The Truth About Your Money Is Less Scary Than the Story in Your Head

Summary

The Ramsey Show – Episode Summary

Date: August 19, 2025
Episode: "The Truth About Your Money Is Less Scary Than the Story in Your Head"
Host: Dave Ramsey
Co-host: Dr. John DeLoney

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Episode Overview

This episode of The Ramsey Show focuses on addressing the fears and emotional blocks people have around their finances, showing that “the truth about your money is less scary than the story in your head.” Through powerful real-life caller scenarios, Dave Ramsey and Dr. John DeLoney blend practical advice with empathetic guidance, tackling topics like crushing debt, career pivots, addiction, family estate planning, real estate woes, and the emotional struggles that accompany financial challenges. The episode’s recurring lesson: Financial chaos is rarely permanent—action and hope can change your trajectory.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Facing Crushing Debt Early in Life

• Caller (Derek, 24, NC): $151k in debt (mostly student loans, car loan, parent PLUS). Low Dev1 salary ($32/hr), long commute, addiction struggles.
• Advice:
  • Get out of job application black hole. “When you just send out applications in the digital world, you're sending them out into nothing. No one looks at them.” (Dave, 06:35)
  • Leverage your network and proximity principle—get connected. Dave recommends Ken Coleman’s materials for job searching and connections.
  • Morally own your debt, get your income up via new job or side hustles, and work on addiction recovery in parallel.
• Memorable Quote:
  “Your life is not a snapshot… Something will change, and it'll get worse or it'll get better. So let's be proactive and let’s cause it to get better.”
  – Dave Ramsey [06:49]

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2. Estate Planning and Family Dynamics

• Caller (Natasha, 31, Chicago): Wants to choose a will beneficiary outside her family and avoid family conflict.
• Advice:
  • You can't control their reaction or the future. “They don’t get a vote. You'll be gone.” (Dr. John, 14:15)
  • Don’t over-worry about small inheritance. Make practical moves—use PODs instead of adding a parent as an account holder.
  • Heal from anxiety and family pressure, focus on living your life.
• Memorable Quote:
  “Who gets your car when you die is probably not a big thing to worry about.”
  – Dave Ramsey [16:15]

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3. First-Time Homebuyer Reality Check

• Caller (Ray, 23, Nashville): Debt-free, wants to buy in affluent Tennessee county on $65k salary.
• Advice:
  • Costs are high; start in affordable area and remember this isn’t your “forever home.”
  • “Don’t be so desperate to get a house that you can’t afford you get in over your head.” (Dr. John, 19:50)
  • Take your time, buy smart, be patient.

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4. Divorce & Real Estate Troubles

• Caller (Lorraine, AZ): Divorcing, house unaffordable post-divorce, rental property in FL.
• Advice:
  • Sell both houses ASAP; don’t let property managers stall a sale.
  • Price houses to move; don’t overvalue.
  • “You guys need to move on with your lives. This is rough.” (Dave, 26:00)
• Memorable Moment:
  Divorce decrees can leave people with unsustainable situations—be proactive, get professional realtors involved.

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5. Using Savings vs. Borrowing for Emergencies

• Caller (Jason, CA): Facing repairs and medical debt; unsure if he should tap non-retirement investments or take on more debt.
• Advice:
  • Use the $85k brokerage account to cover $15k in debt; do not borrow when you have available cash.
  • “No, instead we'll pay interest to a stupid bank. Get it out of there and pay taxes on it.” – Dave [30:31]

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6. Over-Saving for Security / “Child Benefit” Guilt

• Caller (Kayla, Canada): Stashed $8k ‘child benefit’ for kids, anxious about using family savings to pay off personal loan debt.
• Advice:
  • Don’t touch kids’ dedicated funds for non-essential debt payoff.
  • “Part of taking care of your kids in your situation is—you’re an anxious mess… You’re going to do the work on yourself for that too.” – Dr. John [39:04]
  • Stop putting all the child benefit into savings; it’s for the entire household.
• Memorable Moment:
  Caller admits her anxiety controls her hoarding/saving. Dr. John gently encourages self-care and emotional healing.

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7. Talking Money & Values in Dating

• Caller (Melissa, 23): How to discuss expectations around finances in relationships, especially wanting not to split things 50/50.
• Advice:
  • Be honest and clear about your values as you get serious; not on the first date.
  • “Here’s a value I have, and I want to be with somebody who is anchored into those same values.” – Dr. John [42:07]

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8. Single Mom Considering Business Ownership

• Caller (Katrina, Canada): Wants to leave job and build cleaning business for better hours, struggling with expensive childcare.
• Advice:
  • “The worst thing you can do if you want flexibility is to run your own business—because your boss is a jerk.” – Dave [91:18]
  • Line up clients with signed commitments before quitting the day job.
  • Get legal agreements for child support, not just verbal arrangements.

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9. Doctor’s Temptation for Lifestyle Creep

• Caller (Mo, new cardiologist): About to start earning $750k/yr with wife; wants to buy a $250k Porsche with sign-on bonus.
• Advice:
  • Wait until you’re debt-free, have a fully funded emergency fund, and pay cash.
  • “You’ve been a grown up for so long. For just a minute, you want to be a four year old… I’m not gonna let you.” – Dave [110:46]
  • Consider buying a pre-owned Porsche for now; enjoy the reward after the hard work is complete.

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10. Retiree Home Improvements with Limited Savings

• Caller (Jeff, 64): Retired, modest savings, wants to remodel home—considering HELOC.
• Advice:
  • Don’t take on new debt in retirement. Save up, do projects in phases, consider tutoring or substitute teaching for extra income.
  • “Last thing you need is debt. You have no nest egg to amount to anything… You’re going to do these repairs a little bit at a time with cash.” – Dave [119:20]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Life is not a snapshot.” – Dave Ramsey, [06:49]
• “Don’t apologize for who you are.” – Dr. John DeLoney, [42:48] (on dating/values)
• “Stand up. It’s not that deep. The water’s not that deep. You can do it.” – Dr. John, [50:18] (to a caller paralyzed by post-divorce hopelessness)
• “You are 10 times better than you feel like you are.” – Dave, [52:04] (encouraging a discouraged caller)

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Important Timestamps

• Youth Debt Crisis & Addiction: 00:48 – 09:00
• Estate Planning/Family Anxiety: 10:57 – 17:41
• First-Time Home Buyer in Expensive Area: 17:51 – 20:01
• Divorce & Real Estate: 21:44 – 28:31
• Using Investments vs. Debt: 28:53 – 31:35
• Over-saving, Childhood Money Anxiety: 35:43 – 39:33
• Dating & Financial Values: 40:01 – 42:48
• Career Change/Business as a Single Mom: 87:41 – 96:15
• Doctor’s Luxury Car Temptation: 107:49 – 116:48

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Takeaways & Tone

• The episode maintains a supportive yet candid tone, mixing tough love with validation and encouragement.
• Dave’s style is pragmatic: he often interrupts dysfunction with a reality check and quick math, but always points people toward hope and action.
• Dr. John DeLoney adds emotional intelligence, recognizing when callers are “anxious messes” or “frozen by heartbreak,” offering compassion along with practical next steps.

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Summary Flow

• Callers present with immediate problems (debt, job challenges, family struggles), and hosts dismantle fears with hard facts, actionable plans, and encouragement.
• The theme of hope runs through every call: “Your life isn’t a snapshot—it can get better if you take new action.”
• Both financial facts and emotional realities are honored. The hosts don’t shy away from the mental health effects of money problems, nor do they let fear be an excuse for inaction.

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For Listeners Who Haven’t Tuned In

If you’re intimidated by your finances, this episode will show you that most fear is based on an imagined story. Hard numbers, honest conversations, and small steps toward action are always the antidote. Dave and Dr. John’s advice blends heart, grit, and proven strategy—offering hope and a way out, no matter how daunting your situation.

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Transcript

[Dave Ramsey]

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. From the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey show where we help people build wealth, do work that they love and create actual amazing relationships. Dr. John DeLoney, Ramsey personality number one best selling author, PhD in counseling and host of the real popular Dr. John DeLoney show on the Ramsey Network. Be sure and check it out. He's my co host today. The phone number here. Triple 882-55-5225. Derek is in North Carolina. Hi Derek. Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

[Caller]

Good afternoon. How are y' all doing today?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than we deserve. Sir, how can we help you?

[Caller]

All right, so I'm 24, I live in North Carolina. I'm about 151k in debt. I currently work at full time working, sorry, making about $32 an hour. I commute to work and back from work about two hours every day.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow.

[Caller]

And I am.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's weird.

[Caller]

I have an agreement with my father that I can live at home completely for free. Where I work down there. I would be losing quite a bit of money to pay off my debt if I were to live down there instead. So I take the time to commute.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's this?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

150,000 in debt, brother.

[Caller]

So probably two thirds of that is a parent plus loan. I had made an agreement with my dad before anything was taken to take the debt out and that I would pay him back in full for that. And the rest of it is my student loans.

[Dave Ramsey]

So it's all student loans.

[Caller]

I take that back. About 4,000 of it is car loan.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. And you had originally promised when it was all done to pay the parent plus loan. So morally that is yours. I got that. And, and good for you. So what's your degree in?

[Caller]

Yeah. So one thing I'm a little embarrassed by is that I went for a software engineering degree out of state and I have heard the rant about that. That is probably was probably not the best use of my money. But here I am.

[Dave Ramsey]

Do you have a software engineering degree?

[Caller]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh good. And okay. Why are you only making 50 grand?

[Caller]

So I, after I graduated last year in May, I spent most of the rest of the summer and fall probably sending out about 600 something applications. And it was. I barely got anything back. I tried every single reference that I knew and eventually I was reached out to by a company that basically I work. I work as a contractor for a company that contracts me out to a bank. And it's a junior software engineering job.

[Dave Ramsey]

Now if you were to take a quiz with us and you were coming on board here, would you come out of Dev1 or Dev2 or Dev3?

[Caller]

If I were to guess? Probably Dev1.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. Okay. How can we best help you today, sir?

[Caller]

I believe that I'm just. I'm very stressed. I've been dealing with a lot of things in life lately and my debt is really stressing me out and I think my own. My own calculations, I think have been incorrect about how long it'll be to pay off. But I'm just very stressed that I'm not going to be able to do really anything with my 20s and I will be kind of just stuck doing nothing but paying debt off. And that.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

That would be part of it. That's gonna be part of it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why does it say on my screen that you told our phone screener you were struggling with an addiction?

[Caller]

Oh, I apologize. I didn't know how best to put that in there. I have been struggling with a pornography addiction and masturbation addiction for a very long time. And I didn't mention that as much because I actually just last week I was. I just in the last few weeks, I should say I've been a Ramsey affiliated co development coach. Actually reached out to me and I've actually been getting help with that.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good.

[Caller]

So hopefully that I am. I have been doing much better lately on that. But that is.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much are you spending on that?

[Caller]

It was probably on and off depending on a month or whatever. I. That addiction was kind of helping drive me to do maybe 30 to 50 months. Not very, not, not a lot. And it wasn't like all the time.

[Dave Ramsey]

30 to 50 what?

[Caller]

Dollars? Sorry, A month? Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

All right. Sounds unbelievable. It would be like.

[Caller]

Yes, it was. I was starting to get to the point of that sort of.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, all right, stuff. The numbers that you're giving me. I would agree with you that you're going to be in debt a long time. So there's something needs to change. Because life is not a snapshot. Your life is not going to stay exactly the way it is today with the exact same income and the exact same debt for the next eight years. Years. Something will change and it'll get worse or it'll get better. So let's be proactive and let's cause it to get better. You don't make much for a dev one. Dev one ought to be running 70, 80 grand. Okay. And so let's start on the income side. When you just send out applications in the digital world, you are sending them out into nothing. No one looks at them. We hired about 150 people at Ramsey last year. We had 15,000 applications because people just send in stuff. They just send stuff randomly or they buy some software that sends it to everybody and we don't even look at those. We don't have time to go through them all. And that's what happened to your 600 applications. No one saw it. So the way you fix that is you use Ken Coleman's material and you begin to find some people in the software world, in the development world, and you begin to connect with them and you find or you see a job over at this certain location that's paying 75 or 80. And then you start asking yourself, who do I know that works over there even if they're not in the software that can help me get my foot in the door? Who do I know that knows somebody that works over there that'll help me get my foot in the door, even if it's a 2 degrees of separation and that's called the proximity principle. I'm going to send you Ken's book on that and I want you to go to kencolman.com and look at his resume and his letter writing templates that are all free there for you to look at. And I want you to look for a job. Your job sucks. It does not pay enough and it's too far away.

[Caller]

I agree. Okay, I do have a question about that job. So it is sort of a type of. It's not a guaranteed, but it is potentially a work to hire thing to.

[Dave Ramsey]

Where if I want somebody hired at this, it's two hours away and it doesn't pay enough. Why do I want to be hired if they're going to pay you 80 grand and you move down there. Okay, but I ain't driving two hours anyway. My house is 12 minutes from here. No way I'm spending my life in my car. Not for a little bit of rent money.

[Caller]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

So. But we got to get your income up before you start bailing out on your dad's generous offer. But let's get your income up and then and your living situation up and you keep working on your addiction issues and you'll begin to work through this gradually. But you got to get the income up from working more side jobs, side hustle, side contracts, in addition to working a full time dev1 dev2 job and yeah, but if you can get a great bump in pay, move down there. Yeah, take the job. But we don't want to make this bad deal Permanent.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

You say you'll never join the Navy, never climb Mount Fuji on a port.

[Caller]

Visit or break the sound barrier.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Joining the Navy sounds crazy. Saying never actually is. Learn [e-mail] America's Navy forged by the.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sea Statistics show that half of Americans don't have enough life insurance or they don't have any at all. I don't understand this, John. Why don't people want to take care of their family? They think they're going to die or something.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Well, I used to be one of those guys. I didn't even think about it. And one of my buddies said, hey, the only reason to not have life insurance is if you hate your wife and kids. And I immediately went and got term life insurance.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's a gut punch.

[Caller]

And.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Oh, you're telling me. And for decades, Dave, I've sat across people who've lost a spouse, they've lost somebody important to them.

[Dave Ramsey]

Me too.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

They don't know what to do next.

[Dave Ramsey]

Me too. I mean, you're going to have a crisis here and you know you got two options. While you're sitting and talking to a young widow, she's concerned about how she's going to invest all this money properly and not mess this up or she's concerned how she's going to eat tomorrow.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

That's exactly.

[Dave Ramsey]

These are the two options. And take care of your dadgum family, man.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Term life insurance can replace income, pay off debts, cover funeral expenses. So your family can actually have the opportunity to just be sad. Yeah, to just miss you.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's exactly what it's supposed to be. It's saying I love you to your family. Term life insurance, Jeff, Zander and the team at Xander Insurance. It easy and affordable. I've used them personally for 25 years. They're the only people I trust. Go to Xander.com or call 800-356-4282. Natasha is in Chicago. Hi, Natasha, how are you?

[Caller]

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

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller]

So I've been waiting for you and Dr. John for this phone call. I need help choosing a beneficiary for my will and estate and avoiding a fight at my Monty Python meeting.

[Dave Ramsey]

Hmm, sounds like a fight is a bruin.

[Caller]

Well, given the dynamics of my family, yes, they're. I'm predicting one could happen.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so tell us about the players and what's going on.

[Caller]

I have a sister that is three years older than me with a learning disability who doesn't understand, doesn't quite grasp the concept of money. And time. I have three older siblings who are in their adult years with kids. I'm the youngest. My dad is 66 and my mom passed away 10 months ago in October.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, you're not married? You're not married and don't have kids?

[Caller]

I'm single.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you're the baby. And you're how old? You're how old?

[Caller]

I just turned 31.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, and what is the extent of your wealth?

[Caller]

I'm almost done with baby step three. I have a $500,000 life insurance policy. That's term. I have a car that currently has both me and my dad on it. I have bank accounts that have two names on them and a retirement package at about 59,000 on the bank accounts. My dad's philosophy was, in case something were to happen to me, he wouldn't have a fight at the courthouse with getting my money.

[Dave Ramsey]

So he.

[Caller]

With the car.

[Dave Ramsey]

He has equal access to your bank account?

[Caller]

It's just his name on it. He doesn't log in or do anything with it.

[Dave Ramsey]

But he can. He's one of the owners.

[Caller]

He can, but he doesn't.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller]

He just put that on there in case I were to drop dead.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, well, there's a thing called pod paid on death that does the same thing without having it with him, without him being an owner of the account. So you did that wrong. But anyway, so what. What is the fight about? I mean, there's half million dollars. You have a half million dollars in life insurance? Why? Who's counting on your income to eat?

[Caller]

No one. I was. I kept hearing, get a life and get a term life insurance policy.

[Dave Ramsey]

Not if you don't have anybody counting on you. You need enough money laying around to bury you, so you're not a burden. But you don't need to leave somebody a half a million dollars. So probably going to save that money. You got enough money to bury you, right?

[Caller]

Almost 10 grand. And that's my baby step three, which will be done in one to two months.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Okay. And that's your buried. That and the car being sold. And whatever's in your bank account will bury you. And that's the big deal. You said you own a house?

[Caller]

No, I'm renting.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Is this for your estate? For, like, if you were to pass away suddenly, you think there'd be a fight over who gets your life insurance money? Or is this about your father's estate?

[Caller]

No, it's about me. I'm worried that with whoever I pick, because I don't want to choose a Family member that they're going to fight me on it, saying that family comes first before anybody else.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, honey, there's not much there. Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

And they don't get a vote. You'll be. You'll be gone.

[Dave Ramsey]

If we get a car and a little bit of money in a bank account that's used to bury you. You don't own a house. We're getting rid of the life insurance policy. There's not really anything to fight about here. Okay.

[Caller]

Okay. I just worry about them arguing because I'm gonna do what you do, you know, I don't think you need to tell them.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, I don't think. I don't think you need to have a big meeting about it. I think you just, you know, you can designate whoever you want to leave this to.

[Caller]

And that's the issue is I don't know who to leave it to.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. Who do you plan? What was your plan?

[Caller]

A close friend.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, then leave it to them. And you need to take your dad off all the stuff then because he's going to scarf it all upon your death.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

And just put paid on death pod and just have a will that the car goes to the close friend. And you don't really, you know, and then you can just say, hey, guys, I don't have a lot and what little I got I'm going to leave to this friend over here. I just want to let you all know, and you could just tell them that and casual conversation. There's not a big need here.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Do you struggle with anxiety in other parts of your life?

[Caller]

Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Okay.

[Caller]

Dr. John, you may remember me. I called in a year ago saying that my family was pressuring me to not rent and get a mobile home.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Well, a clever definition of anxiety is a potential future worry that you drag back and try to fight with it in the present. And so, for whatever it's worth, you can take it from me And Dave, you're 31 years old. Statistically, you're not even close to halfway done with your life yet. And you've got a long way to go. And so if you're like most Americans, you've got enough to worry about just day in and day out. I would not put this on my list of things I need to worry about today.

[Dave Ramsey]

Who gets your car when you die is probably not a big thing to worry about. Yeah.

[Caller]

Realistically, what I want to do is because I don't want my family to have any of this. I was just going to say, hey, donate my car to charity.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's Fine. Or whatever you want, but do a will that says that. And then if it comes up or if you want to casually mention it, it's fine. But I'm with John. I'd be worrying about other stuff.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Where we see people run into problems. Well, Natasha, where we see people run into problems, and we always tell people to have this. This Monty Python meeting that I'm not dead yet meeting is if you had three or four kids and you were gonna leave one of your kids out of that will, you want them, when you pass to be mad at you, not mad at their siblings. But you don't have that same situation. So if your siblings want to badmouth you when you're gone, you won't have to hear it. You won't be disrupting anyone else's relationship by your being scared to have a conversation now. Yeah, I just wouldn't lose sleep over it. Man, you're doing a good job. You're in baby step three. You're getting there. You are taking care of your life. I would echo Dave here. It seems that you don't want anything to do with your family, yet your dad has some strange hooks in your life. And if you want to be done with your family for whatever reasons, I would go ahead and go all the way and take them off the account.

[Dave Ramsey]

Just have at least some reasonable boundaries, because these accounts and car title things are boundary violations. Ray's in Nashville. Hi, Ray. What's up?

[Caller]

Hey. How's it going?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. How can I help?

[Caller]

Well, so I'll give you a little backstory here. So I'm 23, and I actually just moved down here from Vermont back in March, and I just finished saving up my emergency fund.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good.

[Caller]

I have no debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good.

[Caller]

No debt whatsoever.

And.

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

So what's your question?

[Caller]

Right, looking. Well, my question is I want to buy a house in, like, the Franklin Thompson Station or Spring Hill area or even Columbia.

[Dave Ramsey]

What do you make a year?

[Caller]

Well, only 65.

[Dave Ramsey]

You just chose the 11th wealthiest county in the nation.

[Caller]

Yeah, I'll bet you do.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Expensive place to buy a house.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're probably going to Murray county, my friend.

[Caller]

Yeah, I guess. I mean, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Or you can find something you can afford.

[Caller]

Yeah. I've been looking at the market for a while, and.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller]

Skyrocketing around here. So. Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

A list of tech moguls and country music stars that own it.

[Caller]

Oh, okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. I mean, it's beautiful out there, but there's a reason. Yeah. So if I'm you, I'm gonna go A little further south and get something I can afford. You're 23, you got plenty of time. You know it's not gonna be your last house, I can promise you that. So you've done a good job staying debt free and you saving you up some money. Good. Yeah. I'm just gonna move into a marketplace that because you, the, you know, when you make 65,000 it's just really, really difficult to buy in that county. It's, you know the math, the math just doesn't work hardly. I mean there might be a little corner here or there or something that could be done but it's, it's the, the median house price in there would be close. Roughly double of the nation's median house price. So.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

And don't be a 23 year old who man is debt free but then is so desperate to get a house gets, gets themself way over their head when it comes to buying a house that you can't afford.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Take your time and do it right, do it smart. And if you're a little bit further out, hey, the market's going to come to you. Don't worry about it. I'm old. I've watched it come to me several times. What I thought was out in the country is downtown now. There you go. With the lowest prices of any national grocery store, shoppers save big at Aldi. Aldi believes in making shopping straightforward and stress free. Whether you're firing up the grill for a family dinner or hosting a backyard barbecue, Aldi is there to help. They've got a great selection of fresh USDA choice meats and organic produce at prices that won't bust your budget. And no messing around with apps, coupons, loyalty cards or membership fees to get low prices on award winning products every day. So stop overpaying and start shopping at Aldi. Find a store near you today at Aldi US That's a L D I.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

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[Dave Ramsey]

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[Dr. John DeLoney]

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[Dave Ramsey]

Lorraine is with us in Arizona. Hi Lorraine, how are you?

[Caller]

I'm doing well. How are you guys doing?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller]

My question is more of a what would Dave and Dr. John do? So I'm currently on baby step three with $5,000 in savings. My income is 64,800 a year. We have a house on the market for 405,000 6.24% interest rate. We owned the house for less than two years. The new bills around us is selling for 350 and they're offering really good interest rates. So I don't know how we will compete. We may be coming to the table with that. We'll have to bring money to the table to close. Recently divorced. The 24 years of marriage and the house that I'm staying in is 51% of my monthly budget. And in October it's going to go up $200 because of taxes.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's the house? What is the. What is owed on the house?

[Caller]

We owe 393.

[Dave Ramsey]

We own it. Why do we owe 393 after a divorce? I guess you do, right?

[Caller]

We still. Well, we still co. Own it. So we co own the property.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, why is he not copaying it?

[Caller]

He's. He's moved out. So he's in an apartment.

[Dave Ramsey]

I thought you said you got a divorce. Are you in the process of a divorce or the divorce is final?

[Caller]

The divorce is final. He's in an apartment and I'm in the. I'm in the. I'm in the house.

[Dave Ramsey]

I got that. So the divorce decree has you paying a bill you can't afford.

[Caller]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Is there any. Where are you going to get the money if you have to bring money to the table, that is.

[Caller]

So what would Dave and Dr. John do?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I don't understand. The divorce decree is the divorce decree that you're going to get.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why did. Yeah, why did you sign up for a divorce decree that said I'm going to pay the payments until this house that we can't pay, that we can't sell sales?

[Caller]

We're explaining the difference. So let's say for example, if his rent is 2200, then I apply 2200 to the mortgage and we split the difference. But with it going up now, it's even more.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

So what did you exactly get in this divorce decree?

[Dave Ramsey]

Is there any. Did you all get anything but problems?

[Caller]

Just problems that we have to uncouple?

[Dave Ramsey]

So you got debt is all you got. There's no money in the divorce?

[Caller]

Yes, we have debt. Yes. We also have a house in Florida that were that with a property manager and we're renting and that lease ends May of next year. And we're hoping that the renters will buy the property, but there's equity in that property.

[Dave Ramsey]

What is that, what is that house worth?

[Caller]

So it's around probably 375. We owe around 320 on that property. But the same issue is happening there. New builds in the area, it's offering low interest rates and the prices as well, okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm gonna help you with that one. I'm not waiting until next year. I'm gonna offer it to the tenant now and get rid of that house. I don't know what you're doing with a Florida house with your broke Florida rental house. So you need to get rid of that house now. Both of them need to go now. Is the answer to your question. And wouldn't it be cool if you got enough equity out of the Florida house if they bought it right now to cover the hole that you're in in Arizona?

[Caller]

We reached out to the property manager, and they're talking with them, but they need to make sure that they qualify.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The property manager has a vested interest in this not selling so that the property manager can continue to collect property management fees on a renter. They don't get any unless the property manager is getting a commission on the sale. Are they?

[Caller]

He's going to facilitate both, which is kind of weird. So do I reside.

[Dave Ramsey]

I don't want them squirreling this sale.

[Caller]

Okay. So reach out to the renter myself.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

I don't even mind paying the property manager or the real estate commission. That's fine. I'm not trying to cut them out. I'm just trying to make sure a sale occurs. You need to get out of this house.

[Caller]

That will be amazing.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And if you got enough money out of that, wouldn't that be cool to cover the hole that you're in in Arizona? And then, boom, we're gone. We're done.

[Caller]

Right? We're done with both properties.

[Dave Ramsey]

That. That's going to be my plan. That's what. That's. That's plan A.

[Caller]

Any other blind spots or any other.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, I don't know. I'm not familiar with any market in Arizona that has gotten in trouble like that. The. Where they were the builders. That's very weird. I kind of think you're panicking in the middle of this because you're broke and so you're. You may be dealing off of bad information. I want you to get a real estate agent from the Ramsey Trusted Group in Arizona and have them come out and look at that house and let's see if we can get that house listed properly for what it will sell for. I mean, if everything else in the neighborhood is going for 350 and you've got it listed for 405, well, nobody's gonna do that. But if there's some kind of a difference between your house and those houses, Lot, size or attributes of the house or something like that, that justifies the difference, then that's a different thing. But an agent should not list a property $50,000 over valuation, especially when it's a divorce and they need to get rid of the stinking house. We need to price it in such a way that it sells. So you need to get another agent to look at that. And I'm also going to contact a Ramsey trusted agent in Florida if I'm you and have someone outside the property management world look at this house and tell me what it's worth. And you know, even if you pay some commission out to, I don't mind paying people to do stuff as long as it gets done. It's this thing where everybody's getting lined up to get a chunk of this deal and there's nothing here because nothing gets sold. So I need both of these properties gone ASAP and you guys to move on with your lives. This is, this is rough.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah. The only thing I can think of, Dave, is if there's a HELOC on that property or something. But I've never heard of a divorce decree where, oh, somebody quote unquote gets the house. But then it's my job to run and sell it because I can't afford it. And that's not a win.

[Dave Ramsey]

It would have been better to do the job is we carry the house together that we bought together until it's sold together. But if, if that would be normal.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Ex husband decides he needs a 2200amonth apartment and we're going to deduct that from what he's paying in this, then he can go get himself a. Live in the back of somebody's house until we get this thing covered.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, yeah. Bad deal.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, just a bad deal all around.

[Dave Ramsey]

Bad idea. Yeah, yeah, good point. I need a 20$200 rent while I've got a house. Two houses, right, that I can't afford.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

While my ex wife and my kids can't. Can't eat.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that's probably not a good plan, right? Yeah, good point, good point. Jason's in California. Hi, Jason, how are you?

[Caller]

I'm doing pretty good, Dave. How about yourself?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller]

So we recently had a few things kind of happen that have recently took out our emergency fund and now we're, we're finding ourselves in some debt and we, you know, we're very fortunate that we do have investments in retirement and some property and some, you know, assets we can draw on to pay for it. I was just thinking if there's anything else I should do before we pull out money from investments to cover the debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

By investments you don't mean retirement accounts. You just have money in like a brokerage account or mutual fund.

[Caller]

So we have a couple of things. So one, we have some retirement accounts and Roth IRAs. We have about a little over 200, 200,000 ish. I haven't checked. We try not to look at it. So about 200,000 ish in other retirement account, about 85 in just straight investment accounts. So it's not a tax advantaged account. And then we have a rental property as well, that we have equality.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what was the debt you took on and for what?

[Caller]

So we had some issues with the rental property that kind of creeped up on us and had to happen at once and then a medical issue. So right now we're looking at about 15k that we need to figure out.

[Dave Ramsey]

Take it out of the 85. Why would you borrow money when you got $85,000 sitting there?

[Caller]

So yes, and at the time we were just like, well, we don't want to pull more money out and pay the extra taxes on it.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, instead we'll pay interest to a stupid bank. No, get it out of there and pay taxes on it. Fix the debt and pay the dadgum debt off. No, absolutely not. And dude, I think this rental property is not a blessing. It sounds like it's a curse. You can't afford it.

[Caller]

Well, you know, it's been great.

[Dave Ramsey]

You can't afford to do the repairs on it.

[Caller]

No. Yeah, it was poor planning on us. We didn't have enough set aside to like cover a surprise.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, well no, it's not a surprise. It's a rental property. Nothing on a rental property is a surprise. It's guaranteed. It's going to happen. So I think you probably need to sell the rental house because I think you got a rental house, you owe more on it than you're not cash flowing enough to screw with the thing and you're walking around acting like you got an investor. Sounds to me like you got a mess over there. But for sure don't borrow money to fix stuff like this when you got 85 grand laying over in a brokerage account.

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[Dave Ramsey]

Well, I'm excited about this idea. Have you ever wanted to watch us do this show in person? Now lots of people come and we've always got 50 to 200 folks outside the window here. We in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions. Our studios are on the glass and so you can come and watch us do the show from 1 to 4 central time every weekday, Monday through Friday. But here's an idea. We decided we're gonna take the Ramsey show on tour. So we're gonna take this show out, put it on us, put it in the theater and let you guys come watch. That's kind of fun. We're gonna do that this fall. You can experience live Q and A, raw confessions, crowd debates and a local debt free scream. It's all happening live in your town. Rachel, Ken and George will be doing the show in Chicago on September 30th. Jade, John and George will take the stage in Orlando on October 2nd. Tickets are a whole $39 and there's only 300 seats. Now we keep it small. You guys are going to be asking the questions. We're not taking call ins. It'll be walking up to the mic, ask a question and this is the kind of thing you can't that you don't get through the headphones. You don't get this in your earbuds. You're going experience the whole thing with 300 of your closest friends. So it's going to be a lot of fun. You got to be there. So again, Chicago, September 30th. We're announcing this today. These seats will be gone in a heartbeat. They're only 39 bucks. There's only 300 of them. Okay, so. And Orlando, October 2nd, and grab your [e-mail] the Ramseyshow Live. Or you can click the link in the show notes and we'll get you on there. John, this is going to be fun.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, I can't wait. It's going to be a blast. It's my favorite thing to do is get on the road and tiny little theaters like this, people asking questions, Q and A is going to be. It'll be off, off the rails a little bit.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. The only difference is we really can't screen your call.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

That's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

So if you, if you're insist on being very weird, it's probably going over the air. So, you know, we can't. We can't help you. We can't protect you from yourself, you know, so where Kelly might actually school you up. If you called in here right now, Kelly would say, don't do that. That's weird. You're going to get yourself in trouble. Or she might say, say that really loud because you're going to get yourself in trouble. But either way, it could happen either way. Kayla is in Canada. Hi, Kayla. Welcome to the show.

[Caller]

Hello. I am a longtime listener, but unfortunately not a long time doer. My husband and I started FPU over the weekend and we are going all in on the Ramsey plan because our plan has stuck.

[Dave Ramsey]

Fun.

[Caller]

We're in baby step two, and our only debt is a $55,000 personal loan to a family member. And so due to a lot of why our plan has sucked since we've been married, I've had a bit of trauma around money and basically have been squirreling away a ton of money in different savings. Not a ton, but money in different savings accounts. So it's been holding us back from paying off this loan because I can't let go of these savings. And, you know, we've decided as a couple that we're going to pay off from our savings, get it down to $1,000. And so that's about $9,500.

[Dave Ramsey]

Great. Good for you. Try something new. If what you were doing wasn't working. I like you.

[Caller]

Yeah, that's what we're gonna do. But my question is, we also have $8,000 that we've been setting aside every month in our kids savings account.

[Dave Ramsey]

So it says $8,000 a month. Total of 8,000.

[Caller]

No, no, no. Sorry. Total of 8,000. So in Canada, every month we get what they call a child benefit check. It's based on your income and it's towards raising Your kids. And when we had our first daughters, two. When we had her, we decided we were going to put this money aside in the savings account and eventually invest it. And it's not for education. We want to save it until she's of age to buy a house because we live in a very expensive part of the world where.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's your household income?

[Caller]

Our household income right here we have. Our take home is $9,000 base pay a month. And then my husband gets commission as well. And it's been averaging about 1500.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, and your question is whether to use the kids $8,000.

[Caller]

Yeah. Do that.

[Dave Ramsey]

No.

[Caller]

No. Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, you're gonna. You're gonna. You're gonna. You're gonna. Your brain is. Your brain's gonna. Not like you. And your brain's gonna wake you up in the middle of the night saying you stole money from your children. And you don't want your brain telling you that. Not for eight grand. For eight grand. Okay. Now I gotta tell you, I would stop putting the child credit money in that account. You are not ethically or morally bound to do that. That money's for taking care of the kids, and we put that in the budget because we take care of the kids. So that's just part of the income of the family. Just like child support is part of the income of the family. Same thing. It doesn't have to go into the kid's name. It costs more than child support. It costs more than you're getting from the government with this benef benefit to raise kids. So you know that you're spending more than that anyway. So just put it all into your budget. Use the whole thing and then lean into this. And really, you're just getting started. And you're going to knock the remaining $44,000 out really quick or $46,000 out really quick.

[Caller]

Yeah, that's the hope.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Kayla, can I tell you something? It's gonna sound like I'm being mean, but I'm not. I'm just this. The pot talking to the kettle here. Okay.

[Caller]

Yep.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Part of taking your care of your kids is financial. Part of taking care of your kids in your situation is you're an anxious mess and your house is electric, isn't it?

[Caller]

Yep.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yes. So part of taking care of your kids is saying that that anxiousness, that worry, that constant fretting, not sleeping, snapping at people that you love, you're going to do the work on yourself for that, too.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, we're going to send you a copy of Building a Non anxious like. But Life. I've been there.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Okay.

[Caller]

I've actually listened to your book already, Dr. Johnson. Thank you.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Well, good. I'm going to send you a hard copy also, just as our gift.

[Caller]

Okay?

[Dave Ramsey]

All right.

[Caller]

Thank you.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're going to do this, Kayla. You're going to push all the way through. You're just getting started. But no, I don't tell folks to take money out of their children's accounts unless it means the only way the family can eat. And that's definitely not the case for you guys. And the $8,000 doesn't really even speed up the thing anyway. You're going to do it so fast. With your great income, if you get this budget cranked down to beans and rice, you're going to be just fine. You'll be just fine. Melissa's in Chicago. Hi, Melissa. How are you?

[Caller]

Hi, Dave. Thank you for taking my call.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure. How can I help?

[Caller]

So, I'm 23 years old, and me and my sisters always have this talk about when it comes to dating. How do we tell potential candidates that although we can financially support ourselves as we're doing right now, that that's not necessarily what we want in a relationship without coming off as a gold digger.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm sorry, not necessarily what you want in a relationship? What is it. What is it you don't want in the relationship?

[Caller]

So, basically, I want to be able to support myself 100%, which is what I'm doing right now. But in a relationship, I don't want that to be, you know, what is normal nowadays, which is 50, 50 living together and splitting bills and things like that. At what point in a relationship do I say, hey, that's not really for me?

[Dave Ramsey]

We're going to combine everything and we're going to take on the world together. And at what point do you make that conversation exactly?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, you do that when you find somebody and then you decide to get married and then you combine everything and go get them.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, but I mean, at what point in the. Obviously not the first date.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Let me. Let me. Let me see your credit report.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Here's the biggest thing. Here's what I think people are trying to game. And this is a direct derivative of how much dating apps have screwed up human interactions. But you have already made a checkbox for the person you want to marry, which is all well and good, but you, in turn, have given. Made yourself a checkbox, too. Here's the greatest gift you can give somebody that you meet, show up, and be fully you. And you're a person who Works really hard. And you're a person who at 23 is paying your own bills. You don't owe anybody any money. And you may be a person who one day.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm not dating a guy who lives in his mother's basement and spends 52 hours on call of duty but hasn't ever had a call to real duty.

[Caller]

Right.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

And you're not a gold digger. If you say, one day I want to be a stay at home mom or one day I like, that's not gold digging. That is saying, here's a value I have and I want to be with somebody who is anchored into those same values.

[Caller]

Yeah. And I wanted to start off the call with that of being a whole stay at home mom, but I, I just thought that was. Just jump into it.

[Dave Ramsey]

But no, no, there's nothing wrong with that.

[Caller]

That.

[Dave Ramsey]

As long as that. But we're just talking together. In other words, you have to be married to someone who is as productive as you for that to work and.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Who shares those same values.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's not gonna work.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

If somebody says, oh, I don't want to date somebody who is able to support themselves at 23 and wants to be a stay at home mom someday, then run. Run from that person.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Yeah. Don't apologize for who you are. Not a match. Not a match.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Don't apologize. You're.

[Dave Ramsey]

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[Caller]

Hey, how's it going, Dave?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller]

So I just wanted to run something by you guys. Never really been in this position, so I went through a pretty rough divorce or the recent years, and it's kind of left me with all the marital debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

When was it final?

[Caller]

It was final. It was actually finalized mid last year.

[Dave Ramsey]

So it's been a year, so.

[Caller]

Yeah, yeah, just about a year. And it's kind of.

[Dave Ramsey]

How old are you at the point?

[Caller]

I am 32.

[Dave Ramsey]

How long were you married?

[Caller]

We were married. We were together in total about 2 years or 10 years. Married.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much marital debt did you get with your broken heart?

[Caller]

I think I got. It's right around 40.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. On what?

[Caller]

Mainly credit cards and then vehicle loans.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much is on the car?

[Caller]

On the. On the cars? I think one's. Hers was like 20 and mine was. I got it down to like 10.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you're paying for her car in the divorce?

[Caller]

Yeah, because my name is on it and I kind of got stuck with it.

[Dave Ramsey]

So what about. I mean, it's over now, but here's a suggestion for those of you out there listening. She sells the car, we can't afford it. We're going through a divorce. Okay. Anyway, past that now. Next thing. And so you've got about 10 in credit cards.

[Caller]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what do you make?

[Caller]

So right now I'm just north of 50 a year.

[Dave Ramsey]

What do you do?

[Caller]

I work in solar.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller]

Right now my actual title is warehouse manager. I'm also in the field doing logistics, all kinds of stuff.

[Dave Ramsey]

Any idea how the bill changing is going to affect your job?

[Caller]

What's that?

[Dave Ramsey]

Any idea how the tax credits going away at the end of the year with solar is going to affect your job?

[Caller]

Yeah. So the residential customers are going to be the ones that will be.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, you're doing industrial solar?

[Caller]

Yeah, we do both.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. You're not going to. Your residential customers are going to dry up.

[Caller]

Yeah. So we're getting hit right now, but yeah, that's going to slow down.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, it's going to slow down. You're going to get jammed between now and the end of the year. It's got to be installed, not just purchased by the end of the year for the residential customer to get those credits. So. All right, so you're making 50k, but you're working like a bazillion hours Right.

[Caller]

Yeah. I'm working. I work about, probably about on average, 50 hours a week.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller]

And like, I've tried doing things right.

[Dave Ramsey]

She paying her car payment right now.

[Caller]

So from what I. I learned, she got a whole different car.

[Dave Ramsey]

Where's the car?

[Caller]

And she went. She sent it back to the dealership. What. I understand.

[Dave Ramsey]

Purpose of. I'm on the hook for the loan. You just got repo.

[Caller]

Yeah, yeah. So.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, that was stupid.

[Caller]

Much, much communication with her. She's not the easiest to deal with.

[Dave Ramsey]

I can tell. And so that. That car, you're not paying anything on that. So you have $10,000, you have $20,000 worth of debt. You make 50k and you work all the time, so you haven't got time to spend any money. You got kids?

[Caller]

Yeah. So I said we have one kid. One child. He's. He's three. He'll be four in February.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you're having to talk to her about that, aren't you?

[Caller]

Yeah. And that's even. That is a fight.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm sure. I'm sure. Okay. All right, well, baby, you don't have to worry about the 20k right now. It's going to worry about you later. I'll come back to that. But right now you got 10k on a car and 10k on that, so 20k, you're debt free. No, wait, you're not getting overtime. You're on straight salary?

[Caller]

No, yeah, I'm hourly, but yeah, it's overtime.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, the overtime is the 50 grand?

[Caller]

Yeah, roughly. Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

What are you getting paid overtime? How much are you getting paid? Because it doesn't sound like a lot.

[Caller]

24 an hour.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller]

Okay, so I started here about a year ago because the job I did have from the mass. Amount of court dates she drug us to, ended up losing the job that I was making a lot of money at.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so let me. Let me stop you a minute, John. I'm hearing in Jonathan's voice a lot of pain. Yep.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

You're frozen, brother.

[Dave Ramsey]

And a lot of heartache. And it's kind of clouding your brain's math skills, but that's because your heart is so broken that it has flooded your brain.

[Caller]

Yeah. You're not. You're not wrong.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

So you're getting take advantage of in multiple different places of your life. And I think what you need more than anything right now is to recognize you ever been to the beach, dude?

[Caller]

Yeah, I grew up in Daytona Beach.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Okay, so you've been there when you feel like you can't swim anymore and suddenly you stand up and the water is up to your waist, but you thought it was up to your, like, over your head. That's where you are right now.

[Caller]

Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

You've proven to yourself in the past that you can work and you can make great money.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

You're crushing it right now. You're working a ton of hours. You're trying to hold together, like, being a good dad, even though this woman is. Is wrecking you financially. She's making it very hard to be a good parent. All those things. But if nothing else, after this call, just in the water you're in. Stand up. You're working way too hard in an industry that is literally going away underneath you with one stroke of the pen in Washington. Stand up.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

And use the next few months to get back into a job where you can make that kind of money. You're that good of an employee. You're that good of a man. You just got hit right in the mouth in. In the part that hurts the most in your romantic life and being a parent. Right?

[Caller]

Yeah. Yeah. Access to my son has had a price tag put on it, and it's very limited at that. Even. Even though I'm doing everything, I'm trying to do everything, and you're trying to.

[Dave Ramsey]

Make somebody happy who's not going to be happy. We've already concluded that. So I need to put her in a box over here in my mind and just let her sit there. And then let's get back to building up the things we can build up, the things you can control. She's not on the list. The things you can control are what you do with your money, what you do with your time, and what you do with your spiritual walk and your emotional recovery from going through a tragedy of having your heart ripped out and stuff down your throat. I can hear it in your voice, dude. What I'm telling you is you are, like, 10 times better than you feel like you are. You are in a much better place. You only need to pay off 20 grand, and then we'll go back and deal with the repo later that the stupid chick did, and she's going to get hammered with that, too. But you can deal with that for pennies on the dollar later. But right now, 20 grand makes your life whole. Stand up. It's not that deep. The water's not that deep. You can do it and work more there, work more somewhere else. Add hours everywhere. Work like a crazy man, and let's just get this mess cleaned up as fast as we can. Cut up those credit cards. Quit using them. Don't go out to eat. Don't go out for a beer with friends. Just work. And work on healing your heart. Make sure you're in church on Sunday and you know that's where you are. So your math is not as bad as your hope. Your hope is really low. Your math is not bad. You can push through it. Once you know you can. And that's what John and I are both hearing, listening to you. You're in a much better place than it feels like you are.

[Caller]

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[George Kamel]

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[Caller]

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[Sponsor Representative]

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[George Kamel]

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[Dave Ramsey]

Our question of the day is sponsored by why Refi? You didn't take out private student loans hoping to default. But life happens. Why Refi won't shame you. They'll help you explore a real plan to get back on track. Head to yrefi.comramsey to find out more. That's the letter Y, R, E, F, Y. Not in all states.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Today's question comes from Molly in California. Molly writes, I have two preteen step kids. My husband and I recently went through their iPads which their mom has full access and control over. We saw that the kids have their own Apple Pay accounts and they are free to buy whatever, whenever. My husband and I don't agree with any of this and think this creates bad habits since she's not teaching them how to save or even how money really works. Plus, the money isn't earned, it's just given how can we start teaching the kids the right way to handle money? And should we do anything about the Apple Pay accounts? My guess is Dave, they can't do anything about the Apple Pay accounts other than when they walk in the door, the iPads go in a box and when they're at dad's house they get a ringside seat in how money works.

[Dave Ramsey]

And I always and for that matter how life works.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

How life works. I always tell parents when you get divorced and your kids or sharing time at either house, you transition from a day by day, hour by hour influence to a 10 year influence. You want that 25 year old to look back and say thank God this parent held the line because this parent didn't. You can't win the who is the cool parent or who's the free parent or who's the whatever parent? Because often they're. When parents won't be adults and co parent together for the best interest of the kids, it gets real competitive and the kids are the losers.

[Caller]

There's.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, the normal situation like this is there's not. The ex wife is not going to take input from y'. All.0 I mean that would be normal. It'd be unusual for your husband and his ex wife to be on good enough terms that he could have a sane discussion about this and say hey, I know what you're doing there and we're going to start teaching the kids to work, to save, to give, to spend wisely. And is there any way we could work together on this and let's talk about these Apple Pay accounts or you know, is there a way we can, you know, let's talk through instead of them having just Unlimited access, because they're not in Congress, so they don't get unlimited access to money there, you know. And so is there any way we can talk? If you could do that, that would be the best thing and get her on board. But you can't fix otherwise. You just, You. You can't do anything about the time we're there with her. So they go over, you know. Well, I mean, mom allows us to smoke pot. Well, you don't do that at our house. You know, mom allows us to drive her car, and we're 12. Well, but you can't do that at our house. And so, I mean, sorry. And you don't need to talk bad about mom, although apparently she's nuts. But. But you don't have to tell. Don't say that to the kids. Whatever you do, don't say that to the kids. So anyway, as. All you can control is when they're at your house. As for me in my house. And so, you know, a less extreme situation and a less controlling situation even than you've got is like when grandkids are at my house. I don't know what you. Your mom and dad may do that, but Papa Dave, we don't do that here. This is my house. Well, I'm at Mimi's house. Yeah, well, guess what? Mimi lives with me, and we own this house and our house. This is what we do. Yeah, well, this is when a discussion. This is what we're doing. And we don't do that here. And you might do that over there, but you don't do that when you're here. And so it's up. I can't control what you do somewhere else. But when you're at my house, this is what you're gonna do. And so you guys just keep saying that. And, you know, and I'm definitely picking up the iPads, put them in a box when they walk in the door. Preteens don't need to be having unlimited iPad access, even if there's not an Apple pay account.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

But that also means, Molly, you and your husband have to be off the screens when the kids are around. And y' all are going to have to do things like play board games together. Go run around and throw the ball outside. Y' all are going to have to create a world that feels good to their nervous system. And recognize you can't compete with unfettered digital access. You just can't. So we're going to play a long game. Dave, I've seen parents be successful in this very slowly through teaching kids the joy of generosity, allowing them to do a small job, get paid for it and then show them how fun it is to give money away. And other than.

[Dave Ramsey]

And the money that they earned.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

That's right, they got to earn the money.

[Dave Ramsey]

There's no joy in giving other people's.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Money and be a part of it. I like giving your money away sometimes.

[Dave Ramsey]

I know you do. But that doesn't give you as much joy as giving your money away. It gives me almost as much joy as me giving your money away anyway. But no, seriously, the teach your children to work. Age appropriately. We don't send 4 year olds to the salt mines. We might send 14 year olds there just because they're 14. But teach your children to work, teach them to save, teach them to give like John's talking about and teach them to spend wisely and actually use cash. So here's a funny one. Rachel was telling me this the other day. So the fun uncle, Uncle Mac, her uncle gets these plastic coins from the dollar store that are not real coins, they're gold coins, but they're not coins, they're plastic. And spreads them all over the yard and hiding them has a treasure hunt. So the, you know, the pre kindergartners all come in with these coins. Well, one of the kids thinks he can go to the store and buy stuff with it for real and they didn't tell him any different. So they went in and he didn't want to give up the plastic coins but he finally gave up the plastic coins to buy something and then she slipped around and paid with actual money. But the kid was parting with those plastic coins like he had really, he really was clutching them. He got them, you know, they were my. It's my money and you may not have to give up some of my money to buy this toy. Yeah, that's how it works. And so he put those plastic coins up there like he was paying for something. And in his mind he just purchased something and he gave up something that he treasured.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

And that transaction, that feeling is so important for you.

[Caller]

That's it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Dignity. There's dignity in that. I'm empowered. It's locus of control. I've got control of this. I get to choose to do this. I'm choosing to make the trade of my hard fought treasure that I dug up out of the yard for this toy. And there's a trade there. And I swept the porch and I got this money. I'm choosing to make this trade to buy this child a toy who is not going to have a toy for Christmas, otherwise. And I'm going to be the person that gets them a toy, and that generosity breaks loose inside of them. And the DNA of generosity is inside of every human. All you got to do is source it. You're exactly right. And that's the kind of stuff you guys can do in your home. You can control what you can control, but you cannot control what they do over at Disney, mom. Right. Unfettered access to the Internet with sex trafficking the way it is, is absolutely asinine.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, it's that. It's that line Sean Ryan gave us, man gave me that. When you give your kid those devices, you're not giving your kid access to the world. You're giving the world access to your kid. And I recently saw somebody said, the day you're ready for your kid to see pornography, that's the day you should hand them a phone or, and, or an iPad. And that should send chills down the spine of every parent.

[Caller]

And.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

But here we are. This is a real life situation of a parent who left a marriage and wants to be the cool mom and the. It's all going to be cool mom and whatever my kids want, mom. Okay, as for me, in my house, we don't do iPads.

[Caller]

Here.

[Dave Ramsey]

I have a prediction. This woman, when her teenage daughter is 13, is going to dress like a teenager. I have a prediction. I see that coming.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

That's why they call you the Prophet Dave.

[Dave Ramsey]

I had a college professor said, dave, you have a firm grasp on the obvious. I can see this coming. She's going to be a friend to her children. Yeah, good luck with that. You're trying to be a friend to a teenager. They just need love, need friends.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Can I tell you this?

[Dave Ramsey]

Their mom and dad, I mean, this is a.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Is a private moment. I have a couple of riding mowers for. One of them's old, one of them's a newer one. And we're at the end of the mowing season here. We only got a couple of times before it gets cold here in Nashville. And so to have those things serviced, it's insanely expensive. Someone's got to come all the way out there and do it. And so I just ordered the parts. I've never done this kind of work, and my son's 15. And I said, hey, Saturday, you and I, we're gonna figure it out.

[Dave Ramsey]

We're gonna get the YouTube out and figure it out.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

We turned on some country, old country tunes, and we spent about six hours changing all the wires and parts on These mowers and when they cranked up to see he, we were high fiving each other and Sunday night we were.

[Dave Ramsey]

Both a little surprised.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

We were. Well, he was surprised. He's like, dad, you can do, you can do grown up man stuff. But he told me last night, Sunday night, dad, this is, this is the best weekend I've had in a long time. It's just two guys, no screens, no Internets, no buy like buying a bunch of stuff. We just did stuff together. This show is sponsored by Better Help. These days it feels like there is so much trendy advice related to everything mental health and wellness. But how do you know it actually works for you? I'm just going to be honest with you. There is a ton of nonsense out there. Noise, noise, noise. And all the noise on the Internet can lead to information overload. So it can be a struggle to know what's legitimate and what things you should actually do to improve your life. Here's the truth. Using trusted resources and talking to a live therapist can help you break through the noise. All this scrolling madness with personalized real recommendations. If you're thinking about starting therapy, contact BetterHelp. BetterHelp is a hundred percent online therapy, which means it's convenient and affordable and it's super easy to get started. Just fill out a short online survey. You'll get matched with a licensed therapist. And as the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise. BetterHelp is rated 4.9 out of 5 stars based on over 1.7 million reviews in the App Store. Listen, talk it out with better help. Visit betterhelp.com Ramsey to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp. H-E-L-P.com Ramsey.

[Dave Ramsey]

William is in California. Hey William, how are you?

[Caller]

I'm doing fantastic. Thanks for coming to work today, Dave.

[Dave Ramsey]

Thank you, sir. How can we help?

[Caller]

So my question is I'm kind of stuck between steps three and four and I guess my question would be does a defined pension benefit affect baby step three and four, meaning I have a, you know, a defined pension. I, for every year of service I do somewhere where I work at a government agency, I get a percentage of my top rate of pay.

[Dave Ramsey]

So now are you contributing?

[Caller]

Well, so I have. The city that I work for pays 19% into my pension. I paid 9%, which I have no control over. That's what I pay is 90%.

[Dave Ramsey]

I understand.

[Caller]

So, but I, but I also do a 457 on the side. So my question is, I'm almost, I'm about three months at baby step. I have about three months of bill in my emergency fund, but I'm kind of at a stalemate to where I can't, I can't seem to get ahead anymore.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, you got rid of all your debt except your house. You should have margin.

[Caller]

Well, so I mean, I would say life in the last 12 months has changed because I now have a driver. So car insurance, fuel, that kind of stuff kind of ate up my margin, you could say.

[Dave Ramsey]

How about that driver getting a job.

[Caller]

Because she's still a teen and enjoying volleyball, travel ball.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, I guess. Enjoying free gas and car from dad that he can't afford.

[Caller]

Yeah, well, I mean we want our kids to do better than we did. Right. So it felt that I don't have money in the bank and I don't have any debt other than a mortgage. So I want to make sure my kids, you know, enjoy their teen years as long as they're acting like a proper teen. So sure. Day student, no troubles. So reward that behavior.

[Dave Ramsey]

No. So on that justification you could buy her a Bentley.

[Caller]

No, I'm smarter than that. I'm not going to waste that kind of money. You drive the 10 year old car that's paid off. There's no debt, no debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

Won't hurt her to pick up part of the gas and insurance. It'd be good for her and good for you. So anyway, I'll rest my case. The as far as your 9% going in, I would count half of it toward the 15. You need to get your three months done as soon as you can. Three to six months of expenses set aside and then you adjust your budget and you need to be putting 15% of your income away. You're putting 9 away now because you don't have control of it though. I'm not going to count it as a full 9 towards the 15 if I'm you, you can do what you want to do. You are obviously doing what you want to do. So, you know, that's. I just, yeah, I don't count the pensions full amount even though they're mandatory because you don't have control of what it's invested in if they manage it. Well, pensions do sometimes go broke. I'm not projecting this one to go broke. I don't even know what it is but, but they do sometimes go broke and you don't have any control of it. The rates of return on the pension are nowhere near as Good. If you could put it in a good mutual fund, in a 401k or Roth IRA. And long before you do 457s, you do 401ks that are Roth, and you do Roth IRAs. 457 is the last on the list that's simply deferred comp. And it's taxed like a traditional 401k. And it's not the best thing on your list of things to do. So I'd sit down with a smartvestor pro, lay out a couple of Roths, one for you, one for your wife. If your wife has a traditional 401k, I might put the money over there instead of in your 457. But as far as your 9%, that's mandatory goes, I would count it as about half. So I'd count it at 4 or 5%. We called it 5. Then you still got to put in 10% of your household income if you're the only working person. And that's what we're going to do there. So. Good question. Thank you for joining us. All right. Bailey is in Texas. Hey, Bailey, how are you?

[Caller]

Hey, Dave. Thanks for taking my call, man.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure. What's up?

[Caller]

So I'll give a little Backstory. I'm only 25. I was living in Dallas when I was 24. March 2024. I was in a single car accident leaving a golf course. My first client outing during the week, we drank too much, hit a tree going 60. I've been living with a spinal injury, paralyzed from the chest down about 16 months now. But early in that process, we got approached by lawyers and, like, ultimately, we've been working through settlements and lawsuits throughout this year and a little bit last year, and we've reached a settlement of. They sued the management company for 12 million, but I think ultimately I'll get around 6. I've already committed 3 into, like, a personal injury annuity, which will feed me 14k a month, 40 years guaranteed. It's for life annuity. So if I live past the four years, it'll still.

[Dave Ramsey]

Is this all done?

[Caller]

Yeah. The point where I'm about to get 2.7 in cash, my main question is I need to maximize that the most. I've been talking with trust officers and.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, you don't need a trust officer. It's now, it's now your job to manage this money to take care of you for the rest of your life. And if it makes 10% a year and that's 270,000, you'll be okay. Right. And you've got the other money. And you got the other money as well. So you need to sit down with a good investment broker and begin to learn about investing. So just go to ramseysolutions.com and click on Smartvestor Pro and find one of the people that we recommend. We're not in the investment business, but these are people that we have vetted, and the main thing we do with them, Bailey, is we want them to have the heart of a teacher, because their main job is to teach you. So you are making the decision that they're. But, you know. So sometimes even I know a lot about the stuff, but sometimes my SmartVestor Pro call me up and go, hey, here's something that changed in the tax law. Here's something changed with the investment landscape. I want to teach you about this. And based on that, you may want to look at this. And I look at it, and I go, yeah. Or I look at it and I go, nah, I don't think I want to go that way. Okay, cool. I just wanted their. Their job is to bring me new information and teach me and old information and teach me and remind me of the old information that we agreed to a long time ago that keeps me on the tracks. Right. That's what we're doing.

[Caller]

Gotcha.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Bailey, do you have a lot of people who want to get their hands on this money? Parents, family, brother, sisters?

[Caller]

That's starting to. That's starting to happen. Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. No is a complete sentence. Yeah.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

You need to get some. You need to get a pastor or some people in your corner that aren't after money that coach you up and allow you to set some boundaries with these other people. Okay. You're. It's your job to manage this money, and it's not your job to help everybody else with it. You got a mess on your hands, and you need this money to take care of you.

[Caller]

Yeah. So would you advise no money in the trust at all?

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Yeah. I don't want any of it in there. I don't. There's no reason for it to be trust. Why would it need to be in a trust?

[Caller]

I've heard just. It protects it. Like, if I was ever in a loss again, it wouldn't. They couldn't touch that money. And that's pretty much the only.

[Dave Ramsey]

Have you got out. Have you got outstanding litigation that may be coming at you now?

[Caller]

Okay, I've got no expenses, no dependence. No, there's. No. There's.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

But you will have expenses one day and I'll tell you, my oldest friend in the world has had a similar situation as you. Almost about the same age as when he got in a wreck.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

His health is, is better than all of ours, except the fact that he's paralyzed. And 25, 30 years ago, I never in a million years would have thought that this. And so people will try to get their hands on your money. They'll try to tell you what to do with it. And so you, you understanding what you're doing with this and then not getting sucked into. We need rental properties and you're an idiot if you don't do this. And online game. Like, there's going to be so many temptations to.

[Dave Ramsey]

Everybody's got an idea for other people's money, and it's usually broke people that have these ideas.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

This has to last you the rest of your life. And with medical technology, you can live a long, long, long time.

[Caller]

Time. Yeah. Right. What do you think is going to keep it liquid, like, in my account? Like, how much should I take to like a fiduciary investor or advisor? Like all of it?

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, yeah, but you're gonna, but you're gonna put it in there. You're, you're, you're, you are the fiduciary. You're in charge of. You. We're not, we're not, we're not giving this money to a babysitter.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Your new career is managing millions of dollars for the rest of your life.

[Caller]

Life.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And so that's what I mean by you've got to get with someone with the heart of a teacher. All fiduciary means is trust. That's all it means. Do I trust this person's input? I don't trust anybody to take over this and handle it for you. It's your job to handle it. It's your job. I got me a man says people right before they lose all their money. No, you are the man. You are in charge. You learn it, you stay on it. You get people on your corner to advise you, but you are the man. If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck and feeling like you can't get ahead, join one of our free every dollar trainings. There are new trainings every week this month, and they're all hosted by one of the Ramsey personalities. I think Rachel's doing it this week. We're going to be showing you how to stick to a budget. And typically, a person finds a good amount of margin, thousands of dollars of room when they're using everydollar so they can get out of debt, start building wealth. We show you how to actually do this stuff and there's a cool time for Q and A live in the webinar. So it's like this show except you can actually get through. Sign up for free. It's a free every dollar training with Ramsey [e-mail] webinar Jefferson is in Sacramento, California. Hi Jefferson, how are you?

[Caller]

I'm wonderful, thanks God. How are you doing?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. How can I help?

[Caller]

Better than I deserve as well. So in 2015, I met my wonderful wife when I was in a very tough situation with work and life and drugs, smoking weed and all that. And when I met her, gave myself to God. 2016, got baptized and since then being buying houses, investing on houses and a little bit later and stocks as well and. But when in 2022 I did a class in AFCO, which is if you want to become like a missionary or do work for God. That's when I fully gave myself to God and really stopped smoking fully stop doing edibles and no bad videos or anything like that. Photography and trying to just be a better man. But since then, after made close to $2 million in the past 10 years, but things start getting wrong in the wrong path and all the investments that I did, everything backed fire all at the same time, like losses. 10,000 here, 40,000 there, a hundred thousand there. And then I my guys started messing up at work. I have to start putting on credit cards after credit cards and at that time we're going vacation and enjoying life as well. But now I'm in close to $800,000 in credit cards, including personal loan and business loan and two houses.

[Dave Ramsey]

Thousand dollars?

[Caller]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Were you not working during this time?

[Caller]

I was working, but I have not been working fully the past year and a half since the company I was working with, they went bankrupt.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, but I mean, how do you spend $800,000 screwing around? I'm confused.

[Caller]

I don't even know. It just accumulated with.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh yeah, you do. Yeah, you do. Where'd it go? Oh, I mean, you said you used credit cards to cover your guys who weren't doing their work. What are you talking about?

[Caller]

Yes. So a lot of it went to like they broke something at work or lost tools, so I had to buy more tools or I put in.

[Dave Ramsey]

I thought you worked for someone else that just went bankrupt.

[Caller]

Yes, I was working with them. I was subcontracting with them.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, what business were you answer.

[Caller]

Do construction, home remodeling.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you had a remodeling company.

[Caller]

Correct.

[Dave Ramsey]

And who were you doing remodeling for that went bankrupt? What kind of a company was that?

[Caller]

Was. It's called Voltex. And they went off because they were. I believe.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, why. Why were they. Why were you not just doing remodeling on your own? Why were you doing it for someone else?

[Caller]

Because I have a C15 license, which means I can do flooring. And I was using their license as partnership to do full remodel. And I worked with them for almost five years. Now I'm working and studying to get my own.

[Dave Ramsey]

But you did all of that, and then your guys messed up jobs because you weren't watching the jobs and you had to cover the whole.

[Caller]

Correct. We were doing.

[Dave Ramsey]

So your business sucked and it was losing money. Handover fish is where a lot of the 800 went.

[Caller]

Correct. Vacation as well. At least 150,000, 205 to the church as well.

[Dave Ramsey]

You borrowed money on a credit card to give it to the church?

[Caller]

No, no, that's just the money that I made from. Because on every two, three years, I would buy a house and resell it and.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. Do you own any houses now?

[Caller]

Now I own two houses and I'm trying to sell one, but the prices keeps dropping. So I.

[Dave Ramsey]

What is the house worth?

[Caller]

It was worth close to 600 now I dropped to 520.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what do you owe on that house?

[Caller]

450.

[Dave Ramsey]

You don't get a little bit out of that. And what about the house that you live in? What's it worth?

[Caller]

That one? This one? Probably what I paid for 550 and I owed535.20.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you barely get out of here too. Okay. Have you got your business back up and running or how are you. How are you guys eating? How are you buying? How are you paying bills?

[Caller]

So that's when. When things start slowing down and not having work, that's when you start buying food with credit cards. Paying bills with credit cards.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, but that's not the 800 grand. Ain't that much food on the plan.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

The $200,000 vacation you borrowed.

[Caller]

That's part of it.

[Dave Ramsey]

You went on a $200,000 vacation for real?

[Caller]

Well, not one in the past 10 years. When. If I calculate so.

[Dave Ramsey]

But while you were making no money because you weren't working and you were going on vacation. Okay, wow.

[Caller]

When I was working, I was going vacation and making money. Everything was good.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, it wasn't. You were putting it on a Credit card. There's nothing in the story that's good. Except the part where you came to God. Okay, yes.

[Caller]

No, it's not good. That's. That's when. Last year, he went.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so have you got an income now? Yes or no?

[Caller]

Barely.

[Dave Ramsey]

Barely. Does your wife work outside the home now?

[Caller]

No, she takes care of all.

[Dave Ramsey]

And how are you eating? Just more credit cards. You haven't figured out the problem yet? Okay, so, dude, you need to go get some jobs.

[Caller]

Paying everything. I just stopped paying on my credit card.

[Dave Ramsey]

You need to go get some jobs. You've got to get some income coming in. Wow. I don't. I don't know, man. I don't know where to tell you to start exactly. I think the crisis here is in you paying attention to the adult stuff. No vacations, no eating out. And we work and we pay attention to our work, and then nobody tears up our stuff, steals our tools because we're on the job. Anybody tries that gets fired instantaneously. Because we're on the job, because we work and we work and we work and we pay attention to what's going on. You don't get to coast. And you've been just running around in circles, man. You're going to have to really get focused and go run these jobs. Apparently you do know how to do construction, but you suck at the math part. And you need to start bidding these jobs at a profit margin and get a profit margin coming in and make some money. You've got the ability to do that in freaking Sacramento big time. So you go get your license passed. In the meantime, you do anything you can do legally with the current license you have, and you work your butt off. And no more vacations and no more purchases of any kind. You don't get to buy anything. You've done all that. That is all in your past. You are now Mr. Frugal. Captain Frugal McDougal. That's you, man. And so you don't buy nothing, and all you do is work and pay bills and maybe you can turn the corner on this mess. Maybe.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I don't know, Dave, what is the. I know this is a deep source of pain. What's the moment when someone says, I need to go sit down and at least put bankruptcy on the table? Oh, $800,000 in credit cards.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, the problem is that personal finance or that debt is not the problem. Debt is the simple. And this guy, his debt is the symptom of about six things, none of which are fixed by bankruptcy.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Because if it got Wiped. Tomorrow he'd go figure out another way to borrow money.

[Dave Ramsey]

He's screwing it up like Christmas, man. Every sixth wave of a Sunday, he's spending money like left and right. Buying rental properties, buying stock. He's trying to do add. We got stuff going in every direction. We're buying stock, we lost money on that. We bought rental property. We're losing money on that almost. You know, mama's not working. He's not working much. He's not paying attention to his business. And bankruptcy doesn't fix any of that. You're right back in the same mess from the exact same causes once you bankruptcy treats the symptom. Yeah. Now if you get in there and you're making $200,000 a year and you can't keep the, you can't turn the corner and settle with the credit cards, which you could, but if you, you know, let's say it was $10 million instead of $800,000. If you can't turn the corner and you're doing everything right and you fixed all the stuff you were doing, that's wrong, you might have to look at that someday. I'll never tell you to do it because 99% of the time it's not the problem most of the time, it's the stuff that's causing it that's the problem. Including when I went through it. So I'm no exception. I'm no better man. I'm sorry. What a mess.

[George Kamel]

What's up guys? George Camel here. If you've been thinking about making a real difference in your community, this is your moment. People are drowning in money stress right now and you can be the one who helps them by leading a Financial Peace University class. It's totally free for you and we hook you up with all the tools and support you need. So if you're ready to help people ditch debt, save money and actually sleep at night, go to fpu.comlead to learn more. That's fpu.com lead.

[Caller]

Foreign.

[Dave Ramsey]

Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Dr. John DeLoney Ramsey, personality number one best selling author, is my co host. Today Katrina is in Canada. Hi Katrina, how are you?

[Caller]

Hi, I'm good, thanks for asking. Thank you for taking my call.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure. Well, what's up?

[Caller]

So my question today is I am debating on leaving my job to open up a cleaning company. I have currently been working it on the side since I was on maternity leave. I have an 18 month old just recently separated and moved away from his father. So it's it's us primarily and I'm struggling with child care. So looking at making the switch to open up a bit of time and schedule and actually almost I think make more than what I'm making now. So, yeah, that's the outline of my question.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm confused. What are you doing with 18 month old while you're cleaning?

[Caller]

So right now dad has him during the day, two days a week and then he is actually paying in lieu of paying any change, child support. Right now he's paying for child care. So we have two different ladies that we alternate between as we have not been able to get into a daycare. It's about a two year wait list here. I've actually been on the waitlist since I was pregnant.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you have, you have childcare during the day and you're instead of working a job, you're going to open a business.

[Caller]

Correct? Yeah. So right now I'm working Monday through Thursday at my day job.

[Dave Ramsey]

But it has nothing to do with the 18 month old because the 18 month old has day. Has care during the day cover for now.

[Caller]

Yeah, the cost is really high.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, that's not what I said. But I mean the flexibility that you need for the 18 month old, you don't need flexibility. You have it covered for now.

[Caller]

He can't sustain it because the cost is really high. So because we haven't been able to get into a daycare. So it's about double the price of what daycare is to have the nanny and.

[Dave Ramsey]

For three, three days a week.

[Caller]

So I work Monday through Thursday and I'm doing cleaning on Fridays and I've had.

[Dave Ramsey]

He was keeping the baby two days a week and the nannies were keeping them three days a week. And three days a week is double the cost of daycare.

[Caller]

Wild. Yeah, it's actually. They're making more than I am. When I ran out the numbers. I have all my numbers.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

If he can't, if this isn't sustainable for him, you're gonna have to take him to court for child support. He's gonna have to pay one way or the other.

[Caller]

Right. And so he's agreed that if he's not paying for the childcare, he will pay child support. But it's sort of a, it's a bit of a tricky situation. We just separated. It's. We're kind of working it all out. But basically the cost for the nanny per month right now is over $3,000. The daycares that I've been looking at are 1,600amonth. If we could get. Yes. Canada. It's yeah. Crazy. On the waitlist for daycare since I've been pregnant.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so let's go back. Let's go back to your original question. The original question is, do I quit my job and been cleaning on Fridays and I'm making some money? What I don't want you to do. What I was trying to push against with the whole series of questions is I don't want you to have the false idea that you, that you get to not work and take care of the kids. You're a single mom, you're going to be working. And when you say flexibility to take care of the 18 month old, I'm saying you're not going to have much. The worst thing you can do if you want flexibility to be run your own business because your boss is a jerk.

[Caller]

Fair enough.

When I worked out if the kid.

[Dave Ramsey]

Gets sick, you still got to go to work when you own the business.

[Caller]

That's correct. Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

The kid gets sick, you work for somebody else, you might have some PTO or something. But when you run your own business, you know, you're this idea that somehow that's gonna make everything easier. No, it's gonna make it harder. You might make more money, but it's gonna make it harder.

[Caller]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so now how many clients do you. What are you making on your cleaning now?

[Caller]

So right now, because I'm only able to take the Fridays, I'm making after expenses anywhere from 350 to $400 doing that like per day. So if I fill up my days with eight hours, I'm charging $50 an hour. My expenses are pretty low because I make a lot of my products. They're all like child safe and pet safe. So my expenses are pretty low. But when I look at it, if I were to swap, this is sort of what we've been discussing and thinking about.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why are we discussing anything? He's gone.

[Caller]

Well, because he's gonna. Potentially, instead of paying the nanny, that will then become child support. So if I balance it out where I can build up, that needs to.

[Dave Ramsey]

Happen anyway, whether you do this or not. Yeah. You got these things all tangled up together.

[Caller]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. It's a simple thing. You need to make the right decision for your career based on the numbers and the flexibility and it's. The child support doesn't enter into it. The child support should be an independent discussion. So anyway, what do you make at your day job?

[Caller]

So currently I'm at 60% of my salary and I'm making 36, 600 per year.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why are you at 60% a month after?

[Caller]

Because that's the only thing I can work currently with the hours that I have available. And so that was my return to work schedule. It could go back up to 100%, but I.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you make $36,000. You make $3000 a month. Sorry, you make $3000 a month.

[Caller]

I bring home 2500 after taxes. Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And so you'd have to fill up one more day to do that. Okay. Can you get. Can you get enough clients to fill up one to one and a half more days?

[Caller]

Oh, yes. Yeah. And how do you know beyond that?

[Dave Ramsey]

But how do you know?

[Caller]

Well, because I've had to turn. I've had to turn down regular clients. I have very good relationships with a couple of. Of top realtor teams as well.

[Dave Ramsey]

I would get on the phone with them and have a bunch of stuff lined up. Not just hope, because hope is a good way to go broke and running a business. And so if you're going to walk away from $3,000 a month, make sure you're walking into $4,000 a month or.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

5,000 because you've got a home.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's already set. Yeah. I want you to run five days a week, six days a week. I want you to run cleaning, and then we work childcare out and we figure that child support crap out and all that. But I want you into a business that makes you more than you are making now. The first month you do it. Not. I just thought I had a bunch of clients, but then it was harder than I thought and I only had one day, and now I'm screwed because I walked out of a paying job and I just was dreaming. No, I don't want you to dream. I want you to actually tack this stuff down and run it like it's a business. So have it all set up. Have the clients say, all right, I'm going to start with you September 1st, and they sign an agreement to that, and I'm going to start with you September 1st, and they sign an agreement for that, and I'm going to start with you September 14th, and we're going to sign an agreement for that, and I'm going to start with you, and then I'm going to quit my job effective September 1st, and I'm going to go do this stuff, but don't do it on. Oh, I've turned away a whole bunch of people, so I know I can now that. That. That's. Don't be. Don't be ditzy and try to run a business.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

And here's the other thing I'm telling you. The number of of newly single moms who try to handshake deals with a guy they're separating or divorcing, don't do that. Go through the process and get it written down in a legal binding contract. You will find yourself hung out to dry as a single mom. And I don't care how handshakey. We're trying to do things right now. He'll disappear. It just. I get that call over and over and over and over again.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, he already has disappeared from your life, just not the kids yet.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

So don't make, don't make agreements based on handshakes in the present. Let's go through the process, get this stuff in writing, legally binding so that you and especially that baby have some protection moving forward.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's way too easy to put off making a will. And believe me, I've heard every excuse in the book. But not having the time is one excuse we can kick to the curb right now. Because these days, most folks can make a legally binding will on their laptop between loads of laundry. If you're wondering if you can make your will online or if you need a lawyer, we have a quiz to help you figure that out in less than 5 minutes. Just go to ramseysolutions.com willsquiz ramseysolutions.com willsquiZ Buying or selling a home in the middle of all this drama that's called the real estate market is scary because if you get your information from Tic Tac and your broke friends, you live in Dramaland. The way you cut through the drama is facts, ma'. Am, Just the facts. Facts are your friends when there's drama or trauma. Dr. John DeLoney says that all the time you want to learn about the housing market facts, the actual trends, we've got a site up for you to give you what's really going on. Median home prices went up about another $10,000. Last month they were 441,000. Now they're 400. Oh, no. Went down $1,000. I'm sorry, they're 439,000. So they dropped a tiny bit. Basically, steady number of homes for sale is over a million still for the third month in a row. And 15 year fixed rate dropped a bit down to 5.86% from 5.95. So basically everything's flat. That's what it amounts to. And if you want to know more about this, go to ramseysolutions.com or click the link in the show notes and we'll help you. Cassie's on the line in Mississippi. Hey, Cassie, how are you?

[Caller]

Hey, how are you, Dave? Thanks for taking my call. Appreciate it. Sure.

[Dave Ramsey]

How can I help?

[Caller]

Well, I am at full retirement age in March and I started drawing my Social Security, but I'm still working, so I have income. But I'm thinking of retiring to Nashville where I have my three grown kids, live with my grandkids, and just trying to find out if it's financially feasible to do that. I do own my home in Mississippi. Well, owe about $4,000 on it.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's that home worth?

[Caller]

Have any other debt? It's about 220,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what do you make now?

[Caller]

Currently I make 60.

What do you do with my.

With my Social Security, I make. That's another 30. I am executive administrative assistant.

[Dave Ramsey]

How old are you?

[Caller]

And I am 67.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. And how big is your nest?

[Caller]

Well, not big enough. I have about 500,000 in 401k and IRA.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good. Okay.

[Caller]

And that's it.

[Dave Ramsey]

So what does it take you to live a month in Nashville?

[Caller]

Well, that I don't know.

[Dave Ramsey]

There we go. There's a piece of information we need. And what part of Mississippi are you in?

[Caller]

I'm on the Gulf Coast.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. Probably won't be substantially different depending on neighborhood you pick out. Okay. Housing costs will be your main difference, but your cost of living won't be much different than the Gulf Coast. Things like electricity, food, gas, that kind of stuff. Okay. Housing will be your big difference, and you may see some differences there. And again, that all is neighborhood dependent on how close you are going to be to the kiddos and which neighborhood the kiddos are in in Nashville. So here's the thing.

[Caller]

Thing.

[Dave Ramsey]

If you took 500,000 and invested it with a good smartvestor pro, you're old enough to draw against it without any trouble. And if it created 10% that without touching the 500,000. If you lived off the 10%, that'd be 50,000. I'm just doing round numbers. Okay. And 50 is really close to your 60, so you probably can do it.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, you got $80,000 a year to live on, and you got 220,000 from the sale of your house. You need to get you an inexpensive little condo of some kind and pay cash for it.

[Caller]

But I wouldn't have that 80,000 to live on if I retired. I would only have 30.

My Social Security.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, hon, you misunderstood. You said you had a half Million dollars?

[Caller]

No.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, 10%. 10% of 550.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

If it's invested at 10 to 12% and you lived off a 10%, that'd be 50. I don't want you to take that much off. I'd rather it be less because I want you to leave that 500 alone. I won't want to touch it. But I mean if you get 40 or $50,000 a year off of that or 30 to 50,000 year off that and you got your 30,000 in Social Security and you know, you probably, you might even pick up some personal assistant work around here, around Nashville, two or three days a week or something too. And I think you can make the move. You just got to be careful and watch what you're doing and you're going to have to have the 500k invested well.

[Caller]

Okay. So would you take the sale of.

[Dave Ramsey]

My home and buy a one bedroom or two bedroom condo cheap, pay cash for it.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's your retirement home.

[Caller]

Gotcha.

That's what I was thinking.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, no house payment. That helps your expenses below.

[Caller]

So you wouldn't consider renting my house?

I wouldn't, no, no.

[Dave Ramsey]

You don't need a rental property in the coast and you're in Nashville. Yuck.

[Caller]

Right.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I want my 60 year old, 7 year old mother to have. No, I don't want anyone to ever be able to come take her house away from.

[Caller]

Right, right. Gotcha.

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, so I can do it. Load up the truck and head to Beverly kid. But before you do that, come make some trips and figure out where you might live and what it's going to cost you to live and sit down with a smartvestor Pro. Go to ramseysolutions.com and they'll help you do the analysis on the investing and they can teach you about investing and teach you what you can pull off of that. And you say, well based on that I think I can lift live. Okay. And if you had a debt free house and you didn't have a house payment and you had a, you know, your 30,000 from Social Security and some income coming off of that, what's it take me to live? You're probably not spending all 80 right now. And Dave, I'm sorry, 90 that you're.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Making now, I'm telling you, I, maybe it's just I'm paying attention to it because my parents are older. I have heard the question from what I would call aging parents, should I, should I move? Should I sell this? Should I be closer to the grandkids? And I'm not hearing the words, can I? And more and more and more, I think there's this idea like, I think I'm going to retire. And if you ask, can you. That question never even popped into somebody's head. And so I always want people to look at the math problem on this thing as well as the emotional, relational side.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, absolutely, absolutely.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Like, should I move around the kids? Like, before you answer that question at all, ask, can you, like, mathematically? And then start asking the harder. Don't want to move my life. Make new friends and that kind of thing. Be around the kids and. And whatever. But, man, more and more it's. I'm hearing people get to be 60, 70, and just think, this stuff happens. Now this is the stage I'm in. And there is a math problem to all this stuff.

[Dave Ramsey]

Absolutely, absolutely. Matt is in New York. Hi, Matt, how are you?

[Caller]

Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my call.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure.

[Caller]

Just a little guidance on this situation I got here. Okay, so I have about $6,000 loan on my truck that I currently have. And it needs some work, but it gets me back and forth to work. And I do use it to do side work, which is a good part of my income as well. Well, I really. I have also $6,000 in the bank. And I was wondering what you feel about switching baby step two and three just due to the truck needing work. I don't want to pay off my loan.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's wrong with the truck?

[Caller]

Emissions. It's a night. It's a good running truck overall. Just emissions, some exhaust work, catalytic converted.

[Dave Ramsey]

A lot of money. Cadillac converter could be a lot of money. The rest. That's not a lot of money.

[Caller]

Yeah, I can cheat the system. My plan was to try to pay it off in a year and just.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why $6,000?

[Caller]

I know. So you think I should keep the.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's your income? Honey.

[Caller]

I just started a union job, so right now I'm taking home 2,800, but my bills are 2550, so there's not much room in between the sales.

[Dave Ramsey]

Are you married?

[Caller]

Not basically, but no, not yet. No, I'm not.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Why'd you take a job that's barely, I mean, barely keeping you afloat, making.

[Dave Ramsey]

$30,000 a year in New York?

[Caller]

Well, I was making probably about 150 to 200 more a week at my other job. But the. This union job that I got in, in five years after my schooling, I will make 100 grand a year. Year. So that's as a foreman in our union. So that's kind of.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

That's five years of crossing your fingers, hoping this six thousand dollar truck makes it.

[Caller]

I know. So I was thinking about getting like a commuter because it's a lot of miles.

[Dave Ramsey]

I think I'm gonna, I think I'm gonna get a, an extra job.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, dude, don't do that.

[Dave Ramsey]

And I'm gonna pay off the truck.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Today because you're gonna get an extra car for this community commute and something's going to happen in two and a half years. And you've got two and a half more years of barely surviving.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's a lot.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Hoping the taxes don't go up.

[Dave Ramsey]

Hoping signing up for this union deal might not have been your smartest move. But if you're going to stick with it, you're going to have to have some other income coming in because you're starving to death on that.

[George Kamel]

Hey, George Camel here. So you're thinking about buying or selling your home? It's exciting, but there's a lot to think about and all those decisions can feel overwhelming. Well, here's the good news. You don't have to tackle the process alone. Ramsey's real estate home base is the place to find all of your free tools and resources for help to get prepared to buy or sell your home with confidence. You'll find calculators, start to finish guides, a podcast, and even an in depth video course hosted by yours truly. What's not to love? So if you're ready to take the next steps toward your home goals, go to ramseysolutions.com realestate that's ramseysolutions.com realestate.

[Dave Ramsey]

Mo is in Wisconsin. Hi Mo, how are you?

[Caller]

Hey, Dave, Long time fan. I'm good. How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve, sir. How can I help?

[Caller]

So, you know, my wife and I, we, we've been living sort of very conservatively. I'm a doctor in training and now I have a big contract coming up. That's $650,000 a year.

[Dave Ramsey]

Way to go.

[Caller]

She makes about. Thank you. She makes $100,000 a year and so we're projected to make 750 at the end of. After a year of working.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sweet. What kind of doc are you?

[Caller]

Yeah, Cardiology.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, wow. Good for you, man. You've worked hard. You've worked hard to get there. I'm proud of you.

[Caller]

You. Thank you. Thank you. The training has been very arduous and I feel like I want a Porsche. And my wife is in, is in agreement too that, you know, I've deserved a Nice car. I deserve a nice car. The thing is, is I'm not sure if, if I can afford it and so that's why I called in today.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. Do you have any money?

[Caller]

Yeah, so I've saved up about $60,000, which is I would say like an emergency fund type situation. We own two homes. One is in Florida right at the beginning of my training and that one is being rented out and it's generating $1,000 a month after all the taxes and bills are paid.

[Dave Ramsey]

Does it have a mortgage on it?

[Caller]

Yeah, it does. It has $150,000 left on it.

[Dave Ramsey]

And in your current home, what is it worth?

[Caller]

That one is $300,000 or it's worth about probably 450. We bought it just a year ago and we have 300,000 left on it.

[Dave Ramsey]

So how much do you have in cash to buy your car with?

[Caller]

Well, that's the thing. I'm going to get a sign on bonus of between 75 to a hundred thousand dollars. So I wanted to, I wanted to use that to get the car showing.

[Dave Ramsey]

About $75,000 car.

[Caller]

No, the car itself is. I was thinking about a 200, $250,000 car.

[Dave Ramsey]

Remember that part where you opened the show, opened the call and you said, I'm a big fan.

[Caller]

Hey, hold on.

[Dave Ramsey]

What about your message, how much you've listened to the show? Have you ever heard me told anybody in any situation to get a car payment? No, no.

[Caller]

You know, I know, I know. You say don't do the car payment and I'm just, I'm searching for, I don't know, some kind of approval.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, it's crazy. I'm not gonna get approval. Do something stupid. I love you too much to tell you to do something stupid. You've done too good a job. This is. Listen, you've been a grown up for so long. For just a minute here, you want to be a four year old and I'm not gonna let you.

[Caller]

All right.

[Dave Ramsey]

If you want to buy a $250,000 Porsche, I'm fine with that. With your income, as long as you are debt free and you have your emergency fund in place and you pay cash for it.

[Caller]

I see. So I would probably wait a year or so until I'm debt free and then do it. Yeah, yeah, that sounds good.

[Dave Ramsey]

And what's the house in Florida worth?

[Caller]

You said it's worth about 250.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'd probably sell it.

[Caller]

Okay, sell it. And then even if it's a cash flowing, you know, a thousand dollars a month.

[Dave Ramsey]

Thousand dollars a month is nothing. You want a $250,000 car, you make 750,000. You're screwing around with 212 grand in Florida. Yeah, it's nothing.

[Caller]

I got a property manager burning too many.

[Dave Ramsey]

All bull crap. It's burning too many calories for what it is. It's not worth it. I would use that money to give my. To build my new life. You've. You're. This is a new chapter. You just close this other chapter. That house is part of it. And you're trying to act like it's some kind of smart rental property thing. It's not. And just, you know, start your life fresh. And if you want to buy a $250,000 car, you are able to do that when you can pay cash for it. It's a lot, but you could do that. And you deserve it when you can pay for it. Until then, you don't deserve it. I deserve it because I work hard. Wah. Everybody works hard. Okay? Your work has paid off beautifully. Again, I'm proud of you. You got an incredible income and you've worked really hard to get here. I don't doubt that. But working really hard to get to do something that doesn't. That's not financially smart is not a plan. I want to work really hard, so I want to hurt myself. No, that's not a reward for working hard. No. I want you to get a nice car. I'll tell you what I would do in the meantime. I'd put that house up for sale and I'd take some of that signing bonus and I'd go buy a used Porsche for cash that's not the 250. And get you one and enjoy the ride. Because honestly, they're great cars. I've driven them. Most of them, including the 251. And the difference in the 250 when you're driving it. And the $75,000 version that's a few years old is not much.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

But the difference in the gastrointestinal distress when it hails outside is a lot.

[Dave Ramsey]

Better. One of those doctor parking spots inside the parking garage? Yeah, dude, the cardiologists spot inside the garage.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

But here's another way to look at this. With this income, in one calendar year, you could have completely paid off your house. You could have no house payment for.

[Dave Ramsey]

The rest of your life.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

For the rest of your life. And if you give yourself six more months, you don't even have kids yet. I'm assuming you could have a fully funded. You could have $250,000 in cash just ready for that kid to be born into, to go to college like you have an opportunity to, if you will.

[Dave Ramsey]

Just drive a hundred thousand dollar Porsche.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, yeah. Drive a hundred thousand dollar Porsche. And if, if you can suffer through that and for 24 months, you change the trajectory of everyone in your family. And Dave, I used to always tell grad students with their med students, law students, if you will just, you're three.

[Dave Ramsey]

To five minutes, three to five years early on this purchase from changing everything. If you, if you'll delay the purchase that long. And, and I know you've been working hard and I know you put in the hours and you're a smart guy. Are you in a. And you, you can't do this.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

You can take a heart out of a person and put another one in. Like you, you, you're obviously good at what you do, man, but dude, dude, dude, dude. Two years and you change everything.

[Dave Ramsey]

And let's just be real clear. You called me and asked me if you could get a car payment. So, you know, we can't, we can't.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

You know, you're not that smart.

[Caller]

I'm just kidding.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

No, dude, I, I, Man, Dave, you, you know what? You nailed it. Because I've been there when it's like I would go to all day as dean of students, then I would go to a crisis call in the middle of the night and then I'd grown up.

[Dave Ramsey]

My grown up is used up.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I just want to get a bag of Twizzlers and some gummy bears at 4am on my ride home and it's.

[Dave Ramsey]

Like chase it with a Mountain Dew.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Just be a grown up for a few more minutes. Right? Yes, you're right. My adult gets all used up. But I just want to act like a kid. And you can do that. You can afford it. I could do it. But man, it just cost you. Just cost you. Yeah, that's a great way to put that, Dave. I've never thought of it that way.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's. Well, we all do it. I mean, we run. We. It's.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I've been under control. I've been under control. I just want to hit that guy, right?

[Dave Ramsey]

And it's, it's. Oh yeah, that one. Yeah. And, but yeah, the, yeah and the. You never struggle with that, the cost of that.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, I've been nice. I've been nice. I've been nice.

[Dave Ramsey]

He really needs his nose broken. But the. Yeah, that's a real thing. And what I'm trying to tap into with all these Docs, because they get this doc itis. Thing is they do, they're such a grown up for so long because I mean while he's been doing fellowship, residency, med school, you know the guys he went to high school with a decade ago started partying. Oh yeah, A decade ago.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

They're already in the lobby to see him because their hearts are huge. Because they're about to explode.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And so he's got an extra 10 years of being a grown up, but he also gets the payoff of 650. That's right, $650,000 income. And I don't want a doctor who's underpaid, so I want my doctors to.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Be pay my cardiologist as much as you can get away from.

[Dave Ramsey]

I want them to be paid a lot. So I'm happy for you, Mo. And I'm just going to call on the grown up Mo that's down inside there to stay alive for a couple more years. And if you do that, you're going to be in a lot better shape. You're going to enjoy the car more because it won't feel like a guilty pleasure. Instead it'll feel like something you earned.

[Caller]

Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

You're awesome, Mo. Dude, you're awesome.

[Caller]

Sam.

[Dave Ramsey]

Our scripture of the day, Proverbs 3. 21. My son, do not let wisdom and understanding out of your sight. Preserve sound judgment and discretion. Thomas Sowell said two things that seldom seem to go together are genius and common sense. I have noticed that to be true. Jeff's in Mesa, Arizona. Hey Jeff, how are you?

[Caller]

I'm good. Thanks for taking my call, Dave.

Appreciate it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure. How can I help?

[Caller]

Well, I just retired. I'm 64 and trying to decide. We're living in a 30 year old home and we need to do some remodeling and how to go about doing that. We've got about 80,000 in a Roth. I got about 40,000 in a high yield savings. But being on a fixed income, you know, my wife's working part time just trying to figure out do we do a heloc?

[Dave Ramsey]

That's your entire nest egg savings.

[Caller]

What's that?

[Dave Ramsey]

That's your entire nest egg is $80,000.

[Caller]

No, I have. Well, yeah, nest egg. I'm on a pension, so I get a pension.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much is your pension?

[Caller]

4,700Amonth and then I'll have my Social Security coming pretty soon.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

What kind of work are you going to do on the house?

[Caller]

Bathroom remodels and a kitchen remodel and some paintings, paint. We paid cash. For some new flooring last year.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good.

[Caller]

And some new windows.

[Dave Ramsey]

So that's what you're going to do this year.

[Caller]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Last thing you need is debt. You have no nest egg to amount to anything, and you're living on a $4,000 pension and you can't afford to have a payment. You don't have any room for that. And so. Yeah, I mean, you're going to do these repairs a little bit at a time with cash. You do, you know, break the repairs down into different projects and save up and. Okay, now we're gonna do the bath and save up and like you did the other stuff, you saved up and paid for it. And. And you said you're 64.

[Caller]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

What did you used to do?

[Caller]

I was a school teacher.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. Personally, what I would do if I woke up in your shoes is I would take a bunch of students as a. As tutoring at $50 an hour, and I would let that help me save up and do this repairs.

[Caller]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

What kind of. What did you teach?

[Caller]

I taught physical education and social studies.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. So. And you've obviously had a lot of years in the classroom, and the good thing about tutoring is you can pick and choose the parents.

[Caller]

Yeah, true. Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Could you go back and double teaching?

[Caller]

I can go back and substitute teach and that'll bring in probably 1500amonth.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Could you. Could you double dip. Some states allow you to go back and you start over as your first year of service, but you can get your pension plus become a first year. You get. You draw a first year teacher salary again. Can you do that?

[Caller]

I have to separate for one year and then I can go back and do that.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Because if you did that, and let's say you, you. I don't know what the first year salary is where you work, but it's 35K. That's a bathroom. The next year is another bathroom, and then two years is your dream kitchen. I mean, that wasn't how you drew it up, but man, you could be 67, 68, and have everything paid for with cash and then finally be done, man, but.

[Dave Ramsey]

Or run a nice little tutoring business that creates about the same income. Yeah, either one. Something like that. That's personally what I would do. Reverses. Sitting there and going, I'm 64. I'm doing nothing. Oh, I'm taking out a loan. No, I'm not doing that.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

And the collateral on the loan is.

[Dave Ramsey]

The very house I'm trying to retire.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I'm trying to retire in. Yeah, that Scares me even more.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that takes. That takes some of the joy out of this idea of retirement.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Well, and let me. And let me say this. My guess is it makes these bathrooms that we, quote, unquote, have to remodel way less. Have to. And it may be one bathroom that we need to because there's some plumbing issues and whatnot. But you can put one off just for aesthetics or whatever, but it'll slow down the. Down the trajectory if you've got to pay cash for it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that's possibility. That's one way to do it. But no, I would not take out a loan ever. But I really would not take out a loan in your place. That's really, really scary. Bailey's in Missouri. Hi, Bailey. How are you?

[Caller]

You?

I'm doing okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good. How can we help?

[Caller]

I have a. I've got a question for you, and if you need more information, just let me know. But I'm 29. My husband just turned 36. We just started listening to you guys in May, and we're. I mean, we're all in.

We're.

We're trying to do all the things. We're just feeling a little stuck. Yeah, a lot. A lot of the reason, because both of us work for the public school education system, and we can't opt out of our. Our pensions. So that's almost $1,200 a month that, frustratingly, we can't get to. We just bought a house in February, and that's one of our biggest expenses. It's technically under the 25%, like your rule, but we're looking at anything to squeeze the budget because we can't even get, you know, how much debt have you got extra a month? We have 270 in student loans between the two of us.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you're both teachers.

[Caller]

Well, I'm not a teacher. I'm not a physical therapist. I just work for the school district. And, yeah, my husband.

[Dave Ramsey]

What do you make?

[Caller]

Is.

I make 85,000 a year, and he makes close to 70.

[Dave Ramsey]

So we got $150,000 income.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Can you do work on Saturdays and Sundays doing private PT clients?

[Caller]

I also just started listening. You guys do first steps. So it's like baby through three years old.

[Dave Ramsey]

Great.

[Caller]

Yeah. And he's trying. He's doing side hustles right now. He's in football season. He's a football. So.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. Yeah. I mean, you got a lot of student loan debt. I mean, obviously. And that's the PT debt. A lot of jurors probably.

[Caller]

Actually, yeah. It's It's a. He's got a little bit more than I do.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, I was wrong. Okay, cool. Well, that's.

[Caller]

He went back for a specialist stupidly just to raise like get up on the steps on teacher salary, admittedly.

[Dave Ramsey]

And it didn't. The ROI on that's not there, obviously. Okay, well, we got 150,000 plus side hustles of 50 and we need to tear into 300. And so if you throw 100 at it a year because your side hustles allow you enough to live on, that's three years of beans and rice. Rice and beans. I'm with you. This is a plan. Let's do it. This is strange. You got it. You do have a mess.

[Caller]

Yeah, I mean, we only take home 70 or, sorry, 8200amonth. We have so much going out with pension and I self pacial Social Security on top of the 13% they require.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, but are you getting a tax refund?

[Caller]

No, we actually.

[Dave Ramsey]

Are you putting any, Are you putting any money in that is not required into any kind of retention retirement?

[Caller]

Oh, no, no.

[Dave Ramsey]

Only the required amounts. Okay. Yeah, you're getting, you're just getting docked left and right. And so any side thing you can do to, to try to get dug through the. I mean, because again, we need to find 100 a year and your 8,000, 8,300 is 100 a year. And so if we can make enough with side hustles to live on, we throw that whole hundred at it and we're done in three years. But that's really beans and rice and that's a lot of extra work for three years. But I mean, you've been 10 years and making this mess, so three to clean it up is probably not bad.

[Caller]

Yeah. Yep.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Is there any possibility that you can leave the school system and make more? Make more?

[Caller]

Honestly, it's a, it's a very nice gig for me because.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I know, I know it's a nice gig, but you can't afford it.

[Caller]

No, no.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean.

[Caller]

No, no, no, no. It is.

[Dave Ramsey]

85 is not bad.

[Caller]

That's very good pay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. That's good pay for a pizza.

[Caller]

Okay.

For having summers off that I can work extra, so.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Oh, I forgot about that.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Y' all are both going to be just working full time at a couple different places in the summer and that's a way y' all could really get ahead, huh?

[Caller]

Yeah, I think so. We, we do have two. Two under two.

[Dave Ramsey]

Man. Well, that's what it's going to take. You're gonna have to burn the candle, kiddo. And because you made a big mess and now you get need a big shovel. That's what it amounts to. I think you got the right stuff. You're analyzing it the right way. I don't have any argument what you're looking at. Thanks for the call. That puts us our 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.

[Caller]

Foreign.

[George Kamel]

Up next, we are headed out to Chicago and Orlando for the Ramsay show live. Yep, you heard me right. We are taking this show to you. This is going to be everything you love about the Ramsay show, except you get to be a part of it.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Part of what, George?

[George Kamel]

The Ramsey show live. Okay, that's what I'm telling them about.

[Caller]

Right?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Ramsay show live in here.

[Dave Ramsey]

Nope.

[George Kamel]

We're doing it on the road. You're going to Chicago with me and Rachel Cruz. September 30th. Are you free?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

The Windy City. I like it that time of year.

[Dave Ramsey]

You know what else I like, George?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I like the deep dish.

[George Kamel]

Okay, maybe we'll have some deep dish. You mind if I finish the promo?

[Dave Ramsey]

Is that okay with you? Oh, yeah. Okay. Okay. Appreciate that.

[George Kamel]

Questions and answers, real conversations, and I'm sure a few surprises here and there.

[Caller]

George, are you in here talking about TRS Live?

[George Kamel]

I am, Jade. I'm trying to talk about it.

[Caller]

Nice. So that means it's actually happening, right?

[George Kamel]

It's happening. If I could tell the people, I think it could actually come to fruition.

[Caller]

Listen, just tell me when and where.

[Dave Ramsey]

You don't know. Okay.

[George Kamel]

We're going to Orlando. You're gonna join Dr. John Deloney and I. October 2nd.

[Caller]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, great.

[Caller]

I'm gonna go pack now.

[Dave Ramsey]

Thanks, George.

[George Kamel]

Please, please do that. Go pack.

[Sponsor Representative]

Hey, George, speaking of packing, is this like sweater weather or is it not that cold yet in Chicago?

[George Kamel]

What is happening?

[Dave Ramsey]

Can I.

[George Kamel]

Can I please just get to how they buy the tickets?

[Caller]

Geez, I thought it was a good question.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, okay.

[George Kamel]

This is not an arena tour. This is a one night only event in Chicago and Orlando. General admission is only 39 bucks. Plus there's a VIP experience if you're bougie like that. But here's the thing. There's only 300 seats available, so get your tickets now at ramseysolutions.com events.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Hey, how come you get to go to both cities?

[George Kamel]

I. I just go where they tell me, man.

[Dave Ramsey]

Hey, have.

[George Kamel]

Have you been there the entire time?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Maybe.

[Caller]

Okay.

[George Kamel]

And also, are you reading a ch children's book?

[Dr. John DeLoney]

I'm expanding my mind, George.

[George Kamel]

That's how we got those PhDs.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Yeah, it's probably where you got that jacket.

[Caller]

Okay.

[George Kamel]

See you on the road, John.

[Dr. John DeLoney]

Support for this podcast and the following message comes from America's Navy. The Navy offers new graduates hands on training and experience in careers like computer science, aviation and medicine, plus education and sign on bonuses. Parents, help your grads start their career [e-mail].