You Can’t Heal Your Finances Without Changing Your Habits

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start budgeting for free today. [MUSIC] >> Normal is broken, common sense is weird, so we're here to help you transform your life and your money from the Ramsey Network in the Fairwins Credit Union Studio.

This is the Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Warshaw and next to me for a change. >> Kenneth, that guy Coleman. >> Sorry, I'll be delivering UPS packages later today. I've got the full outfit on today.

People are a little bit shocked by the monochromatic. >> Oh, I see what you got going. That's the Doug Heffronin.

>> The audience can't see, but I have matching pants with the shirt.

It's throwing people off, Kelly. I don't know why, but it is. So I'm gonna moonlight tonight and drop some packages off.

“>> I think we'll survive if you got any packages.”

Let me know, I'll drive them out. >> You know. >> The white sneakers and everything. >> Okay, full you can decide it. We're ready to go today.

>> Yeah, let's do it. Let's get into the phone lines. We've got Whitney, who's in Nashville, Tennessee, right down the street. What's up, Whitney?

>> Hi, thanks for taking my call.

>> Yeah, you bet. How can we help? >> So I'm trying to figure out how to protect my finances. We've, my husband, I've done Dave Ramsey on and off the program. And due to addiction, there has been just changes.

And so it's, it's separation is what is about to happen. >> Oh man, I'm trying to figure out how to protect finances. >> Okay, sorry. And let's, since we're separating them, I'm sorry that this is happening. Let's look at it individually.

Tell me about how much money you make. Tell me about that side because when you say you're separating finances, is he moving out as well? >> We don't really know. >> Okay, I'm hoping a program to get help kind of thing, but I don't know.

>> Okay, so then, for now, what I want to ask is, you're separating the money, but is he going to give you portions of his paycheck to help pay the home bills? >> So, if this happened, we wouldn't be able to, I mean, I'll see keeping the home, just because of the finances. >> Okay.

>> Okay, I was, I've been to stay at home mom, but I recently started bringing it in two thousand a month, just a supplement, and then he makes 65 a year, which depending on his circumstances, I don't know if that's going to change. >> Okay, so let's talk about how the separation of money goes. So, you're making 2,000 a month, yes.

>> Okay, and then, tell me, list out like what the monthly bills look like, what's your mortgage every month, tell me some of the big ticket things, do you have car payments? >> No, we're really financially good, we're, we were in the things that's further on, but we have a mortgage that's there, and it's 900, 959 a month, I believe. >> Okay, that's really good, and that's the only debt to speak of, yes.

>> Okay, so tell me what you're, tell me what you need from us today. >> Okay, I guess, like, before this has happened, and we had debt due to just not know, he took out credit card and alone, but I didn't know about due to fulfilling his addiction. So, I'm just in a state of being worried that this is about to happen again, and so, I don't know what to do, because I don't make enough, I mean, I've been to stay at home

and, like, separating just feels almost impossible, okay, I see, so you're thinking, >> Let's go back a step, because you seem uncertain, I mean, is the separation going to happen or not?

“It feels like there's an asterisk, and I think we can walk through maybe what you should do,”

but I don't know that you know that the separation is absolutely for a certain, am I hearing this, right? >> I mean, yeah, because I want to believe the best, and I'm hoping, but I've had many mentors and counselors, and I just feel like -- >> What are they telling you? >> I'll tell you the same things.

>> What are they telling you? >> What are they telling you? >> That the patterns and the girls coming back and they're there. >> Okay, are you certain that, as of right now, there is no debt that he's not accumulated some debt outside of what you know?

>> As far as I know, I have the credit karma, and it hasn't been anything on there. >> Okay, so your name right now is clean, except for it is on the mortgage. There's only thing your name is on that is debt related is your mortgage true false. >> Yeah, and have you frozen your credit? >> No, I've heard about that.

>> That's so cool.

“>> Yeah, you need to do that immediately to make sure that he can't pull out any debt and have”

you as a sign around it and forge that. >> Do you have family, close friends that are near you, that if you had to get out,

and you had a place to kind of land for a bit.

>> Do you have that? >> Yes. >> And what are they? Family or are they just close friends? What are we talking about?

>> Yes, my family lives nearby, my mom and my dad both over nearby. >> Okay, are they aware of your situation?

“>> Well, honestly, we separated for ten months before due to this.”

And I guess I headed back in too soon. I thought I thought it was better. >> No, but I'm just saying, are they aware of where you are today? >> No, I'm 100% going to take this, I don't hate. >> I understand, but you call it, so I'm not tackling the money yet.

I'm kind of coming at it really quick to say what I would do if I were you. You called and asked us, I would call both of your parents today and tell them that you're

planning to separate and you need a place to land.

Because you've got to have some stability where the $2,000 a month is going to take care of some basics. >> That's right. >> You're not having to worry about utilities, you're not having to worry about a mortgage or rent if you're staying with mom or dad.

So that's step one. That gives you some sense of relief because you're a head and harder already on fire. Because you want this to still work and I hear that in your voice. So I'm trying to get you to a place where we eliminate as much fire as we can. And by going to mom or dad and saying, I don't have a timeline, they're not going to

be kicking you out. They understand where you're at and you are moving forward as though husband is not going to fix his life. You've got to have that stability. Then the next step would be to go get some full time employment.

“Because you have to act as though your husband's not going to get well.”

We want him to get well. We pray that he gets well. We hope he does counseling with you. But you have called and it felt like when this call started that you were ready to cut bait.

And so now we need to act as though that's the move and we hope and pray that things get healed. But I think I'm trying to just get a super tactical as I can on what I think your next moves are. And Jade called it out.

First move is freeze credit.

Second move is call mom and dad and find the best place to stay. What are your thoughts? I think that you're right on. I would agree with that. It sounded like the only reason that you haven't exited this circumstances because you didn't

feel the confidence to do that. I didn't seem like it was a question on whether it was the right move or not. It just felt like it was a question on whether you could sustain yourself or not. Is that true? I mean, morally is definitely a struggle.

I'm a Christian. I just don't divorce is not, you know, we're talking about divorce. We're just talking about getting to a safe place. And that's fair. You've got children.

Yes. We do. We have two small children. That's real. It takes nowhere.

Everything. Yeah. So they're leading them. And it's, you can't look at it like that.

“You have to think of it as getting to a place of safety because you're in a unsafe environment.”

Right now, if you're worried about someone's being addiction to the extent that you possibly can't pay your bills. And honestly, that you're calling into a YouTube show or radio show to get help, that lets me know that you're really in dire straits here. And so for that reason, I would do exactly what Ken said.

I would talk with the family. I would freeze your credit today and the best thing that you can do for yourself is to get an at-place of independence where that's getting full-time job, full-time income coming in and feeling really confident that if the time, if the time comes, where you need to live on your own with these children that you'll be able to do that.

Plus, back at the end, we're helped. Hey guys, George here. Listen, 99 times out of 100, when people say, "I don't know where my money goes." It's not a math problem. It's a behavior problem.

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we help today? Hi, I'm super excited.

“I was calling because I think my husband should sell his early and keep him not”

want to.

Oh, I just wanted to go over the numbers with you guys and live in.

Is he, by the way, before you tell Jade and I the numbers, is he anywhere nearby? He's not. But I asked him to call you guys yesterday after I showed him the number, and he said, I'm not doing that. But he wouldn't say it.

That's the sound. So I hope he hears this. That's the sound. He hears the sound. He's like, okay.

Okay. That's why I'm calling you. Okay. Go for it. So, together, we have $39,000 in debt.

We currently do everything separately.

I've brought it to his attention since I started listening in February that I want us to work to unify that. But we have some things to overcome. We started counseling. Good.

That's awesome. But, thank you, so his debt is 22,650. His two credit, one credit card is 1350, one is 2300, a personal loan of 6,000, and then his bike is 13. He has told me that his bike is worth around 10, but he has an extra vehicle worth 5.

So he would have $2,000 left over that he could close towards other debt and finish saving the $1,000 market design. Okay. Tell us about your situation. Tell us about your side.

So, you laid out his $20,000 of debt in what he could do.

Tell us a little bit more about your side. So, I started listening to guys in February and I'm like, I'm going to get development

“and I have, and that's why I mean, I've been super blessed, I've gotten my tax refund.”

So, I paid off in the last two weeks $5,133 in debt. Okay. I am down. How much of that was the refund? 90% and then I got a bonus that I threw towards my last credit card.

Okay. Great. So, what's your total debt left at this point? That's for you. My total is $16,698.89.

Okay. Cool. And what's it broken down, what type of debt is it? I have, we had to get our house five drafts a lot of loans for that, and then we did last year.

How much is that? I'm not going to loan. It is $7,762. Okay. And then a personal loan, how much is that?

It is $64,000. Okay. And then what else? And then some medical debt, and I don't say I've gotten the bills, but I didn't have the money to pay them.

So, I don't know what the amount is, and I did a rough guess of what I looked at, and I'm losing. Thinking around $2500. Oh, $2500. Okay.

Where's the other $2500? $2500. Okay. Where's the other $2500? We're two or $3,000.

That's all I've got. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, you're thinking, even though you guys are separate, even though your money

right now is separate, and you guys are working to get it together, you're kind of still like, let's act as though our money is together, and I still have opinions on what you can do. How does he feel about that? Because it could be a move point.

If you're saying I want to combine the money, and he's saying I'm not ready to combine the money, and then you're saying, and by the way, sell your motorcycle, it may not be

“the best way to get him over to your side if that makes sense.”

I agree with you, by the way, like let that be known, I agree, sell the motorcycle, do this thing together. All that's right. However, I don't want to attempt to level jump on where you guys are in your relationship, and I certainly wouldn't want you to make a very delicate situation, even more fragile

by going, sell your motorcycle, you know? So he has a side job, which he does when he's getting on the side, so he's going to start that, and like the next couple of weeks, and so his thought is he's just going to take all the side money and throw it at that, and we kind of calculated that, and that would leave him around like 9,000 versus just like 80, 300, and like one quick swoop, but the truth

you and I both know that.

Right. Okay. Yes. It's not his primary, it's not his primary. I'm sorry, I jumped it.

No.

“Is that his primary, is that his primary mode of transportation the Harley?”

No. In fact, it's not even at our house for storage for the winter. What's his name? He's name is Jonathan. Your wife says you're going to watch the show, and I've been listening, and I only have

one thing to say, you got to sell the hog, or at least explain to us why not. No.

But I'm just saying that we can understand it.

No. He has to sell it. It's my position. Do you want, you don't want to have to save up to buy anyone, because we're going into summer, and he wants to be able to write it.

There's a lot of things that I want to do. There's a lot of things that I want to do that I still cannot afford to do. And that is why. I want to hold him like it's a one season, it's just one season. I just don't think you guys are on the same page, and I don't even think you're close.

I agree with that.

“And I think as long as that's the case, this is not really the issue.”

The bike is just not the issue. I mean, we can keep talking about a kid's right. He needs to sell it. You're right. He needs to sell it.

I'm right. He needs to sell it. But he doesn't see it that way. Chasing our tails on this until you guys get to the deeper reason, which is number one, how do we get on the same page on what our goals are?

Because if we both have the same goals and we both know the reason why, then we can both attack that with the same intensity. So there's something behind this that it's in at least in his mind. This is more your thing than it is his thing, and he's just kind of going along with your thing.

And I think that as long as he knows it that way, it's easy for him to go, yeah, I'll do this, but I'm not going to do that, right? Yeah. So there's more conversations that need to be had. If you really want to solve this, sorry, no, no, no, go ahead.

Yeah, we have a lot of other issues when I started listening to the show, they said something once. And I'm like, now I come up with my finger on it, like we fundamentally just disagree. Yeah. I'm not a lot of things, and so, and I kind of took the pen out of the great grain and toss

it into the living room. I'm like, we have to get on the same page, or I don't know what's going to happen, but I cannot live. Yeah, we don't want to do that anymore, like we have to get on the same page. So can you agree to start counseling with two kind of one session?

We have our next one scheduled, so we're making the right steps, I think, but it's kind of like big question mark, like, are we going to get on the same page? Yeah, I mean, for what it's worth Jonathan, we think you need to sell the motorcycle. I mean, if he's listening, I definitely think that, but I don't see that happening right away, is what I'm telling you, Nicole, I don't see that happening right away, and you

can keep jumping on the mattress, but eventually the mattress is going to fall through the frame if you do it is what I think. So, Jonathan, if you are listening and watching and you really do want your marriage to work and you really are serious about what you're about to do in therapy, why don't you pay attention and bring it up yourself in the next session that your wife doesn't feel

“emotionally safe, financially, since you're watching, I'll tell you, and I think you should”

sell the Harley because of what it represents. Yeah, because he's essentially saying that his Harley Davidson is more important than his marriage and what his wife wants, why don't mind saying that, problem, because that's what I'd say to anybody, and I just think this is so important, and you nailed it.

The counseling, by the way, Jonathan, and Nicole, most important thing you guys can do,

and it's so amazing when you can sit down with somebody who's partial, excuse me, who's impartial, thank you, and we share our emotions about what we're feeling, because this is a money issue, but you just laid out for us, Nicole, that you guys are not on the same page on a variety of issues, and when our values aren't aligned, somebody's got to give, and it's my experience that both of you are going to have to give, at some point.

Yeah, I agree, I think that it's okay to do something out of good will towards your spouse. I agree. Even if you don't want to, you know what I'm saying like, yeah, there's another Harley down the road. Yes, yes.

Probably nicer. You do what we tell you to do. You know, scarcity mentality, he's like, I got it all onto this one, they don't. If debt collectors won't stop calling, and you feel like you're drowning, you don't

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We've got Esteban and Los Angeles, California.

Esteban, how can we help today? Hi, thanks for taking my call. I'm currently on long-term disability, and I'm going to lose it in June 4th, and it's about $6,000.

“I have my income, and I just want to know what the best way to tackle my debt and adjust”

to the situation that I don't work among the disability. So you're losing the long-term disability money. Are you for sure you're unable to do any type of work going forward? Yes, I've tried for several years, my conditions, the bipolar, schizophrenic, and like any level stress causing you to have episodes.

So it's an opinion of my doctor that I'm not working. Currently, I have my DA disability at 4300. I have my SSDI, between my daughter and myself. I bring in $5600. Okay.

And my wife gives me about $1500 to $1800.

Okay. Once a month. How much is the VA-1? The VA is $4300. So why in the world do you need more money?

That sounds like a nice monthly income. It's over 10. It is. Tell me more. I have $44,000 in consolidation loan and I have a $39,000 car loan that I just refinements

to go over the payment. Okay. I was writing something when you said the debt consolidation. How much is the debt consolidation? 44.

44,000. What's the car worth? The car is worth anywhere from 31 to 33,000. What's the also? I also have a $15,000 tax bill that I got to pay and I have 11,000 saved up in my checking

account. Okay. Good to know. What other debt do you have? That's it.

Well then my friend, where's your money going? That's what I need to know. You have plenty of income. You have plenty of income. You have 11,000 over 11,000 dollars a month and 11,000 saved.

I would not be trying to track down more disability checks.

“I would be saying, okay, with what I have, how can I optimize that?”

Because it's pretty, it's a good amount of money a month. So tell us more about your living conditions and who's living with you. What do you pay? What's my wife? It's my wife and my daughter.

Okay. She goes to daycare. We pay $1,600 a month for three days a week. Okay. Before you keep doing that, I need to go back to something because you said my wife gives

me $1,500. What does that mean? Is there more money there that we need to know about and why isn't it all pulled together? Well, she makes around $3,000 a month, but $1,600 goes to daycare and then the other checks she gets paid by weekly, she gives it to pay off my debt.

Understood. Okay. This is an interesting system. All right. To do from now on, it's just pull all that money together.

Just mentally, it's going to help you tackle this a little better. It's totally fine that $1,600 of that check goes towards daycare. I'm not saying any differently. But if you guys are thinking about that we're doing this together, it's not her giving you money to pay off your debt.

It's us working together to pay off our debt. I think that's going to just help you emotionally and help your marriage feel like it's

So that's one piece of kind of, that's one piece of advice here.

But let's look at this by the numbers. If I look at the 11,000 you have saved, what I'd be doing this weekend is I'd be posting that car for sale, private value. And then whatever you're able to sell it for, if you can sell it for $33 or $34,35 even, then I'd put the other 5,000 with it out of your savings so that you can get a clean title

on that and actually offload that vehicle. And then I take the other 5 or 6,000 left and I'd buy yourself a cash car because you're not going to work. So you definitely don't need a $39,000 vehicle, you know, sitting in the driveway, isn't fair enough?

Right. And that's there. So that would clear up a lot of almost half of your debt right away. And what's that car payment a month? 677.

Ooh yeah. Dude, that's a lot, yet's a huge raise. That's $7,200 plus a year back in your pocket. That's going to give you a lot later.

When we pause for a second and just, I want to know, are you hearing what we're saying

that we think you have more than enough money to pay this debt off? Do you agree with that or are you still cloudy on that? I'm just, I was just very used to when I was working, making very high income. And so earning less money, making nervous. Okay, but that's not what I asked you.

So you see what we see that you have plenty of income to pay down this debt. Yeah. Okay, this is a realization, I understand the fear and I totally understand it, but that's why I want you getting out of the fear game and looking at the real numbers. Okay.

“And if you sell this car, that's why I asked you what the monthly payment was.”

I wanted you to register that all of a sudden, if we sell that car in the next week to 10 days, we don't have a $670 car payment. That's even more margin. And are you spending a lot every month? Um, I just moved to a new apartment.

My apartment cost 3800. I used to spend a lot on gogas. 30, 100, hold a hold on, you have a $3,800 month rent? Yes. Where are you staying in a apartment complex in Monterey Park?

Okay, how could we beat that rental price? That feels pretty high to me. In other words, maybe not for that area, but you can rent somewhere for a lot cheaper true or false. True.

But you just signed a long-term lease, so now you're stuck.

Okay, here's what I'm pointing out.

You're going to have to adjust your lifestyle, my friend, and as you're getting healthy. You're dealing with something that is obviously very debilitating and who knows what your prognosis is. And so I understand that, but so what we need to be doing is adjusting our lifestyle. And the last thing I would have done if I were you was sign up for a place in Marina Del Rey,

one of the nicest areas in LA, and pay $3,800 for one person, especially when you're on a fixed income. Now here's the good news for you, is Jake pointed out, you have plenty of income, even though

“it's fixed, so you can still get out of this, but you have to adjust your lifestyle”

in the form of a budget. But that's what's going to allow you to overcome this fear, are the facts of the numbers. And we can sit here objectively and say, you got plenty of numbers to be able to solve this problem. And the calls we get, this amount of debt versus the income you have is very, very.

Yeah, so this is, this is the last two year, this is a classic two year deal. If you can put, I mean, I don't know how much your wife was willing or not willing to help with this, but I mean, obviously, if she was willing to take on some extra hours and you guys did this thing together, and if you said to yourself, okay, we, right now we're making $12,000 a month, can't, is there a world where we can put $5,000 a month on this

thing and what, what type of side hustle would it take to do that? Well, then now you're done in 12 months, you see, that's with you selling the car. And so that's the kind of mindset it's going to take is let's create a world where this happens in like 12 to 18 months and work backwards from there. So that's you putting somewhere anywhere between 35 and 5,000 a month on this.

And that's going to take you guys working on this together. Okay. Do you think there's a world where she says, yeah, we're tackling this together. It's not just me giving you $1,500 out of my paycheck to, quote, pay your debt. But this is our life and something that we're all tackling together.

Yes, I think she's on board. Okay.

“So I think that's where you guys need to get because freedom, I look at this, Esteban, I”

got to tell you, I look at this and I go, oh, yeah, no problem.

I don't know, you know, this one's going to be tight.

“But I look at your situation, Esteban, I go, oh, my gosh, this could be so much worse.”

Thank goodness, they have all this money coming in. Thank goodness, his wife is able to work. And thank goodness, because then my other thought is I don't know with the nature of your disability. But even the child care thing, the fact that she's able to get out and have actual income

coming in and maybe there's times when you're with the kids, I don't know. But that really does open her up to be able to put in more hours. If you guys buckle down on this and get on a beans and rice rice and beans budget, which by the way, will send you every dollar in order to do just that, you guys are going to be free in the next 12 months, 5,000 bucks a month, that is the goal and you can do it.

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All right. Cody is in Missouri. Hey, Cody. How can we help today? Hey, thanks so much for taking my call.

Thank you. My brother and I have, we have a pretty strange relationship and it's been going on for six years. Yes. Some explosive outrageous text threads you'll just send and recently he did this before

my birthday and then tried to send me a really nice about $4,500 gift for my birthday. And the family is saying, you know, this is Kim trying to make up for it and all this. And I don't know what to do with it.

Anytime he's given the gift in the past, it's always come back against me.

So I'm actually, I'd rather send it back, so I don't want it. Tell us about the other times where he's done that and what the repercussion was. What did it look like? Yeah. Yeah.

So I've been in the ministry before he supported our ministry before that's come back. And in ways of him through some really aggressive texts or calls of just saying, remember when I did this for you, I've always supported you. You've never there for me or gifts to my kids for their birthdays. That's been used against us and so this in more way that it's like an apology.

Okay, but let me ask this. What does he want in return?

“It's because of the first example, you know, I get what he's doing, but what does he want?”

And what has he asked for or implied that he wants as a result of supporting you or sending gifts. So he will get mad or he's quite a conspiracy theorist. So he will get mad when I don't agree with him on something. And these will be brought up along with, you know, anything else of areas where he supported

me. So my disagreement with him equals I don't support him on a conspiracy theorist. So he's not asking for anything. He's just no. He's just aggrieved that you don't see eye to eye with him on something.

And so he kind of guilt you into this. What he wants and give me a little attitude here, because I'm taking, he wants you to agree with him. That's what he wants. Yeah, he, he wants me to, okay, here's the attitude.

He wants me to say you're right, look at what you've learned and because in turn he said, I've supported your endeavors, please show me where I'm right. How old is he? He's 42.

or do you think there is a lack of diagnosis here?

“So that's a great question and my wife and I actually think he may, he may be bipolar.”

I was going to ask you. If you bring that to him, it's going to, it would go bad. I want more quick dig here. So on this last situation where you, all you started off with is you got this nasty text and then the nice gift.

What precipitated the nasty text? Okay, it was a series of when the Epstein files came out. Of course. Of him saying, look at how right I was and then it was to me and his wife was in a text search.

Actually ended up calling and saying, I'm so sorry that he's doing this. It was F off, you don't know, I mean, it was, okay, but, okay, okay, okay. So that's because you are playing this game with him and you are playing a game you cannot win. Mm-hmm.

Okay. Now what I'm going to say is, oh, we're brothers and we're going to have real honest back and forth on any topic. Could be football, could be politics, could be religion, whatever. And here's my advice because I have someone in my family that this could happen like this.

Not quite as intense, but shades of it. And so I want to address this tactically and then wait and we can weigh in on the gift thing, what you're going to have to do is realize that you can't fix him and there's no way you can win this crazy game he's created. So you, so you know what you do, you don't play the game.

When he fires off that text about the Epstein stuff and how right he was, instead of, you have to betray your integrity and what you think, instead of engaging with a, well, I don't know, or whatever, just go crazy, isn't it? Wow, fascinating.

See can you're better than me because I would have just been, I never saw the text.

I never saw it. Again, and that's a tactic, but I do think he's unwell and I think that all this guy cares about deep down is something of an approval from you, but he doesn't, but you don't

“have to agree with what he says, but I do think if you want to save this relationship”

and actually try to detangle it. And this is an approach that may or may not work, but I really think it could work. And I just think what you do is, you make him feel valued, but you don't have to agree with what he says. And you see what I'm saying, because you can't win.

So just, you know, don't disagree with him on anything. There's a way, by the way, to hear somebody and make them feel seen and heard without rubber stamping what they say. I have a master's degree in this, with someone in my fans. Is that what you've been doing with me all this time?

100%.

See what I just did there.

So now on the gift thing, you know what, man, if you want to sell the gift or give it to somebody, because it has such a stain to it, I want you to hear me say, I get that. You won't win for losing with that, though. But don't return it, because that's going to create more of a hornets next. You're going to have to take the high road, and I'm going to give you one of the piece

of advice that somebody gave me recently. It was about parenting. And I think actually this is going to help you with your brother.

“And this is what my friend said, he said, you have to be the doc, not the boat.”

And your brother is going to do speed of boat, whatever the waves are doing at the doc. He's just bouncing up and down with whatever's going on in the news. And somehow he secretly got this weird, perverted sense of, I need approval from my brother. And he tweaks. And he tries to throw things at you that he knows you're not going to agree with, because

it's some type of weird game. And you got to be the doc. Or you are planted in the ground. And so you don't play the game, don't take the bait. And is it okay?

It's on the gift. I will, I will get, I'll just give it away to someone and with a clear conscience. And it comes to engaging. I feel like I've tried, tried, changed approach of not responding. I've tried the, I've tried arguing years ago, that doesn't go anywhere.

Definitely don't do that. Did you try my approach? You know, I have, and it comes off to him, the story he tells himself is that I'm being demeaning or sarcastic. And I'm truly not, if I say, I'll tell me more, man, thanks for reaching out, those sort

of things. They just, well, then, just feel like, well, then you've got mental illness. Yeah. Well, then you've got to cut him off. Yeah.

Well, I, I was just not engaged, not, not engaging those texts when those texts come through that you not look to Ken's point. You know, it's the bait. Just don't engage. Just don't, and he probably will fire off more and more and more and more and more, and

pretty soon. I think it'll, he'll learn to go, oh, he doesn't respond to these texts.

he doesn't write back and he'll probably get mad and send a text passing you out.

How often do you see him in person?

“You know, it's, we've actually canceled the trip because one of his outrageous text rights”

and stuff with that dangerous. And so I see him maybe once or twice a year, and even then there's a sense of, you have the dangers. The relationship's fading, yeah. Does he act this way in person?

Or is it just all this bravery via text? It's this bravery via text. That tells me a lot. That's very interesting. Because he wouldn't, he doesn't even act that way too in person.

No. No. Huh. Oh, then I'd call his bluff. That tells me a little bit.

I'd put him in his place. And I mean, how would you do that? Face to face. Yeah. And I'm not talking, I'm not talking like, don't confront, like in it.

I'm not talking fist to cuffs. I'm saying, look him right in the eye and call his stuff out and go, you try to bully me and manipulate me via text. If you print these off and had somebody objective read these, they tell you how nuts this is.

Just stop or let's hash it out right now. Let's get the whole family around in the living room and let's hash it out. Let's get it done today. Garen D runs like a scalded dog. I might.

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Identity theft is everywhere. Zander is how you fight back, zander.com. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fairwins Credit Union Studio. We are taking calls about your life and money, and we have Kendra from Minneapolis, Minnesota on the line.

Hey Kendra, how can Ken and I help you today? Hello, thank you for taking the call. Absolutely.

I have a quick question about debt collection, so I've never been in this situation before,

but I just found out through my mortgage lender, actually, that I had something in debt collection. And I'm wondering, books sort of like legal actions like a take, or if I have to pay for it myself, are you contending that it's not your debt, or do you know that it's your debt?

I don't, I believe it's not mine. It's from, as far as I'm aware, it's from 2023, I'm going to partner and I lived it back in, in 2017, it was two weeks, and I had signed everything over to them and that's the situation a decade ago, and I thought they were paying for it, and then I found it out just last month that I owe $500, it's not too much, but that means you're

at the piece where it was your name somewhere on the lease that you just didn't know about it. I mean, you had to assign something, I'm guessing, if you were roommate there. Yeah. It was Internet and it was on my roommates name, I would pay her by check, everyone's interested

for it. Okay. Well, they're coming after you, interesting, I mean, how long ago was that, did you say? So, I lived there in 2016, 2017?

“And at no point where you were ever, at no point was it, was it ever under your name?”

No, I didn't. I haven't been contacted about it at all in the last decade. I mean, you could dispute it, I mean, yeah, you could dispute it with the credit bureaus and say, like, this account doesn't belong to me or, you know, whatever the thing is and file that dispute, you can do that online and see how it comes back.

But honestly, it's $500 and you're getting ready to buy a house.

I don't, I mean, you get to decide what's easier for you, but can I hate burning the mental calories? I agree. On stuff like that, it's $500 if you have the money and it's keeping you from getting your mortgage going through.

So I would just pay it and be done. Okay. I do, currently I'm paying for school at a pocket, as well as I've had some sort of a medical issue. So I'm paying for that, out of the topic, too.

I have the money. I could pay for it on this kind of tight right now. Okay, let me ask you this.

Let's get creative for a second.

By the way, I agree with Jade, get this out of your life and even if we're to make life a really tight for a bit, you're just going to feel better. However, I do think there's another tactic. Do you have stuff, how much stuff do you have? I haven't done three, four, two, three, two.

No, no. I'm asking how much stuff you could sell. I mean, you can sell stuff. My wife is the queen of selling our kids, older clothing, stuff we got around the house.

“I'm saying, how much stuff, general word here, do you have that could equal to $500?”

And honestly, not even $500, you could price settle it for $250. Well, there you go. Now, it's even better. Now, do you have some stuff you could sell? Andrew?

I could. Yeah, like what? Give me two or three items. Let's walk through this real quick. Let's go.

What do we got? Nice. Well, I've got an extra TV, like a probably sell. Bingo. Okay, what else?

I've got an extra, okay, a few game consoles.

Love it. Great. Let's go. A pair to 50 at least. Come on, that's it.

Now, how does that feel as opposed to where we just were 30 seconds ago? Yeah, that feels a lot better just to be out of my mind. Go sell something, go sell a few somethings tonight and tomorrow and get $500 cash and be done with it. That's what I'm doing.

It's not worth it. You can track it down. You can file the claim. You can do all these things. But at the end of the day, depending on how much money it is and what piece of your world

financially it truly is, at many times, I'm just like, settle it, get it out of your ear. Mental calories. You see it. It's so well.

When I start thinking about that, that's like my only goal in life right now is to burn mental calories. I know that's right. Like, no. I'm actually to not burn them.

Like, I want to go burn mental calories. Yes, make life simple, give me a piece of calories. It's tough enough.

“What's the craziest thing you've sold to get money?”

Wow.

I wish Stacy were on the line right now because she's always been the lead dog on this.

But I would say we sold, I wouldn't say it's crazy, but I remember when the kids got out of the double bot. We had a double bot because you know our kids that we had three within three years. I had double bob. Did you remember that?

So a huge stroller had the big wheels, it could, you could, you could like, you could climb a mountain. That's the stroller. It's okay. It's okay.

It's called a bob. Got it. We had a double. Because you know Jason Jocelyn or seven months ago. Yeah, yeah.

Well, and then we had to want the exact same one, but a single for time. All that said, one day we realized we don't need these anymore and they were in high demand. Because we took care of them, we didn't have for very long, and we sold all three of those. And the reason I'm saying that is because we made a real nice chunk of change. I bet that's.

I don't remember what it was, but it was also very emotional. We didn't realize that. We had to sell your strollers. That is big. I still have mine up in the attic.

I don't know if I have a crazy story, but we've sold just about everything. I stole those huge bath mats. Sure.

“And someone bought them on Facebook Marketplace.”

For how much? $5. But see $5 dollars. But I'm just saying, it's five dollars. It's five dollars.

It's five dollars. It's five dollars. Right. Use bath mats, people. People you've heard, if some of you have not heard Dave Ramesy say this, we're saying it for decades.

But he's to say something effective and you'll help me out because you're better at this than I am. Sell so much stuff. The kids think they're next. That's exactly exactly.

Yep. And by the way, he was on to something then. And that's all we're saying. He was on to something then. He's on to something now.

Sell so much stuff. The kids think they're next. Quote Dave Ramesy. All right, we got Kurt in Georgia. Kurt.

We're right up against the club, but we can help you out. How can we help today? Yeah, thank you for having me on. Just calling in. So, meanwhile, I've been listening to the podcast, Dave Ramesy, and we've got a car payment.

We're not sure if we should keep or do something with. What do you owe on the car? What's it in? What's it worth? It's 2007.

You can 17. You can't deny it, we owe around 31 or 32,000. It's like it's worth around 17 to 22,000. Yikes. Is that private sale?

No, that's who bought them a dealer. No, no, no, if you were to sell it private sale, is that the private sale value or is that you trading it into a dealership? Just on, just on marketplace, that's just what we're going for. Okay.

I would check that on Kelly Bluebook and just see what it would go for private sale. And I also want to know, is this your only debt or how much other debt do you have?

Okay, well, home is off to the side and land probably is going along with it.

“If this is your only debt, what do you guys make every year?”

What do you bring home every month? Um, somewhere around five to six thousand a month, probably. I mean, what you could do, if you're really trying to offload this, you could say, hey, we're just going to go down to the credit union, and we're going to get a loan, a $10,000 loan for the difference, and we're going to pay that thing off aggressively.

We'd rather pay off $10,000, $32,000, and while you're at it, maybe you get the loan for $5,000 more, so you can get a better cash car with the $5,000, and now you're paying off $15,000 from the bank instead of $32,000 from wherever you bought this $2,000,000 vehicle from. Does that make sense?

Actually, actually, it does, but well, we're actually been in this for, we bought it 2022. Um, and it's at 13.75% so we've already been in this for a few years now, so yeah. Um, we just did not know, we just didn't know if it was, um, it's not something we can't pay for, it's just something that we don't know if it's usable, or it just even makes sense to pay for it.

“Well, that's what I'm saying, you call it.”

You call then asking, should we sell it, and I'm saying, you can, and I'd rather pay off a $15,000 debt than a $32,000 debt, if you'd like to pay it and keep it and you can pay it off in the next year or so, sure that's fine.

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Regina, you're on the line. Can we help? Hi, how's everyone doing? Thanks for taking my call. Sure.

I got myself in a bit of a conundrum and I was hoping for some perspective. Just a little context, I'm 44, single and holding down 3 jobs, 1 of which I don't get paid for.

Whoa, top stop, stop, stop, stop, come first.

So by the way, you started this call.

“I'm fairly certain you don't have time for a volunteer job and that's what you just”

described. So what in the world are you doing with that one? I've been a caretaker for as long as I can remember and I'm caring for my auntie. Okay, well, that's different, now I feel like a big jerk. But that's not the way you said you said a third job where you're not getting paid.

So now I got a backtrack everything. That's not. No, it's okay. I'm trying to help American know that I'm not heartless about your aunt. That's all.

Okay. So keep going.

So basically I've been caring for her and I was getting paid by the state, but I'm

no longer getting paid by the state for caring for her. Okay. Me and my mother purchased house in 2002 and we only have 2 and 1/2 more years to pay on it. She pays the mortgage, I pay all the utilities. I issue that I'm struggling with right now is I am $30,000 in debt.

7 grand of that is a student loan that I'm not even touching. I haven't paid anything and it's a killing interest every single day. And we literally have no food budget.

So I know. So how are you eating? How are you eating?

“Well, we have beans and rice like they've always cooked.”

And I've been getting some assistance from the state, however, that's going to stop when they find out I have this other job. So that's going to stop pretty soon because I have to report this new job that I have. Right. And that's where I want to camp out because you're either below the poverty line to where

you do need government assistance for things like food and what have you. Or you're earning through that and you are no longer eligible, which means there should be money for things like food and what not and what have you. So help me understand how much you're earning from the two jobs that you're currently working.

I get about $1,000 in $50 a month. What's the nature of these jobs, Richie? I'm currently with a janitorial company I cleaned for some attorneys. How many hours a week? 25 hours a week.

Regina. Yeah. It's not a job. It's not a full-time job. No.

I want to make sure we understand. You're saying with both of these part-time jobs, you're making $1,000 a month. Yes. Okay. And if 15, I get $15 an hour at each job.

So and then the majority of the time I'm running from appointment to appointment with my auntie. Now here's my question, me being 30k in debt.

“I have contacted my creditors and I have gotten, so what's it called?”

It's a hard, hard chip management.

Here's what I want to stop.

We got to stop and talk about it and what's going to actually help you move forward today. And it has to all change today because at 44, if you keep going down this route, you're going to end up in a place. You're going to hit a point of no return where it's going to be very, very hard.

Do you see what I'm saying? So here's what we need. It's going to help you with this, but we've got to find work today that's paying a little more than $15 an hour and we've got to be able to put dedicate full-time effort to it. You've got to be able to work and it's not, you being a bad person, it's not you being

mean or anything like that, but you've got to be able to sustain yourself and you simply cannot on a thousand dollars a month. Something that you have in your favor is you're living in a house where it sounds like you're not having to pay rent, you're simply having to pay utilities, which is helpful for you in this season, but we got to get you somewhere where you're making an income.

Okay, here's what I don't understand.

You've got, you said you've got two jobs and you're making 15 an hour for both of them. Did I hear that correctly? That's correct. But you're not working 40 hours a week. It's working 23.

Right? And you're 25 at each of 25 hours a week at each job. Okay, well that's 50 hours.

“You should be bringing home way more than a thousand dollars a month.”

I have you, okay, what are you paying, what are you paying, what are you paying in taxes? Right now, I have to pay in on taxes, I've been paying in for the past five years. What how much? $89 this year, and I get 82 back from said, and then something's not adding up. Okay, should be making at least 3,000 bucks a month, if 50 hours a week times 15, okay?

I'm just doing simple math here, okay? That's 750 a week times four, equals 3,000 gross. There's no way at that income level that you're getting $2,000 a month of taxes take an out. Yeah, it's a lot.

So something's not right, that's where I'm really struggling. Can you explain that? Maybe my neck. Hence me having these lower page jobs, but I have to have every dollar app and I've been trying

to stay on top of it, but obviously I always go negative.

So I do need some help. Here's the challenge, here's what we're going to do, we're going to put you on hold and Katie's going to get you connected at our gift to a financial coach, because we quite frankly, in the remaining three minutes we have or two minutes, we cannot help you, but high level, I will tell you that you don't have a grasp of your numbers, and it's impossible

if you're working 50 hours a week, and I don't know how you're working 50 hours a week, if you're running on to you around a lot. So something is off, and here's the really sad part, it's actually coming full circle. Someone else is going to have to take care of your aunt. And so I don't even think, and I'm trying to be as kind as I can, but I think your

numbers are off on the hours you're working too. I think so. So I don't know how you're running in these appointments and working 50 hours a week. I just don't see it, so something's off, and you need a coach, and we're going to give it to you as our gift, who's going to walk you through what your next steps are, but you

need urgency. I want to give it back to Jay, because she was going down this lane here. This got a change today, or else she's going to wake up and be 64 and homeless. Yeah, that's that's serious. It is that serious, and I'm not saying that to be hopeless.

I'm doing it so that you can take advantage of the now.

There is always a greater measure of peace that people can get from doing the baby steps.

“But the truth is, there are prime times to get started.”

And there are optimal times to start to where you can get the fullness of the value that the baby steps have to offer, which is what we teach here. And so in this situation, yes, the time to start is now for Regina or anybody. Somebody who's listening out there, because compound interest is your friend, and wealth building is part of this, and having the time, time can, to save money, and pay off debt,

and make those differences, the less time you have, the tougher it can be. And for Regina and anybody else listening, who's in a similar situation, it's not too late, but you got to start today. And just a reminder, when we're talking to folks, it's actually very simple the equation that we're thinking about.

If you want to affect your finances, there's really only two things that you can consider. You have to think about the money going out in the money going in. That's it. So we're either looking at what we spend and saying, hey, I got pulled back on what I spend. That's not her issue, or we're looking at income.

There is no magical solve for income other than you going out and getting a J.O.B. And working hours that actually translate into real cash that is enough in your account to do the basic things of human life there. This show is sponsored by Better Health.

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Ken, I know you don't file your own taxes. No, are you kidding me? I'm a free man. I'd be in jail if I did not out of dishonesty, but just incompetence. That's the same.

So I have a pro. Tax pro all the way. Love my guy.

Love it.

“By the way, I got to give him shout-out.”

David. He knows who he is. That's it? You're not working. I can be found.

Oh, he listens to the show.

So he's going to hear this. He's just doing it for him not to help the people find someone they want. No, I wanted to get a tax pro, but I'm also very grateful for my guy, David, and he knows that. That's a shout-out.

All right, I'm going to give a shout-out to mine. Nina. There it is. Book. I can't say more.

All right. Carrie. Carrie isn't Florida. What's up, Carrie? Save us from ourselves.

I cannot do that. That is a true statement. All right, I'm in talk for it. My name's Carrie. I'm 30 years old.

My partner is 39 years old.

We have two children, six and ten.

Our house is sitting out one ninety-six on a 2.875 loan. I was in nursing school, graduated, and tried to pay for a lot of it out of pocket, so that drained my savings account. Um, ran out of money. I took out two, zero percent interest for the tuition.

I paid those both off, but I had to take out student loans as well. Half the wasn't paying for it. So I have $35,000 approximately right now in student loan debt, but I have way, way more in credit card debt. Three, seven.

I want to say. Oh gosh. Forty seven in credit card. And it gets a little worse. We had a really bad hurricane in twenty two.

A true one for our roof. We had to get the roof for a place. We had to do, um, yeah. A lot of new walls. Was it like $6,000?

$6,000? No. We had to take out a heel lock for 80, because the insurance company didn't want to pay us. Yeah.

Why didn't they pay? We had a hurricane and ended up paying $23,000. I think. It was a really long process, and it involved the public adjuster, and they took their percentage of whatever we got.

But it was like really turmoil in south of Florida.

“So our heel lock right now is sitting at $73,000, I think.”

The payments are roughly $800 a month. Our payments on minimum for the credit cards are just under 15. My mortgage comes out to about 14. And then I have a car payment. It's really crazy.

I know we shouldn't do this. I owe 16. I'm paying 25 a month. I do have. I am a bartender.

He is a mechanic. We make about 130 a year. That was Florida's very seasonal work, so summertime, it gets thinner for us. Winter is more lucrative. So our monthly income does fluctuate anywhere from like $6,000 to $10,000 a month.

So I'm a money funneler. I am a $100 bills in a box kind of person because I don't want to not have cash on hand.

There's always something happening.

How much cash do you have on hand? I have, right now I have $24,000 in cash, and then I have a separate savings account. That's supposed to be dedicated to my kids and they're 13 in there. What do you mean? Yeah, go ahead.

Good. What do you say, when do you mean when you say dedicated to your kids, is that like college fund? It every month I am looking to infect it in something that will grow for them, but I'm not sure what to do, how to do that yet.

Okay. This is great news. I mean, it's great news. I'm great because I am very anxious. I want to ask about the kids money that you have saved real quickly.

I just want to make sure this is money that you've put aside not money that other people gave you for the kids. Some of it is given, like I haven't heard of it. I have their birthday gifts, money separate, so they each probably collectively have $2,000 separate.

Okay. I just have for them. And then I have this other fund that we have put into, that's about 13. Okay. So what I would do is, what I would do is exactly what you said, any money that was gifted

to them or that they worked hard for or worked for. I would keep that money aside for them because it really is for them. For you, you're not at the phase where you can begin saving for things like kids college kids, kids, kids, kids, things like that. So for all intents and purposes, that money is now pulled in with money that we can put

towards paying off debt. Fair enough. I have this other, yes, I right now we're looking at, we're putting out about $89,000, $89 $9,000 a month between living. Okay.

So we were, we were, we were holding on, including these debt minimum payments. Yes, all my student loans, credit cards, the geolock, the mortgage, car insurance. Okay. What's your take on pay off the 1/30? Uh, it varies, it's going to be a little under one.

No, maybe a little over one after health insurance and everything gets taken out. We have really high health insurance rates here for some reason. Okay. What do you mean? This is go ahead, Ken.

Where were you going with telling us that? Uh-huh. You were going somewhere. I'm not sure that's where we need to go, but I'm curious. All right.

“So I have approximately, so what is that, about $40,000 a little more in savings?”

And I know this is going to fell crazy, but I, ideally, would like to rent my house out.

anymore.

“I want my house to be rented out for the next two years so that we can just lock in and”

funnel money into all of our savings.

How much would you make on that? Unwrenching it out in my area, so my house is about 14 right now. We can probably go anywhere for 18 to 2100. It's a four-bedroom house. It's not that much money, you know.

Yeah. What's your mortgage worth? What's it worth? You owe $196, did I hear it right? I owe $169 right now.

Once it reached the mortgage was like, I bought it in 19, it was... But what do you... It was $18. What's it worth? What's it worth?

Between $3 and $350. But the market, I don't know I haven't looked into it much. Okay. The fell. Tell me what you feel about the house, because I know you're tired of paying it.

I know it's been a pain in the butt. It feels like it's been a drain. Do you like the house? We like the house. We don't want to live here forever.

We want, like... Well, sure. Honestly, we want to cool. It was really good when we had my fund was born. It was really good, really open concept.

But I'm talking about today. I'm talking about today. No one knows if they're going to stay in the house forever. I want you to answer this in a Ken Coleman fashion, which is quick and simple. Like what's the first thing that comes to mind?

Do you like the house or not? I like the house. Okay. Do you want to stay in the house or not? I don't need to.

Okay. Now we're getting somewhere. What about your husband? If you could answer for him, what would he say? He is the most passive person in the entire world.

Okay.

Here's what I don't want.

I don't want you to make a simple thing complex. Making it complicated would be we're going to live with mom and do a rent thing and all these other things.

“I think that if we can go back to the basics here and go, okay.”

How much cash do we have? You have $40,000 in cash when we look at the 25 saved and the 15,000 of the, quote, "kid's money." That's now your money. I'm going back to for now that he locked because of the amount.

That's really just going to roll into your mortgage and be part of that. How many credit cards equal to 47,000 of credit cards debt? I have 11 overall for your paid off. Good heavens. Okay, so the $40,000 goes in the snowball.

Are you familiar with our debt snowball? Okay. So you take all those credit cards and you go smallest to largest and you start applying the $40,000 up the ladder if you will, right? If we've got a two.

I started with that method and then I could pay the car off because the minimums for the little ones don't equate to the same as the car, so the car, if I pay it's 16, maybe-- Well, you can do it your way, but that's not what we teach and we're trying to help you move momentum and so and then you can potentially sell the car. It's like, did you want to get out of this mess or not?

But the way we teach it is very simple. You call it us. You can do whatever you want to. But what we would tell you to do is take the $40,000 and you get 1,000 out of that in an emergency fund.

This baby step one, baby step two, when we now start taking that $39,000 if you will and we start applying it all the way through and then from there and I, I'm what Jade didn't say, this, I don't want to put words in her mouth. I would sell your house if I were you. Okay.

Now, I'm not as a, you know, get out of Dodge easy. You got to accept the mentality that you got yourself in this, but I would sell the house and I'd start fresh and start building a life that is debt-free.

It's definitely on the table to sell the house, but at the very least, first thing to go

is this car is $16,000, get that payment back in your pocket, then you have the cash to buy something in cash, $5 or $6,000, now you're 20 grand in, throw the rest of that towards the next smallest debt, which is to be student loans, do them one by one, you're going to feel the momentum of doing, you know, because they're likely broken to little chunks. So do that.

And before you know, all that's going to be left is this $47,000 of credit card debt. So, if you don't know, Ask Ramsay is our free AI tool that's built and trained on Ramsay proven principles and today we're going to break down the most asked questions of the week. So you can go in there and type in whatever questions and we kind of look at it and

“say what seems to be a theme for the week, and that's what we're talking about.”

There are questions around retirement, savings, obviously investing, but the most asked question this week was around the topic of emergency funds. The main question was this, what is the best option to manage and store my emergency fund? So here's an example of the response, your emergency fund should be liquid and easy to access in the event of a real emergency.

You want to store it in a place where value won't go down when you need it most.

Next it tells you a high yield savings account gives you better interest rates than

“a regular savings account, but still keeps your money safe and available.”

And then finally, make sure the account is FDIC ensured or NCUA if it's a credit union like FairWins.

We always recommend three to six months of living expenses, but ask Ramsay can help you

figure out exactly how much you need and your emergency fund for your specific situation. So you can go on there today to ask your question at RamsaySolutions.com or just click the link in the description if you're listening on podcast or YouTube. All right, Janette is in Kansas, Janette, how can we help today? Hi, thanks for taking my call.

I'm 61 years old, my husband is 70, we are completely deaf free, no, we own our home, cars, they're that long, so we have absolutely no debt, no credit card debt, also got out with Ramsay Plan probably 10 years ago. We are looking to build a permanent home, I know he doesn't like the terms forever home, but as we're getting older, real lives, we need everything on one level and just kind of

makes you a little bit nervous, it's like, is that a wise thing to do at our age? I mean, are you paying cash for it? On it would primarily be can we could pay complete cash if we took money out of our retirement plans, we could go into it debt-free, but I don't know if that's wise either, we would

have to pull out about 150 to 200.

Well, let's talk about it, so what would be the entire spend on the new house?

“6, 10, 6, 10, okay, and how much cash do you have to put towards that today?”

Well, we will sell our current home, we would get about just under 400, between 350 and 400 for that. We have put about 100 already into the house, which would leave a little bit over 100 left on it. Now I see how you got to the 110, so how much is your nest egg?

Um, close to 600. Okay, so the idea is will it, will it mess this up if we pull out the 150 from the 600 nest egg? Right. Um, I don't think so.

What's the other option? I mean, are you both still working or are you fully, fully at my worst?

My husband has retired Air Force after 20 years of active duty, and then he just recently

retired as a nurse from the VA. Okay. I am still working. I'm a nurse practitioner with my own practice. Nice, what are you, what are you guys taking home, combined with those benefits plus your

salary? Um, probably, well, the practice does over 200. I pulled about 90 from it. For a salary. Great.

Um, and then my, so together, we probably are close to 200 by 180. Okay. With no debt. I mean, with no debt. I mean, we travel a lot, so we know that's going to really change with, I mean, I

love to travel. I mean, if you wanted to cash flow this and you're both planning on still working for the next one to two years, I don't see why that wouldn't be really, really a priority. And then whatever's left, you could pull off the nest egg. Well, you were just talking about compound interest.

I would lose all that. No, no, I'm saying, I'm saying, I'm saying don't touch it. I'm saying don't touch it. I'm saying for the next one to two years, like go ahead and start with the 500 that you have.

And then for the next one to two years, let it be your, your deep intention that we're going to throw anything and extra that we can find on this $110,000 mortgage. And then when you're ready to stop working, that nest egg will have continued to grow for the next one to two years. And then you can say, okay, now we feel good about pulling out the 50 or whatever's left

on the mortgage. And we can go into our non-working years with no mortgage.

“Okay, I just seem like do you take out a mortgage at 60 years of age?”

Like, okay. Well, it's not about the age. I'm just going to do it, but I was just thought, is that why so it's not about the age because truthfully the money is there, but if you don't have to touch it today, why not? And you're both still working and you're still both making a really good income.

And I also have a feeling because of his military, how much is he going to, like, what's his retirement going to look like? Well, we don't know what his social security will be. He just turned 70. But he's already getting his two retirement checks for both of those other organizations.

Right. So my point is probably the VA retirement pension will start next month because he just turned 70. Okay. And how much will that be?

That one we don't know. We estimating according to the Social Security website, his Social Security will be about 3,400. And then his current military retirement is about 2,500. Right.

And then, so my point is, what you'll be pulling from your nest egg is not going to be a crazy sum of money just to keep your month to month going on, especially with such a low

Once you get to that point, you can just reach over into the nest egg and pull out the 50 or whatever it is and pull it and pay it off. Okay. Okay. How's that feeling?

Thank you. That's so better. I just was like, I just, you know, it says that there's wisdom and the counsel is two or more. And I'm like, okay, I'm not a financial planner.

I'm like, you're smart, but you wanted something all one level living and if we end up in a wheelchair, your walkers, that it's, we can stay there. Yeah. Absolutely.

And go and talk with your smart vester pro and ask him, hey, here's what I was thinking.

I called the Ramsey Show here's what they said and ask what he thinks too. He might say that it feels good for you to pull all the money today and if, at the end of the day, though, it's got to be something that you feel good about too. And it felt like Ken that hybrid was, was where it was at. Yeah.

I'm just, if I was in their shoes, I just would not touch that $600,000 retirement because I know that every seven years, based on history, that's going to double. Yeah. If they're making a good writer. And so I want to get all of that that I can and with that kind of income, they can

be patient. And yeah, I, I, I wouldn't touch it at all if it were me. They seem like they've got more working years in than what I said. I mean, he's 70. She's 61.

She's got a great practice. Yes.

“She, she could probably pay herself more for a year, you know what I mean?”

Yeah. If she, you know, there's something she can do. Do I grow the business, juice that a little bit? They just have other options to be able to pay for this house. Well, they're in San Diego, but my guess is if they lived on a hundred or 120, they'd

be done. See where you're going. They'd be done.

And here's what else we know about both of them.

They're going to be more than comfortable on just his benefits alone. You just know that. Oh, yeah. Definitely. Definitely.

And that's what I was saying. If you're not going to really have to touch it, then there you go. All right. We have some questions on the desk. I like these candies are from the social medias, by the way.

Can you just like the crispy cream hot now, like, fresh, fresh, fresh? I hope so. Okay. All right. If people interact with you on social media, what's the one that you're on and like

talking to folks on? If they want to know, I want to see can for real. The only one that you're going to have a chance of getting a real response for me on his Instagram. Me too.

Yeah. Does that have to do with our age? Because the kids are going to tell you I'm going to say, yes, I guess. I don't know the answer. Well, to prove, I think it's the app.

“I think I see the messages more than I do on other apps.”

The DMs. Yeah. I feel like they're in my conscience. I don't have the other ones on my phone. The only one I have is Instagram.

So for that reason, let's take the Instagram questions. Okay. Oh, that was a setup. Yeah. It was a setup.

And Instagram said, we just went to a restaurant that had a robot delivering our food. Oh, I've loved that. When the bill came, we didn't know if we should leave a tip. What are your thoughts on tipping culture, especially when you primarily interact with robots? I have thoughts.

So I went to a local place recently where there was a waitress and a robot. And so the waitress came and took our order. I don't know. I don't see the name of it. It was a hibachi, you know, where everybody sits around.

Okay. So we got a big group. So the waitress comes up lovely lady and she's very kind, responsive. Get to everybody's order and she takes off. Five minutes later, here comes the robot with the food and she kind of follow up to make

sure we had drinks the whole time, but the robot brought us the food. I still tipped her the normal amount because of her involvement. Yeah. All the robot did.

They basically do what the 16-year-old kid does at the nice restaurant.

Yeah, no, no. I go 20 to 22. You didn't even in that scenario? Yeah. Good for you can call me.

Yeah. I probably would have done the same thing. I love tipping, but I'm not tipping a robot. I don't tip at coffee shops. Beware.

What was the difference? It's coffee shop. Well, welcome back to the Ramsey Show. We're here in the Fairwins Credit Union Studio Kid Coleman. Are you ready to get to the phone lines yet again?

I'm ready. Who's up next? Landon, Reno, Nevada.

“To this day, anytime I think of Reno, I think of the movie Sister Act.”

Yeah, good call. What's up, Landon? You guys don't think of Reno 911. Who kind of dangle and all of them? Not my genre of television.

I do have questions about go to the dangle. Yeah. I don't even know who that is. I'm not sure I want to. You know, it's a comedy central show.

But yeah, I know the scene that you're thinking about, Jay, with a with his track. Yeah. You're by the Reno large and everything. Yeah, I know what you're talking about.

All day. Oh, Landon, you're one of us. That's what we hosted.

Hey, guys, I got a little predicament. I'm thankful for your call, Ken.

I think you're amazing, Jay.

I think you're amazing too. Here's my predicament. I'll keep it nice and short. HOAC went up to $1,000 and $8 per month from $450 per month. I know.

And I don't know what to do.

“Does that include a swim up bar, right to your front door?”

What in the world? It should. Yeah. For that kind of a hike. What's the penalty?

No, I know. So no perks. Basically, what's going on here that we have a special assessment for the time being to do the roads. Okay.

Roost and all of this stuff. Some capital maintenance with the entire complex. But short term? Yeah. Well, so it's going to be at least a year.

And then from year on out, I mean, there's no way. We're probably going to need to do this for, I don't know, three, four years.

If not more, we're probably going to need to get up to, you know, two, three, four million bucks.

And we're not there. So it's going to take some time. Wow. I'm sorry. That's not cool.

So what's your question? So here's my question. I am going to move out of my house. I'm going to rent for $1,500 a month. But now I have the home that I own.

“And basically what I'm kind of going back and forth with is should I rent my house out?”

Or should I sell my home? If I rent my home out, I'll basically be cash neutral. I'm not making anything. I'm not losing anything. But then if I work to sell it, I get probably make about 250 in equity.

So I don't know what's going on. That's a no-brainer. It's a no-brainer. Yes. You don't want to live in this place.

We can tell. Here's why. You can push back. I'm going to tell you what I hear. I hear a guy who's rightfully upset about a ridiculous upcharge in HOA.

A thousand bucks a month. Are you kidding me? And you're going, I don't love this house that much. I want to get out. You have no attachment to this house.

You've got $250,000 worth of equity in it. And you're going to get a reasonable rent to kind of reset and figure out what the next step is. Versus rented out. And you're saying it's a net net. You're not going to make any money.

Well, guess what? That means you're losing money because when something breaks on this house and it will, Guess who has to fix it. You. So now you're going in the hole.

So for that reason, as George would say, I'm out. I'm out. I'm out. That's funny. You say that.

So I did the FDA brand see saying on the. This could be embarrassing. What did that say? No, it's an exemplary. Okay.

Well, it's an exemplary. It said, it said, you're bleeding. You're bleeding every month. Yeah. Exactly something that the host would would say.

So I, by the way, cool to see.

“I think the way I said it was far more entertaining than ask Ramsay.”

But it's still a great resource. Yeah. That's going to give you the nuts and bolts. Yeah. We're going to give you the style and in this case, all khaki, apparently.

Thank you very much. You're welcome. So landed. Did we solve your problem for you? No.

It seems like it was a pretty easy thing. I mean, that's the way that I was kind of kind of leaning towards. Yeah. But yeah, you know, it's my first home. It kind of sucks to get rid of it.

I guess there's a little bit of sentimental there. But it wasn't going to be forever in a way. That's my thoughts. No. Well, this is a great reminder of how fun ask Ramsay is for people who can't get

throw on the show. Yeah. Don't have the time. Maybe you're nervous to call us. This guy went to ask Ramsay.

The AI version of our show host, right? Yes. Yes. And he got the same answer. So just to fun a little plug there, because it is very helpful to those of you who can't get through.

Yes, indeed it is. Fun stuff. There's no universe, Jade, where I'm going to ever. Deal with a house. That I'm not making any enormous money on what it comes to rent.

In other words, if it's a cash house, like all the day, so that's one thing. Yeah. But where you're breaking even or barely making money? No.

Renting by default is never the move.

If you're going to have a rental, it's I set out to have a rental. And I chose a specific house for the purposes of rental. Right? Let there be some intentionality behind it. All right, Maria's in San Diego, California, Maria.

How can we help today? Hi, thank you so much for thinking my call. Yeah, you bet. What's up? So I am in a bit of a predicament.

I started my own business last year. Started getting paid in August, but it has been a little bit slower this last couple of months. And with the work that I've had, my projections for income for the next six months are really low. Um, so right now, I'm in a position where I'm not sure if I'll be able to make my credit court payment. Uh-oh.

Or it's going to be either that or my car. Uh-oh, so tell us what that isn't real numbers. What were you bringing in that felt like a good income to live on? And then what is it now?

When I first started my business, it went down to like 6,000, and now I'm looking at like 3.

Okay, so in August, it was like around 6,000, you felt good. Now you're at 3K. How many months has it been at 3,000? Um, since like November. Oh boy, okay, so there's a trend here.

“Have you identified what the issue is like why business is down?”

Yeah, so right now, my most consistent source of income was a subcontractor job that I have.

Yeah, I'm which it's kind of like dependent on how much work the other company has.

I just signed a contract with my actual business. We do property services, so we do turnover management. I'm so that should be starting soon, but it is going to be less paper work because right now we're I'm at right now, it is on the military base. So the paper gig is a lot better here.

Okay, and it's just you, you're the sole employee. It's myself on my boyfriend, but his that is a lot lower. So the bet, I mean, the good news is it's it's you and your boyfriend and you're working as the work comes in since it's subcontracting.

“So the the best thing that I could do if I were in your shoes is while I'm working to get more business coming in the door or while there's a down season or whatever the nature of that is.”

I'm also going to have another job over here on the side that brings in the gap of what I need. And until you can figure out how to get this back up to making you six to eight thousand a month. Yeah, okay, my my biggest biggest dilemma right now is three of my credit cards already hit the 30 daily. Right, which means you need money. Yeah.

That's all that is that means okay yesterday I needed a job. So that means today your weekend is going to be spent pound and pavement and getting online and finding whatever you can to fill that gap. Because if you don't have dollars and they're calling you all you can do is say, hey, I don't have any money. Check me next month until this happens.

“Yeah, so income is the name of the game. I mean, that's the only solution can we have you.”

I mean, you did a such a great job. You don't add much more to a really good song. Except maybe repeat. So they're fine. We're fine. Thank you. You helped me out. I shouldn't be talking music terms with you ever. [Music]

When people hear my story of paying off debt, they say things like, "Dadding, that must have been so hard. I can never do that."

And I tell them, sure you can. It's a short term sacrifice for a long term game. But do you know what's really hard? Working your whole life and never having anything to show for it. Never having the long term game. Just feeling broke and stressed and maxed all the time. And sadly, that's the hard that most people choose. Listen, you're capable of transforming your situation and living a life of freedom. But you need the right tools to do it. Like our every dollar budget app. In minutes, it will build you a step by step plan that's tailored to your money situation.

And every day it finds ways you can free up extra money in your budget so you can get rid of your debt and actually build wealth. So make the choice today. Short term sacrifice, long term game. Choose the tool to help you get it done fast. Download the every dollar app and start for free today. [Music] Fying or selling your home is a big deal. And with all the clickbait headlines and conflicting data that's out there,

it's hard to know what's really happening in the housing market. But we're here to help make the latest trends easy to understand. For instance, median home prices dipped a little below 400,000 last month, which is typical for this time of year. Mortgage rates also dipped to 5.44 in January, down from 6.27 last January, giving buyers some breeding room. But since rates are unpredictable, the best time to buy is when you're financially ready. Not when home prices or rates drop. So to learn more about the housing, market trends and get free tools to help you buy yourself with confidence.

Go to ramsysolutions.com/market or click the link in the show notes if you're listening on podcast or YouTube.

Hi, y'all are absolutely going to hate me whenever I tell you what I want to be doing. No, that's a strong word. Hay is too strong. I am a realtor investor here in Texas and I have a long term boyfriend and I we're buying a house together and I told him I didn't want to ring. I wanted a house instead. We've both been married previously and we're coming in together obviously. We're very Dave Ramsey friendly and we know it, but he is carrying quite a little bit more debt than I am.

I am credit card free. He is as well. However, we, I'm just trying to figure out how I want to tackle his debt when we buy the house after we buy the house. It's not okay.

I don't even know what I'm going to sit back for a second.

I'm going to let you go first. I would just say for the people who are listening for the first time because you said that you were Ramsey friendly and then you went off to say things of such nature.

“You're laughing all the time and you know what she's about to say, right?”

I know. Why are you laughing about it? Because obviously because of the market that we are in and the real estate the way it's going, it would just be too good to pass up this property to where obviously we would want to live in it for. Why don't you just buy it? How about, well, I do. I can buy it myself, but I really want him to be on board with me and it's not bad debt like we are selling.

He has a camper that he was living and I'm working out of. So doing like insurance adjustment across the US. So that's really the only one that's a major one. The other one is just a minor amount maybe. Here's something, it's not about the debt.

For me, the debt is part of the home buying equation. Don't get me wrong. But in the bigger picture of what you're talking about, if I'm going to address these things by thing that's most on fire to think that's not as burning as quickly. I would say the first thing is the idea of buying a house with a boyfriend is a very, very risky business because it's you're doing something that should be very long term with someone that you can't. You really don't know if it's going to be long term and if because of the nature of the mingling of money, it can get really really messy.

And if it doesn't have to be messy, the easier thing to do would just be like, hey, I'm going to buy this house or he's going to buy this house. And then if you so choose that you're going to live together in that way, that's your choice. But at least the money's are clear and free and that is not adding any insult to injury if this were to go south and not proceed into. Okay, hey, that's about as good a word as you're going to get on that. What is your response to that? Because I can hear you saying yes to her, but you have a retort.

So what is your retort?

So basically with me being an investor, so I do actually show which, you know, the banks don't love me, but my CPAs do, you know, that always that joke.

So really with qualifying for this property, you know, he shows way more of an income. I mean, it almost doubles what, or triples what my income is. What are you, okay, plus plus what investing do you have? You sound like you're over leveraged. No, I have 10 rentals. And so basically, how much do you owe? How much do you owe on 10 rentals? Um, high three loans, um, totaling about 225,000. Okay, that's not as bad as I thought.

“I thought it was going to be worse. Okay, here's the thing. Here's the thing. I want to give you props because even though you may not have done.”

Some of these things, the ramsy way, the fact that you have 10 rentals and you only owe 225, unless these are just really crappy properties. There's something that you've done that you've not gone ridiculously. Do you see what I'm saying? Like, for 10 rentals, can I, I would think that I thought for sure you're going to say a couple million. Well, why wouldn't you buy it? But why, so what does it really mean? Because J gave you great advice. You buy it yourself.

Why wouldn't you buy it? You have 10 rentals. Because I love, like, I am an investor at heart. So, no, no, stop. That's the crappy answer. You said that three times. And what's the real reason? And you said this. Let me tell you what you said. So you said, well, yeah, Jade, you're right.

But I want us to be on the same page. I want him to be in it with me. And I even think that's a cop-out. So what he shows more income. So with our lender, they basically cannot.

I know what the answer is, but you won't tell me. You're trying to play a game on interest rates.

Because it's not that. What is it?

“I think my lender basically qualified said that we would be qualified based on his income based off my rents.”

But you're smart. You're smart.

Because you know today, hey, if I really wanted this property, I could just sell off one of the ones I have.

I could buy it and kind of, like, you know that. Are you trying to lock him in? Yeah, I told him I turned down a ring for a mortgage. No, but okay, do you know how crazy that sounds? Why don't you just go down to the courthouse?

Scamery. Do you want this guy to be your husband or not? Yes. Okay.

“Well, then why don't you let him give you the ring?”

Yeah. That's true. What's the problem? Tell us for real for real. It's business. I've been independent for so long, and so with my, you know, being divorced and having my son.

It's been, it's definitely scary. Yeah, but you just told us, you just told us you want this guy to be your husband.

And you were willing to do a more, here's what I want to frame up for you.

You said that you want to be independent and maybe you've been burned before all of those things. Do you understand, and I can, I'll validate for you that that makes sense to me that you would be, you would have some trepidation getting into another relationship that makes sense. What doesn't make sense is how you are solving it. Because you're creating something that has the ability to be even more dramatic.

Yeah. Even more, like, even worse for everybody involved if it were to go south. So why not fuel what you're feeling into a better solve, which is I might not be ready to get married yet. Maybe we're not. Great point out.

That's okay. And if it does be married. And Jade's making a great point. If it goes bad, then there's going to be a legal, very clear legal decision on what happens with the house. It's an asset.

But if you guys go in together and there's no legal marriage, then it's a mess.

You know this. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think we can sell you on our philosophy. But I think if we come to your page.

No, no. I'm not trying to go on your philosophy, which is your independent, so be independent. And it's so be independent or then get legally married. Okay. So that this risk that you're afraid of goes away in the sense of it's going to be clean.

If there is another divorce or nobody wants to think about it, but that's your fear. So let's go there.

“So our position that you should be married and combine finances while it's coming from a different vantage point then you have.”

It does meet you where your biggest fear is. So take call this guy. I wish we could get him on the phone. And because I would make you tell him that you were foolish and that you will take the ring. And that with the ring comes an actual marriage.

Mm-hmm. And we're going to do our money together. Mm-hmm. And we're going to dominate. Yeah.

We're going to heal from our past. And we're going to come together and we're going to set out a vision for our life that we both are in lock step on. And then we're just going to do this thing. How long have you been together? Uh, over two years.

Oh, for heaven's sake. Two years. And we're like, "Go, go, where are you living now?" Um, so we do live part of the time. We're pretty respectful of our kids.

So when he has his child, and I have mine, we kind of stay apart. But when we don't, we obviously are living with me. But with him traveling. So he's staying a lot more at my property, which is one of my investments that I am doing. So--

Y'all need to-- I can tell you. This is exhausting. This is exhausting. And by the way, the whole respect for the kids thing, they know it's happening. Let's stop playing games.

Let's get married. All right, Ken. I'm with you. I'm with you. I don't think she's ready.

That's my hot take of the day. And I think you're probably right. I think she's ready. You're always right. If you've been working the plan paying off debt saving and changing your family tree,

I'm proud of you. And if you're in baby step four or beyond, it's time to celebrate. The live like no one else cruise is back March 14 through 21. Twenty, twenty seven.

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Cosimel, Jamaica, and Grand Cayman on the ultimate debt-free vacation. Cabins will sell out just like last time. Lock in yours with a $600 deposit at RamseySolutions.com/events. [MUSIC PLAYING] All right, today's question of the day is brought to you by Y-Refive.

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So you can stick to a budget and work the plan. Go to Y-Refive.com/Ramsy. That's Y-R-E-F-Y.com/Ramsy. Remember it may not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Jessica in North Dakota.

My husband and I are on babysept two and we'll be paying off our last 10,000 of debt this year. I have a 2014 SUV with three growing boys. We desperately need something bigger. My in-laws have said they would buy us a minivan and we could pay them back when we've paid off our debt. The only problem with this offer is that there's stipulation that we have to purchase a new vehicle.

I'm very grateful I have such a generous family, but I've heard you say never to buy a new vehicle.

Should we take them up on this offer? No. And I also don't buy that three growing boys don't fit in a 2014 SUV. Very long. I don't care if they're all six feet too.

They can be uncomfortable for the amount of time you're getting them from point A to B. This is one of those things that is just an absolute, it sounds very reasonable in your head, Jessica.

“But to somebody like me who has no emotion attached, what kind of SUV were they making in 2014 that three boys can't sit in the back?”

I don't know because I'm thinking about when my parents had a 1995 suburban and we fit in the back. What's the difference? So that's the first issue and a mini van. That's the answer to the three growing boys. What do they park giant?

They're going to fit in the SUV. So this just keeps falling apart. And then it gets to, well, they're going to loan us money. That's family.

We don't want you to borrow money.

But has to be brand new apparently. And now it's got to be brand new. So now they're fleasing you on their conditions. Everything about this is just so wacky. And we have created in our minds this need that is not a need.

And we're wrapping a desire up in the clothing of a need. And there's nothing about this that is a need. And my gosh, you have 10,000 to go. Come on. Just finish it.

And then walk forward to babysit three. And you know, and why you're doing that cash flow car get creative.

“But in no way shape or form, do I have any sympathy for your three growing boys?”

And how that could be. By the way, one of the great hardships of life that every young man needs to go through is to sit in the middle. And I don't think they have a hump anymore. With your knees all folded up in the center.

Yeah, do they still have a hump in the middle of the back of these SUVs? I would be great.

I'm wondering if this SUV has a third row, sounds like it does it.

But if it's got a hump in the middle, one of those boys needs to have his knees touching his nose. Yeah. That's just a right a passage. Yeah. It's a right a passage.

I mean, don't get me started. I remember there were times where if we had a friend come with us. Uh, one of us would get up in the back window because cars back then cars back then. You know what I say? I do.

Cars back then had enough space that you could get a good size 10 year old, 11 year old. And you would lay the full length. And it was great. You could stare like a freak at the car behind you. I was a part of this.

You don't have to ask. I will tell you on a sunny day. Got kind of warm. Oh, you were sweaty. Getting car sick in that window.

And just staring at the poor drivers behind you. Like you're some sort of psychopath. Uh, I digress. You call the spade a spade on this. I agree with you.

Wholeheartedly can.

“Sounds like what did you say desire wrapped up this?”

This is desire wrapped up in the clothes of a need. Very profound. Very profound. Katie. Got to call my kids and tell them you said that.

I will. They won't care. They're going to be like, they don't care. Alright. Katie's in Ohio.

How can we help today, Katie? Hi, guys. Oh, yeah. Great. How can we help?

So my question is, I'm on Davy Step 2 with a job that provides a company car. So I don't have a car payment or pay for gas or anything like that right now. Nice. But I recently received a job offer, which it would be a pay increase. But instead of a company car, they would give a monthly allowance for car payment

and gas separately. So my question is, if I take this job, should I pause Baby Step 2 and try to save as much money as possible? To put towards a car or should I keep going money at my debt? And then just use a car allowance when I potentially start. That's a good question.

You're going to need something to drive in right away. Do you have any money saved whatsoever? No, I'm a Baby Step 2. So I have maybe 1,500 bucks. Okay.

How much is the car allowance once they give it to you?

Gas would be an additional like 2 to 300 a month.

Okay. Are you close? Would you be close enough to the work that in the meantime, you could do something like take the bus or Uber or do something short term while you stack up that, you know, however much the car

“allowances in order to just get yourself a quick beat or to get started?”

Well, the job includes sales so I would have to use the car to drive foods different offices. But the other thing is that when it starts until June, maybe July, even so I would have a few months to save up. So I think I'm thinking I could potentially save up 10 to 15,000. So. It's great.

You can get a, you can get a fine car for 10 to 15,000. I mean, this is a real opportunity. If you, and I love, by the way, your, your suggestion because you, you, you are demonstrating someone who, has got some self discipline. And if you can do that.

And use this car allowance effectively. That's a win for you. So I, that's, that's the play. You just answered your own question. Yeah.

That's something.

I've just known such a motivated kick.

I'm paying off my dad. It's going to hurt the pause a little bit. But I know in, you know, in the long run. Yeah, but, but you know what's great about this is. It's in the grand scheme of things.

It's not really a pause. You know, like you're, you're, you're not, this isn't like going to put you way behind. You're only talking about you. You're not stopping progress. Yes.

That's what I meant to say. That's even better. You are pausing the act of, of, of paying it down. But, but you're doing it for a reason. And you're going to pick right back up where you left off and not be behind.

Yeah, buying a car and cash is great progress in your. Yeah. Good for you. Yeah. Very good, Katie.

Thank you for the call. Next up, we have Gary in California. Gary. What's on your mind? Hi.

Hi. Hi. My basic question. I got to give you some detail.

“But my basic question is, how can I enjoy monetary gifts?”

I'd received from my parent. Given, I've pieced all my life, but found it difficult to say. I'm very late in the life, and I've, 60, 60 years old. This came to Randy a few years ago. I now have an emergency on paid off my house, about attention.

But not much savings. And I also, as I'm a car, everybody's looking after my folks. So, recently, my parents gave me, and my brother, 38,000 dollars. And because my mom knows I want to go to Africa on safari. She says, "This is for your Africa trip."

Great. And what do you have in savings? What do you have in savings? Sorry? What do you have in savings, right now?

Nothing of my home. You have zero dollars in savings. No, I mean, I've been given some money. So, I've got some money, but how much? Oh, no.

Over 100,000? Okay, so let me just recap, right quick. You're retired. You have no debts. You have 100,000 saved.

“And you got a $38,000 gift to go on safari in Africa.”

Yeah. But you told us that you've not been good at saving. So, I'm so confused. Okay. Here's a deal.

I've had it very difficult throughout life to save.

I always made this 10% for God.

But I always, I hadn't learned to brand me principle. So, I was going through life at the end of the month. I just didn't have enough left to save rather than putting savings number one. Okay. Okay.

So, what I've got is a situation where I have a kind of bad taste in my mouth that's spoiling things. Because I feel ashamed for needing everybody, for needing the money for a bucket list trip. I've no sense of satisfaction.

Oh, let me fix that. Let me fix that. Let me fix that. Let me fix that. First of all, this is a gift.

And you need to receive it as a gift. Or else it robbs your parents of the blessing. And a safari trip is like going to cost you 38,000. It's enough. Go do a great safari trip.

And then invest or save the rest of it. And enjoy your life. You're 66. We're not promised tomorrow. Go take some pictures of some giraffes, man.

Yeah. But you also need to save some retirement for yourself. Because you don't have it. I told him that. But he used to go do the safari too.

It's got a hundred grand. He could start investing. Yeah. He needs to start that immediately. [MUSIC PLAYING]

Hey, guys. Dave Ramsey here. Every day on this show, we help people work through real money problems. And figure out what to do next. Now, you can get that same kind of help any time with Ask Ramsey.

Ask your money question and get answers built on Ramsey principles. We use on the show whether you're making a decision or just want something explained.

It's fast, simple, and free to use.

Go to RamseySolutions.com and try Ask Ramsey today. That's RamseySolutions.com. [MUSIC PLAYING] Our Ramsey shows scripture in quote of the day. Philippians 413.

Can you call him in? I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Yes. Amen. I love it.

Dolly Parton. If your actions create a legacy that inspires others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more. Then you are an excellent leader. Dolly dropping some leadership goal. That's actually a really great quote.

It is. Inspiration. Oh, she's a treasure, folks. She's a national treasure. I love it.

Love it. All right. Ellie is in Louisiana. Ellie, how can we help today? Hi.

So me and my new husband. We just got married.

First marriage for both of us.

Hopefully the only marriage. We're a young, grossing couple. We're looking at buying a place, but we're not sure.

“This is going to sound so it's like, are we two young to buy property?”

We neither have to have debt. We both have college degrees. We have together like over a hundred thousand savings. Would it be a good next step of a couple to buy a house together? How long you've been married?

We just got married in January, but we were together for five years prior. Okay. And how old are you guys? We are 23 and 25. Okay.

Fantastic. What are your incomes? I make about 60 and he makes over a hundred. Fantastic. And what do you do?

I am an engineer. I just graduated, but he is actually in the finance realm. But he's newer to it and he's very good with money. Obviously, we wouldn't have that much in savings, but we're just like, geared almost to have a mortgage.

Sure. Well, let's walk through the emergency fund.

“So based on you know your numbers, do you guys have a three month or six month emergency fund?”

And in that a hundred thousand, I know that's more than you need. But what would be three months, what would be six months? We're currently renting in $1,300 place right now. So that would be probably at least six months plus any expenses we would have in that time, more than probably that.

Oh, a hundred thousand is more than six months of basic expenses for you guys. So what kind of a size house are we talking about? And not size actually. What price point are you guys looking at? Because I assume you guys have driven around or you've been on websites looking at houses.

What are you looking at? Yeah. We're looking between like 250 to 350. We're looking at getting a duplex and fixing it up and living in one side and renting out the other. I don't like that.

What do you think about that? All I can tell you is when I was in high school, we moved into a duplex and it started out fine. And then it went south very quickly in what sucks is. If the person on door number one doesn't get along with the person on door number two, you have to see them every day.

Those walls are thin. Yeah. Yeah, they are. That's a horrible idea. You're so sweet.

You're so sweet. I didn't want to say it that way. But now I just have to warn you. This is an awful idea.

You guys are already thinking you're thinking in our first house.

Guess what? We'll live in it, but it's a real investment. And I just think because it's a duplex and all the problems that come with it, we don't think that's a strong investment strategy. And it sure is heck is not a great young marriage strategy.

You guys need your own place without any kind of headaches. Literally next door. Yeah. Don't do that. Please.

“Who would with our income do you guys think that we could buy a house then?”

Yeah. Jade welcome through. All right. Okay. Jade's going to walk you through.

How you would do it with that really nice income. So it's nothing to be scared of. Tell me what you guys are taking home every month. Every month. So he commissioned.

So it really depends. But we've had months where it's been like. Pingray and and then we've had months where it's been like the lowest like six. Okay. So I would plan based off of the lowest month because that's going to give you a measure of peace.

So if six grand is the lowest month, I'd say, okay, for us to really feel great. We don't want our mortgage to be any more than $1,500 a month. That's 25% of our take home pay. And that's kind of a parameter that we use here at Ramsey Solutions. And then what I would do, which is what I'm doing right now.

And I pull up the mortgage calculator.

And I say, okay, let's return. We're looking for a house. You said between three two 50 to 350, right? Okay. So let me just, I'll look at three 25.

How about that? That's kind of somewhere in the middle. It's a plenty of house or a young couple.

“And so if I say, okay, what happens if we put our down payment?”

We need to get to $1,500 a month. So I'm going to make this a pretty hefty down payment. And we're still not quite there yet. Let's see. But all I'm doing is plugging in the numbers to see.

You're going to have to put down a lot to get there. So I don't think you guys are quite there yet. You're going to be putting down upwards of 160,000 to get there at 325. So sit on that number here for a second. And you're not going to hold you to this.

How long do you think? So this has got to be above and beyond your emergency fund. Okay? So three months of emergency fund and you're going to calculate that. You know how to do that and go, okay, this is our total expenses.

To run everything, right? We're not crazy about this. What's that number? And so above and beyond that, how long do you think it would take you to save 160,000? Hmm.

Hundreds from where we are probably only another year. That's what I'm thinking. Very low right now. Because that way. So could you wait a year?

And get a fat down payment?

And here's what else is going to happen in that year.

Your husband who works on commissions is going to find his flow. And he's going to have way more months where he's sitting at 10,000 as opposed to 6,000. You see what I'm saying? So again, you guys, time. It gives you time to get in the flow both income-wise.

And it gives you time to save up the down payment. You really need to get in the house. That's just yours. We don't want Billy Bob across the door. Until, by the way, by the way.

I mean, yeah, the people that are living in dueplexes. You got to do your homework on this. Go drive around. Sit in the parking lot of some local dueplexes and watch who's coming in. Cool out here because I lived in dueplexes.

I'm just saying, and many of us have. But not long term. I'm calling calls and strikes right now. Go sit in the parking lot because your husband's on this call. He may go, well, Ken is.

Okay. Here's what he needs to do. Go sit in the parking lot of four or five different area dueplexes.

And just take up just kind of pay attention on what's going on.

Hang out. Now, I also want to say one other thing. Actually, it's a question. Are you guys in a nice apartment right now? What's your situation?

It's a two by one right now. So two bedroom, one bathroom, which is fine. We just, we know we're going to need more space. Stop it. Stop it.

You'd been married two months. Is it a nice apartment complex? It's fine. Overall, yes. It's fine.

You got a nice pool. Uh-huh. All right. Listen, they'll be okay. You guys have big home ownership goals.

I know. I was going to, I was trying to get her trapped ago. Would you just enjoy being married? And not having to worry about a roof. Here's the thing.

Or the HVAC. I mean, this is things that young couples will think about. They say something, everybody wants a house. Nobody wants to deal with the problems of a house. It's true where words have not been stated.

“That's what I want to say to young couples.”

Cool it. Yeah. Because you have no stress right now. Living in an apartment. You just got none.

Yeah, because once you buy a home and I say the word water, you-- What? Like, the moment you experience water being in the wrong place, owning a house. I'll tell you something right now, Jade.

I'm, I'm a being old man right now. I'm gripping about the fact that I just had to spend $2,500 to get my beautiful, gorgeous tree in my front yard cut down and get the stump taken out because of an ice stone. Wow.

I just want to keep it real for all young couples that are just dying to get a house. Well, guess what? I had to cut the tree down because it split into it, blew up.

It should pay an arborist is crazy money. $2,500. Yeah, man. You think I was, by the way, I have it. But do you think I was happy about it?

I'm never fun. I'm still gripping about it right now. All of America's having to deal with me gripping. But guess what that, that doesn't happen when you live in a nice, little apartment complex and the ice-dorm comes through.

Well, yeah, because then you just call maintenance and you're like, "Hey, if something goes wrong, they send Roger up." Yeah. And Roger comes in, you know, and he fixes it and then we go on date night. Yeah, exactly.

But in the house, it hits a different house. I'm still gripping about that tree. And by the way, it's a gorgeous tree. Yeah. Go on.

Let me tell you, I'm still a little offended about what you said about us. Doplex dwellers. [laughing] Was I wrong? [laughing]

I don't know, kid. Y'all drive around this weekend. Spend 45 minutes in the doplex parking lot. Pay attention to who's coming in and out of this place. That's all I'm saying.

I'm keeping it real.

“Oh, boy, remember there's ultimately only one way to have”

financial peace and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace Christ Jesus. [music playing]