you feel like you've done something”

and you have it and then sell your home in Nashville, okay? Use that money then to buy something in Dallas. Written Dallas for a year sell your home in Nashville and not just don't be a long distance landlord either. When you take your car to the shop you're probably thinking two things. How much is this going to cost me and is it going to get done right? What you need is a mechanic who will give you transparent information so you can make the best decision for your

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Show because you can trust them to take care of your vehicle the right way. Their digital vehicle inspections let you see exactly what their technicians see giving you confidence on which repairs

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three years or 36,000 miles with a guarantee like that you can walk away knowing that your car and your wallet are taking care of schedule your service today and get 10% off your visit at CBAC.com/RAMsey or click the link in the description that CBAC.com/RAMsey 10% off up to a $250 value. See store for details All right welcome back to the Ramsey Show here in the Fairwins Credit Union Studio. I'm here Jade Worcestershire next to George Campbell if you were listening I was with Rachel but now I'm with

George. Some call it an upgrade some call it an upgrade. I'll let you choose. I'll call it a comeback. Let's go to Violet who's an Arlington Virginia. Hello Violet. How are you today? Hello. Hi. I'm on baby

since you first of all thank you for taking my calls. I'm on baby since two I started in December

20 25 and I am but I've got 37,000 paid. I am now almost done with all my consumer data except for my student loans. Wow. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah I'm really excited but my student loans are really big because there's a lot and but I'm ready to face the music and I'm have a plan and it's going to take me a number of years but I can do it and I had some questions around it. My balance right now is 225,000. The balance has balloons because I had it in forbearance for 20 years so it's really

my fault that this happened but I'm ready to face the music. I've been listening to this show. I heard your story, Jade. I know this is possible. I can do this so I am going to start repayment next month. Wait a minute. I'm really proud of you. Just that alone. I really am proud of you because a lot of people would stuff their head in the sand and kind of ostrich this situation but you're like you want to know what? It's time to go. It's go time so I'm really proud of you.

So 225,000 student loans tell us about where did the loans come from like are you in your degree? Are you earning a good income? Tell us about it. I am 43 now. I'm a single mom so I am working for myself. I am earning in my degree like I'm a consultant in the work in the field that I've completed so I have been burning my head in the sand but I am able now to pay 3,750

“months on this and I think I can get it done in five years but my questions are that the first”

one is that I have been hearing a lot from others online that their repayment or their payment have been lost by their loan servicer and so I wanted to ask if like you experienced any of that or what kind of like best practices did you engage in when you were making payments just to track all your payments and make sure that they were all counted. I've not experienced that the areas where I've found people experienced that were on public service loan forgiveness,

were certain payments didn't count or the payments were lost in that way like hey I thought I made this amount of I thought I made 100 payments but it's showing that I only made 70 so 30 payments were lost like I've heard it in that frame work but I've not heard it in just my normal month to month bills I'm making payments and they're just not being applied. I have not heard that however I do think that with what you're doing you're not just paying minimums you're actively

and see that math actually happening in real time and so I think that gives you the advantage to just be you know hitting it with an onslaught of payments and just yeah continue to track it.

Well, that leads to my second question so the at the 225,000 is comprised of nine

separate student loans and I'm going to debt snowball all of that. Great. The first the first four are between 10 and 14,000 each. So I know this sounds maybe against the principles of like the baby steps in the debt snowball but I wondered if it would make sense for me to save up like you know over two to three months to like make a lump sum payment and just pay that entire 10,000 or 14,000 just for those first four. Why? I guess I'm worried that my payments

are going to get lost. I just want to pay this thing twice. Well, it's not going to get lost. You have bank statements showing that money leaving your account. So that on top of just save the PDF from your loan service or each month showing that your payment history and you can

“always request a payment history as well from the service or via email. So I think it's a I think”

it's it I'm not going to call paranoia but I don't think it's the real issue here. I don't want you to kick the can down the road any further based on well. What if the payment doesn't count? Let's just start throwing as much as we can every month instead of saving up lump sum and then hoping that we actually throw it the debt. Yeah and I mean you can again to combat this when you

make your initial payment make your initial payment first that satisfies the interest and whatever

a little bit goes towards the principle and then make a separate principle only payment within that same paper within that same statement period and that way you can physically see the loan lower by that amount and like George said with your statements you're totally covered. I think that you are I don't know but I think that you're looking at this mountain and you're like how can I tackle this and it's like part of your brain is creating an excuse and the other part

“of your brain is like I'll feel better if I just pay off a couple of lump sums at once. I think you're”

just trying to find a way to like deal with this in your mind is what it sounds like and honestly just minimum payments on everything attack the small what is the smallest loan right now you said between 10 and 14 but what's the smallest loan the smallest is around 10,000 it's 10,500 okay so you're going to be done with that in three months and you're going to be cutting into the next smallest one I mean that's really really cool and what you can start to do violet is just these little

mile markers that celebrate those small winds and I I think you probably already have it like this because I can tell by your personality but have it tracked out ahead of time so you know okay

the first loan is going to be done when are we September octa it's going to be done and done

in November and November I already have on the books that I'm going out with my buddy and she's going to buy us both a cocktail and we're going to celebrate that and then have it tracked for the next one and those are things that you can do to really fire yourself up and get excited about this because that momentum is what's going to carry you through because five years is a long time in George let's talk about this for a minute because it's worth saying you know most of the people

who do the baby steps they're they're through baby step two it's like a year and a half to two year deal for most people that's the average but and and when you're doing that in two years a year and a half guess year balls to the wall you're cutting your cutting everything out of your budget you're living scorched earth it's totally possible to do that when you start creeping up on five

“and six years you have to be strategic because you can't live in that state of mind for five years”

it's very very difficult so maybe you do this violet and you're like I'm going to do a one and a half to your sprint and I'm going to like sprint just run it all off leave it all on the court and then after two years I'm going to you know do something for myself maybe it's something that you need to upgrade maybe it's something that you need to do to just kind of feel your income a little bit and then you do another year sprint and then you kind of take a little bit

of a breather but five years of scorched earth it will take a toll on you so you need to be be thoughtful and set those milestones ahead of time and you tend to speed up on the tail end oh yeah so know that just because right now on paper this is what it looks like you're probably going to make more money you're probably going to find ways to sacrifice deeper and so all of that can speed it up so I would go okay what is a four year plan look like well that's

46 80 a month going toward these loans what does a let's say I wanted to do it in 36 months three years 62 50 so now you're going well I bring home 10 can I live off of 37 50 if I really got intense I think you might find the answers yes yeah and the short of the sacrifice you know the more likely you are to finish this also true yeah that's so good anything that you can do to shorten this if there's opportunities that come up if you're like you want to know

it maybe my rent could go down or maybe they take those opportunities because to George's

[Music] people ask me all the time George what's your number one money saving hack I'm glad you asked nothing makes me happier than helping another frugal friend so here's the hack get on a budget

seriously how he's supposed to save money if you don't know how much you're spending in the first place

“and that's what makes the every dollar budgeting app a game changer with every dollar you'll”

get a clear picture of your spending and from there it's easy to see where you can get more intentional cutback and save more money how much money are we talking well the average every dollar budgeter frees up $395 in their very first budget and if you ask me I think you're way above average so why are you still listening to me go download every dollar for free and start saving more money right now

well George you already know this but the people need to know that Ramsey is taking over an

entire cruise ship it sounds violent when you put it that way I know it's like we're pirates

it's a mutiny it's not we're not pirates we're just taking a cruise together it's called the Luf like no one else cruise it's going to be so much fun guys March 14 through 21st next year it's seven nights in the western Caribbean we're going to the Bahamas Jamaica Grand Cayman Kazumel so much fun it is a full Ramsey takeover this cruise is going to have everybody on board my self Dave Ramsey all the Ramsey personalities George Campbell George Campbell's wife

it's going to be a part of my husband who isn't going to be there it's a shorter list I know what's fun is there's no strangers on the boat it's all like friends we just haven't met yet yeah you know we've all got many similar things in common but we're going to do the largest debt free screen which that was one of my favorite things that we did on the last cruise um obviously guys there's going to be lots of great content there Dave's going to be doing

some new wealth building content there's going to be a live tapings of your favorite Ramsey shows so much more remember guys this is the only place that you're going to be able to experience this level of Ramsey so if you're super fan this is the most Ramsey you can visit it really is um and remember it's a limited how can I say like it's an exclusive party yeah not a bigger than 4 yeah this is the negative cell this is not for you if you still have

debt you don't have your emergency fund but if you're a consumer debt free you just have the mortgage left you're in baby steps four five six seven you are welcome we want to celebrate the hard work that you've put in the milestone let's mark the moment a lot of people don't get to do that yes you pay off the mortgage and then you go all right yes I don't have to work tomorrow

“uh we don't like that you need to celebrate with a cruise and for those of you who are in baby”

step two let this be aspirational for you to co you know the next year the year after that uh but if you're interested go to Ramsey Solutions dot com slash events to book your cabin all you need is a six hundred dollar deposit to secure your slot all right let's go to Elena and Harrisburg pencilvania hi Elena how can George and I help today hi um my father-in-law established a trust for a son when he was young and we know very little

about it except that it's for his college education my father-in-law's very private with his money and he hasn't given us any details on it um my son is in 11th grade now and he does not know about the trust and we don't know when we should tell him about it and also we don't know what all we should know about the trust at this point well George I'm sure you guys covered so much of this and investing essentials I feel like you're the one uh yeah there's a in setting up a trust

is a pretty aggressive move to say for a kid's college so do what why did he set it up in the first

place did he talk to you and say hey I'm gonna set this up for a college and this was back when

“he was a baby pretty much yes yeah he was two years old um he just basically told us that's what”

he was going to do and we know that he did set it up and that's that's all we know so no clue how much is in it what's even in there is it cash is it investments it like we have no idea exactly and if you talk to him and just said hey dad uh he's a junior now we're looking at colleges we want to make a game plan to make sure that he goes debt free can you let us know what's in the trust and how we access it he would say none of your business I don't know if he would say that I think it would be a

trust for your son and that's the part that I would push on because this is your boy and you kind of

have a right to know about something that has the potential I don't know but seems like it has the potential to have a major impact on him because you don't know how much is in the trust you

“don't know when he would have access to the money if it's 18 you would you need to know those things”

and I also don't like that your son would be blindsided because if there's I mean I don't even know if you can guess Elena but are we talking hundreds of thousands are we talking millie like how much wealth does your father-in-law have he he's very well off he he definitely can afford to do a trust if I'm had to guess I would I would guess around a hundred thousand but I I really have no number to go off of but the part that worries me is that you're scared to even ask him about this

yeah I mean and why isn't your husband yeah we should it would be it would be we would both go to him and ask him and we could just say we're starting to look at colleges we know you set up a trust for his education where we can you get us a copy of the trust document can you tell us who the trustee is can you tell us any if there's distribution triggers anything we need to know as we make plans then you can also pick a school you can pick a school yeah everything is predicated on

knowing what's in the trust because if there's ten dollars in it well we got to make a plan for ourselves

and if there's a million dollars in it that changes the type of schools we look absolutely

okay so I would just I mean he set this up for your son so there's no this is private you involved he involves your son yes so this is your business okay the time is of the essence essence here because your son is about to be looking at the colleges right and I don't that's the other thing I don't know when to tell our son I don't want it to dictate whether or not he goes to college I would wait until you know more info about the trust because you don't want

false promises of hey granddad has a trust for you everything's gonna be great yeah that's the order yeah let's talk about that order of events I think George is right the first thing is you guys need to

“get the information and the truth is regardless of that information we kind of need to treat that as like”

if it's here great if it's not great because we don't know anything about it but it shouldn't stop the conversations that you guys are having with your son regarding further education whatever that may be you do need to have I mean you said he's 11th grade so hopefully the conversation has already opened up about hey if you are choosing to go to a university here's

what the options are you know here's what your mom and what mom and dad have here's what we

expect from you we expect that you have a part-time job and that you'll contribute you know a certain percentage of what you make we're expecting you to start applying for scholarship like whatever of those expectations that you guys have for him we're gonna do community college for the first two years you guys need to start saying that to him now we can't wait until it's time to start applying for schools and then him be like whoa he gets into the dream school and realizes we don't have the

money so I would I mean if he's a beneficiary of the trust he should have a legal right to the basic information of the trust and so if your dad is unwilling to talk about it say hey is there trustee or a state planning attorney we can talk to about this if you are uncomfortable for some reason because we need to get to the bottom of this before we can make our plans for college okay have you guys saved up on your own or were you all banking on this being his education funding

we we have not saved up like I said my father-in-law is definitely capable of creating this trust for him to cover his college so and that's that is a little scary for us because we

“don't know and that's that's why we went to start the conversation now which is hopefully not too late”

but if we do need to give money to it then no yeah that's what you want you just want the basic facts we can move forward that's all you're asking of him now is your son I mean he's an 11th grade you might know this by now maybe not is he the college type are you seeing him as the type who will go to university or is he more of an entrepreneur or more of a trade school what do you think um at this point he doesn't know and he kind of goes back and forth between talking about

going to college and not and I think he's leaning more towards not going to college and those are some of the other things that I'd want you to be able to talk about with the father-in-law which is if little Jimmy decides that he doesn't want to go to college what are his options because we don't want him to feel pressured to go around that he wasn't going to go or to feel like this is the

they're not you trying to tell him what to do with his money the father-in-law it's just hey we just want to know what's going on this is crazy this is some chaos he's created it is I mean we

“talk about all the time I know Dave says all the time when you're a state planning you have to”

bring the others into the conversation you don't want anything to be sprung on them it's it's unfair and then it's kind of like everybody's left to figure it out and you're you know having a nice sleep yeah we're not asking for like private information about your life that's fine if you want to remain a mystery man but you don't set something up for a kid with him as a beneficiary and

then keep it in the dark until the very last second that's not fun

hey guys Rachel Cruz here and I'm so excited to tell you that the brand new 2027 Ramsey Gold planner is available now guys this is the only planner with exclusive monthly content from John Deloni Jade Worshaw and me to help you set clear goals and actually stick to them all year but

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planner for 49 97 a Ramsey Solutions dot com slash store that's Ramsey Solutions dot com slash store Alrighty our Ramsey Show question of the day is brought to you by wifi sometimes the hardest financial step is the one you've been avoiding if your private student loans are past due wifi can help you explore a low fixed rate refinancing option and payment plans that are tailored to your circumstances go y-refied.com slash Ramsey remember it may not be available in all states

today's question comes from Dylan and Delaware I'm 25 years old and my income is commission based this year I should earn close to $350,000 I have roughly a hundred grand in student debt about five grand in credit card debt and my girlfriend has roughly 11,000 in student loans and credit card debt she wants to get engaged soon but as financially unstable as we are it doesn't make sense to me to take that step yet should we wait until we're debt free to get married or get

married and pay our debt off together goodness gracious this is hilarious the corner making 350 grand and you're unstable I know average Americans would like to have a word with you sir at 25 years old

“that he's killing it that's why I said chachinger would be honest I don't think he wants to marry”

this girl he might not he's maybe looking at her going excuses because the truth is he could knock

out all of his debt in a year yakin 350 and he's got what 105,000 in debt yeah that's gone on a year yeah and she's and his girlfriend's debt is gone if they get married you know if they go ahead let's say they do want to get married they get engaged they get married her debt is gone in two seconds he's gonna burp 11,000 dollars in pound this debt wants to marry so yes if you want to get married to or get married get engaged get a ring you'll do that next paycheck

yeah and get engaged and get married and by that time honestly you'll be debt free and the day you come back from the honeymoon you can knock out her debt so let's discuss that for a minute because I I think especially he's young and I think if there's people listening who are you know in their early 20s and they're like I love ramsy solutions and they haven't found that special person yet some people sometimes think that we're very if this person has debt don't marry him

or if you both have debt you need to wait to get married and it's actually that couldn't be further from the truth I think the bigger thing to think about when you're dating someone and you have a very clear financial perspective is to get to know what their financial perspective is yeah I mean it's very telling honestly if the other person has debt and it's starting to change your mind now I get if it's hundreds of thousands and sure I know what I'm signing up for but it's

beautiful when you meet a couple in the debt free stage and they said yeah we got married and you know she came in with all this debt and we just attacked it together yes I'm like great that couple is gonna make it through anything because if you're willing to take on your spouse's burdens financially one aren't you willing to do for them yeah that's such a big thing to do so absolutely but if you don't have the conversation and you're just thinking oh we'll get married I'll pay off her debt

and you never found out that he or she was a princess to begin with and now you're fighting

the fact that they just keep spending and spending and spending it's like well you never got to

people go we've been married for three years and I guess we're talking about money now for the first time

“yeah like this is a huge problem talk about beforehand because those values are hard to align”

after your married yeah we say it all the time um religion is a big one um you want to know like what do you think like what what guides your life that's a big one um kids well how do you see warm and how many do you want yep how many do you want do you want um how do you view parenting roles and things like that money is a big one am I leaving anything out of family and family and loss gosh maybe today is world maybe politics I mean that's more if you think about most of the calls where

there's dysfunction they're around some of those things yeah absolutely I love it all right let's go

to Rose who's in Washington DC all right Rose you're on the line how can we help hi guys um okay so

“I recently purchased a very expensive home I rushed into it is an emotional process”

I didn't have the best um agent and I got a little bit of awful advice but also I should have been a little bit more patient and so putting away I'm in this expensive house that I can afford and um I am wondering if I do I kind of cut my losses and sell this house in two years stay in there for a little while why two years um the kind of I just moved in a few months ago it hasn't been a year, I haven't been a year, I haven't been a big month okay and I'm now discovering

that there is very expensive repair that you can done in the in the house that you just bought in the house that I just purchased tell us the numbers tell us what you paid for the house tell us

“what your mortgage is every month oh how's 750 okay my mortgage is 5200 and what's the mortgage balance”

750 I didn't put any money down I did I did I did I lied I'm sorry 712 oh you put the beer minimum down to the mortgage is 712 the more what I put I put about $56,000 down where's that money I have I have okay so part of it was just money that I see and then I took about $33,000 I borrowed 33 out of my retirement which I'm coming back right now okay but if you're telling me you put $60,000 down on a $750,000 house I'm expecting the mortgage to be less than 700,000

no well my mortgage in my mortgage is 50 too I'm talking about the full loan not the monthly payment the balance compared to what you paid for the house oh so sales price versus mortgage balance that's what we're talking about right right right I started with about 7 oh maybe it's a little under 7 a little under 7 got it as your mortgage balance okay what do you make every month what is your after tax monthly income so I'm averaging about 16,000 a month I am commission bank and it's

bill okay okay that's good so I don't make anything under 2025,000 a year so ideally you'd be making

20,000 a year for this to 20,000 a month sorry 20,000 a month thank you and again here's what I want

to check is this after tax only or are you doing after taxes after investing after health care premium yes when you get to that 16,000 number that you gave us um after taxes after insurance okay after the little bit of retirement that I'm putting away right now so if we add back in if we add back in your insurance premium if we add back in what you're putting aside for investing every month not quarterly but five months what will that turn that 16,000 into um probably about 18

right okay so now this is not nothing's on fire yes there were mistakes made your frustrate with yourself you rushed into it the agent was looking for a commission you didn't do your do Dylan's on inspection repairs let's put that in the past and just look toward the future and go what's the next step so do you have savings right now how much I have I have a pretty good like I have six months will be cause I'm in sale I was like that was my priority good so I have

six months worth of um of my mortgage saved up wow just of the mortgage okay so you got like 30

on a different bid so yes yes yes yes so I got anywhere between seven and a half to eight

“thousand right so you can go check today get the repairs done okay that's a pretty I mean”

I feel like you are real hard on yourself you have the money to pay for repairs yes the mortgage is a lot I'd like it I'd like to be slightly less your income slightly more but you don't have to rush into selling this thing off and I don't know that you need to sell it off if you like the house I I don't know and tell me if I'm wrong Rose my guess is this is the most expensive house you've

purchased this is the first time you've had a mortgage that's this high and you're like freaking out

because you're like this this doesn't feel right to have a mortgage that's five thousand but you're taking home almost 20 thousand a month like that's your that's your that's your pay and so ratio wise it's a fair amount if we're close to the 1819 that we think we are ratio wise is it's a totally fair amount I think you're just feeling like oh my gosh what if something changes in my situation

“what if my job is what if yes I think that's what you're feeling and if you are feeling that”

and you reevaluate in two years like you said and you're like you want to know what I would

feel more peace if I just downsize I think that that's a totally fair place to be

or just aggressively paid off over the next seven years yeah whether you're a small business owner or an individual doing your taxes is not fun it's like an algebra test where if you get anything wrong the IRS can make you pay with actual money but if you work with a Ramsey trusted tax pro you don't have to be a tax was because they are they know taxes like the back of their hand which makes filing super easy so work with a Ramsey trusted tax pro and get back to doing

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phone lines we go we've got Carson who's in Dallas Texas on the line next hey Dallas Georgia and I are here how can we help um so I am a freshman in college and my brother is a software engineer in favor but I'm actually from Arkansas but thousands of closest major cities but my brother is a software engineer in favor Arkansas and we we want to start a Christmas site installation business and was one y'all's opinion on it okay why Christmas lights um so this past summer

I pressure washed and I made a lot of I played football in college and I needed some money to save up to come down here and I pressure washed the summer and I made a lot more money than I was expecting to make and I really enjoyed it what'd you do with the money um save it nice how much you got in

“savings uh not much now I think I have like 1300 left okay so what happened to the rest of it um I mean”

I saw like books for school then traveling I was uh it's like four hours from home so when I actually do go home gas and then food every all of the living expenses okay so do you have any debt right now no I don't fantastic and so you want to start this business with your brother who's a software engineer how does that plane to the Christmas lights was he you gave him this idea and he was like I'm in we'll install these together so we wanted to start something for quite a while and we

researched a lot of different things and talked about a lot of different things and Christmas lights was something that came up because we were talking about pressure washings because I would go up there and visit with him in the summer and I would uh we talked about how much money I'm making it like what I'm doing yeah why not pressure washing what what made you land on Christmas? Yeah because it's it's not all like the business for pressure washing is a lot

it's down a lot in the winter time and so that's when Christmas lights are of the most from like so what it be both would you do one is it seasonal we do pressure washing on the other part of

because I mean I kind of have in mind what I'm thinking I have a couple of thoughts here why do

“it together why not one of you just say hey I'm why wouldn't you just say hey yeah I think I want to”

start opening up this business and it'd be cool if my brother wants to work with me or work for me on it for a while versus it's got to be a partnership with God to do this deal together like what's the benefit to you of linking up with him on this so I would have some of the lives I would stay with him and also he would also keep his job for as long as he can and depending on how much we scale the business is whether he's gonna just completely drop his job and come you do know

Christmas lights is like a one to two month gig so I wouldn't be dropping it full time job for a one month to two month situation what if you just started what if you just moved up there and you started up with the pressure pressure washing and you just said hey can I stay with you while I start seeing how many pressure washing clients I can get and you just make it your full time job that I'm gonna get as many pressure washing clients and I'm gonna just build slowly using

the cash that I have I'm gonna start with the pressure washer I have and once I get enough clients and I can save up a little bit more money you know and just go very very slowly and then as the pressure washing part starts to take off now you have cash flow now you can start saving

“up for whatever infrastructure you need to do their Christmas lights and I would largely be doing”

this on my own I wouldn't hitch my what is it hitch my wagon to someone else's cart is that right I would I wouldn't hitch myself up with someone else if I don't need to and I don't think you do I think partnerships make this get really muddy really quickly because what happens when he wants out because he's tired of it or would rather focus on software engineering or gets a promotion or moves yeah because it's two people you have to pay him out so that's the part where you really need to look at

forming a partnership agreement if you're gonna do this so you're both on the same page with all the what ifs and then what must be true to start this business how much is it um we're looking into it to start it it would only be around like four to five thousand okay where is that money gonna come from he has he has money saved up he has like he has that money but after that so now how does this work he put in all the money and you didn't Carson I got it right I got to be honest with you I feel

and I I'm not trying to point a finger but I feel like you're kind of leaning on him for your deal you're like I got to I got to move up there where he lives I got to move into the house with him so

I have a place to live he's got the money to do this so it kind of feels like hold on a second just

kind of feels like you're too leaned on him for something you're trying to do with your own life and he he's got a job you software software engineer yeah sounds like he's doing fine he's gonna have to leave his thing to do does that make sense I just don't feel like this is set up the foundation of this doesn't feel set up in a fairer sense and I feel like you're too leaned on what he can do for you versus you going out and doing something for yourself is that fair enough

yeah on the same way you're getting too but where I am right now I am in a town of 2000 people and the closest place is pine blocks which is an hour and a half away okay and there's 30 people there so why are you out there? What are you studying? I'm studying finance and I play football down here and the reason I can is because I get a large amount of school paid for it okay so I think then let's let's tackle one thing at a time if you're there to go to school go to school like

“play your sport do that thing pressure washing is not going anywhere if you want to do some”

side hustles like that but I wouldn't go just starting a business willy nilly I would just make it a side hustle try out a few people's Christmas lights if you want this winter get a feel for it and then if you love it and the margins are there and you're like I could scale this thing do it with your own cash before you bring brother into it as the sort of finance year yeah I agree it's just going to get met we've seen it get messy too often and make sure you do it properly

if you're going to do it you need to form an LLC you need general liability insurance because you're up on ladders your messing with people's gutters on houses you need to make sure you're protected yeah absolutely and I tend to say I'm sure there's plenty of partnerships out there that

are doing just fine honestly if you can just do this on your own it's your first business do it on

your terms that way everything is operating according to your values you're not have because what if

debt and now you guys do you see what I'm saying everything has to go through each other so

“and it's well Carson's doing all the work brothers not getting on the roof he just wants to”

be part of the business it's so now it's like well I'm putting in all the hours and you're just

doing some accounting on the back end or whatever it is it's going to feel unfair at some point

rarely does it feel like we're both putting in 50 50 yes generally each partner thinks they're pulling the others weight that's a very good point and that's where it gets messy and resentment bubbles but it sounded like a great idea a promise like this will be fun it's way for us to bond I'd rather you bond over going golfing or something absolutely cleanliness is what we're after a nice clean plan well let me go back and read the scripture in quote of the day because I opened up

our forge or without doing people are wondering I know I broke the I broke the chain here I hope there's no bad luck or something in that that's fine god god is a gracious god he's a gracious god as a matter of fact Psalm 1832 says it is god who arms me with strength and keeps my way secure

“and spite of the fact that I did this incorrectly and then Sarah Blakely said I think failure is”

nothing more than life's way of nudging you that you are off course and so I have just been nudged that I did go off course you can humble it I have been I love it oh my goodness gracious all right George I love these quick questions from social they're just a quick way to say something you know just a little shout out what's the recommended dollar amount percentage of take home pay that you can budget for fun money after you complete baby step three oh I'd make it reasonable I'd be in a

agreement with my spouse and you know you know you know you get a thousand dollars out of your

“$3,000 take home pay that's bad yeah it's not a percentage it's a vibe exactly all right guys remember”

there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace

Christ Jesus.