Getting Out of Debt Takes More Effort Than It Took to Get You In

Summary

Podcast Summary

The Ramsey Show
Episode Title: Getting Out of Debt Takes More Effort Than It Took to Get You In
Date: April 21, 2026
Hosts: Dave Ramsey & Jade Washaw

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Dave Ramsey and co-host Jade Washaw field live calls from listeners facing significant financial crossroads. The conversations revolve around the central theme that escaping debt requires greater resolve and intentionality than the ease with which people often fall into it. The hosts emphasize honesty about family drama, business risk, emotional health, and teamwork as essential ingredients to lasting financial transformation. Each scenario is met with practical, sometimes tough-love guidance rooted in Ramsey’s no-debt, high-agency philosophy.

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Key Discussions and Insights

1. Dealing With Family Business Debt and Toxic Dynamics

• Caller (Sean, Fargo, ND): Facing the likelihood of inheriting a family business with $6M in debt and conflicting ideologies with family.
  • Advice: Dave and Jade counsel Sean to "walk away" rather than inherit the stress and financial liability, given the entrenched attitudes toward debt and business mismanagement.
  • Quote:
    • [05:03] Dave Ramsey: “There’s nothing here that aligns with who you are or who you want to be. This all sounds like misery and there’s not enough money there to fool with.”
  • Key Point: Don’t let the emotional “tractor beam” of family and money entrap you in a future you don’t want.

2. Auto Debt, Job Instability, and Mental Health

• Caller (Martina, Phoenix, AZ): Deeply underwater on a car loan, with overlapping issues of job/housing instability, mental health, and family stress.
  • Advice: Focus on “food, shelter, basic clothing, transportation, and utilities” first. Delay everything else. Fill calendar with income-generating activities, bypass fragile credit concerns, and let go of side hustles that depreciate assets (e.g., Lyft/Uber exacerbating car depreciation).
  • Quote:
    • [13:02] Dave Ramsey: “Are they going to work you 40 hours?”
    • [15:37] Dave Ramsey: “You need to fix your whole life right now is $16,000... All you do is work, girl.”
  • Key Point: Action and intensity help break the cycle; securing basic needs creates emotional and financial footholds.

3. Whole Life Insurance Policies: A Middle-Class Pitfall

• Caller (Greg, Nashville, TN): Wondering what to do with old whole life insurance policies with $100K cash value each.
  • Advice: Cash out, invest in mutual funds. The return is minimal compared to what’s possible elsewhere; term life is all that’s needed if there’s wealth.
  • Quote:
    • [24:38] Dave Ramsey: “The whole life cash value policy is the biggest ripoff in the financial planning world.”
  • Key Point: Understand what you truly gain versus what the insurer keeps—don’t conflate insurance with investment.

4. Family Inheritance and Poor Financial Decisions

• Caller (James, Columbus, OH): Received a $6,000 inheritance gift, now sister demands repayment after wasting her own inheritance.
  • Advice: Stand firm—it was a gift. Stop participating in family drama.
  • Quote:
    • [29:52] Dave Ramsey: “There’s two options. The third option is not keep whining about it... Straighten it up.”

5. Young Entrepreneur Facing Business Failure

• Caller (Leland, Oklahoma City, OK): Age 22, about to have farm equipment repossessed after a fertilizer business failed.
  • Advice: Let it go. Work to save as much cash as possible to settle the deficit post-repo. Lesson learned: don’t borrow to start a risky business.
  • Quote:
    • [36:03] Dave Ramsey: “That’s the rule of business. Don’t borrow money to start businesses—things never turn out exactly as you predict.”
  • Key Point: Early financial failures can be the best teachers.

6. Retirement Anxiety Amid Relationship Turmoil

• Caller (Diane, Chicago, IL): Wants advice on investing a large cash sum post-business sale; husband’s gambling has led to all assets in her name.
  • Advice: Invest with clear boundaries; create separation from husband’s financial recklessness. Limit franchise investment to a set amount.
  • Quote:
    • [48:01] Dave Ramsey: "It’s hard to fill up a hole while somebody’s digging out the bottom."
  • Key Point: Protect assets from addiction—optimism isn’t a substitute for due diligence.

7. Keeping Family Safe Amid Financial Obfuscation

• Caller (Nicole, Detroit, MI): Husband refuses to give financial transparency, leading to marital separation/divorce.
  • Advice: Some situations can’t be salvaged without both parties’ willingness. Divorce courts will reveal all, regardless of one party’s secrecy.
  • Quote:
    • [91:01] Dave Ramsey: “This guy’s bad news...There’s not a single phrase that’s going to make him not be a jerk. I don’t have the Not Be a Jerk phrase.”

8. Home Purchase, Debt Prioritization, and Frugality

• Caller (Nicole, Atlanta, GA): Debating whether to rent bigger or stay cramped to finish debt repayment.
  • Advice: Don’t trade short-term comfort for prolonged debt. Aggressively pay off debt before increasing lifestyle.
  • Quote:
    • [56:23] Dave Ramsey: “You guys suck at this so far, Nicole...not enough debt reduction.”
    • [58:34] Dave Ramsey: “If they’re squished and their life is miserable for one year, they’ll be fine.”

9. Elder Parent with Debt: When to Walk Away

• Caller (Dustin, Idaho): Managing an elderly father’s $30,000 debt with no assets and advanced dementia.
  • Advice: Do not pay the debts for him; creditors will get nothing and can’t touch Social Security.
  • Quote:
    • [60:03] Dave Ramsey: “Just show them the smallest finger on my left hand and say, that’s all you get.”

10. Business Startups: Don’t Borrow—Grow Organically

• Caller (Logan, Indiana): Considering $150K loan to start a cattle business.
  • Advice: Start smaller, cash flow growth; borrow nothing.
  • Quote:
    • [77:02] Dave Ramsey: “Start a third as big with cash, reinvest profit, and in a year or two you’re where you want to be. Because nothing ever goes perfect.”

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Notable Debt-Free Scream Highlights

Debt-Free Celebration 1: TJ & Alice (Ramsey Staff)

• Paid Off: $165,000 (student loans and car debt) in 15 months.
• Key Factors: Teamwork, side hustles, using EveryDollar, support of Ramsey community.
• Memorable Quote:
  • [66:33] Alice: “The best sleep I’ve ever got was October 30th when we made our final payment.”
• Celebration: Bought a king-sized bed.

Debt-Free Celebration 2: Nathan & Megan (Woodstock, GA)

• Paid Off: $155,000 (mortgage) in under 5 years (age 28–29).
• Strategy: Cash-flowed home renovations, chose a “jungle” fixer-upper others rejected.
• Quote:
  • [111:25] Megan: “There’s more opportunity in America than there has ever been...Work for it.”
  • [112:12] Dave Ramsey: “You have a paid-for half-million dollar house. You’re almost millionaires at 30. Your parents are heroes.”
• Family Echo: Their kids will reap generational benefits.

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Additional Memorable Quotes & Moments

• [05:56] Dave Ramsey: “I can love you...but I do not want to personally be involved in this. It brings me great stress just thinking about it.”
• [26:25] Dave Ramsey: “Whole life insurance is the biggest screwdriver to the middle class I’ve ever seen.”
• [40:26] Dave Ramsey (to young businessman): “Ask yourself—what do I want to be doing when I’m 32, that I’m a millionaire, and it’s not $25/hr work? I’ll help you with that.”
• [124:19] Jade: “You said it exactly right—it may be a reason for a behavior, but it doesn’t make it right or good.”

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:44–08:27 – Sean’s Family Business Debt Dilemma
• 10:17–19:46 – Martina’s Car Loan, Mental Health, Student/Medical Debt
• 21:24–28:00 – Greg’s Whole Life vs. Term Insurance
• 28:12–30:05 – James’s Inheritance Family Drama
• 32:26–42:10 – Leland’s Young Entrepreneur Business Loss
• 44:15–52:11 – Diane’s Investment Questions & Spousal Gambling Fallout
• 55:01–58:24 – Nicole’s Housing vs. Debt Payment (Family w/Young Kids)
• 59:16–62:02 – Dustin Handling Elderly Father’s Debt
• 65:19–73:33 – TJ & Alice’s Debt-Free Scream
• 75:06–80:39 – Logan Starting a Debt-Free Cattle Operation
• 105:20–114:44 – Nathan & Megan’s Debt-Free Scream (Mortgage/House Reno)
• 116:32–125:09 – Charlie Supporting Overseas Family vs. Protecting Financial Future

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Core Ramsey Philosophies Reinforced

• Debt-free is the path to peace: Getting out takes more work, but delivers real freedom and sleep.
• Intense focus provides relief: Sacrifice and aggression in financial strategy create rapid change.
• Honesty and transparency: In relationships, business, and families—face the truth and act intentionally.
• Don’t fix others’ financial messes: Hold boundaries with loved ones, especially those stuck in destructive patterns.
• Cultural and emotional context matters: Recognizing when obligations stem from background, but balancing with self-preservation.

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Overall Tone

Blunt, compassionate, and often humorous, the hosts challenge listeners to reject “normal” (broke) and instead pursue generational change through hard choices, teamwork, and focused living. The stories shared underscore that lasting wealth and financial sanity are built through grit, honesty, and an unyielding commitment to living within your means.

Transcript

[Dave Ramsey]

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. Normal is broke and common sense is weird. So we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Network and the Fairwinds Credit union studio, this is the Ramsey Show. I'm Dave Ramsey. Jade Washaw is my co host today. Ramsey Personality number one best selling author. Our phone number here is 888-255-225. And some say the advice is worth exactly what you pay for it. Sean is in Fargo, North Dakota. Hey Sean, what's up in your world?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Oh, not much, Dave. Just enjoying my life.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good. How can we help?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

So I am kind of stressed out right now in a little, kind of in a pickle feels like with my family. They are give or take five to $6 million in their family business debt and I am struggling to. Struggling like to cope with like my dad is in failing health and he owns the family business and he is not worried about the major debt that his business has.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. Do you work there

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

part time? Okay. Because I can't, I can't handle full time there.

[Dave Ramsey]

Can't handle it. What do you mean him? You can't handle him?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

No, just the ideology he has and the business feelings.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so why is it bringing you stress? You have a part time job with a business that's in trouble and with a guy whose ideology you don't agree with. Why would that be cause you to be stressful?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I will be most likely be inheriting it with my three brothers, the business which is probably worth around $10 million. And so I'm kind of in talks right now to take over the books and all the like the business side of it to pretty much be full time.

[Dave Ramsey]

When are you supposed to do that?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Probably within the next 10 to 15 years.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm so confused. Okay.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean so you're going to be part time with a guy you disagree with while he runs a business in the ground the next 10 years and you're going to stand there and watch it happen and then they're going to hand it to you and call that a blessing. Why don't you just say I don't want it. Yeah, I don't, I don't want it

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

because so I, I mean it's a good. Oh, I shouldn't say it's a good business but is it really worth. Because he tries to get me to go full time like almost weekly on a weekly basis.

[Jade Washaw]

Well, you tell us the upside because you called in and said all the negative things.

[Dave Ramsey]

So it makes nothing you describe. Sounds like something I want to do. Why would you want to do this?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah. So, so I guess I want to ask, should I try to, like, almost intervene and be like, yo, we shouldn't start taking out this debt because they're thinking about adding another.

[Dave Ramsey]

Who's that?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

25 million dollar debt? My. My family.

[Dave Ramsey]

Your brothers.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, my brother.

[Dave Ramsey]

Who are your future?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Another million dollars in the debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

Who are your future, bro? Who are your future partners?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I, I, My brothers.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, but you said it.

[Dave Ramsey]

You say your brothers are as dumb as your dad.

[Jade Washaw]

You said it before yourself, Sean. You said their ideology is completely different than yours. And I think you need to accept that, that that's the case. And you haven't said anything that shows any sign of them changing that ideology. And so if they continue down this path for the next however many years, they're just entrenching themselves further in that. And you're part time.

[Dave Ramsey]

What do you do for a living?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I operate heavy equipment.

[Dave Ramsey]

All right. Are you, are you the baby of the family?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

No. No, I'm not. Second? No. Third oldest, middle.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. Yeah. Well, here, here's the thing. I don't think that these people are going to change. Do you?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

No, I don't.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. So you either got to walk away from them or you got to enjoy their bull crap.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah. One way to put it.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, you really do. You're going to have to decide which one you're gonna be. If it's me, I'm gonna let them have it. I'm gonna walk away. This sounds like a bear trap. Sounds like it's gonna tear your freaking leg off. It's gonna. The next 10 years of your life are gonna be pure freaking misery till the old man dies. And then when he dies. Now you got partners that were trained by him called your brothers. No, thank you. I don't want in this.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

For sure. For sure.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, I just, I, I. There's nothing here that aligns with who you are or who you want to be. This all sounds like misery and there's not enough money there to fool with. Let them have it. They're going to screw it up. It's going to be worth nothing. Yeah, you don't believe that. You're still. You think your wife thinks you're walking away from a million dollars and you're not. You're walking away from a million dollars worth of debt. That's what you're walking away from.

[Jade Washaw]

15 years.

[Dave Ramsey]

I would sit down. If you want to have one final Conversation with the boys and with the dad and say, guys, I'm uncomfortable with this much debt and I'm not going to join the business as long as you guys continue to run it further up into debt and have no desire to get out of debt because it makes me uncomfortable. I don't agree with this. And I can love you. And if you want to go over there and do something that I don't agree with, we can still be dad and son. We can still be brothers. I can still love you.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

But I do not want to personally be involved in this. It brings me great stress just thinking about it. And so if you guys want to commit to a path that gets us out of debt and keeps us out of debt as a permanent way of doing business, I would love to join and be part of this thing. I think it's got a future. But I am not going to get on this horse when you have this many bricks in the saddlebags.

[Jade Washaw]

Listen, I agree with that 100%. Clearly, easier said than done.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure.

[Jade Washaw]

Because you're going to have basically your whole family on this side, and you're the lone ranger over here. That's not easy, But I agree 100%.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, the thing is, you put everybody on notice and 100% chance they're not going to do it.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

No.

[Dave Ramsey]

And so you're basically saying, here's why. I'm gonna go on and have my great life over here and I'm gonna love you. I've got family members. Most of my family members don't know the stuff I teach, but I am not in. I'm not in a deal with them either. And I still love them. Some of them even vote wrong. And I still love them, but that doesn't mean I have to go around and be in business with them. And it doesn't mean I have to sit around, be stressed and I'm, like, somehow guilted into joining something I completely disagree with. No, walk away from it, son. It ain't worth it. You make a lot of money running your own heavy equipment operation without any debt.

[Jade Washaw]

That's probably the other part of it is there's the allure that maybe there's like, that bit. Maybe just possibly one day it could be good. Then you look back and you're like, man, I should have stayed part of it. Right? He's probably thinking about that little one. One or 2%.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. It's like, I'm gonna pet an alligator and hope it doesn't bite. What do they do? They bite. You know, it's dumb. You're just asking for it. Don't think they're going to change. They don't only do how to do one thing, and that's bite. So don't. Don't be shocked when they bite. I mean, it's just your dad, this is what he does. He's a predictable environment. And he didn't hide it. He's not. He just said, that's who I am.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, that's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

And he kind of said, like it or lump it. So I lump it. That's what I do. I mean, you know, it's just. It's hard to walk away from something like that. Especially when all the Family ties. It feels like you're being drawn in by a tractor beam.

[Jade Washaw]

Yes. Gravitational pull. Yes, drama has a gravitational pull. I've noticed that.

[Dave Ramsey]

Drama, drama, family drama will suck you in and eat your life. Yeah. And then we connect a little $5 million debt to it just for the fun of it. Yeah.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Sam,

[Dave Ramsey]

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[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Hi. I. Two and a half years ago, I bought a car. And it's a good car. It's a 2018 Corolla, but I have a 16.5% interest on it and over half of my payments go only to interest. I'm actually the co signer on the car and my mother is the main signer on the car. And I have had job instability, housing instability over the years, and I'm just not putting my life together. But currently I haven't even been able to make my February car payment. So I also rely on this car as a source of income. So I. What are you. What is your advice on the car.

[Jade Washaw]

I would look for a different, I would start looking for a different source of income that's not tied to this car. My guess is you're doing some of the. One of the delivery apps.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah, I'm actually a Lyft driver. I had a dead end job. I quit that, but I got a new job. That is a really good job, but it just, it doesn't start for a couple more weeks.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much are you gonna be making at the new good job?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

About three to 4,000 a year.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

It's, you mean a month or months?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

I mean, sorry, months. I, I, I am a swim instructor and I'm contracting with a pool that pays very well for their lesson.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay, and then what's, what do you owe? What's the total amount owed on this car?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

I owe 16,200 and I originally paid 18,500.

[Jade Washaw]

Have you looked to see what it's worth? If you looked on Kelley Blue Book. Have you looked to see what it's worth? Private sale.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yes, it's worth 7, 500.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, boy.

[Jade Washaw]

What happened to it?

[Dave Ramsey]

She's been driving Uber.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, that's true.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Years on and off.

[Dave Ramsey]

Destroyed the car.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay, well, then your only choice here, you're, I mean, you're gonna have to pay it off because it's such a low value and you're gonna have to work quickly to do it. Is it your only debt?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Definitely not. I've got about $50,000 in student debt and I ended up dropping out of school due to mental health issues. And I have about $25,000. 20 to 25,000 in personal loans and credit cards. And then I have an. I don't even know how many thousands of dollars in medical debt. I don't even like, know.

[Jade Washaw]

So you're going to be doing, you'll be doing swim lessons at this place. How long is it going to take you to build up your lesson pool to make 4,000amonth or is there a base pay?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Because I make, I'm going to be making about 30 to $40 an hour.

[Dave Ramsey]

Are they going to work you 40 hours?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

That's the plan. But yeah, that's the problem is that it does depend on how many clients they get. They do get a lot of clients.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, I'd be looking really deeply into that. First off. And my homework for you leaving this call is I would have something else lined up that gives me the ability to work because you don't know how to, how many clients they're going to send your way and you don't know how quickly your calendar is going to fill up. And you've got to get started on this debt asap. Because here's the thing. If you default on another payment, it's really going to mess with your mom. I'm sure it already has, right?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah. I feel bad for my mom, and I. My mom does try to help when she can, but she's already. She's a single mom raising my teen. Teenage brother with special needs, so she's already strapped a lot.

[Dave Ramsey]

What we've got to start with, let's go back to basics. All right?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Before you do anything else with money, you take care of food, shelter, basic clothing, transportation, and utilities. Okay? Do you pay. Do you pay rent?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

I do. And I live in the smallest, cheapest apartment I could find here in Phoenix. And I.

[Dave Ramsey]

Perfect. So you pay the rent. So you pay the rent and you go to the grocery store. Stop. You pay the rent, you go to the grocery store, you get the car current. Before you do anything. All the other debts can wait till you pay rent, get the car current, get. Get food on the table. Okay. Before you do anything, you got to bail the basic foundation in your life, and that's food, shelter, clothing, transportation, and utilities. Okay? Now, once you're current on the car, then you can decide. Let's reach out to the student loan people, let them know you need a hardship deferral, and send them some of the paperwork on some of the mental illness issues you've had. And just to let the bureaucrats have something to chew on for a little while while they wait around, you do nothing. You quit paying them for right now. And then you get this book of business at the swim lessons full as fast as you can. And Jade's right. In the meantime, and even after, I want you to work all the time, because what you need to fix your whole life right now is $16,000. Yeah, if you had $16,000 in this car, payment was gone. We could really get after some of those other debts, couldn't we?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah, it feels like that. That car loan is a big wall between me and basically the rest of my life.

[Dave Ramsey]

Agreed. Agreed. So we need to go find an extra $2,000 a month for eight months and smack this thing in the head. Okay, but that means, like, all you do is work, girl. You just work all. And it's not Uber. Freaking Uber is making the car worse, okay? You're putting so many miles on, you've destroyed the value of the car. So. Yeah, but if they. If you could. If you can work 80 hours a week with swim lessons. Just put your fins on and go, right?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean if you can't get, if you can't get a bunch of hours down there, then let's find something else that you can do. That's the thing where you make the most possible money. That's moral and legal. Okay. And I want you to go cray cray for a while because the way you bust this is you throw dynamite in the middle of it and the dynamite is dollar bills.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Okay?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I like that.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you just say food, shelter, lights and water and pay off the stinking car. And that's all I am breathing to do right now. I breathe in and out every morning. I'm tired because I work all the time, but by God, I'm making progress for the first time in five years. Yes, you can do this. You can do it. What was the nature of your mental illness stuff?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

I have a level 1 high functioning autism and that has made it hard for me to hold a regular full time job. And then I also have because of that stem, so like some anxiety and depression I have over the last few months gotten on the right meds, got into the stable housing and finally I'm starting to get my finances stable. I'm trying to do baby step one right now.

[Dave Ramsey]

Here's the thing, here's what. I've worked with them in 35 years of doing this, I've worked with a whole bunch of people that both had high level functioning autism and I've worked with a whole bunch of people that had depression. And the thing I know is the depression is made worse when you feel trapped and when you're not in action mode. When you get in action mode and get in warrior mode and get in attack mode, it helps because it releases the dopamine and other things and it helps to melt away the depression and, and the autism. Can. The high functioning autism can actually work in your favor in those situations because you have the ability to do extreme amounts of focus, don't you?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah, I am really good at teaching people to swim. And actually the gym I'm working at is called ability360 and it's actually an adaptive gym and most of their employees

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

have some kind of disability.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And anything you can do to help people work out. If you could do a personal trainer thing going like I was going to

[Jade Washaw]

say, you need to go to the.

[Dave Ramsey]

What we're going to do is use all of this situation to your advantage. The thing that has been a blocker for you because as you start melting away these debts. First and foremost, you get this car off your back, off your mother's back, your brain is going to clear up the fog that you've been walking in. The stress related anxiety of feeling trapped in 16% and feeling honestly shame about signing up for 16% too. That was dumb. So you're not dumb, but that was dumb. So you know what you do is you get an attack mode warrior girl. You put on your warrior stuff and you get after it, complete focus. I don't want you to pay anybody else, just let them all go bad. I don't really give a crap about your credit. You already don't have credit. We know that because you had a 16.8% car payment. We know your credit's trash already. So I'm not worried about that at all. I'm worried about you. I want you to be free. So you hang on and we'll get you signed up for every dollar and that'll help you walk through this stuff as.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Well.

[Dave Ramsey]

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[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I'm good.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

So I have some whole life policies that me and my wife got like when we were like 20.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

I'm 50.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I'll be 55 this year.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm sorry.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

And I, I know, I know. I've heard. I've been listening to you for the last year or so. But my question is on it, should we Cash surrender those. There's each about a hundred thousand cash surrender. I don't think we have to pay on anymore. I think they've. We've had them since we were so young that I think they pay for themselves each year now.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

And I don't know if it's worth, I don't necessarily need, I mean I could always use extra money, but I don't know if it's worth doing the cash to render on those policies or just leave them. They're small. I think they're $150,000 policies or something like that when we got them originally.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you have $150,000 policy with $100,000 cash value, is that right?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you have two.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

And you have two grows like they sold you on that stuff when you're young.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, I'm going to make sure I understand what you've got. Stop a second. Do you have two $150,000 policies and each of them have $100,000 cash value in them?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes. If we were to surrender them now.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's what I'm asking. Okay, good. Okay. And so if you die, you know they keep the 100,000, right. So you have $50,000 worth of insurance in essence. Do you follow me?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah. That. I kind of heard that the other

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

day on one of your shows and

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I, that I didn't understand.

[Dave Ramsey]

I don't understand it either because it's the biggest screwdriver of the middle class in my life I've ever seen. But it happens all the time. So that's how a whole life policy

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

have a two million dollar term policy that we got a few years ago.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you're covered if you die. Right? You don't need them.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah. No, and, and my question is even about the term too is like do I need to keep that up if my value or like my personal value or me, my wife's value is over that amount. Should I like do I need that life insurance or is it just keeping even after.

[Dave Ramsey]

What life insurance is for is to take care of her if something happens to you. If you have $5 million in mutual funds, you don't need life insurance. She's taken care of. Okay, does that make sense?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

What life insurance for is to take care of you if something happens to her. And if you have a big pile of money and you're okay without her income, then she doesn't need. You're self insured on all of it. Okay. Then back to the whole life. The whole life is paying an average of about 2% in growth on that hundred thousand. Had that 100,000 been in mutual funds last year, it would have made 24%. On average it would have made more like 12%. So you're losing somewhere around 10 to $20,000 a year in growth because that's so poorly invested. Oh, and by the way, when you die, they're going to pay $150,000 out.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay?

[Dave Ramsey]

Not 100,000, not plus 100,000.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Do I have to pay if we do the cash surrender, do we have to pay tax on that?

[Dave Ramsey]

Your tax basis in a whole life policy is what you have paid into it over all these years. I Suspect you've paid $100,000 into this over all these years.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I would assume so.

[Dave Ramsey]

Your basis is probably higher. It almost always is. If it's not, it won't be by much. So if you have taxes it'll be very, very, very small. But if you just say here's what my premiums were over this number of years and number of months or whatever it is, you know, the 25 or 30 years you've been getting ripped off, then easily you probably paid in 100k, you're going to get your money back out. And yes, I would cash it in. And if. What did you, what do you think your net worth is?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I mean, I think it's close to 6, maybe 6 million. To sell everything? Yeah, if I were to sell everything.

[Dave Ramsey]

So do you think the, the current asset base would generate enough income for your wife to be okay if you died today?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I mean. I think so. I hope so.

[Dave Ramsey]

I hope so too. So, yeah, I think, I think pretty easily.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

That's, I mean that was kind of

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

one of my other questions is I got this, I got some industrial property that I don't necessarily need anymore that I have that I still owe about. I mean if I were to sell it, I could cash that out for about 2 million bucks maybe after taxes. But I do make income on that.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's up to you. What do you want your money invested in? That's an investment. And then you look at it and say, is this an investment that's giving me enough yield on my money? I mean long term investments, you ought to be making 10 plus percent on whatever it is, real estate, mutual funds, whatever. There's not really anything else that you should. That's fairly low risk portfolio that'll do that. Mine make a lot more than that and I don't take a lot of risk. But you gotta look at that piece of industrial property is it making you a good return and then dump that. But folks, the whole life cash value policy is the biggest ripoff in the financial planning world. I mean, it's like the payday lender to the middle class. Payday lender screws poor people, right? And these people screw you. And it's a horrible rate of return when you die. They keep your money because you've been paying extra for this savings account that you don't get. They only pay the face value when you die. It's that simple. And so get some inexpensive term insurance while you need insurance. This guy doesn't even need that anymore, probably. And put your money, your investment money in good investments that go up and they don't keep it when you die. And then you're not building a building in the skyline for somebody else. Or you think those life insurance buildings came from. They didn't come from Santa Claus. I know that same place those banks came from. They didn't come from Santa Claus. It came from them screwing you with credit cards all these years. And you're just smiling and going, I got airline miles. And you're just getting screwed over and over and over again. And it's just, you know, that's how this stuff happens. It's called a transfer of wealth from you to them because they're screwing you. So you just learn about these things and you go, never again. Changes everything. James is in Columbus, Ohio. Hi, James. How are you doing?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Well, how are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay. I have my youngest sister. She and her ex boyfriend inherited a quarter million dollars about three to four years ago. He has since passed from cancer and he, at the time, I was going through a messy divorce and he gave me $6,000 to pay for my lawyer so I can take care of my divorce. I'm going through a rough time as a gift. And since then, you know, he's passed on, like I said. And she has blown through all that money in the meantime and is back to square one again.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Wow.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

And yeah, and she has not come out and said directly to me, but I heard it through my other sister and she keeps asking, you know, saying, hey, he needs to pay me back that $6,000. You know, that's, that was my money.

[Jade Washaw]

And so she's saying that he, the boyfriend got the money from her and lent it to you.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

No, no, no. It was his, his parents. It was his inheritance from his parents.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, okay.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah. And, and I can afford to pay it back now. I've been having a good spot in my life, and I can afford to. To pay it back. I just don't feel like, Yeah, I have to. I've helped her out with bills and stuff now that she's a hell out of money. Like, you know, the occasional electric bill, things like that, where she's called me up and said, hey, can. You know, I've done stuff like that.

[Dave Ramsey]

Y' all are a hot mess, aren't you?

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, right?

[Jade Washaw]

Are you. Are you afraid that she's gonna do. You're just afraid. You're like, why do I give her another $6,000 to be irresponsible with is what you're saying.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

That.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

And, you know, she has three kids with them. They're older. They're 17, 18 in that range.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

But.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, I mean, there's James. There's two options, okay? The third option is not keep whining about it, okay? I would either call her and say, your boyfriend gave me this money. It's a gift. I'm not gonna pay it back. Or I'd write her a check. But third option, I'm gonna keep whining about this, and y' all keep this family drama going on. On. And who said what and who told GE and good Lord, for $6,000, straighten it up. At Ramsey, we don't partner with companies chasing trends or pushing gimmicks. Trust is earned. And that's why we send people to Fairwinds Credit Union. See, a lot of banks rely on teaser rates, marketing hype, and fine print. But that's not how Fair Winds operates. They've been serving members for 75 years. And you don't last that long by cutting corners. You last by serving people well, there's a reason their name is on the studio wall. They built products that help you manage money intentionally, not pull you into debt. If you're looking for a practical way to organize your money the Ramsey way, check out the Fairwinds Smart bundle. It pairs a high yield savings account for your emergency fund with a checking account that doesn't drain your balance with fee after fee after fee after fee. Open your Fairwinds Smart Bundle today at Fairwinds.org Ramsey and get the Ramsey Be Weird debit card. That's Fairwinds.org Ramsey insured by the NCUA. Leland is in Oklahoma City. Hi, Leland. How are you?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

All right. How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

So, I've got a question. I'm 22 years old. I started a business last year, and it's kind of just went backwards on Me where I'm to the point now where I've got a piece of equipment that I'm sitting here staring down the barrel of a gun, where they're basically probably going to have to come repossess it the 1st of April.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you started what kind of business on

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

custom dry fertilizer spreading business.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, and so you bought a. What is the equipment?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

It's a applicator that applies dry fertilizer on fields.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what. How much do you owe on it?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

178,000. My annual payment on it's 40. $40,000 a year. And everything just went backwards.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm confused. I'm confused why they would loaned a 22 year old $178,000 on a piece of farm equipment.

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

Well, because I had a way to get into the business. And then since then it's just went backwards. Since then I had the money for a down payment. Put the money down.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much did you put down?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

12,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

But still, I mean, you were not even. Were you in the business already?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

I've been in agriculture business all my life.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're 22?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Okay. All my life is not long.

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

Well, I've been doing it ever since I could.

[Dave Ramsey]

I know, honey, but I'm talking about what moron loans you $178,000 with a $12,000 down payment when you're 22 years old. There's nothing, there's nothing that says this deal should have happened.

[Jade Washaw]

Leland, you can't turn around and sell it.

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

I've been trying to and I've tried selling it with an auction company, but they wanted me to put a hundred thousand dollars up front before they'd even sell it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, and so you had grand plans of spreading a lot of fertilizer. What happened?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

I put my name out within 100 mile radius. And the farm economy the way it is, fertilizer prices is high and there's not a lot of people doing dry. They're all going different routes.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm sorry, hon. This is scary, isn't it?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

Yeah, it definitely is. Yeah, it's definitely scary to be sitting here in this position. It's just been haunting me ever since, I guess.

[Dave Ramsey]

All right, well, I went broke when I was 28 and I had more zeros on the end of my stupidity than you do. So I got you beat, right? Because this was straight up stupid. And the guy that loaned you the money deserves to lose $100,000. Whatever company did this, what's the name of the company?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

I can't remember. Off the top of my head, and I.

[Dave Ramsey]

You owe them $178,000 and you don't know the name of the company?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

Well, I do. It's on a piece of paper at my house. And I don't have that information in front of me.

[Dave Ramsey]

You bought it at a dealership, didn't you? What brand is it?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

John Deere?

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, I guess so. So you don't know John Deere Incorporated the money?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

No, no, absolutely not.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right.

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

And my plan was, you know, do 10,000 acres a year. That can be done extremely easy. And I found out the hard way that it has not been near as easy as what everybody said it was supposed to be.

[Dave Ramsey]

So the moral of the story is, we don't borrow money to start businesses because things never turn out exactly the way they're supposed to in business.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

They.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's the rule of business. And so that's a lesson that, sadly, you have learned. The only good news is you Learned it at 22. I learned it at 28. So I had the rest of my life to not do that stupid mistake again. And you have the rest of your life to not do this stupid mistake again. So the next time you have a bright idea and someone wants to loan you money to do your bright idea, you tell them no, right?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, Good. All right. So we've learned our lesson. Now let's walk through it. I'm so sorry. Honestly. So I do not know a way around this because I don't know your world. I'm still just sitting here aghast that someone loaned you that money, loaned you $178,000 to spread fertilizer. There's just so many fertilizer jokes that I could weave into this. But, yeah, it just kind of comes. They just roll off the mind right now. But anyway, the. The spreading of fertilizer is pretty thick here. But the. So let me tell you what I think is going to happen and how you can handle it. Okay. I think you're going to get repoed at the first of the month. I don't know how to tell you to stop that with anything that's reasonable. One thing you could stop it with is a Chapter 13 bankruptcy. But that's a. Or a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, even in this case. But that's a pipe dream because the business idea is dead, and there's no way to revive the cash flow. If you could revive the cash flow starting two months from now, you know, we could delay the repo and put it. By putting it into a bankruptcy But I wouldn't do that here because I think this business idea is just a swing and a miss, right? So I think they're taking it at the first of the month, okay? Then what's going to happen is they're going to sell the piece of equipment for X number of dollars at that same auction and then they're going to come knocking on your door for the difference. It's called the deficit. Okay? So let's play pretend. Let's play pretend. And it's 178,000 owed and they sell the piece of equipment for 100,000 and they come see you for 78,000. You're 22 years old, you don't have any money, right? That's where we're going to be. It's probably going to be a year before they knock on your door wanting the difference. It's not going to be soon, okay? And when they do, normally what happens is they push you and push you and the person files bankruptcy and they get Nothing on their 78,000. In our example story here, okay? However, you have a year to prepare for this battle. And were you to save up during this coming year by working your little tail end off $25,000 and you offer them $25,000 as settlement in full on the deficit, they'll probably take it because they're used to getting nothing, right? We settle deficits on car repos at 20, 25 cents on the dollar every day. I've not done it much on farm equipment, so I don't know that world, but it's probably pretty close. And the reason we're able to settle those deficits at that is because they very seldom collect anything. Usually the person files chapter seven bankruptcy, they get a big goose egg. Zero. Especially when you look at it through the creditor's eyes. Not to put you down, Leland, but looking at it from the banker's perspective, I'm trying to get money out of a 23 year old who's broke. The likelihood of that's close to zero,

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

right?

[Dave Ramsey]

So if he stands up and offers me 25k, I do a little happy dance and take it. If I'm the banker, you follow me? So what are you gonna do for a living now that your life is starting over, sir?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

I mean, I'm pretty much self employed and don't, I mean, I don't have a college degree.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what are you gonna do for a living, sir? You're gonna fall, you're gonna farm. Whose farm are you farming?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

Some, some friends.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're going to work on a farm?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

For someone else.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what does that pay?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

It just depends. Sometimes $25 an hour, depending on who you're working for.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

All right.

[Dave Ramsey]

And then ask yourself, what do I want to be doing when I'm 32, that I'm a millionaire and it's not $25 an hour work? I'll help you with that.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

And it's not going into that. 178,000 to spread manure. Oh, no, this was dry. I'm sorry. Okay. But anyway, you see the point. So you got to figure out, what am I going to do next? Because one of the things that I discovered when I went bankrupt, because I couldn't turn it around the way I think you actually can turn it around. If you'll work like a crazy person and stack cash and keep your living expenses very, very low, I think you can scratch up some cash and settle the deficit. When they do come after you one or two years from now, don't call them. Wait for them to call you. And in the meantime, build a war chest. And then settle it in full in writing. Settlement. And I think you can get through this. I really do. And then you could just look at this in the rearview mirror as that dumb thing I did when I was 22. I can look at my life in the rearview mirror. That whole series of dumb things I did when I was 28. You can. You guys paid off, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars because of dumb things you did in your early 20s.

[Jade Washaw]

A lot of stupid things.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And so it's. You know, you're talking to the choir here. Okay? Singing with the choir, so. But I do want you to develop a future and a plan that doesn't involve a Hail Mary. You threw a Hail Mary into the end zone and got intercepted. Don't do that again. Learn. Learn from the mistake. And we'll walk with you. Anything you need, Leland, you call me. And if you want to save up that money and when they mess with you, you call me. I'll teach. I'll walk you through it. I'll show you how to negotiate with them.

[Guest Announcer / Jeff Zander]

Dave, we got a lot of calls on this show where life happens. One day, someone's healthy, they're working, providing for their family, and. And then a curveball hits.

[Dave Ramsey]

You know, we hear it all the time. A car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, and suddenly everything changes. Yeah.

[Guest Announcer / Jeff Zander]

And that's why you've always said that having term life insurance from Xander is essential because it protects your family. If the worst happens.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that's right. You need 10 to 12 times your income in coverage. No gimmicks, no whole life junk, just straightforward term life protection. But there's another piece that people often overlook and that's long term disability insurance.

[Guest Announcer / Jeff Zander]

Yeah, it's important to understand the difference between them. Life insurance steps in when you die. Disability insurance steps in while you're alive but can't work. So it replaces a large part of your income so the bills still get paid while you get back on your feet.

[Dave Ramsey]

Now, if your employer gives you free disability insurance, great, take it. If it's discounted there at a better price, take it. But if not, Zander can help you find the right plan whether you're single or married. It's not optional. If you're going to be out of work for a while, then you need to make sure the money's still showing up.

[Guest Announcer / Jeff Zander]

And that's why Zander is our go to. They make it super simple to get the right coverage at the best price. No pressure, no upselling.

[Dave Ramsey]

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

[Guest Announcer / Jeff Zander]

So don't wait. It's fast, it's easy and it could make all the difference. Go to zander.com or call 800-356-4282.

[Dave Ramsey]

Protect yourself, protect your income, protect your family. Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Fair Winds Credit Union studio. I'm Dave Ramsey. Your host Jade Washall Ramsey personality number one best selling the all author is. My co host Diane is in Chicago. Hey Diane, how are you?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Hi. I'm doing well, how are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Oh, yeah, same here. Well, I thank you for taking my call. I currently have

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

quite a bit of

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

money in the bank I feel and I am thinking about my retirement and I'd like to know how best I should invest it in order to make it last through retirement.

[Jade Washaw]

How much is it?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

So I have 600,000 in the bank. I'm debt debt free. I have just 250,000 in retirement which I don't know what to do with because it's been with a payroll service since we had owned our own business. And it's just been sitting there. I don't know what to do with it. I know nothing about it. I wasn't actively involved in our business. I stayed home and took care of our kids, raised them and have decided to go into my own franchise. And so I know that I will be using some of that money for the franchise. But I don't know that just sitting in a bank is the best place for it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. How old are you?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

57.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And you said you were not involved in the business, and now you're opening a franchise with the business money?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

So your husband was running the business?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Where is he?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

He's. He's at home. He is supporting me on my business. He's hoping at some point he'll be able to branch out and do something on his own. But everything's been in my name. The bank accounts, the houses, the business. We sold the business last year, and then.

[Dave Ramsey]

That where the 600 grand came from?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yeah, we sold it for 1.2 million. But we were given a large lump sum, and we paid off some unexpected unknown debts.

[Jade Washaw]

Like. Okay, unknown. You're being cryptic.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

I didn't. I. I didn't know about it.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're gonna have to tell. You're gonna tell us what's going on, because you're not. It's not making my home.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

My.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

My husband has a gambling debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

I don't know what He. He gets. He gets a set amount every month that comes in that he collects, and he uses that for extracurricular activities. I have no idea.

[Jade Washaw]

You don't know how much he's.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Oh, no, I know how much he gets. He gets $3,600 a month, and that's his play money.

[Dave Ramsey]

So he's basically got a gambling problem that ran you guys deeply in debt, and that's why everything's in your name.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right, that makes sense.

[Jade Washaw]

So who's supplying the $3,600 a month for him to continue gambling?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

We have $2,500 coming in from a rental that. That person bought the business, and he has the option to buy by the end of the year for 350,000 if he exercises that right. And then he also gets Social Security, eleven hundred dollars a month.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so at this point, you're okay with losing $40,000 a year with your husband?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

No, I'm not, but I have no control over that.

[Jade Washaw]

What's the. What's the plan moving forward? Does he know that? Does he know?

[Dave Ramsey]

You apparently have a lot of control. You got everything in your name, right?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Everything's in my name. He knows that I'm opening up this franchise, which will be approximately $125,000, to open the franchise on my own. He. He's just kind of like, leaving. Letting me leave the money in the bank, but I feel like it's not getting the best return. So I'm looking for ways that I can invest it.

[Jade Washaw]

I mean we could tell you to get with the smartvestor pro and invest that money, but I really don't feel like that's the issue of the conversation.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, there's a lot, there's so much going. Here's the problem. It's hard to fill up a hole while somebody's digging out the bottom.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

And that, that's kind of what we're hearing here. But you feel like you've got him, his, his gambling addiction under control. And I question that because I've seen, I've seen so many. Well, I mean, but, but, and so as long as you keep this stuff in your name, I guess you have the option of divorce at some point. If he runs up, you know, let's say he runs up a million dollar gambling debt and you don't want to pay it with the money that's in your name, then you've only got one option at that point. So anyway, that's what you're facing. So yeah, I would take the 600,000 and I'd take the 250,000 and I would sit down with a smartvestor pro and begin to invest it in good mutual funds. If it averages 10% or more, it will double every seven years. So you basically got a million dollars in seven years. At 64 years old you'd have $2 million. At seven more years, at 71 years old you'd have $4 million. So you're going to be fine if you do that and you don piss it away with this franchise if this franchise doesn't go belly up on you. And so, and it sounds like you've never run a business before. He ran the business before and now you're buying a franchise. So that's a little concerning.

[Jade Washaw]

Is the franchise in the same like field of expertise or is it something totally different?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

No, it's something that I'm passionate about. Something that is for me, not for him. I don't accept his involvement in it, but I'm very confident and very passionate about this and I'm expecting for it to be very successful. And I have a family that is willing to stand behind me and support me. So that's not even a question whether or not that's going to be successful. I'm confident that it will be.

[Dave Ramsey]

I got to tell you that that's not true in the small business world. So there is risk that you're not perceiving, apparently. So yeah, you're going to buy it and you're going to do it. But I want to insulate you from you and this bad decision. If it's a bad decision. And I want to insulate you from him and his continuous bad decisions with 600 or more thousand dollars going over in a regular low risk investment in comparison to gambling and in comparison to franchise purchasing. And so let's put some money over there. So if these other two things go sideways and this plan doesn't work, then you know you've at least got that money working for you. So yeah, you need to sit down and do that and you need to put a real limit on the amount of dollars you're going to pour into the franchise before it starts giving you money back instead of you putting money into it. Absolutely. And because if you don't, with the level of unrealistic optimism that you're coming at this with and you're positive how positive you are about it, then you're going to end up going 300 grand in the hole on this thing. And if you want to put 125 in it and you believe in it, go do it. Go live your dream. I ain't got a problem with that. What I've got a problem with is these absolute statements. And I've been in business my whole life and there is no absolute 100% people are behind me. I feel positive. It's an area I'm passionate about. None of that may matter. You may still lose all that money. So don't, don't go into this 300 grand with all your positivity. If you want to put 125 in it, do it. And then I'd put the rest of it over and with a smartvestor pro and some good mutual funds and to where it's protected from this business risk and the gambling risk and separate these things.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, I'm just, I'm going to call it like I heard it. It almost sounded like this business for you was some sort of retaliatory thing against him to kind of prove that you're doing your thing over here and my thing, I would just say draw a line in the sand and set some boundaries about how long you're going to endure this and to what point. Point. Before you go and do the things that you need to do and make that separation so that he can get the help that he needs. Because allowing this to persist doesn't feel like the answer. It's. It feels like it's breeding resentment from you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh for sure. It kind of should.

[Jade Washaw]

Absolutely.

[Dave Ramsey]

Getting married changes something in you. It sure did in me. When you say I do, all of the sudden, life isn't just about you anymore. It's about we. And one of the most grown up things you can do for that we is to make a [e-mail] See, being a grown up isn't just about jobs and rent and splitting up the chores. It's about having a plan so the person you love is protected. And a will isn't about dying. It's about deciding. It puts your wishes in writing so no one has to guess and judges don't have the final say. That's why I recommend Mama Bear legal forms With Mama Bear. Making your will is easy. It's completely online, no lawyers required. You can get it done in about 20 minutes. The price you see at the start is the price you pay with Mama Bear. So if you're serious about being an adult, do this today. Go to mama bear legalforms.com use the promo code Ramsey and save 20% on your will. That's mama bear legal forms.com promo code Ramsay. Nicole is in Atlanta. Hi, Nicole, how are you?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Hi.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

I'm good. How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Good. What's up?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

So me and my husband live in

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

an apartment and we're trying to decide

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

if we should move to a bigger space because we do have two, three kids. So two or five year old twins and then a two year old baby girl. So last year we were able to pay off our vehicle, but we have $52,000 worth of student loan debt left and we were going to use, we've been using mostly like our overage, which is about eleven hundred dollars that we have a month to put towards our debt. And then we also pretty much use like our tax break or whenever that comes in to throw a lot at it, just in and out. So we're trying to see, we want them to, you know, have a space to have a yard and like just more space. A little bit cramped up with all five of us here. So we were just wondering if we should stay or if we should kind of go. Like our budget would be tighter, but we're trying to see what we should prioritize.

[Jade Washaw]

What are you guys earning between the two of you right now?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Gross would be 103,000.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay. The hard part with this is what you said. If you were to move from this apartment to a house, it's going to close the gap on how much margin you have to throw out this debt. Which means there's Going to be a longer period of time that you're going to be in debt, which long term, that's going to affect your ability to build wealth. For that reason, I like the idea of home ownership, but I think the first step in that process needs to be eliminating the debt so that you can actually go wholeheartedly into the home buying process and actually do it the right way so that it's a blessing for you.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're not even talking about homeownership. You're talking about renting a nicer place, aren't you?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah, yeah, we were actually, like, looking to. Our rent is 2200, and so we were wanting to rent, like, thinking about 25 as our max, 2,500. But that doesn't include, like, gas and utility. I'm sorry. You know.

[Jade Washaw]

Understood.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah. So we just don't know if that's going to be leaving us with 400 instead of a thousand.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much. How much debt have you paid off so far?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

36,000 was the vehicle.

[Dave Ramsey]

And how long did that take?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

That took us two years.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Making $130,000.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

103,000. Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. So you guys suck at this so far, Nicole?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

We suck.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. $18,000. Making 100 grand per year is not enough debt reduction. You guys are. You're still out. You're still going out to eat, you're still going on vacation, you're still spending money. You're still not on a tight budget. And. And so you made a little progress, but you should have made a lot more progress if you told me you paid off 36,000 in six months. See, then I can take that number and go, oh, wait a minute. You could clear up the rest of this in a year if you'd suck it up and get it done. But at the rate you're going, it's going to take you 10 years. Yeah, that ain't cool.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

That's true.

[Dave Ramsey]

That ain't right.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

That's how we feel.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, we gotta. We gotta not get stuck in that. And if you feel like you're never gonna get out, then you just so, well, the heck with it. I'll just take a big old rent and go ahead and enjoy my life now and get the kids a yard. And, you know, you give up. You're giving up is what you're doing, because you're not making fast enough progress. And so I'm gonna put you on the beans and rice plan. If I'm you, I'm going to sit down with my husband and go, look, we did a little bit here and we didn't do a bad thing, but we really weren't, it wasn't like we were spectacular. We kind of got the flu here and we need to really light this thing up instead of putting fifteen hundred dollars a month on it. We need to take extra jobs, we need to sell stuff, we need to not go out to eat. We need to tight, tight, tight, tight, tighten down this budget, not go the other way. And let's get this thing to 3000 or $4000 a month going at this 6000, 60,000 that's left and then we can get out in about 14 or 15 months. Then we talk about building an emergency fund and then we talk about buying a house, not renting one. Yeah, but what you're talking about is a five or a six year plan and you won't even make it.

[Jade Washaw]

I agree. I, I, if you can have these kids, they're young right now, right? They're five years old, three years old. Now's the time that they can be squished and they don't know the difference. You know the difference, but they don't know the difference. And I for one would try to stay in that position as long as possible and save as much money as possible so that you can pay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Listen, if they're squished and their life is miserable for one year, they'll be fine. That's better than them being not squished and having a mediocre to average life for the rest of their life.

[Jade Washaw]

You want to know what though? I think back a lot of times on the house that I grew up in and I think back on the house that my parents grew up in with six kids.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, nobody told us they were tiny. Nobody told us we were squished. No, we were, but nobody told us we were. There's a thousand square foot brick ranch. Hello. And so, I mean we went out in the backyard and played. They'd say go play in the graphic outside.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, all the time.

[Dave Ramsey]

You tell your kids to go play in the traffic. You don't tell your kids?

[Jade Washaw]

I don't tell them to play in traffic. I just tell them.

[Dave Ramsey]

My mother would say that all the time. Don't play in the traffic. Get out of under my feet.

[Jade Washaw]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's what caused me to be the way I am. Dustin is in Coeur d', Alene, Idaho. Hey Dustin, what's up?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Hi.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

So I'll get right into it. My dad incurred about $30,000 in debt. He has no retirement. His only income is Social Security. He now has Dementia. And my brother and I are left kind of trying to manage this for him. He's currently being sued on one credit card for 8,000 and he owes 13,000 on another credit card. And I guess my question is, should we try and settle this with them?

[Dave Ramsey]

Does he own any.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

No. No assets.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, how would he settle it?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Essentially, my brother and I would have to help him out.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why? Why would you do that? Just tell him. Tell the credit card company to bite me.

[Jade Washaw]

He has no money. He has nothing to give.

[Dave Ramsey]

They can't get anything. He doesn't have anything, right?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, he has nothing. It's the only Social Security, and I don't believe they can touch that.

[Dave Ramsey]

They can't touch that. Does he own a home?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

No.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, he doesn't have any money in his bank account except the Social Security.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, it would. It would just be for me and my brother have one last thing to have to deal with.

[Dave Ramsey]

I wouldn't deal with it at all. I got one less thing. I'm just going to show them the smallest finger on my left hand and say, that's all. You get nothing.

[Jade Washaw]

Are they calling you?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

No, no.

[Dave Ramsey]

I just tell them to, you know, tell them jump in a creek. You shouldn't have load loan money to a guy who had dementia and no money.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay. And should I. Should I offer to have them sign a stipulated judgment to avoid additional attorney fees or.

[Dave Ramsey]

Who cares? They're not going to get any of it. What I would do is call them up and say, if you want to talk to him, call them up and just say this. Say, I want you to make a note in the file, he has advanced dementia and zero assets. We're not going to have any conversations with you. You might as well write this off because you're not getting a dime.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

And just real simple. I mean, let's pretend he had passed away. Okay. I just sent him a copy of the death certificate as a courtesy to let them know. And let them know that there's not a. There's no estate. And then. Then after that, I'm not having any more discussions with these people. They're morons.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah. None of this can pass to you if you're worried about that.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

No, yeah, I'm not worried about that.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I mean, it's his debt and I'm not responsible for that.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's just sad. And it's. It's one of this part. It's a sad sub chapter, sub paragraph in this overall sad story that you're dealing with. But what I would do is just Say, I'm not going to worry about it at all. And if you want to have one conversation, just as a courtesy, you could. But I'm not going to have lengthy conversations. I'm not going to have multiple conversations, and I'm not going to give them a dime. There's no point in it. They shouldn't have loaned him the money.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, I agree.

[Dave Ramsey]

And it's just sad. I'm sorry for you having to face that. And, you know, I've run into situations like that in my life. Dustin, how old are you?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

44.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, I've run into situations like that. And what I do is I say, okay, I gotta help my dad out. In your case, this is what you're saying, I gotta help my dad out. And this is a sad situation. And so what I'm going to get from this is a lesson to never end up like this.

[Jade Washaw]

Right?

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm going to do whatever it takes in my life to not end up this way. It's like, you know, I was working for a guy one time, he goes, I might be working in McDonald's at my retirement, but it'll be the one I own in St. Thomas.

[Jade Washaw]

Come on, now.

[Dave Ramsey]

So I'm going to learn a lesson from those old people standing there working in McDonald's because they don't have any money. I don't want to be one of them. And so you look at this and you go, he's got no assets. He's got dementia. And the only positive thing in his life is he's got two sons that love him and are going to care for him. Other than that, this guy's a pauper. We would use old language, but it's very sad. And so take it as a lesson to go, I'm never. You know. And then you teach your kids, your grandpa ended up that way. Your grandpa was not a bad person, but this is how he ended up, and this is how we're not. From this point forward, the family tree changes. We're shifting it. It's over. So take a lesson from it. At least. At least get that out of it. But no, I wouldn't give those guys any money. Not a dime.

[Sponsor Voice / Dr. John Deloney]

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[Dave Ramsey]

Well, we love debt free screams. We love them in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on our debt free stage. We super love them when it's one One of our Ramsey team members. TJ is with us here with his wife Alice, and he's a project manager on the Every dollar team. Been with us about a year and they get to come in here and do their debt free scream. Welcome, guys.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

Thank you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good to have you. How nerve wracking is this?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

It's we're here and it's finally real.

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

Love it.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much have you paid off?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

$165,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

I love it. How long did that take?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

15 months.

[Jade Washaw]

Awesome.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And you've been here about a year. So you started on it before. How long you all been married?

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

One year and eight months.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, wow. So moving here, getting married, starting the debt free journey all in the last two years?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Yep.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow. Where'd you move from?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Central Illinois, but we're originally from Chicagoland.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right, so you got married and did you come to Nashville to take the Ramsey job?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Yep.

[Megan]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

And project manager at Every Dollar. Well, that's awesome. So you people out there that are using every dollar to get out of debt, it's all TJ's fault. All the things that are awesome about it. It's all TJ's fault. He's one of the many talented folks we got on that team really, really working on this. So what kind of Debt was the 165,000?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Yeah, it was 107 in student loans and then 58 in new cars. This was blue before learning about Ramsey.

[Dave Ramsey]

Right, Gotcha. Okay. Very cool. How's it feel to be free?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Liberating, liberating, peaceful. It was the best sleep we've Ever got? Well, I've gotten the past two years was October 30th, when we made our final payment, Filled in the rest of that. I saw the thermometer that we had up there. Filling that in, calling those that supported us all along the way, and just being able to cheer it.

[Dave Ramsey]

So how did the order of events go about learning about doing the Ramsey stuff, coming to work here, getting married, all that. How's that all that line up?

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

So we got the total money makeover as a wedding gift.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

It was not on our registry. We were not familiar.

[Dave Ramsey]

It seldom is.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

So TJ read the book about three times, and then he started on this journey to try to coerce me into reading it. He was saying that it's Bible based, which really resonated with me. And then he was like, dave's really funny. Which I was like, hmm, let me see for myself. And I loved it. We had a conversation where we had combined our finances after getting married and realized that we had $2,800 of minimum payments, and we didn't feel like we were able to really live, even though we had two pretty good incomes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Very cool. What do you do?

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

I'm a nurse.

[Dave Ramsey]

Awesome. Very cool. Good. Yeah. That is two good incomes. Excellent. Well done, y'. All.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. So you get married, you get the book, and you get on the same page. And then how does he end up with this job? That's weird.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Well, it all came down to we were Dave. Ish. Around Thanksgiving, I got to talk to my Uncle Matt and Aunt Gina, who were the ones that gifted us total money makeover. And we're like, we're doing it. We're doing it. And they were like, are you really doing it?

[Caller 4 / Various Callers]

Oh.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

And we were like, well, we have 20,000 savings while we're trying to pay down the debts we, you know, we paid for our wedding, and anything that was a gift, we just threw at debt. And I'm like, that felt good. Let's keep going. And they were like, hey, check out their website for additional resources. And I was like, okay, cool. So I started looking around. I saw there's a careers page. I'm like, all right, let's see what this is all about. Saw some jobs. I was like, I could probably do that. I applied previous role. I applied for hundreds of jobs, and then I eventually got my one. I was like, all right, Lord, if you open up the doors for me, I'm going to continue to walk through them and however, 12 steps to get here.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Hiring process. Yeah, but, you know, it really felt like God called me here, able to serve, be able to be here and help spread hope to other people.

[Jade Washaw]

That's really awesome. So what are you going to do to celebrate?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

We did. We did.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

We bought a king size bed.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

Best sleep of my life.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, I love that. That's exactly right.

[Dave Ramsey]

I thought he was sleeping better because he got out of bed.

[Jade Washaw]

I did too, but they got a

[Dave Ramsey]

new mattress because he got a new mattress is what it was. That's great.

[Jade Washaw]

That's excellent.

[Dave Ramsey]

Very cool. All right, so what advice do you have? What do you tell people when they say, how did you do that? How do you pay off 165,000 newly married in 15 months? That's over $10,000 a month.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Yeah. God's blessings for sure. Everything kind of had to come right together. We wrote down October of 2025, and when I first. When we were writing that, I'm like, everything is going to have to come out right in order for this to happen. And God's blessings allowed us to be there. New opportunities. She was travel, nursing, good money, which is where a lot of all of that came from.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that's good money.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

And it took a lot of sacrifice. I mean, I had to move down here and I was here for about a month and a half before she got to come down after she wrapped up.

[Jade Washaw]

That is a big sacrifice.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

So she was doing some roles that were about an hour and a half away. So a lot long commute. And I appreciate all the sacrifices that we were able to make, both of us taking up multiple jobs, to be able to get there and just want to be an inspiration to others.

[Dave Ramsey]

So working here can be a mixed blessing because everybody's like, everybody's doing this. It's like the positive peer pressure, but it's also pressure. I mean, was it helpful to have your team, you know, all up in your business or, you know, your buddies cheering you on, or was that a back? I mean, they're all standing out there. You better be nice. But I mean, is it helpful to be in this kind of environment when you're doing it or not? I think it could work against you. Yeah.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

At least I can tell my side. It's been extremely. It's a support system. If we didn't believe in it, then yes, I think it'd be a whole lot of different pressure that we're like, oh, I don't really want to do it. But we believed in it. We knew that was gonna be good for us. Changing our family tree, going through financial peace University, really seeing the whole scope of where your life can change and being able to use every dollar to keep us on track and on budget along for that.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

It was a blessing for us because as far as our friends and family, it's still kind of a mixed bag as far as, you know, their thoughts on our journey. So we committed to it. It was amazing for TJ to be working in an environment where we got that support. So it ultimately was such a blessing.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Cool. Very cool.

[Jade Washaw]

Any setbacks on the way?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Right after we got out of it, I had to. We had some. I had some health stuff that came up. So we got debt free, and then we were able to cash flow 10k in medical expenses, and now we're tacking on taxes, but we were able to cash flow at all car repairs and all that. We were able to cash flow it as we went.

[Dave Ramsey]

So it's about time to celebrate with some of it. Oh, my gosh. That's enough. Enough already. So you're working on an every dollar. Your project manager on every dollar. The journey and now the freedom has to affect how you look at all those projects.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Yeah, just.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, you're not agnostic anymore. You're in it.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

You're able to just focus. It's being able to say, okay, this. I'm a product of this.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

I believed in it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

It makes it that much more motivating to be able to come in every single day, come into work knowing that I made a difference not only for myself, but for everyone outside of these walls, which I know we preach very dearly here. It's truly inspiring. It's just so nice to be a part of it. Something that you believe in and you're able to say, I'm affecting this. I'm changing this. I'm trying to make this better. I'm trying to make it easier to work the Ramsey plan.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

And that's all the motivation you need.

[Dave Ramsey]

Amen. Amen. I'm proud of y'.

[Jade Washaw]

All. Yeah. Excellent job.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well done. And the team's out here gathered, and none of them are working. They're all here to cheer you on. And this is great. I'm glad they're here to cheer you on. It's very, very cool. Congratulations, you two.

[Nathan]

Thank you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Very well done. All right. We don't ask when our team members on. We don't ask their household income because all their friends are standing around, and that's not fair. But they did pay off $165,000 in 15 months. Count it down. Let's hear a debt free scream.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

Three, two, one.

[Jade Washaw]

We're debt free. So good.

[Dave Ramsey]

This is how you do it, ladies and gentlemen.

[Jade Washaw]

Love it.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Man.

[Dave Ramsey]

You know, I can't imagine coming to work in a place like this right after I got married. The place I went to work right after I got married was bad.

[Jade Washaw]

I mean, lucky for them it's great because now you're submerged by everything. You need to get off on the right foot financially.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, Yeah. I mean, it's like you don't have a choice around here. I mean. Well, you're on stage this morning, staff meeting, doing walk the talk.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

We have a whole system here where we're not being hypocrites. The people that work here need to be doing the stuff we teach, you know? Hello.

[Jade Washaw]

100%. 100%.

[Dave Ramsey]

The non hypocrite system. Walk the talk.

[Jade Washaw]

Right on your honor. That's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And these guys, they, they did it. I'm so proud of them. $165,000.

[Jade Washaw]

We were smoking it 15 months, man.

[Dave Ramsey]

Let's get it done. Get her done. Logan's in Indiana. Hey, Logan, what's up? Wait a minute, let me try again. Hey, Logan, what's up?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Hey, sir, how are we doing? Thanks for taking my call.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure. How can I help?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Well, I'm trying to get some advice on my wife and I going into debt to start a cattle operation.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. How long you been listening to the show, Logan?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

About six months or so.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And so you know that about 95% of what we talk about is telling people to not go in debt and. And how to get out of debt, right?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, it is. I feel like I've heard a little bit of information with businesses that sometimes like buying a business or something that can depend on the profit that it brings and how quickly it can be paid off. So I wanted to.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

If that would work in this case.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, that would be like buying it from an owner. And the owner gets the prop. The former owner gets the profit. Until not borrowing $150,000 to buy cows from the bank. That's different. So I don't borrow money, Logan. And I've done that for 40 years. And I run a business and I've grown the business with the profits in the business without borrowing money to do it. And because the simple fact is this business has risk. When you borrow money to start a business or run a business, you increase the risk a hundredfold. A lot more chance that you're going to go bankrupt. And so what's your household income sir,

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

about 120 to 130,000 overtime.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good for you. So if you took out $150,000 loan, how fast could you pay it back?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Running the numbers that we ran, given the market now, and obviously, as long as it doesn't just completely tank out within about two years to three at the most, by your third, your third third round of cads, everything should be completely paid off. And it would be profit after that, minus operational cost.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. So what would be wrong with starting a little bit smaller and taking four years and making the thing cash flow its way to the exact same position by. By. By a third of what you're talking about buying with cash.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

And make that third by the next third. And by the next third, you don't need any money out of this cattle operation. You could pour every single dollar of profit into growing it. Agreed?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Correct. Yeah, that would be the plan.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because you have a good income at home already. And so I think it's what we call in business, organically growing the business with your cash, your own cash. And that's what we've done here. Although we weren't able to do it as fast as you're going to be able to do it. And that's assuming cattle prices don't do what they have done in the past, which is they're all over the freaking place, as you know. I'm sure you've looked at the trend lines on that. It's scary. So there's times the market has tanked and it's an agricultural product, and so it's. It's a lot more unpredictable than some other types of businesses. So you've got to be very, very careful. But if I were in your shoes, I would scratch the itch, but I would save up 50, $75,000 in cash by living on nothing. And I'd dump every bit of that in there, and then I'd take every dime of profit and use it to grow the business. And I think you'll be there one year later than you would have been there if you borrowed the money and everything went perfect. Which, by the way, nothing ever goes perfect.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Perfect. That. That is. That's true, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, you get. The cows get sick. There's all kinds of problems. There's, you know, the Brazilians decide they're going to come in and, you know, upset the beef market. I don't know. I mean, I don't know how those works, but there's always something, right?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Correct.

[Dave Ramsey]

So, yeah, I would rather you do that and, and be tired and stretched on your cash. And then no one's going to take it away from you. You're not going to lose everything because you rolled the dice on this particular horse race. I just crossed metaphors.

[Jade Washaw]

That's.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

All right, that. No, that, that makes sense. A follow up to that would be is if you were to cash flow this. What's your opinion on, you know, like leasing pasture and stuff? You look at that as debt or is that looked at a little bit different?

[Dave Ramsey]

No, that's just over. That's like, that's just like. Least. That's like leasing a building to run your business in instead. Instead of buying the building. That's. There's no problem. I would rent the pasture for sure.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because now we've got two businesses. If you, if you buy the pasture, you got two businesses. You got the real estate business and the farming business. Yeah, I mean, it's like. It's like me, I've got this building here that's 650,000 square feet. Like, you know, $600,600 million property. Right. So I've got this piece of real estate. I'm in the real estate business and I've got a business that's inside the real estate. But I've got two things going on here, Very substantial things, Ramsey. And a big old piece of real estate. Big campus here. Right. I mean, I'm in the office building business, period. No, no matter how you cut it and you can set. You can mix those two together and act like, well, they're all one thing. No, they're really not. It's. I've got a big old office building. I could at least it. There's six of them right down the road down here. I could at least another one. And not put, you know, not put, not put half a billion dollars into this thing, right? So that, that's, that's the thing. So just. No need to get in the real estate business. I just lease it. If you're gonna start a restaurant, for God's sakes, don't buy the building.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, gosh, please, no, just.

[Dave Ramsey]

Just rent the building and get started. You know, you start a daycare, rent the building and just don't, don't get in the real estate business until you've been in business a long time and you've got a predictable environment. But you don't have that there until then. So. Wow, Cool. I think we won that one.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, I think, I think he's going to take your advice.

[Dave Ramsey]

I think he's going to do it.

[Jade Washaw]

I Believe in him.

[Dave Ramsey]

I like it. I like Logan. All right. That's kind of nice. I'm. I like getting one occasionally. Leona's in Cincinnati. Hi, Leona. How are you?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Hi, Dave. Hi, Jade. I'm good. How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

So I have a quick question. So my husband and I, we have a one year old, and we recently moved. Well, not recently. Last year, we had switched from our apartment because of noisy neighbors and went to a townhome. The townhome. When we moved in there, it was not great. And we sent several emails to the leasing office about the issues that we were having and, you know, mold and spiders everywhere and centipedes and all these things happening in there. We told them that we are not happy with the townhome, and they said they'll fix things. Months went by. They weren't fixing anything, so we decided to just break our lease because I have legal shield through my job, and I reached out to an attorney through there, and they said, well, they failed to provide suitable living conditions. I have pictures of everything, and you don't owe anything, so you can break your lease and you'll be fine.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, boy.

[Jade Washaw]

That was not good advice.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, wow. Yeah. You got what you paid for with that lawyer.

[Jade Washaw]

Did you send them? Did you send. I mean, did you get any. Did you send them anything in writing? Did you do any. Did you do your due diligence other than just making a phone call?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Oh, no. So we definitely sent pictures. You mean to the leasing office?

[Jade Washaw]

Both. Did you send them? Did you let them know that you were seeking legal counsel on behalf? Like, did you go through the due diligence of making sure that they understand what's going on?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

I. Yeah. So I called the leasing office. My husband went up there because they weren't responding to my emails. My husband went up there. Up there. He talked to them. They said, okay, we'll take care of things. A couple months went by. Nothing was happening. The most they did was change the tray in the dishwasher.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so stop. Just stop. It's. You just moved out when you got mad because you called Legal Shield and they said you could.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yeah, well, we weren't. We weren't planning to break our lease because we did that before to move to where we are now, and that was not fun. So we said, we're not going to break the lease unless we get some kind of advice that we can. So after we call the head office, the property management company or whoever, we talked to the district manager. They Said, okay, definitely send us emails and everything, all the pictures that you've been reaching out to them about and everything did that. No response. Called again, left a voice message, not getting any response. So the Legal Shield attorney said they sent them a letter to the leasing office and the property management company and saying that they failed to provide whatever suitable living conditions for us and our child. So we don't owe them anything. So because of that, we decided to just break our lease because they weren't fixing anything. We asked them multiple times, are you

[Dave Ramsey]

going to say, well then this is on Legal Shield. Legal Shield needs to defend you for free. Yeah, you're gonna, you're gonna get, you're gonna get sued. I can promise you, I promise you 100. This landlord's coming after you. You don't have the option of just walking away because I got some bugs. Even if you send them pictures and even if they don't answer you, even if they're jerks, even if they have horrible service, it's not how it works. I mean, so now Legal Shields bit this off, they need to pick it up and close the deal and, and they're not going to be able to. This is going to be horrible. For. Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Fair Winds Credit Union studio. Jade Washaw Ramsey, personality number one best selling author is my co host. Today Nicole is in Detroit. Hi, Nicole, how are you?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Hi, Dave. I'm good.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. Better than we deserve. How can we help?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

So I was calling. So basically my husband has refused to give me financial visibility into his life. He has put his foot down like, you know, literally like, no, you cannot see anything that I have going on. Financially, I can tell you about it, but you, you can't know anything that's going on. And the reason why it happened is we were in a position to buy a home and the housing counselor and the lender that we were working with asked about finances and I found myself saying, well, I don't, I don't know, let me hold, let me, hold on, let me ask my husband. And then I, after our call was done, I told my husband, I said, you know, I shouldn't have to say hold on to anyone. Let me ask my husband.

[Dave Ramsey]

Right?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

I should know what's going on, you know, in that part of your life. It's like we're roommates. It's like, you, you're over here.

[Dave Ramsey]

How did that go?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

He, he said, I'm a grown man. I do not have to show you anything. Financially in my life. I said, but you're a deacon. You're a deacon and you're my husband. I said, we're supposed to be one. That you saying that makes us not be one.

[Jade Washaw]

And what is that?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Me showing you my money has nothing to do with us being one. My husband is a deacon.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, but this is.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wait a minute. So where are we now?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

So I moved out. We were in a rental when I. When we came together eight years ago. It was. It was his house. So I moved in with him. We've been there for eight years. We were trying to work on getting our own house. And because all this, I mean, it's so bad days, it's so bad.

[Jade Washaw]

But what else is going on? Because this was explosive. So what else is going on? I have a feeling that it wasn't. This has not been the only issue is what I'm gathering.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

No. So he has a 21 year old son and his son is very disrespectful. He basically. It's basically like he runs the house. And if I try to say anything to him about his son, what his son does, if I try to tell him stuff that goes on when he's not around, he never believed me. So it's just. It's just bubbling over.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

How can we help you today, hon?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

So I just want to know. So we've separated. He has filed divorce papers, but I haven't signed them yet. I'm trying to talk to him, but he is not. Talk to a bowl. Gotcha. That's not a word.

[Jade Washaw]

Have you suggested some sort of counsel? Have you suggested, hey, this is really bad. We need to get in counseling. What did he say?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yes, I said that and he said no. Because you're. That person is not going to tell me that I have to allow you to see my money.

[Jade Washaw]

See, here's the thing. And I'm just going to go ahead and say this. This is based off of just what you've told me, so take it with a grain of salt. This based on what you're saying, there's something going on he doesn't want you to see. And maybe it does have to do with his stature or how people view him. He doesn't want you to have any parts of what he's doing with his money. Maybe that's a blessing. He's the one that's filed for divorce. Maybe this is you dodging a bullet. I don't know. I don't know. But this sounds like somebody who doesn't. It sounds like somebody who's got extremely high pride that they cannot be told nor learn anything about a better way to exist in a relationship. That's what you've told me.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, the. And the, the weird thing is, is that all of his finances are now going to get exposed in the divorce.

[Jade Washaw]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because the judge going to go along with his plan.

[Jade Washaw]

It's very ironic.

[Dave Ramsey]

100% of his finances have to be exposed or he's going to have to lie to the court, which will get him put in jail. So you don't lie to the court, not even divorce court. So, you know, he has to come. He has to show all the stuff to the lawyers and it has to all come before the judge and he's going to find out that half of it's yours. That's going to be very weird for him.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah, well, we only been married two years.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that doesn't matter.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, I thought it was eight. So you've been in the house for six

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

years married, too.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Jade Washaw]

What are you concerned about? Are you concerned that there's debt that your name might be on that you don't know about?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Actually, so before we separated, I had to find out the hard way that he had a garnishment on my.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

On my account.

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

And so I had to ask him several times to get it taken care of. He got them to remove it and put it on his bank account, but he was not happy about it. And, you know, so I was just like for you to be so angry with me and telling me, no, you won't allow me to see you financially, but you got a garnishment on my. On my account. How is that fair?

[Jade Washaw]

There's probably some shame going on that you don't know about. There's probably a lot here going on that you don't know about. And it's. Now, granted, I don't know what parts you've contributed to whatever messes here. I'm sure there's is two, you know, two sides to everything, but. But my guess is there's some things going on that might be causing him some shame or, you know, it might be just the way he views those gender roles that you guys never aligned on. That money is the man's thing, and it's not who knows? But there, it's never going to come out because he won't go to counseling with you.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's going to come out in the divorce. You're going to find out everything about his money in the divorce, which is the irony of him filing for divorce because you wanted to find out what was going on with the money. So it's kind of ironic. And he just, he's just, he's just dumb enough. He doesn't know that. So this is going to be a real surprise to him. It's going to be this awesome wake up call for him. Because the judge doesn't really care about. The judge doesn't really care about his theories. He's just going to tell him what to do. And if you don't do it, you're in contempt of court. And it's really nasty. You don't want. You don't screw around with a judge. So this is where he's going. The question you asked, I have a sad, horrible answer for what can I say to him to make him want to do this? And the answer is nothing. There's not anything you can say to him. I wish there was one phrase, one way of doing it, but this is a very entrenched position that he has taken to the point he's willing to give up his marriage over this. And so there's not a single phrase. If he was coming to the table and saying, hey, I want to work on this. Let's go to counseling, I could give you some things to say to do all that, but in this situation, you know, you're just going to be, you know, just throwing water against the wall. There's nothing happening here. So I'm sorry. I'm sorry that you chose poorly. And a husband, this guy, this guy's bad news.

[Jade Washaw]

Too bad.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, you wouldn't. No one listening that has a daughter would want their daughter to marry this guy. Not a person out there, regardless of how much Nicole contributed or whatever else was going on in the house, all that kind of thing. But this is a guy that is not in a good place and he's not helpful and he's not a good husband. And that's sad. You're. You know, there's not a single phrase that's going to make him not be a jerk. I don't have the not be a jerk phrase. I don't have one of those. And I'm sorry. I wish it was. I wish it was something we could just do. But unless he just decides that he wants to be together, unified, work together in full visibility and in order to save his marriage and start with a marriage counselor, then you're. You're not gonna make it, kiddo. I'm sorry. I wish you were.

[Sponsor Voice / Dr. John Deloney]

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[Dave Ramsey]

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[Jade Washaw]

today's question comes from Steve in West Virginia. He says, I'm 66 years old and have been retired for five years. I have 500,000 in retirement funds, but I have two debts, 40,000 in credit card debt and 150,000 on my mortgage. I have Social Security and pension income of 6,000 per month. Should I pay off my debt to reduce my withdrawal each month from my 401k? I wish I had a little bit more information, but off the top I would say yes. Because to have your mortgage paid for, that's money that you're not going to have to take a draw on. And my guess, I don't know what your expenses are every month, but my guess is you probably are living okay on the $6,000 per month. If you don't have a single debt

[Dave Ramsey]

in the world and it's you. Yeah, make sure you cut up a stupid credit card and get on a budget so you don't spend more than you make again.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, that's really what you need to

[Dave Ramsey]

do because credit card debt is not the problem, it's the symptom of you overspending.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah. And if it's. It's. If it's old debt and you're like, I am. I'm not on that lifestyle anymore. I just still have it laying around. Absolutely. Paid off. But if it's current debt, then Dave is absolutely right about that.

[Dave Ramsey]

Mike's in Virginia Beach. Hey, Mike. How are you?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Good. How you guys doing?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than we deserve. What's up?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

My wife and her siblings inherited some money from their dad when he passed away several years back. And one of the siblings is the executor, and they said they're not going to tell one of the other siblings about it because they don't feel that they're financially responsible and they're just going to hold their money back from them. Oh, I say that's not. That ain't their call.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're exactly right.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Okay, well, I'm smarter than I look.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sometimes the executor, the literal reason they're called an executor, is there to execute their. Execute the what? The will said. It didn't. It didn't say, you're a trust officer and you get to decide what's best. It said, you execute what the will says. That's your only option. Even if you don't like it, even if you don't agree with it. You have one option when you're the executor, and that's to execute what the will says. Otherwise, the people on the other side of it are going to sue your butt and they're going to win because you violated your fiduciary responsibility.

[Jade Washaw]

What's your wife think?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

She agrees with me.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

You guys got your part, right?

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, Well, I would tell the executor that they're being stupid and they're gonna get sued.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Well, I did that.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Well, then that. You've done your job and leave it alone. It's not your problem anymore.

[Jade Washaw]

How much is it?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, you know, I think like eight or ten thousand dollars each.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh. It's not enough to mess with. But here's the thing. The person finds out that they were not given the money they're supposed to be given, the person that is the executor is in deep kimchi legally.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Well, that's. That's what I've kind of figured. Yep.

[Dave Ramsey]

For sure. For sure. But there's nothing you can do about it. I mean, it's just. These are people doing whatever they want to do, and that's what people do all the time. That's the Problem. When you pick the executor of your will, folks, you need to pick someone who's going to have the integrity to execute your will.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

What is it? You will to happen.

[Jade Washaw]

That's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's what that means.

[Jade Washaw]

They need to be Switzerland.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Jade Washaw]

Did you say deep kimchi?

[Dave Ramsey]

I just did.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay, Just check in.

[Dave Ramsey]

Just make sure things come up in the Rolodex. Nora is in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Hi, Nora. What's up?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Hi, Dave and Jades. Excited to talk to you today. I have an exciting question for you. I want to know, should we buy a new car with cash or pay off our house?

[Jade Washaw]

Ooh, my favorite type of question. Tell us more.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Okay, so we are in baby steps. 4, 5, and 6. We've been on the Ramsey plan for a solid, like, seven years. We have $60,000 saved for the vehicle in a high yield savings account. But then when we are doing our annual budget meeting, we're also looking at our brokerage account, which is sitting at $35,000. Our mortgage is approximately $83,000 left. Okay, so if we liquidate that brokerage account, we could pay off the home

[Dave Ramsey]

and be done and still have an emergency fund.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yeah, we do have $10,000 set aside for an emergency fund.

[Dave Ramsey]

Beyond that's a bit small.

[Jade Washaw]

Is. Yeah. Is that what it would be if the house were gone?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yeah. Well, we use, like, the brokerage account

[Caller 2 / Various Callers]

as, like, a backup emergency.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, you don't have that anymore. In this scenario, we have.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

We have $10,000 in our bank account

[Dave Ramsey]

right now as a. I know, but if you use the brokerage account and you use the 60,000 from the car and you pay off the house, you're down to $10,000, which isn't much.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Well, we want to spend approximately 50,000 on a car.

[Jade Washaw]

He's saying if you pay the house off.

[Dave Ramsey]

I said if you pay the house off, you got nothing but 10 grand left. Right.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Well, we also have a $10,000 savings account that is just the side emergency fund.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you have $20,000.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

So we would have. Yeah, we would have 20 if the

[Dave Ramsey]

house is paid off. Okay, that's what I didn't understand. Are you. Is your net worth over a million dollars dollars?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

It is, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

And this is a brand new car, new to us. Oh, it's not a brand new car.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

It might be a year old.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. That's not a brand new car. It either is or it is.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

All right, now, so, wow.

[Jade Washaw]

I mean, how long would it take you? You could do either. I don't Think there's a wrong answer here. How long would it take you if you were to pay off the house? How quickly could you save back up 60,000 and buy the car you want?

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

We think by probably August.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, crap, man. I gotta be honest, there's not a wrong answer. I probably pay the house off.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, there's a wrong answer. Don't buy the car. Pay the house off and then go buy the car.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

You would.

[Dave Ramsey]

I would never buy that car.

[Jade Washaw]

I mean, I wouldn't buy the car, I would pay the house off. But I'm just saying, do you think she'd be dead wrong?

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Because in eight months you can go get the car anyway.

[Jade Washaw]

That's what I said.

[Dave Ramsey]

So get the house paid off. What are your priorities here? Your priorities are get the house paid off, not buy a stupid car. Stupid cars you can get. I got a stupid car today. I don't mind getting a stupid car. Listen, fine, but they go down in value. How's it going?

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, but do you think that lightning would strike her down had she done the other way?

[Dave Ramsey]

Lightning doesn't strike you down on anything on this show. Hardly. But no, I'm definitely paying the house off a hundred percent today. I paid off today. And then I'd save like crazy and go buy the car that you want.

[Jade Washaw]

And you might even get a nicer

[Dave Ramsey]

car parking it in the driveway of a paid for house. Hello. No question that, that's the order things got to go down. Definitely, definitely, definitely, definitely. So here's the thing, and I'm a car guy. I, you know, I, I've got own a bunch of different vehicles here and there and they all go down in value.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

And so you're, you know, you can't put appreciating assets in the same sentence with the largest depreciating asset that we buy. Even if you've got a high net worth.

[Jade Washaw]

But what sent you over the edge was the fact that they owed so little on the mortgage.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's simple.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, if she owed 500,000 on the mortgage, then we could have a different discussion.

[Jade Washaw]

Or even 100. Well, see, my tipping point probably would have been like 250.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. I mean, I just, the point is that this is very doable very quickly and so it doesn't matter. So do it the right way.

[Jade Washaw]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

And let your actions reflect that you've got an understanding of how these assets work.

[Jade Washaw]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because five years from, from today, that $50,000 car is worth 15.

[Jade Washaw]

Yes. And that's going to be painful. Hopefully you Keep it for a very long time.

[Dave Ramsey]

Five years from today, that house will have double. Twice.

[Jade Washaw]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

You know, so, I mean, there's no question where I'm going with this. And it doesn't mean you never buy a car. I bought one today. Or literally, you bought a car today? Yeah.

[Jade Washaw]

What'd you get?

[Dave Ramsey]

I got the new Bronco Raptor.

[Jade Washaw]

Look at you.

[Dave Ramsey]

So I just wanted one, but I'm not. I'm not mad about cars. That's not the point. That's not the point. The point is they go down in value and they need to be a minor part of your overall life.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Sam, Foreign.

[Dave Ramsey]

Dave Ramsey here. Most people stay stuck with their money because they're not paying attention to it. Most people are living paycheck to paycheck, stressed out and broke. Don't be most people. You work way too hard to be broke and feel broke, and you deserve to have something to show for it. That's why we built the Every Dollar budget app. It gives you a package personalized plan for your money that shows you how to free up extra money every month and use it to beat debt and build lasting wealth. Plus, you get real coaches guiding you through your plan step by step. Look, most people hearing this will just keep hoping something changes, but not you. You're ready to make change happen starting now. Go download every dollar in the App store or Google Play and start for free. Today. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt free stage. Nathan and Megan are with us. Hey, guys. How are you?

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Hi, Dave.

[Nathan]

Doing well. Great to be here.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good to have you. Where do y' all live?

[Nathan]

We live in Woodstock, Georgia.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, yeah, Just down the road. Well, welcome to Nashville.

[Megan]

Thank you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good to have you guys. And how much debt have you paid off?

[Nathan]

We paid off $155,000 in just under five years.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good for you. And your range of income during that time.

[Nathan]

Starting income was 100,000 and ending income was 145,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

Very cool. What do y' all do for a living?

[Megan]

So I work in technology. I manage a whole tech team in the convenience industry.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, yeah.

[Nathan]

And I worked part time in a credit department at a staffing company during that time.

[Jade Washaw]

Okay, what kind of debt was it?

[Nathan]

It was our mortgage.

[Dave Ramsey]

Looking at weird people.

[Nathan]

I know.

[Megan]

That's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Very cool. How much is this house worth?

[Megan]

About 450 now.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good for you guys. And you've been putting money in your retirement all along, so how much is in that?

[Megan]

About 300.

[Dave Ramsey]

All right, very good. Almost millionaires now.

[Megan]

That's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Look at you guys. And. Well, how old are you two?

[Nathan]

I'm 28.

[Megan]

And I'm 29.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you got started this in your early 20s?

[Nathan]

Yes. Our goal was to get it paid off before Nathan turned 30 in March.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you did it. Wow.

[Nathan]

So paid it off on Christmas Day, 2025.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Wow.

[Jade Washaw]

That's awesome. So you must've.

[Dave Ramsey]

Tell us the story. How do you guys be smart enough to do this at 22 years old?

[Nathan]

Well, honestly, he listened to you since

[Megan]

he was 12 years old. Yeah, I grew up, and we didn't have tv, so as a teenager, I couldn't go to bed early. So I turn on my clock radio today, Ramsey. And I didn't quite get everything at the time of what you were saying, but I started picking it up. And then, I mean, it really just comes from my parents instilling, hey, if you're going to accomplish anything, you got to work for it. So following your steps along the way. We did Financial Peace University right after we were married and just, I mean, worked as a team together.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow. Very cool.

[Nathan]

Yep.

[Dave Ramsey]

So your mom and dad were doing this stuff, and then you're hearing the stuff on talk radio back in the day.

[Megan]

Yes. Yeah. And they were. It was really just instilling, if you want anything in life, you have to work for it. So that was what my parents gave me, and then you gave me the tools to, you know, us. The tools to work together and accomplish this.

[Nathan]

Yeah. We also bought a fixer upper that needed a lot of equity or a lot of sweat equity.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, my gosh. I see the picture.

[Nathan]

So that's what it used to look like. And we worked really hard on it. And it's in Woodstock, which is where we wanted to grow up. Wanted the kids to grow up, and.

[Dave Ramsey]

Doesn't even look like the same house.

[Nathan]

So that's where we live.

[Megan]

Yeah. That was the dream. Just putting our hard work into it and not just, wow, expecting things to come to us and working for what we wanted.

[Dave Ramsey]

Looks like it started with a chainsaw.

[Megan]

Yeah, that's right.

[Jade Washaw]

It did.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow.

[Nathan]

And lots of poison ivy.

[Jade Washaw]

So the moment you bought it, you knew you were gonna pay it off fast. Like, you already.

[Megan]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

That was the whole idea.

[Nathan]

Yes, definitely. We wanted to attack it, you know?

[Dave Ramsey]

So, Megan, I mean, when you're dating a guy that, at 12 years old is listening to a financial show on talk radio before he goes to bed, you might be dating a nerd.

[Nathan]

I know. Learned this a lot from him. And then he got me onto U2, and I truly, he is A little bit of a nerd.

[Dave Ramsey]

It sounds like he was an attractive nerd.

[Nathan]

He was tall, dark and handsome. I was very, you know, didn't take much. Financial. Yes. So. And I truly, I mean, once I learned it too, once we did financial peace, I was all in as well. We were just trying to do it together. And I think that's one of the keys too, is just doing it together.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, you guys throw those pictures up again on YouTube in case someone is 23 years old and thinks it's impossible to buy a house. You could buy that house. Looks like a jungle. Put it back up there. It's like a dad gum jungle.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, that's the. Yeah.

[Jade Washaw]

You said it's worth 400 now?

[Megan]

450 now. Yeah.

[Nathan]

Neighborhood.

[Dave Ramsey]

Woodstock. Sweet. Great area.

[Megan]

Dave always says it's important to dream together. So I was actually. Took us two years to convince this lady it was vacant to sell us the home. And we would drive by and, and she would get annoyed at me and I'd go, that's our home. See, our home. And we didn't even have it under contract yet, but we'd dream and we'd stare at it and, you know, fall in the principles of going, hey, we wanted it to. We wanted a 15 year mortgage, not more than 20% of our down pay.

[Dave Ramsey]

How did you get her to sell it?

[Megan]

Well, honestly, I was her friend for two years. She didn't know anyone else. And I honestly didn't think we were going to get it most of the time. But I said, I just told her if whenever she wants to sell, she'll think of us first. And one day after two years, she said, said, all right, I'm ready to sell. Yeah.

[Nathan]

We wrote her letters, drove to her house at a different residence.

[Dave Ramsey]

She wasn't. It was vacant.

[Nathan]

Yeah, it was vacant. It looks like it in a different place. And we drove there and got her phone number and they talked on the phone every month until she's decided to

[Dave Ramsey]

say until she relented.

[Nathan]

We're ready. Yeah.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Wow.

[Dave Ramsey]

I love this guy. This is incredible.

[Jade Washaw]

And of course, you cash flowed all the, all the upgrades you did inside and outside.

[Megan]

We went down the studs and it was, you know, I had some family help, but it was all us just working through it. We did gas, electrical, plumbing, we did the septic system and we did everything.

[Jade Washaw]

So you pay. I just need America to hear this.

[Dave Ramsey]

You cash flowed all of that and paid off $155,000.

[Megan]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you 26 year olds that are whining I can't buy a house right now. The world. Oh, kiss my butt. These guys right here hold their beer. Look at this. It's unbelievable.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, tell them what they need to know, because there's a lot of naysayers out there. Tell them what they need to know.

[Megan]

Absolutely. Dave, you preach it. I actually saw the bumper stick over there, and I love it. And it was pray, like everything depends on God and work, like everything depends on you. And that was us going into this. I tell everyone that'll listen, I'm annoying, I'll get passionate about it. But you're the problem. You're the solution. Work hard. I can't stand anyone that says anything different. But there's more opportunity in America than there has ever been in the country for all of history. So work for it. It's easy to look at all the obstacles and say, hey, I can't do this, but roll up your sleeves and get to work. Work is underestimated. And working together as a team, this has just helped us in our marriage. And, you know, now we have a home for our kids and we're just gonna continue building the dream.

[Dave Ramsey]

You got a drum drop.

[Jade Washaw]

You can pull that headset off and slam it on the floor.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, don't, don't, don't do that.

[Megan]

It looks expensive.

[Nathan]

Yes, I would say too, like just, you know, eat at home and practical things like being content with what you have, not comparing yourself to the people around you. And also just work inside hustles. We both worked during this whole process. I was stay at home mom, but also trying to help provide some income during that time. And Nathan worked really hard at his job just to work his way up, but also worked side hustles. So do the things that are required to get to that point, but also just enjoy your life and be content with what you have already.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, I mean, you're not even 30 years old. You have a paid for half million dollar house you've got. You're well on your way to being millionaires within the next probably 36 months or so. The markets are moving and everything's happening. You guys are in really, really good shape. Congratulations. I'm very proud of you. I know your parents are proud of you, your children, your heroes. You have changed your family tree. So your secret is work at it and stick together.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Megan]

And just don't take no for an answer. You know, if someone tells you no, just figure another way to do it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, there's always another way. Another way to get it done.

[Jade Washaw]

Wow, that's Amazing. I have one more question. When you went to buy this house, how did you set your expectations? Because a lot of people would have seen that before you renovated and said, that's not. That's a shack. I'm not going to spend my money on that.

[Dave Ramsey]

How.

[Jade Washaw]

How did you know to do that?

[Megan]

Well, great question. I mean, my whole life it's been, what do people. We're so wealthy as a country, people throw away great things that we can work hard and make beautiful. So going into it, it was horrible looking on the inside, but we were just looking and we had talked about it. What are the bones? What can't we change? Let's make sure that's good. We can work hard on everything else and change that.

[Nathan]

Change some paint colors, change the flooring. Just kind of see past that stuff on the outside and just look at the beauty on the inside. And there were no mold issues. No, like, floor foundation issues. Like, we were very blessed. God blessed us with this home, too. Like, we were put in all the right situations where we were like, this is not just coincidental.

[Jade Washaw]

So good, guys.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well done. All right, bring the kiddos up. Let's get their names and ages.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, boy, are they cute.

[Dave Ramsey]

They are cute.

[Megan]

Cute.

[Jade Washaw]

Oh, there's more of them than I thought. Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

They just keep coming.

[Nathan]

Yes. We paid it off when he was 10 days old.

[Jade Washaw]

What a guy.

[Nathan]

Yes. Baby James.

[Dave Ramsey]

So what's his name?

[Nathan]

This is James. She's two months now. And the girls, this is Emmy. She's five. And then Lily is two.

[Dave Ramsey]

All right.

[TJ (Ramsey Team Member)]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

You guys are. Your parents are heroes. You don't even know it yet. You're too young. But someday you'll know. They're the ones that change the family tree. Way to go. All right, Nathan and Megan, count it down. Let's hear a Debt free scream. 155,000 paid off in five years. Making 140 almost baby baby steps. Millionaires already at 30 years old. Let's hear it.

[Jade Washaw]

Three, two, one.

[Dave Ramsey]

We're debt free.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Wow.

[Jade Washaw]

I love it. I love it.

[Megan]

Wow.

[Dave Ramsey]

These kids are cute.

[Jade Washaw]

They are. I love it. That's amazing, Dave.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow.

[Jade Washaw]

Amazing.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, it can't be done. We're all going to die.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Not.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, not if you're Nathan and Megan. They got it figured out, baby. Hey, guys. Dave Ramsey here. There is a lot of noise out there when it comes to money advice, and most of it just leaves people confused. That is why we built Ask Ramsey. It's a free tool on our website where you can ask your money question and get A clear answer based on the same proven Ramsey principles we teach on the show every day. No mixed messages, no bad advice, just clarity you can trust. Go to ramseysolutions.com and try Ask Ramsey today. That's ramseysolutions.com. Our scripture of the day is 1st Corinthians 15:58. Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. Thomas Sowell said, there are people who go through the motions and people who get the job done. It's amazing how much work you can accomplish just by hiring the latter and firing the former. Amen. Charlie is with us in Cleveland, Ohio. Hey, Charlie. How are you?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Better than I deserve. How are you, Dave?

[Dave Ramsey]

Just the same. What's up?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, so my wife and I, we have two young kids and this mom, we just got debt free, so we pay off the mortgage.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good for you.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

There you go.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Thank you. Thank you. So the question is, so I have a pretty good job. My wife, she stays home. My dad, he is in his 70s. He's still working partly because maybe a series of poor financial decisions. So he cannot retire because he has to continue to financially support other family members, adult family members in the family overseas. And so I'm a bit torn because I don't have any that I can help. But I also don't want to continue to encourage bad behaviors. So I'm kind of torn apart and seeking some advice.

[Dave Ramsey]

So what do you make?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

600,000.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Wow.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good for you. And what is it you're being torn about? What? What is it they're at you're being asked to do or that you're doing?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I want my dad to be able to enjoy retirement life.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. But he chose to give all his money to somebody overseas.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Well, he lives overseas, so he doesn't live here in the States. We are immigrants.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. From which country?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Korea.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. And so he lives overseas and he's 70 years old and he doesn't. He has the money to support himself, but he doesn't because he gives it to other family members.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Correct.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right.

[Jade Washaw]

What's the situation with the other family members? Are they ill? Are they unable to work? Can he stop doing that today or is the damage completely done?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Well, I say it's a multifold. Right. So, you know, some of the family member, he support them just to help them with their lifestyle choices. And some of the family members, they chose not to work because, you know, some of the poor choices they made in the past. So that makes it very difficult for them to find jobs. So basically, my dad has been paying for everything, you know, for as long as.

[Dave Ramsey]

What happen if he couldn't?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

That's the big question. So we don't know.

[Dave Ramsey]

So do you give your money?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Huh?

[Dave Ramsey]

Are you being asked to give your father money so that he can work?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

He makes good money, but I'm worried he probably doesn't have enough, save for his.

[Jade Washaw]

What's the equivalent? Give us an equivalent in US Dollars of what he makes over there.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Oh, he makes $250,000 and he's 70 years old.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so let me stop. What's the problem? The problem is he gives all of his money away and he's going to retire with nothing and ask you to get to help him. Is that the problem?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

The problem is, you know, I don't know if that's going to make the problem worse because I'm worried that if I give him the money, the money just go to other family members.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, I wouldn't give him anything. I'm just asking you today. You're not giving him anything. So there's not a problem other than you're observing that in the future there's getting ready to be something happening, right?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Correct. I'm anticipating, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's what I'm trying to figure out. Okay. All right. So what you're anticipating is, is that he's going to run out of the ability to work and not have any money because he's given all of his away.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Now, at that point, you can decide how much you want to help him. Him, I mean, and you'll have the money, too. You make 600,000. But we're not going to help him to the tune that he has enough to help everybody else, only to the tune that he has enough to help himself. I'm guessing because I'm a redneck hillbilly and I don't know these things, but I'm guessing that part of this might be cultural.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

It is very cultural, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because, I mean, in, you know, in the Latino world, for instance, it's very normal to have more of a family obligation to support parents than we would have in a typical gringo culture. Right, My hillbilly culture, you know, you're not required to do that. Puritan ethics, so to speak. You're not required to do that. Right. But in an Asian culture, where you're talking about, or the Latino culture, it's more normalized to be asked to, expected to, and you've grown up with it your whole life. It's integrated into your DNA that, that this is how things are done. Is that correct?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Yeah, I bet the hundred percent correct.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And I'm thinking that may lend itself to why he's giving all of his money away as well. Even though someone in my seat would look at that and go, why are you doing that? But. And the answer is it's a cultural difference. To do that doesn't make it smart, doesn't make it dumb. It's just an explanation. Right. So mathematically we can all agree it's dumb, but there's a reason that he's doing it. It's not just straight up irresponsibility, although it is intertwined into this cultural icon. So, yeah, I think I'd talk to him about it if he'll listen. But I bet he doesn't and just say, dad, you know, you need to be aware that when you are broke, I will be helping you only with food and shelter, not with enough to. For you to further on your giving of these other people. So these other people, when you run out of gas and aren't able to work, are going to be on their own and they should know that now because I'm not going to be held to this standard. I think it's okay to go ahead and communicate that, but I don't think it's going to change what's going to occur. What's going to occur is what you expect. I think that's exactly what's going to happen. Do you, Jade?

[Jade Washaw]

I do. I think he's 70 years old and he's been making this decision for a long time and it would be a miracle if he stopped today.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And he's old school within that culture.

[Jade Washaw]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

And he's, he's duty bound.

[Jade Washaw]

Yep.

[Alice (TJ's Wife)]

Yep.

[Dave Ramsey]

And gonna follow through on his duty to take care of them, no matter how irresponsible or, you know, bad decisions they've been making. He's going to do it anyway, I think. Aren't you, Charlie? You agree with that?

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

I agree. I agree 100%. I tried to have a conversation 10 years ago. Didn't really go anywhere.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you're right.

[Caller 1 / Various Callers]

Decided to focus on my own and try to get that free and protect the family.

[Jade Washaw]

You know, the hard part for you, Charlie, is hold. Gonna be to hold that boundary when the time comes because you're likely going to feel guilty and all these other things. But it wasn't your. You didn't make the choice. Right. He did. And that's the thing that you'll have to remind yourself of many, many times.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you'll be able to help him to a reasonable degree.

[Jade Washaw]

Absolutely.

[Dave Ramsey]

But not an unreasonable degree. And it's not going to be. It's not going to make everybody happy. No one in the end of the story is going to be thrilled with the outcome. But great news is you make a huge income and you're going to be in a wonderful position financially. And if you want to reach over and do a, you know, help somebody a little bit every month, you can do that, and you won't even notice mathematically. And so that's the thing. So not accounting for cultural differences, and you have to account for that. So it's. It's not fair to say that, but you just. Folks, you need to plan to not be a burden on your children.

[Jade Washaw]

Yeah, you do. And you said it exactly right. You know, it might be a reason for a behavior, but it doesn't make it right or good.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's true.

[Jade Washaw]

And the same way that Charlie was able to look at that and go, that doesn't make sense.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, yeah. And he comes. He comes from.

[Jade Washaw]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Comes right straight out of that. So. So yeah, you just gotta go, no.

[Caller 3 / Various Callers]

Yeah.

[Jade Washaw]

You can't.

[Dave Ramsey]

Don't park your. We're not going to participate in that. It doesn't make sense. And I've learned a better way.

[Jade Washaw]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

And that can happen. You could learn that. I could learn that from his culture. You learn that from my culture. It doesn't matter. You can learn a better way.

[Jade Washaw]

That's right. But the hard part is he's going to have to do that at the expense of

[Dave Ramsey]

hurt feeling.

[Jade Washaw]

Hurt feelings and family meals and all that stuff is going to be very different. When you. When you draw boundaries like that, people don't like it and they push up against them and all that stuff.

[Dave Ramsey]

So count on it.

[Jade Washaw]

Good luck to you.

[Dave Ramsey]

That puts us out of the Ramsey show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of peace, Christ Jesus.