“We’re in Way Over Our Heads With $1.5 Million in Debt”

Summary

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The Ramsey Show – Episode Summary

Episode: “We’re in Way Over Our Heads With $1.5 Million in Debt”

Date: November 26, 2025
Host: Dave Ramsey
Co-Host: Jade Warshaw Ramsey

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Overview

In this episode, Dave Ramsey and Jade Warshaw take on a range of intense, emotional, and practical financial calls from listeners. The central arc is a young couple with staggering business and personal debt, seeking a roadmap out of financial catastrophe. Along the way, the hosts address buying cars while in debt, coping with financial stress during the holidays, lending money to loved ones, dealing with payday loans, the emotional reality of financial setbacks, and the impact of massive wealth on spending decisions. The episode is rich with personal stories, teachable moments, and Dave’s signature tough love balanced with empathy.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Caller Heather – $1.5 Million in Debt (00:43–10:02)

• Situation: Heather (age 28) and her husband are over $1.3M in debt due to a failed business purchase, back taxes, mortgages, car loans, and credit card debts.
• Breakdown of Debts:
  • House: Owe $48k (Home value: $250k)
  • Cars: Owe $17k
  • Credit Cards: $19k (business and personal)
  • Back Taxes: $30k
  • Business Loan (SBA): ~$1.2M
• Business Story: Started a summer camp, then bought an event rentals business (assets only) for $1.2M, funded via SBA loan. Discovered they significantly overpaid due to hidden issues.
• Income: Summer camp generates $200k/year but is seasonal, as is the rental business.
• Current State: Business is not bringing in enough to service the debt; they’re “overwhelmed,” unsure if they can sell assets to get out without a major loss.
• Notable Quote (Dave, 05:15):
  “When life looks like a country song, it just looks like a country song. Lots of people still renting kids stuff all over the place. The economy’s quite booming in some areas, but so. No, the economics at your house suck, and so. I’m so sorry, honey. It’s so scary.”

Dave’s Advice

• Consider selling the business for whatever they can get, even if it creates a large shortfall.

• Propose a short sale to the SBA, leveraging their unwillingness to repossess event equipment.

• Pay the IRS before anyone else ("Pay the KGB, I mean, the IRS").

• Emotionally prepare for possible bankruptcy.

• “...the worst case scenario is you lose the business, you lose the camp, and you start your lives fresh after a bankruptcy. And you hold on to each other, and you hold on to Jesus and you hold on to your marriage. And so what? Okay? Lots of people have gone broke.” (06:42)

• Jade and Dave on teachable moments:
  “There’s a proverb that says the simple see trouble and move forward, and the wise avoid it and take refuge, and the simple are punished for it.” (14:34)

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2. Jay – Transitioning Veteran, Car Purchase Decision (16:58–19:55)

• Situation: Recently out of Army, moving for new job, limited cash, wants to buy a car but is in debt payoff mode.
• Ramsey Advice:
  • Don’t go backwards by taking out a car loan.
  • Use current savings to buy a car outright, even if less reliable or less new; wait until finances improve for upgrades.
• Dave’s Quote (19:42):
  “Can’t get out of a hole while digging out the bottom. So, yeah, you’re going to go buy it, though. I kind of think we can talk you out of it in 30 seconds. But no, there’s no chance I’ll ride a bicycle before I get a freaking car payment again.”

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3. Holiday Stress, Debt, and Four Jobs – Bo in New York City (33:18–42:31)

• Situation: Struggling father with four kids, $123k of debt (SBA, student loans, credit cards, car loan), wife at home homeschooling, working multiple jobs, still stuck.
• Emotional Impact: He’s overwhelmed, exhausted, can’t form sentences.
• Advice: Drastic change is needed – possibly move, have wife find work, change career path, sell everything.
• Memorable Moment:
  “You are not stuck, but you are going to have to change something… You need to play this back and listen to it… you’re defeated is everything that comes up. I’m already defeated. I’ve already lost. …and you have not lost. You’re a hard working guy…” (39:18)

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4. Helping a Broke Ex-Girlfriend Facing Eviction – Carl in Chicago (44:46–51:25)

• Situation: Recently broke up, ex is facing eviction, caller has only $7,000 and no debt, ex has patterns of poor money management.
• Advice:
  • Don’t sacrifice your own financial stability.
  • Setting boundaries is not cruelty; helping only if child is at-risk and no other options.
• Jade’s Point:
  “...it would be enabling. I think that it would be for her, somebody who’s just kind of softening the fall.” (51:25)
• Dave’s Classic Take:
  “You’re not Jesus; that’s his job. You can’t do his job for him.”

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5. Caller Alex – Payday Loan Trap (54:55–58:58)

• Situation: Unemployed, sunk into payday loan cycle at exorbitant (500%) APRs, new job starts soon.
• Advice:
  • Cover basic needs first: food, electricity, rent.
  • Avoid payday loans at all cost in the future.
  • Consider changing bank account to stop auto-drafts.
• Notable Quotes:
  • “Don’t you ever walk in those places again and borrow money the rest of your freaking life. Remember the pain of this and remember the stupidity of this and the ridiculous trap that you voluntarily stepped into so you never do it again.” (57:36)
  • “You stepped in a bear trap and guess what? It ripped your leg off. Oh, my gosh.” (59:01)

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6. Prenups and Financial Transparency – Brian in Minneapolis (61:39–71:18)

• Situation: Engaged, worth nearly $20M, fiancée doesn’t know full amount, lawyer pushing prenup.
• Advice:
  • Full financial disclosure should happen before engagement.
  • Apologize for lack of transparency and unpack wealth details in person.
  • Prenup is reasonable with such a large financial disparity, but should not substitute for trust.
• Key Advice (Dave, 68:44):
  • “You shouldn’t ask someone to marry you that you can’t be honest with and transparent with that you don’t trust.”
  • Jade: “If Sam Warshaw came to me with this conversation, I’d be like...the door is that way. We’d be done, bud.”

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7. Massive Wealth and “Outrageous” Purchases – Robin in Orlando (96:47–103:36)

• Situation: Retired, $20M net worth, husband wants to buy a $300k Shelby. She’s uncomfortable with such a large expense.
• Discussion:
  • Dave helps her contextualize: this is like buying a biscuit for someone with $20k; with $20M, $300k is negligible.
  • Emotional memories of being broke can clash with the realities of wealth.
  • Dave encourages honesty (“I think it’s dumb, but he’s earned it.”) and reminds her of the leverage their net worth provides.
• Notable Quote:
  “The stock market will move on your $20 million worth of investments. More than $300k in the next 60 days, up or down, and you won’t even look at it.” (100:02)

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8. Emotional Cost of Child Support – Caller Jennifer (76:35–85:02)

• Situation: Remarried, dealing with resentment over husband’s ongoing child support obligations, ex-wife drama, husband recently laid off.
• Advice/Insight:
  • Separate financial support for the child from emotions about the ex.
  • Focus on the children as the beneficiaries—not the ex.
  • Jade: “I’d be picturing the child. Because the fact is, if you make a human being, you got to pay for them, period.” (79:22)
  • Dave and Jade validate her feelings, but urge shifting the focus to the next generation and practical acceptance as the path forward.

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9. Other Notable Segments

• Compound Interest Teaching:
  Dave walks listeners through the concept of compound interest, the long-term costs of 30- and 50-year mortgages, and criticizes political stunts proposing “solutionary” loan products.
  “A 50-year mortgage has no mathematical substantiality...if it cut your payment in half, we could talk about it, but it cuts it 16%. Don’t be stupid.” (94:12)

• Financial Triage Calls:

  • Advice on using savings for car purchases versus fearing money drain.
  • Prioritizing emergency fund savings, budgeting, and not using debt as a problem solver.
  • Using “teachable moments” from financial regret as motivation for change.

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Memorable Moments & Quotes

• Dave Ramsey (Addressing Huge Debt, 07:28):

  “I would sell it for whatever you can get for it. If you can get 800,000 for it, take it, okay? And go to the SBA and do a short sale. ... And honey, if you don’t take this 800, because I’m walking and you’re going to own a blow up inflatable, and the SBA is not in the inflatable business.”

• Jade Warshaw (On Emotions in Money, 25:49):

  “If you can’t be specific, you can’t solve it. Now, this guy could say, well, here. Here’s what I’m afraid of, Jade. I’m afraid if I drain my savings down to 10,000 and get a $10,000 car, I’m afraid my AC is going to break and it’s going to cost 12,000. Right. Tell me exactly what you’re afraid of. Then we can go back and we can go, well, let’s play out the worst possible scenario.”

• Dave Ramsey (Addressing Grieving Sister, 120:04):

  “If you and your husband sit down and say, we’re going to take X number of time off and just, we’re not going into debt, we’re not going to grief spend, but we’re just going to take some time off at the intensity and cry a little, that would be perfectly fine.”

• On “Throwing Dynamite at a Logjam” (Bo in NYC, 39:18):

  “You’re the plate spinningest dude I’ve talked to in I don’t know when, and these plates are crashing all around you, and you’re scared to death. ... There’s an old thing… that’s how you bust up a log jam. You bust up some stuff. Now, I don’t know exactly what it is in your life, but I’m going to start selling everything in sight… You cannot be saying the same exact sentences you’re saying to me right now [next year].”

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Timestamps for Notable Segments

• 00:43–10:02: Heather’s catastrophic business debt – tough love advice and emotional support.
• 16:58–19:55: Military vet transitioning to civilian life – buying a car while paying off debt.
• 33:18–42:31: Bo in NYC, overwhelmed by four jobs and family obligations – theme of being “stuck.”
• 44:46–51:25: Carl in Chicago, boundaries in helping an ex-girlfriend financially.
• 54:55–58:58: Payday loan cycle – how to get out and never return.
• 61:39–71:18: Brian and the prenup – transparency, pre-engagement conversations, and handling massive net worth.
• 76:35–85:02: Jennifer’s resentment about child support – refocusing on children, not ex-spouses.
• 96:47–103:36: Robin struggling with her husband’s $300k car purchase – emotional vs. mathematical perspectives.
• 120:04–126:18: Megan dealing with the grief of losing her brother and pausing her debt snowball.

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Takeaways & Tone

The entire episode is laced with Dave’s signature mix of stern, practical financial counsel and deeply empathetic acknowledgment of callers’ pain and fears. Jade Warshaw contributes both practical strategies and an understanding of the emotional complexities in financial decisions. The hosts repeatedly return to themes of personal responsibility, learning from mistakes, seeking financial and emotional support, and focusing on relationships over riches. They don’t shy away from the reality that sometimes bankruptcy or starting over isn’t the end of life, but can become the beginning of a new, wiser chapter.

Overall, this episode highlights that anyone – regardless of past mistakes or current crisis – can find hope, but only if they’re ready to change, face reality, and above all, put people before possessions.

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Episode Highlights & Quotes

• On overwhelming debt:
  “So what? Okay? Lots of people have gone broke. That’s the worst case scenario. So I want you two to sit down tonight and accept that emotionally and look at each other and hold hands and say, we got this together no matter what.” — Dave Ramsey (06:42)

• On buying cars while broke:
  “Can’t get out of a hole while digging out the bottom.” — Dave Ramsey (19:42)

• On enabling others:
  “You’re not Jesus; that’s his job. You can’t do his job for him.” — Dave Ramsey (50:28)

• On payday loans:
  “Don’t you ever walk in those places again and borrow money the rest of your freaking life. Remember the pain of this...” — Dave Ramsey (57:36)

• On resentment over child support:
  “I’d be picturing the child. …Because if you make a human being, you got to pay for them, period.” — Jade Warshaw (79:22)

• On emotional spending during grief:
  “It’s easy to medicate grief with spending. A lot of people do it, and so be careful with that.” — Dave Ramsey (119:50)

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For Listeners Who Missed This Episode

This episode is a masterclass in financial triage, emotional resilience, and learning from the worst mistakes. Whether you’re wrestling with giant debt, struggling to help a loved one without hurting yourself, or wondering whether you “deserve” a big purchase after years of sacrifice, Ramsey and Warshaw’s no-nonsense yet compassionate advice offers a way forward—and plenty of tough love and laughter along the way.

If you want to build wealth, first you must take a hard look at your own behavior, face up to your past, and decide—never again. Hope is real, but only if you act on it.

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Transcript

[Dave Ramsey]

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. Normal is broke and common sense is weird. So we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey network and the Fair Winds Credit union studio, this is the Ramsey Show. I'm Dave Ramsey. Your host, Jade Washall Ramsey, personality number one best selling author, is my co host. Today, open phones at Triple 882-55-5225. You jump in and we will talk about your life and your money. Heather is with us in Nashville. Hi, Heather, how are you?

[Caller Heather]

I'm good. How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller Heather]

Well, first of all, thank you so much for taking my call.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure.

[Caller Heather]

My. My husband and I are in. Sorry, we're in way over our heads and so I'm just. I'm just looking for some help. We are about $1.3 million in debt. That's with two businesses, a house loan, a car loan, credit cards, and back taxes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. Pretty scary. How old are you guys?

[Caller Heather]

We're both 28.

[Dave Ramsey]

How long you been married?

[Caller Heather]

Six years.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right, cool. So how much do you owe on your home?

[Caller Heather]

About 48,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And what's it worth?

[Caller Heather]

It's from. From last we had evaluated, about 250.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. So what do you. What do you owe on your cars?

[Caller Heather]

17.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, this is starting to scare me. And what. What do you owe in taxes?

[Caller Heather]

30,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

Good. Okay. I'm a little less scared than I was a minute ago. And that means we have a whole bunch of business debt.

[Caller Jay]

Mm, yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, like $1.2 million worth. Yes. What in the world? On what?

[Caller Heather]

Well, so we got into business. My husband was fired from his job, what is it, Four years ago, and found odd jobs, but was never able to find like stable full time work. But we ended up starting like a summer camp in 2022, but built that with credit card debt. And then to. It's going to sound really stupid.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I know.

[Caller Heather]

To make that stable, we bought. It wasn't a business sale. It was an asset sale. We bought basically as assets for the 1.2.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, so the business. The one business. Not the summer camp. The summer camp has how much credit card debt?

[Caller Heather]

That's the one that's got about. It's still got about like 15,000 out of the credit card debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. I didn't get credit cards earlier. I just got cars and house earlier. Okay, so the credit card debt totals how much?

[Caller Heather]

It's about 19. So 4,000 of that is ours.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you have one business. That's the Problem?

[Caller Heather]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And you were able to secure a loan as unemployed people with a summer camp for 1.2 million. Why? Who. Who is dumb enough to make this loan?

[Caller Heather]

Well, I mean, the summer camp was doing extremely well.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, but the loan was not on the camp, was it?

[Caller Heather]

No, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

You don't own the land on the camp, do you?

[Caller Heather]

No, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. So basically, you're renting a piece of ground in the summer, running a camp on it, and you make what kind of income on that?

[Caller Heather]

That makes about $200,000 a year.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. And the business that you purchased, what was the assets?

[Caller Heather]

It's. It's rentals. It's event rental. So it's like staging and lights and audio visual and inflatables and all that kind of stuff?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

All the fun stuff for the camp?

[Caller Heather]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And you borrowed 1.2. Who loaned you $1.2 million for that?

[Caller Heather]

The SBA?

[Dave Ramsey]

I bet they did. I bet they did.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Is the camp still operational?

[Caller Heather]

Yes, ma'.

[Dave Ramsey]

Am.

[Caller Heather]

We. We still do that every year.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Is there a way that you can add things for the other seasons to earn. That's quadruple the amount, right?

[Caller Heather]

Yeah, I mean, that's. That's what we've been trying to do. It's just, we've. I mean, y' all know, like, we've hit a point in the economy where people are trying to figure out other solutions for fun stuff or childcare, you know, so they're trying not to spend as much. So we kind of are stuck with the businesses that everybody's trying to avoid.

[Dave Ramsey]

Not really true. But in the situation as you are in being so overwhelmed, I can see how you could start to think that. Because when nothing goes right, nothing goes right. When life looks like a country song, it just looks like a country song. Lots of people still renting kids stuff all over the place. The economy's quite booming in some areas, but so. No, the economics at your house suck, and so. I'm so sorry, honey. It's so scary. So scary. Okay. Is there any possibility of selling the first, the last business that you bought for anywhere near what you owe on it?

[Caller Heather]

No, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

How do you know?

[Caller Heather]

Because the more it was like the layers of an onion, the more we peeled back, the more we found the.

[Caller Jay]

Deception that you had overpaid?

[Caller Heather]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

By how much?

[Caller Heather]

By, like, $400,000.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Can I. How much does this cost you every month to pay the minimums on this?

[Caller Heather]

For the business we have? It's. We're operating a cost of 50,000amonth.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you're not making that.

[Caller Heather]

I mean, some months we are. Like, we're. Some months we are, but it's. Both of our businesses are very seasonal.

[Dave Ramsey]

I don't know. Here's the first thing. I was your age, been married, your distance of time when we went broke and lost everything and ended up bankrupt, okay? So the first thing I want to tell you is the worst case scenario is you lose the business, you lose the camp, and you start your lives fresh after a bankruptcy. And you hold on to each other, and you hold on to Jesus and you hold on to your marriage. And so what? Okay? Lots of people have gone broke. That's the worst case scenario. So I want you two to sit down tonight and accept that emotionally and look at each other and hold hands and say, we got this together no matter what. This is. Because I don't right now see how you're getting out of this. But here's an idea, okay?

[Caller Heather]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

I would sell it for whatever you can get for it. If you can get 800,000 for it, take it, okay? And go to the SBA and do a short sale. Hire an attorney and tell the SBA you get nut. And honey, if you don't take this 800, because I'm walking and you're going to own a blow up inflatable, and the SBA is not in the inflatable business. And so you go to the bank and you say, we're going to do a short sale on this business because we got screwed. You participated in it because you idiots loaned us the money. And they are idiots. Anybody that made this loan should be just lined up and shot. Oh, my God, this is ridiculous. Cause they've screwed you in the process. So, yeah, I'm gonna short sell the business. If you can't short sell it, sign a note for the difference and scratch your way through that 400k making 200 and something, and you can bust through these other little debts and pay the stinking irs. They're not bankruptible. Before you pay anybody else, you pay the kgb. I mean, the irs, okay? They're first on the list. So hang on, we're gonna set you up with one of our coaches and see if we can get you some better advice than you got here because I'm a little short on time and I had to rush that. I'm so sorry. Finally, mortgage rates have dropped. And you know what that means. People who've been sitting on the sidelines are about to jump back in to the housing market. So if you've been waiting to buy. This could be your window. But you've got to be prepared and do it the Ramsey way. You need to contact Churchill Mortgage. Their Home Buyer Edge program gives you peace of mind. In a wild market, you can cap your rate for 90 days. So if rates go up, you're protected. If rates go down, Churchill will drop yours automatically. Automatically. And get this, Churchill will even back your offer with a $10,000 seller guarantee. So if your loan falls through due to financing, the seller still gets paid. That's how confident Churchill is. Plus, when you shop as a Churchill certified home buyer, it's stronger than pre approval. It makes you look like a cash buyer, which makes your offer rise to the top. So don't let this moment pass you by. Get ready now. Go to ChurchillMortgage.com to get started today. That's ChurchillMortgage.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

This is a paid advertisement. Homebuyer Edge and seller guarantee are available.

[Dave Ramsey]

For qualifying borrowers and select loan types only and not available in all states or locations. NMLS ID 1591 in mlscumerexcess.org/equal housing lender. The rich rules over the poor and the borrower is slave to the lender. You don't think that's true? You talked to our last caller. She turned on when I turned on her phone. Put her on the air. She started crying. $1.2 million in debt on Blow Up Jump House. Good God. Wow. And then some of you want to call me up and tell me how debt is, how you go into business, because you have an idea that no one's ever done before, like fried pickles. Well, there's a reason. There's a reason no one's done it before. So yeah, the more debt you're in, the more risk you take and the more you understand the slavery aspect. And she's sitting there with some basic income coming in and nowhere near enough to even service the debt, much less everything else. And she can see the writing on the wall. It's gonna. I mean, I don't know if that kid makes it or not. They'll make it, but I don't know if they make it without bankrupting. I hope they can. If they sell it. If they sell it, they claw their way through the 400,000 making 200,000. They can do that. And they clean up the other hundred thousand. That's $500,000 in debt. Making 200 plus. You can do that. That' but my thing is the fact.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That somebody lent them the money and that when you're that young you. Do you think that if somebody will give you the money, that means you're good for it?

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, I mean, that's like.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah, you know.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. But I mean, when you're first starting, a lot of things do dumb things. I mean, it's like people think, if I have checks left, there's money in the checking.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's right. That's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

You know, so then, of course, no one even knows what a check is anymore. So that joke doesn't land anymore. It's. Yeah, you've got a responsibility to not get yourself in these kinds of things. And here's the thing. He lost his job. They run the summer camp. Everything's going good. And then there was some kind of a desperation or a greed thing that kicked in. That blinds you to doing a deal that's that dumb, because that deal, by any measure, is dumb. I mean, I didn't say the people are dumb. I've done dumber. I was $4 million in debt, $3 million in debt. So they only did 1 million. So I've got a PhD in dumb. So I have done dumb things. That does not make me dumb. I did them for dumb reasons. They did this for a dumb reason.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, my goodness, folks. So my point is the teachable moment when you listen to the show, you can just get entertained and go, that's ridiculous, and that's crazy. And how sad for those people or how weird is that whole thing? And you can kind of get that, you know, Jerry Springer effect off the show if you want. Or you could actually try to learn something.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's the lesson in that? Well, the lesson is, after losing that job, that guy's heart was broken and he said, I'm never going to be there again. And he read some story about some guy becoming a millionaire after borrowing money on TikTok, and he went and borrowed money out to his ears, and now he can't breathe. And his poor little wife is so scared she can't breathe. And that's exactly how Sharon Ramsey sounded at 28 years old.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Oh, yeah. But there's another. The other lesson for him and for her, too, because she was part of it, is exactly what you said when you do something like that, Dave. The shame. But the shame of it, because you think I'm dumb. You think I'm stupid. It's my fault we're in this. But they've got to remember going through this, that the business plan was bad, the loan was dumb, the business idea was stupid. They're not. They Cannot wear that as an identity.

[Dave Ramsey]

The thing you need, the takeaway for all of you listening, is this. When you're in the middle doing something like this, you've done it, I've done it, and every one of you have done it. You have a moment of sanity while you're in the middle of this going, this doesn't feel right.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Oh, yeah. You get that ripple out and you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Go past that moment and do it anyway. And 100% of the time, you knew better. Every one of us, there's a proverb that says the simple see trouble and move forward, and the wise avoid it and take refuge, and the simple are punished for it. And that's exactly what that is. Because when you're doing something like this, when I did something like this, I was simple. It was not wisdom, it was a fool.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But you had that moment. You had that moment.

[Dave Ramsey]

I was like, I know this is out of control, but I can handle it. There's an arrogance, a greed, a desperation that causes you to plow through it. And that's a simpleton. It's a simpleton. It's not a wise person, not biblically wise. It's a biblical fool. And you don't want to be a Bible fool. That's a real dumb person. That's really dumb. And so, you know. But I've done it. Every one of those things in proverbs that says you're a fool if you did this. I did every one of them, you know, and so that way I don't have to do them ever again. And now I can be the wise person. I stood on those books. So. Yeah, but it's. You know, people, you know, when you're getting ready to sign for the. That brand new car that you cannot afford, you got a $400 a month raise and you're taking out a $1,200 car payment to celebrate.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And if you have to start rationalizing it, that's how you know.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you know when you're doing it. You know, you're sitting in the office that this doesn't feel right. Your heart is, your heart rate is. There's some. Your spouse is looking at you like you've lost your dad gum mind. Cause you have. And you try to tell them how smart you are and that we're going ahead anyway. You just don't understand. Cause the were brought up. You sound like your mother. And you go straight past it and straight into the dad gum fire. And man, that poor girl. That's exactly what they did. And it's what you've done out there. If you're listening to this. So don't be too quick to make fun of her and don't be too quick to make fun of me. I've done it too. But listen, the lesson is when that bell starts ringing in your spirit, that's God's spirit saying, don't do it, fool. Turn on your heel and walk out of the room. Get. Run away. Run away. Carl or Jay is with us. Rather, Jay is in Portland, Oregon. Hey Jay, what's up?

[Caller Heather]

Hey, Dave.

[Caller Jay]

How are you?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[Caller Jay]

So I am currently getting out of the army and looking to move back to Oregon.

[Dave Ramsey]

Cool. That's for your service. You're in the army, you said, or just are the military?

[Caller Jay]

Yes, sir.

[Dave Ramsey]

Army. What. What was your rank? What'd you do?

[Caller Jay]

Staff Sergeant, Human Resources.

[Dave Ramsey]

Cool.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller Jay]

I'm currently looking to go back to Oregon and I have a basically like the job of my dreams. The only problem is, is that it is located about 70 miles away from where I'm going to be living for the first year that I'm back.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why?

[Caller Jay]

And so I need reliable transportation.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why are you living 70 miles away from work?

[Caller Jay]

What's that?

[Dave Ramsey]

Why are you living 70 miles away from work?

[Caller Jay]

Just for the way that my child custody agreement is set up.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Huh. Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's the closest you can get for the next year?

[Caller Jay]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Are you okay?

[Caller Jay]

I've gotten it worked out and I will be able to move closer to the job within approximately 15 minutes after that.

[Caller Carl]

So it's just for the first short.

[Caller Jay]

Little bit while I'm back.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller Jay]

But anyways, my. I am looking to get a new vehicle and I have been looking at a Toyota Corolla. I have talked them down from their asking price down to approximate. I think it was 23,000. As of now, I do not have a vehicle. I sold my vehicle that I had out here and with the amount that I'd be putting down, I'd be able to afford it.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much money do you offer within the next year?

[Caller Heather]

Sorry?

[Dave Ramsey]

How much money do you have?

[Caller Jay]

About 7,000. And between that amount, I will have my baby step two completed. Other than the car loan, then why would.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So you're going backwards.

[Dave Ramsey]

You have $7,000 in cash?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's all you have today. What does baby step two completed. Come in. You're already at baby step two completed.

[Caller Jay]

I'll have all my debt. I'll have all of my debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

Have all. It's not all paid yet? No. How much debt do you have now?

[Caller Jay]

I have the remainder of the money for my divorce to pay off, and it's about 3,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you have $10,000.

[Caller Jay]

Today I have no. I have $3,000 left of debt.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

You have $7,000 saved and $3,000 of debt. So you have $4,000 to your name, correct?

[Caller Jay]

Yes.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay. Okay. I would not go into debt to do this. You're going backwards and then save up some more. And if you want to trade it in to get a little bit more dependable, if it becomes a problem, you can do that. But don't go back into debt. When you're spending all this effort getting out of debt, you can't solve a problem while simultaneously creating it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Can't get out of a hole while digging out the bottom. So, yeah, you're going to go buy it, though. I kind of think we can talk you out of it in 30 seconds. But no, there's no chance I'll ride a bicycle before I get a freaking car payment again.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Take the bus.

[Dave Ramsey]

Owning a business can be a heavy load. You want to serve your customers well, make a healthy profit and grow. And your team, family and customers are all counting on you. And now everybody's talking about AI like it's magic and you're wondering how to keep up. You're carrying a lot, but you don't have to do it all alone. That's where NetSuite comes in. Over 43,000 businesses, including Ramsey Solutions, use NetSuite to lighten the load by bringing all their numbers into one system. Accounting, inventory, CRM, payroll, the works. And now NetSuite's AI takes it further. Automating busy work, flagging inventory issues, spotting cash flow problems in real time, and catching risks before they hit. So you're not just closing the books faster, you're making decisions confidently. And when your numbers are right, that takes a lot of pressure off your shoulders. And yeah, switching systems is a big move. But NetSuite's suite success process gets you up and running fast. Go to netsuite.comramsey for a free product tour and to schedule time with a NetSuite rep. That's NetSuite.com Ramsey. Our question of the day is brought to you by why Refi defaulted? Private student loans don't define you and they don't have to control your future. Why Refi helps you start fresh with low fixed rate refinancing made for real people. Go to y refi.com Ramsey that's the letter y r e f y.com Ramsey not in all states.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Alrighty. Today's question comes from Jesse. In Texas, they say I'm 27, make about 100,000 a year. I have 18,000 in student loans, no other debt, and have 25,000 in savings. My old car died and I need to replace it. I'm nervous about draining most of my savings to pay cash for a car because I've seen my parents make big purchases that sent them into decades of struggle. So I'm wondering if I should get a car loan that's in my budget and pay down excessively over the years. I want to make the choice. Right. I want to make the right choice. What should I do? Okay, first off, you've got a great income. Yeah. You've got the 18,000 in student loans, no other debt, 25,000 in savings. You have the money to do this in cash, So I would do it. What I'm really focused on is the part where they're afraid of draining the savings and the part where they're comparing this purchase to something their parents did, I don't know, decades ago that caused ruin in their life.

[Dave Ramsey]

Now, if you paid cash for a car, it did not cause them to struggle for decades.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

No going.

[Dave Ramsey]

It would have been the car payment that caused them to struggle for decades.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

This is the cycle of always borrowing every time I want something and I like my savings more than I like.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah. You know, that's one of those things you kind of have to play out and ask yourself, like, what's really going on here? Because when I see stuff like this, Dave, this is just fear operating unchecked in the background, and you don't even know what it's based off of. It's very, like, it's very vague. It's very. I'm afraid I'm going to ruin everything. I'm afraid I'm going to ruin my life. My parents ruined their life. But there's no real clear detail. And when that's the case, it's very hard to track it down and find out, okay, like, what. What am I actually. What's actually going on? So if I were them, I would look at this and say, okay, what is it? If you're really afraid that you're gonna. Your life is gonna turn into your parents life, Right? Like, play it out. What actually did they do? Because what you're probably gonna find is what Dave said. They went into debt and this caused a domino effect of events. And that doesn't have to be the case with you. And then I look at this part where he says, I'm nervous about draining most of my savings to pay cash. I mean, we see that all the time.

[Dave Ramsey]

Dave, why would you. Okay, start with, you're driving a piece of crap now. So why do you need a $20,000 car to replace a piece of crap? You don't. So, by the way, when someone says, my old car died, I'm an old redneck, I fix the car, right?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

You can fix it, or you could spend a little bit more and replace it. You don't have to spend the whole 25,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

Take your old car, sell it for 2,000, put 4,000 with it and buy a $6,000 car. And then go pay off your student loans and you're debt free with a $6,000 car. Now save like crazy. Get your emergency fund in place, properly done. Now start saving like crazy and move up in car. Okay, yeah, but drive a $6,000 car for a year, making 100,000 with no payments in the world.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I love that. I love that. But, okay, you. You gave the number side. I'm going to give the emotional side.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because that's really in your book. What. What no one tells you about money is that you have to not only crunch the numbers, but you have to deal with this person in your mirror who's misbehaving because the person in his.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Mirror is going, oh, but I'm so scared. So he's got to go, all right, I'm afraid I will own that. Now, what I talk about in the book is understanding rational versus irrational fears.

[Dave Ramsey]

Exactly.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Because the irrational ones are the very vague. Oh, I'm going to ruin everything. Oh, I'm just going to be stuck on the side of the road. Oh, I'm going to repeat my parents. No, no, no, no, no. What are you specifically afraid of? Because if you can't be specific, you can't solve it. Now, this guy could say, well, here. Here's what I'm afraid of, Jade. I'm afraid if I drain my. My savings down to 10,000 and get a $10,000 car, I'm afraid my AC is going to break and it's going to cost 12,000. Right. Tell me exactly what you're afraid of. Then we can go back and we can go, well, let's play out the worst possible scenario. Worst possible scenario is this. How would we fix it? And we can give answers, Dave, to all of that, but as long as you let it float around and just be in la la land, you're never gonna do it. So do yourself the service of taking A moment and go. Why is it that when Dave and Jay told me to buy this car cash, I froze up? Right. What is it specifically that I'm afraid of? What did my parents do specifically? And then it's like our friend Dr. John Deloney says, you've gotta. The facts are your friends.

[Dave Ramsey]

Exactly.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Is there anything true about this?

[Dave Ramsey]

You have to tell us. A rational fear is, don't touch a hot stove. An irrational fear is, I'm not buying a stove because someone might touch it.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Because somebody I once knew that I read about in a book got burned on the stove.

[Dave Ramsey]

My mother, when she was 14, got burned on a stove. We will never have a stove in our house. Well, that's cray cray. I mean, that's. But that's the same kind of stuff. That's the way our brains are. The little drama queen that lives in our heads. Just that little drama queen does this little dance, and then all of a sudden you're in stupidville.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's right. And I mean, I'm not. I'll validate the fact that it's real. We all have it to some degree. But. But it can only be an excuse for so long. A good reason, if you let it go around long enough, becomes a bad excuse. And so you've got to look at the reason and say, why am I doing that? What's the reason I'm doing that? I don't want it to be an excuse for me moving forward. And you got to work through that. And that's what we talk about in the book.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'll tell you when I hit bottom. I said these words, never again.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Never again.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so you're sitting here right now, Jesse, you make $100,000 a year. You have a piece of crap car and $18,000 in student loans and 25,000 in the bank. And I don't like this feeling. So do something about it, son. Say, never again. I'm going to clean up these freaking stupid student loans. I'm not going into car debt, and I'm going to pile up some cash, and by the end of the year, I'm going to have $30,000 and no freaking payments. Because never again do I want to feel this feeling again. And you know what no one tells you about money is you got to get a little pissed off at some point and go, I'm not living like this. I've had it. And that's what you and Sam did. And that's what you talk about in this book.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I do. I talk about just being Able to understand, hey, there's more to it. Some people, I'll be honest, I'm generally the type of person who can just up and change. I get to that sick and tired of sick and tired point. But then there's those moments the wrong thing hits you in the wrong way, and it's like you feel paralyzed. And you're like, why do I feel so paralyzed by this? Why am I getting so upset about this? Why am I. Why do I feel like I'm going backwards? Why did I push pause when I was going so quickly at one point? And those are the times you got to stop and pause and go, what's going on here? And to his point, he's thinking about something that it wasn't even in his life. It's something his parents did.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's causing him to stop.

[Dave Ramsey]

Dude, 27, you make a hundred thousand dollars a year. Here's an idea. Stop being broke, get off your butt, and fix this and that. You know when you kind of get that own thing going inside of you, that voice, saying that stuff to yourself, that's when you're going to just flip this whole thing around. But right now, you're dancing around all the sides of it going, I'm going to touch a little of this, little of that little. No, knock it in the nose, dude. Reach up and smack the bully in the nose. You are either going to tell your money what to do, or you're going to be miserable the rest of your life. Because money's gonna tell you what to do, and other people are gonna tell you what to do, and you're gonna watch Instagram and figure out that other people have a better life than you. Cause they lied on Instagram, you know, and so nobody has a life that looks like their Instagram life. If you didn't know, I'll just clue you in. There's no such thing. So I was with Willie Robertson this week. He was telling me, he said, we were talking about television show. And he goes, no, that's like a show that really happened. I do reality tv. It never really happened. It's not real. It's not real. It doesn't happen that way in real life. Oh, my gosh. Okay, Jesse. So the prescription is we're going to take some of this money no one tells you about your money, is that there's an emotional side to personal finance, a psychological side, a spiritual side to personal finance. That's very much about you looking you in the mirror and dealing with the stuff you said to deal with.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

It's three parts. You want to change your mind, you have to consider three parts. The numbers in the math, your behavior and your emotions. I say it like this in the book. I say if behavior is the car, behavior is the vehicle is where you want to go, you get in it. Your behavior is a vehicle. Your belief is sitting in the driver's seat. That's the thing. Do I believe I can do it? If I believe it, I mash on the gas. If I don't believe it, I go in reverse. And your emotions are the thing that say I'm going to keep steering it down the right track. If you get spooked, you hit a tree. If you feel good and you are managing those motions, you go straight forward to the goal. That's how it works.

[Dave Ramsey]

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[Caller Jay]

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 Jay]

Oh, you're telling me.

[Dave Ramsey]

And for decades, Dave, I've sat across.

[Caller Jay]

People who've lost a spouse, they've lost.

[Dave Ramsey]

Somebody important to them. Me too.

[Caller Jay]

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. That's exactly the two options. And your dadgum family term life insurance.

[Caller Jay]

Can replace income, pay off debts, cover funeral expenses. So your family can actually have the.

[Dave Ramsey]

Opportunity to just be sad, to just miss you. 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 Zander Insurance makes it easy and affordable. I've used them personally for 25 years. They're the only people I trust. Go to Zander.com or call 800-356-4282. Bo is in New York City. Hi, Bo. Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

[Caller Jay]

Hello, sir. Thank you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Sure. What's up?

[Caller Jay]

I don't even know where to start. I guess my overall question would be how to handle the overwhelming stress of the holidays while we're climbing out of debt and still trying to be what we need to be for the children.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

What's the overwhelming stress? Buying gifts.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

How old are the children when there's.

[Caller Jay]

When there's literally nothing.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Well, we'll get to. Why is there nothing? But how. How many children?

[Caller Heather]

Four.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Four. And what are their ages?

[Caller Jay]

15, 11, 10 and 7.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay, tell me why there's nothing.

[Caller Jay]

Just not enough. There's not nothing, but there's not enough at the end. There's not anything extra.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

There's paycheck to paycheck.

[Caller Jay]

Hour to hour.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller Jay]

What are you earning at this point for jobs? Right now you have around 120 a year.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

You yourself have four jobs?

[Caller Jay]

Well, one full time job and then three like gigs, Amazon catering, flex.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And that equals 120 a year?

[Caller Jay]

About. Yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

What's your main job?

[Caller Jay]

Managing a small grocery store. Okay, that was mine that I sold to them last year.

[Dave Ramsey]

Did they give you money for it or you just got out?

[Caller Jay]

They gave me a good chunk of help toward the debt. How much left over on paper? Yeah, 200,000, but I owed about 240.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So there's 40,000 left of business debt?

[Caller Jay]

Pretty much, yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

There's any other debt?

[Caller Jay]

SBA loan, there's personal debt, there's school loan debt. There's. It's a mess.

[Dave Ramsey]

What do you. What do you make?

[Caller Jay]

What's that?

[Dave Ramsey]

What do you make at the grocery store?

[Caller Jay]

That's a hundred.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay, okay, tell me. So there's a 40, 000 SBA loan. Tell me. The student loans?

[Caller Jay]

Well, different ones, but between my wife and I, close to 30.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Tell me about the personal loans.

[Caller Jay]

Not loans, credit cards that we took out in our own names.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller Jay]

To help the business in the last year, you know, how much is that? If I had to guess, it'd be 30 to 40. I'm so sorry I called on a whim. I'm listening to the podcast.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I got you, I got you.

[Caller Jay]

But 30 to 40. I mean, we haven't.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much do you.

[Caller Jay]

Haven't.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much do you own your cars taken anymore.

[Caller Jay]

I will say that.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much do you owe on your car?

[Caller Jay]

I know you're gonna hate that, but we have one car that we owe about 13,000 on the 2018 4Runner. And then I take your advice, and I went and I bought a hoopie, and it blew up, so I had to buy another hooptie, and it broke down. So now I'm on my third hooptie, which is a 200,000 miles. 200, 2009 Silverado.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That you paid cash for.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah. And it spends more time at the mechanic than it does in the driveway, so I think I spend less on the 4Runner over the past two years.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Well, I chalked it up to. I chalk that up to your. You might not know how to select a great older car. Yeah, that's what I chalk that up.

[Caller Jay]

One of those Astro vans that your wife drove.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So $123,000 of debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

How old are you?

[Caller Jay]

I'm 43. Just turned 43.

[Dave Ramsey]

All right, so here's the thing, okay? You live in one of the most expensive cities in the world to live in, okay? And you can't afford to live there, can you? I think. I think you need a change of scenery. Thank you.

[Caller Jay]

I know. Well, there's a problem that legally can't yet.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Is this custody? What is this?

[Dave Ramsey]

That was vague. What do you mean?

[Caller Jay]

Yeah. My oldest son is not my own son, and he's, you know, we're tied here to the father, so.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay, then let's talk. Let's still talk living situation because.

[Caller Jay]

Oh, we haven't. We live in a beautiful, beautiful area that we don't deserve to live in. We pay less in rent than you would think you'd pay for a basement apartment.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

What do you pay?

[Caller Jay]

$2,000 a month.

[Caller Carl]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Does your wife work outside the home?

[Caller Jay]

No, she homeschools her for kids.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

We might need to change that.

[Caller Jay]

I know, I know. It's kind of hard to bring that up.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah. But let's. Let's.

[Caller Jay]

Let's see how much he does.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But let's. Let's stop for a minute.

[Dave Ramsey]

Hey, Bo, listen.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Something's got to change, dude. You're gonna have to decide what it is.

[Caller Jay]

Not even any more hours in the day.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, you. You can't work anymore. You got no emotion left in your gas tank. I'm talking to a guy who can't even form a sentence because you're completely exhausted. Something's got to change. You're going to have to change something. You're carrying all of this. You're the plate spinning est. Dude, I've talked to, and I don't know when, and these plates are crashing all around you, and you're Scared to death. And every time we bring up, you got to try something. You got to try something. You got to try something. You go, can't do that, can't do that, can't do that. Something's got to change. You got to change something. You're going to rise up and bust something and change something. I don't know what it is, man, but I love you and I want you to win. And I'm talking to a guy who's.

[Caller Jay]

Scared the wrong work.

[Dave Ramsey]

I think you gotta move. I think you gotta do something different. Your wife's gonna work, somebody's gonna work, Something's gonna change. Your job changes. You get away from that grocery store that failed because every time you walk in there, you feel like a failure. I don't know what's going on, but your emotions, man, are all in your words. And it's. You're. If you could, you need to play this back and listen to it on the podcast because you're defeated is everything that comes up. I'm already defeated. I've already lost. I've already lost. I've already lost. And you have not lost. You're a hard working guy. You manage to keep a family together in freaking New York City. My God. I mean, you're amazing. There's a lot of stuff you can do. Just because your stupid grocery store didn't work doesn't mean your life is over. Your life's not over. There is a lot of stuff my friend Bo can do that makes more money and better decisions. You are not stuck, but you are going to have to change something. There's an old thing. When the lumberjacks in the mountains of the Appalachians used to put the trees in the river to run them down the river to deliver them to the sawmill. They would get stuck in the bend. When they go around the corner, there'd be a log jam. That's where that saying comes from. You know how they fixed it? They'd light dynamite and throw it in the middle of it. That's how you bust up a log jam. You bust up some stuff. Now, I don't know exactly what it is in your life, but I'm going to start selling everything in sight, anything is online. And I'm gonna look at the kids and go, kids, we're freaking broke. We're freaking broke. We got no money. So we're gonna have to figure out a very creative Christmas this year. And I'm gonna get on the phone with the old ex husband, wife, whatever the flip is going on. And Going, hey, you know, we. We cannot stay here anymore because of Junior, okay? So something's gonna have to change. And something's gonna change because you cannot. The guy I'm talking to is not in a sustainable situation one year from today. You cannot be saying the same exact sentences you're saying to me right now. You cannot exist that way. It won't work. Something's going to blow. You're going to blow a gasket. Something's going to blow up in your marriage. We're going to find you in addiction. Something's going to blow up because you're just the stuck. Stuck, stuck, stuck, stuck. And just start yelling at the stuck and say, no, I'm throwing dynamite on your butt. Now, I don't know exactly what the individual tactical thing to tell you to do is right now, except to encourage you and say, I think you're a whole lot better than you think you are right now.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I'll give you some homework if I were you. Let's send you find the work you're wired to do. Because I think you need to get on a different career path.

[Dave Ramsey]

Got to get out of the grocery store for sure.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

What you did before is. That's just hanging over your head. And the longer that you work in that, it's just driving you into depression. You need a new job, and you need to not have four jobs because you've been doing that for too long. I'm gonna look at this homeschool situation. Cause your wife needs to be able to work. You need her help earning income in this season. I'm not saying it's gonna last forever, but those are the two things that need to shake loose immediately.

[Dave Ramsey]

Something's got to move you. Decide what it is before it decides for you. That's the situation. Bust up into it. Bo, you're better than you feel like you are. Hang on. We're gonna send you finding the work you're wired to do because you need some new work. There's only one security system that deserves to call itself real security. Simplisafe. And right now, my listeners get 60 off with exclusive early access to Black Friday. So think about your common home security system. It only reacts after someone's inside. I don't know about you, but I think that's too late. Real security should be better. And that's why I've recommended Simplisafe for the past 10 years. SimpliSafe takes action to stop a criminal when they're still outside your home before they can do damage. The moment someone steps onto your property. AI security cameras identify the threat and alert Simplisafe's live agents. Then they can take action immediately. They can confront the criminal and even trigger sirens, spotlights and dispatch the police. And right now Simplisafe is having their biggest sale of the year. If you've ever worried about your family safety, you can't miss this once a year opportunity to get 60% off your new system at SimpliSafe. SimpliSafeDirect.com that's SimpliSafeDirect.com there's no safe like Simplisafe. Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Fair Winds Credit Union studio. I'm Dave Ramsey. Jade Washall Ramsey personality number one best selling author is my co host Carl's in Chicago. Hi Carl, how are you?

[Caller Carl]

I am better than I deserve, I hope. How are you too?

[Dave Ramsey]

Just the same sir. How can I help?

[Caller Carl]

How can I go about helping someone that I truly care about without financially ruining myself in the process?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Who's the person and what do you need to do to help them?

[Caller Carl]

So this is a girlfriend for dating for about two years. We actually, technically I ended things a couple weeks ago just because of the patterns with her money and her finances just kept leaving me in a bind and now she's like really in a bad spot to where she's like facing eviction and she's got a young son and I don't know what to do because I don't want to enable her at the same same time, you know, cause I've tried many things until we got to this point, but I just, I also don't want to see her homeless either.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Are you thinking about this young son more or are you thinking about like is it more about the son or is it more about her?

[Caller Carl]

I think, I think a lot. I mean it's, it's gotta be the son. He, we obviously had like a really close bond like while we were together. And it's just I don't want to see a kid on the streets or.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Like, well what stops her from working? Like is there something that keeps her from being able to have a job?

[Caller Carl]

Sort of. She was working when we were together early 2025. She did get sick where I, I took over the family finances and everything and she still has this sickness but she ended up going back to work after we had broken up. And she's had two jobs since we've been together and I did make her several budgets. I'm like, hey, this is how much you make. This is how Much. You work like this will work if you just don't overspend. Always been 27.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And what type of. I mean, I'm not trying to pry, but what kind of sickness was it?

[Caller Carl]

Yeah, stomach ulcers.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay. Okay. And she's smart?

[Dave Ramsey]

Yes, very.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So what do you perceive? Like, just be flat out honest. If I say to you, hey, level with me. Why isn't she working? Is it because she's lazy? Is it because she has a toxic trait? Like, tell me, why isn't she working?

[Caller Carl]

Yeah, I think more so, it's like, she has toxic traits that obviously, like, led to our breakup, too. But, you know, obviously when I met her, you know, our first eight months were great until we got into the money issues and, like, me having to spot her, but it was just.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. So you were living together. Were you living in that apartment?

[Caller Carl]

Yes, for a little bit. I mean, we never, like, officially lived together, but I was. I was over there fairly often.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, and so you were paying. You were paying the rent for a while?

[Caller Jay]

I was, yes.

[Caller Carl]

I was helping her when she wasn't working. Correct, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

And how much is the rent?

[Caller Carl]

1050.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And how much does it take to get a current?

[Caller Carl]

It's like 4,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And you've been gone for. I thought you said you broke up two weeks ago.

[Caller Jay]

We did.

[Caller Carl]

I mean, we got.

[Dave Ramsey]

How's she four months behind if you were helping with the rent?

[Caller Carl]

I was helping with the rent until June when we broke up.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, I thought you said you broke up two weeks ago.

[Caller Carl]

We started talking again, but never official, but yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Did she ask you for help, or are you just looking at this, saying, I need help, she needs help.

[Caller Carl]

She. She hasn't helped. She hasn't asked yet, but she has before when she gets in these situations, like, just trackable money. Since we've met, does she have any.

[Dave Ramsey]

Does she have any money at all?

[Caller Carl]

None.

[Caller Jay]

No.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so does she have a job now?

[Caller Carl]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so if she was current, could she stay?

[Caller Carl]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

She couldn't make it going forward. How much money do you have?

[Caller Carl]

Maybe. I've got about 7,000 in my name.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. You can't help her. You don't have enough money. Yeah, it's really sad.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Does she have family?

[Caller Carl]

Yes. I don't know the dynamic too well. Obviously, when we were together, she had family issues, too, so I don't know if they would help willingly. I just don't know if I were.

[Dave Ramsey]

You don't have the money to help.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Her, and if I were in your shoes, here's here's the facts. She hasn't asked you for help yet. That's thing number one, you're kind of thinking about this and it hasn't even happened yet. I'm not even sure why you know all of this if you've been broken up. Number two, if the. If let's just play this out because let's pretend they did end up on the streets. I don't think they will. I think she's going to figure something out because the truth is she was probably existing just fine before you came into the or. She was surviving. I don't know if she was doing just fine, but she was surviving before you came into the picture. If for some reason you got wind of the fact that this little boy was on the street, where are you living?

[Caller Carl]

Yeah, I live on my own right now.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So is there a way that you could say he can stay with me for a couple of weeks until you get on your feet?

[Caller Carl]

I could do that, yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So there are some options here that involve you helping if it got to the worst case scenario. But I don't like the idea of you trying to be Superman and keep any of this from happening to begin with.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. If you had 700 and you want to write one four thousand dollar check to walk away from this clean, dust your hands off, shake the dust off your feet and walk away, yes, that'd be okay. But you ain't got 700 grand. You got seven grand. You don't have any money, you're broke.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And you've got debt too, don't you?

[Caller Carl]

No, luckily.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Oh, good, okay, that's good.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're not in a position financially to give up half of your net worth.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

4,000. Yeah, 5,000 bucks to do this.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's just not, it's not tenable. And it's not your job either. I mean, because within two miles of you, there's eight of these people. You just happen to know this one.

[Caller Carl]

Okay. Yeah, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you're not. Jesus, that's his job. You can't do his job for him. And so you can only do what you can do. And. Yeah, and so I'm with Jade. If you find out that the little boy needs some help, you can help him. If it was, you know, if it was a small percentage of your world, I would give her some money and then just no more ever again. And because she's gonna mess it, she's gonna mess it up again.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And he said he's already done that. Here's my thing. Cause I don't want Anybody to think, oh, my gosh, jj, you're screwed. You're so mean. There's nothing wrong with her. If she was on drugs, if she was having some sort of. I mean, she's got stomach ulcers, but it seems like she can work. She already has another job. I think that at this case, it would be enabling. I think that it would be for her, somebody who's just kind of softening the fall. Okay. I don't have to work as much. Okay. He's gonna be here. I think that she can do this. He said she's smart, she's capable. If she has personality issues, go see a therapist.

[Dave Ramsey]

Amen. That's all I'm saying, man. So it's interesting that a lot of the things that keep us from working, the income from working, solves work.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah, money.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, money. Work creates money. And then you don't have anywhere near the stress. And so the stomach ulcers, which are a stress induced by and large thing.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Point.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, the reason you got stomach ulcers is you've been broke all your life because you don't maintain a job all your life. And so these are created situations. And so, yeah, your anxiety, so to speak, that everybody throws their word around these days, goes down. Your stress goes down. Your health improves when you create some margin in your life. And there's only one way to do that, and that's work a lot. And you won't die from hard work. Right before you die, you pass out. You won't die. So just working all the time, just like a crazy person, and it creates this big old pile of money. And money's not everything. But paid rent is. Paid rent is, and paid electricity is, and food on the table is, and Christmas presents are. And all those things happen. And all that stuff's what money buys. Money's not important, but what it buys. Oh, the stuff it buys is really important. If you've got collectors breathing down your neck and you're drowning in credit card debt, you don't need another debt relief company trying to sell you sunshine and unicorns. You need real help. And Guardian Litigation Group is the real deal. They're not a call center. They're actual attorneys. That means when a creditor tries to sue you, they can step into the courtroom and fight back. Now, listen, debt settlement isn't pretty. It's not a magic wand. And I'd prefer you get out of debt the old fashioned way. But if you're staring down bankruptcy and you've got no other way out, Guardian Gives you a path to clean up the mess without paying a dime up front. Guardian's attorneys have helped over 55,000 people across the nation settle over $600 million of debt. So if you're ready to take back control of your life and stop cringing every time the phone rings, go to guardianlit.com Ramsey that's guardianlit.com Ramsey paid endorsement attorney advertising Guardian Litigation Group LLP not available in Minnesota and Oregon. Results vary and no specific outcome is guaranteed. Debt settlement may negatively affect credit and not all creditors will negotiate or settle. Savings vary and may be taxable. Please review our we terms for more information. Alex is in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Hi, Alex. How are you? Good.

[Caller Jay]

How you doing, Dave?

[Dave Ramsey]

Good. How can we help?

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, I've gotten myself into a pretty big hole with payday loans.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh.

[Caller Jay]

Totaling about 3,500. You know, the APRs on them are all 500% or so.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yep.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, I took them out because I got laid off in August and I didn't have a good enough credit score to get a loan to get me help with rent and everything. And I'm starting a new job in about three weeks. And in the meantime I've been working Lyft and making about 800 or so a week. And basically all of my money just goes to those payday loans and basic living expenses. And I just really want to get out of this cycle.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's the new job Pay?

[Caller Jay]

It'll be 63, plus some bonuses, so probably about 70.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's good.

[Dave Ramsey]

What else can you do for the next three weeks other than lift?

[Caller Jay]

That's the thing. I don't know. I'm already doing 10 hour days, five, six days a week.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you're making a dollar an hour. What else can you do?

[Caller Jay]

I don't know.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Do you have a lawnmower? Can you go cut grasses and trim hedges and rake leaves and detail cars? Can you do something like that where you can set a higher rate?

[Caller Jay]

Yeah. So I've been looking on Craigslist and Facebook for just general odd jobs. And the only thing been able to get was I helped this guy move, move all this furniture and stuff for like 200 bucks. You know, it's not really the best area, but that's something that I would be qualified for.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

What about. I'm just, I'm spitballing with you. What about it's holidays. What about like hanging up lights? People need help hanging up lights. What about something like that?

[Dave Ramsey]

I'm just trying to think FedEx. You can throw boxes, FedEx and UPS are hiring right now and they're paying. They're paying more than you're making with Lyft because you're making 800 coming in. But you got gas and wear and tear on the car coming out of that.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

If you're driving that car 10 hours a day, you're not making any money.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, I thought about going and just getting that simple. Being a server or bartender or working at UPS or FedEx, it's. I just don't want to go through that whole process and then just leave in two weeks. No, keep it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Keep it. Your new job doesn't work on the weekends.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Work Saturday and Sunday.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Mm.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, I could do that.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, you're gonna need to and clean this mess up. In the meantime, the first thing you do is you buy food. The second thing you buy is you buy electricity. The third thing you buy is rent. The fourth thing you do is pay a car payment. Only after all of your living expenses are covered do you pay anything on a payday loan. And don't you ever walk in those places again and borrow money the rest of your freaking life. Remember the pain of this and remember the stupidity of this and the ridiculous trap that you voluntarily stepped into so you never do it again. Okay?

[Caller Jay]

Yeah. Yeah. I don't ever want to pay 500%.

[Dave Ramsey]

Teach your children. Teach your grandchildren. Teach everyone's children to stay away from those scumburgers. They are screwing people.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, the other thing was, I was thinking about just revoking my bank authorization to them so they can't charge me anymore until I can. Yes, get out of it.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yes, that's fine.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that's fine. But. But you could stop it. That's fine. Just stop it. Or change your bank account or close your bank account. I don't care. But the point is, you're going to have to pay them the 3500 and you're going to pay them a bunch of stupid interest at some point. And the more money you make, the faster that's going to happen. And then never, under any circumstances, go in there again. Okay?

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, I know. I knew it was stupid, too.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. I mean, it's just. You stepped in a bear trap and guess what? It ripped your leg off. Oh, my gosh. This is ridiculous. I'm so sorry. Wow. It's such a trap, though. It's such a rip off, but yeah, you just have to be one of those guys who goes, yeah, back then when I was that Alex, I did that and I won't ever do that. 1. I got a lot of those in my life, Alex. A lot of stuff that I used to do that I don't do anymore, and it's caused me to have money, and it's caused me to have a better life and a better walk with Jesus and everything else, because I don't do the stuff I used to do, the other version of Dave. Right? And so it changed everything. And that's where you are. That's who you're going to be, and you're on your way. You're going to clear this up. But the faster. And the more you work, the faster you create income, and the more income you create over the next four months, the faster this thing goes away and becomes a memory of that dumb thing I did a long time ago back in. You'll tell your grandkids back In August of 25, I was over there, debate. You know, you could tell the grandkids story, right? And go, that I did that stupid stuff. Son, you stay out of them places. You'll be that grandpa, right? And that's the grandpa you want to be, not the one that's still living broke.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

The thing is, though, what I keep thinking about when I hear his call is he had been on the edge before. Before, and he had no margin. No margin. And all it took was one little flick, and then all the dominoes fell down.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yep.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And somebody listening.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's on the edge. Like there's a whole bunch of somebody's. And so you got. You need better wise up on. Buckle down right now. Otherwise you're gonna get laid off at the work. Because they don't. They don't. They don't come in and tell you, like, seven months from now, we're gonna lay you off.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

They come in and tell you, seven minutes from now, you're leaving the building. Mm.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And that's what they tell you. Yep.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because corporate America has one job, and it's piss on their employees, and so that's their only job, and they're really good at it. So, you know, this is what happens. So now you've got to build a margin of an emergency fund and no debt payments. You got $30,000 in the bank and no payments, and they lay you off. You look at them and go, what's the severance? You got $30,000 in credit card debt and no money, and they lay you off. You go, oh, crap, I am heading down to the payday loan place.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

You're at the mercy of whatever desperate thing you do next.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, Sarah's in South Dakota. Hi, Sarah. What's up? Sarah is gone.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Locked out. She dropped out.

[Dave Ramsey]

Scary question.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Scared her off.

[Dave Ramsey]

Scary question. Brian is in Minneapolis. Hi, Brian. How are you?

[Caller Jay]

Good morning OR Good afternoon? Mr. Ramsey and Jason. Hey. I'm doing well. Question for you guys, which I'm glad I have. Male and a female. I'm engaged. I'm 45 years old. My fiance does not quite know what my net worth is. How do I tell her fully and that I. My lawyers have. I pretty much have to have a prenup.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, your lawyer is not in charge of your life yet.

[Caller Jay]

No, I.

[Dave Ramsey]

Number one lawyers. Lawyers give advice. They don't tell me what to do. And then I decide if A, they don't want them to be my lawyer anymore and B, if I'm going to take their advice, they don't get to tell me I have to do something. That's not how you. You're not the boss of me now. So how in the world do you get engaged and have never told her? You should have told her before you got engaged.

[Caller Jay]

I. I agree. She knows I'm worth a decent amount. She just doesn't know the full amount.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

What is the full amount?

[Caller Jay]

Close to 20 million.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow. 12 to 20 million. That's a little vague.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Did you say close to 20 million?

[Caller Jay]

Just shy of the last time I had my financials audited and you're telling.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Me there's no signs that you're a 20 millionaire?

[Caller Jay]

She knows I'm a millionaire, but she doesn't quite know that much. No, I'm. I live very frugal. Lived in the Same house since 2005. Drive a vehicle from 2011.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. So you said you. You said your net worth is close to 20 million. Did I mishear you?

[Caller Jay]

Nope. You did not miss him.

[Dave Ramsey]

You said 12 to. I thought I heard you say 12. 20.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Close to 20.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so I did miss you. Okay, so let's call it.

[Caller Jay]

Let's call it 20,600,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

What do you. What do you make a year?

[Caller Jay]

700 ish,000.

[Dave Ramsey]

Does she know that?

[Caller Jay]

She knows and they get amount.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, well, she doesn't know that.

[Caller Jay]

No.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

How long have you been together?

[Caller Carl]

Three years.

[Dave Ramsey]

How long have you been engaged?

[Caller Jay]

Eight months.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So you were. Can I. Can I ask a clear question for that long of a period of time that means you were intentionally keeping it from her? There was a point that came. I'm not going to tell her this.

[Caller Jay]

Yes and no.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And my question for you is why?

[Caller Jay]

I was in a relationship once where I found out it Started because of the money.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that makes sense.

[Caller Jay]

I guess I never wanted.

[Dave Ramsey]

Hang on. We're going to talk about this after the break because it's a good question. I appreciate you calling in. Hang on.

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[Dave Ramsey]

We're talking with Brian in Minneapolis. Jade Washaw is my co host. Brian has a net worth of around 20 million. He's been engaged for eight months and has not told her yet the amount of his wealth. He makes 700,000 a year and she doesn't know exactly how much. She knows he has a lot, makes a lot, but that's all and not everything. And that's about how far we got in the conversation. He's asking how to let her know now and to talk to her about a prenup. So let me backtrack for a second. So the reason you've not disclosed this to her is because you got. You had someone before that was after you and you realized they were only after you for your money, right?

[Caller Jay]

Yeah. You can sum it up to that?

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And so how do you know this lady's not.

[Caller Jay]

She's. I can say one of. We did have a talk about debt because obviously I'm not a fan of it. And she did at one time have some debt and I.

[Dave Ramsey]

How do you know she's not after your money?

[Caller Jay]

Because she never asked for anything. She tried to pay me back, tried to give me money every month when I did that. And I obviously said, I don't want it, please.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, she gave you gave her some Money.

[Caller Jay]

I did pay off her debt. She had debt. I did pay it off.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

How much?

[Caller Jay]

Like 40,000. So I wouldn't. It was some student loans, car, and she had unfortunately a payday loan like you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Just for someone who's so worried about her not finding out that you have wealth because she might be after you for your money, you sure did write a 40,000 doll dollar check. That's inconsistent.

[Caller Jay]

Yes, I. I look at that as I've been with her, you know, for years. And if it got checked up that I got burnt on it, hey, I got.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

How early into the relationship did you pay off her debt?

[Caller Jay]

Two years. Okay, not really early. No. And I looked at it that if she left me like.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And did she ask.

[Dave Ramsey]

Did she ask to pay it back? All right, so. Okay, here's the thing. What makes. What makes you. What makes. So just the fact that she's never asked you for anything and offered to pay that back makes her. Makes you think she's not after your money.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, I just think I would have seen it in the, in the course three years that we've been together that she never came to me.

[Dave Ramsey]

So how do you react to this? How do you react to this? State statement. You should have told her before you asked her to marry you.

[Caller Jay]

Agreed.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right. Because you shouldn't ask someone to marry you that you can't be honest with and transparent with that you don't trust.

[Caller Jay]

You know, I. I fully know I'm in the wrong.

[Caller Carl]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

So I think. I think the conversation starts with that I owe you an apology. We should have talked in detail about our finances before we got engaged. And I didn't do that because I was afraid because of this other person. The way I was treated before. I don't think you're that person. And I didn't know how to handle this. And so I'm sorry. Now I've got to do something that I should have done eight months ago. And that's unpack for you what I have.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, no, I truly agree. I just.

[Dave Ramsey]

I think that's the way you have the conversation. And you have it. You have 24 hours. Mama. Man. Okay. No more dreading this. No more thinking about it. This is cost. You can't sleep. You're fretting about this. Worried about this.

[Caller Jay]

Second quick question then. I actually won't see. Are we. Actually, I'm an American and she's a Canadian, so I travel back and forth. So I won't see her for actually a couple of weeks.

[Dave Ramsey]

Well, then wait, I see her this is in person. Yeah, this is in person.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And we do not recommend prenups except in situations where there's extreme difference in their net worth and there's extreme difference here. So I do recommend a prenup.

[Caller Jay]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

I recommend it. I'm not your lawyer. I didn't tell you you have to do it. But. And let me tell you, if you think that you need a prenup to protect you from her, don't get married.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, I don't believe that for one second.

[Dave Ramsey]

The only reason you're getting a prenup is to protect you from her crazy relative.

[Caller Jay]

And she has one.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, well, everybody does. And if you think they don't, then that means it's you. So. All right, so when you get. Next time you're in person, we sit down and you start with I, an apology that you should have trusted her enough to unpack this before you ask for her hand.

[Caller Jay]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

And then you tell her what's going on and what we're doing. And you know, a financial advisor has suggested we discuss. Have recommended we have a prenup to protect us. So you can look at your family and say, I don't have anything. He handles it all. And you come into them, you go out of the marriage with what you came into the marriage with and basic prenup stuff.

[Caller Jay]

Okay, Sounds good.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Very interesting. Thanks for the call.

[Caller Jay]

Thank you so much.

[Dave Ramsey]

Appreciate it.

[Caller Jay]

Yep.

[Dave Ramsey]

Have a great. You too. So, Jade, John Deloney posed an interesting question to me the other day, and it'll come up again in the next few months because he's doing some writing about it. He read a book, I guess it was, or talked to an expert somewhere that said, you know, we tell people get a will. Right? Why? Because if you don't get a will, the law tells you and the court system tells you what's going to happen.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's right. That's right. That's right.

[Dave Ramsey]

And this guy argument to get a prenup was so intriguing. We had a great discussion about it the other day on the plane. This guy's argument was, you have a prenup because the law is there. The judge and the court's gonna just like with a will, they're gonna tell you what's gonna happen. But with a prenup, you decide. You decide what's gonna happen. And I've been so anti prenup over the years that that created a really interesting discussion. I'm still not gonna tell you to get a prenup, but it did frame it. In a way I had never thought.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

About it before, which is you can pre decide while you're in your right mind.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Just like you do with a will.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Without spite, without anger, without.

[Dave Ramsey]

Just like you do with a will. And then the judge doesn't tell you. The judge has to go along with what the prenup says. Judges, you know, if the prenup's properly written, it can't be. The courts can't undo it. And so by and large, there's some movie scenes that tell you. But I mean, I mean, it's. I think of that one with Clooney. That's hilarious. But anyway, you pre decide what's gonna happen. Otherwise the law decides and the judge decides. That's the same thing we tell people to do with a will. Now the difference is you're gonna die and you might not get divorced.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's facts. That's facts. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

There's a difference there. And you know, I think for a while, dying is a spiritual decision. So is divorce.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I think the divorce thing, it's like that forebod. It's almost like you're gonna create a self fulfilling prophecy.

[Dave Ramsey]

Exactly. That's the problem. You're planning something and so you're aiming at it unintentionally. You spoke it.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yes. Cause everybody dies. Everybody doesn't have to get divorced. Yeah, I get it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Exactly. Yeah. So it's just interesting. I had never heard it framed that way. And it made me stop and think about prenups. I was a little lighter, a little calmer about it. Cause I'm real anti prenup. We had one lady called here on the show many years ago, say her fiance wanted to get a prenup because he had a 67 vintage Mustang. And I'm like, don't marry this guy. He loves his car more than you. Run, girl, run. And so, you know, that's the kind of crap I associate with prenups.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Right. But the idea that two people, if.

[Dave Ramsey]

You got 20 million bucks and you know, that's a lot.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But even the idea that two people could sit down and say, hey, we're getting married. Let's do some planning. And if you decided together, here's in the unlikely event. It's like when you ride a plane and they go through the safety precautions.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, exactly.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

In the unlikely event of a water landing, a divorce landing, here's what we're gonna do. And then it's like, you've done it before. There's anger before. There. I don't know. It's an interesting conversation for sure.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow. I'm not mad at it. I'm still not a fan. I'm still not gonna tell you to do it. But it did. I will. I'm admitting here on the air that it made me stop and think about it.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I'm thinking about it now.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's a different, different framing to the whole prenup discussion.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

As I'm thinking about it, though, I'm also thinking if Sam Warshaw came to me with this conversation, I'd be like.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, the door is that way. We'd be done, bud. We be done, man. Yeah, we be done. Yeah. So. Yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So there you have it.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's the other thing is, I mean, Sharon and I got married at 22 years old. I had a $12.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, I couldn't even have paid to have the prenup done right, Much less thought about.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I needed one and I had negative dollars.

[Dave Ramsey]

I was just so happy to be here, you know? That's all. I'm just happy to be here. Sa. Countdown to Christmas is on. We got a ton of great deals for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Plus we're dropping special one day sales on Black Friday and Cyber Monday. We're talking hardcover, books, audiobooks, assessments, some with as low as $3.99. Don't miss these deals. Go to ramseysolutions.com store or click the link in in the show notes in the description. We would love to have you. All right. Jennifer is on a zoom call with us in California. Hi, Jennifer. How are you?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I'm well.

[Caller Jennifer]

How are you? Thank you so much for having me, you guys. Thank you.

[Dave Ramsey]

Our honor. How can we help you today?

[Caller Jennifer]

This is a hard question. I need help around my heart because my heart is not right. I'm having resentment and I'm a Christian. I don't believe that that is what we need to do. I married a wonderful man, but now we are continuing to pay his ex wife's child support. She went back for more and I am angry and resentful and it's. We're snapping at each other more. And I took Jade's advice. Jade taught me this where she said fight the problem, not fight each other, right? So I'm like, okay, we're gonna fight the problem.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But.

[Caller Jennifer]

But it's affecting everything. It's affecting even me parenting his kids. And it's just affecting everything.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

The amount, the amount of it or the, the him having to deal with her.

[Caller Jennifer]

I think all of it because he's. Because we, we do everything together, right? So it's not just him that actually triggers me. I love that you said that too. Like, that he's going through it, and I'm like, I'm going through it too, my love. It's my money as well. And he just got a layoff, and so he. His last, you know, he's going to end December, and then he's. He's laid off. And mama does not make enough for our four walls. Like, our four walls calls are 7, 300 just to exist is $7,300 a month.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And what do you make a month?

[Caller Jennifer]

Mama only makes 3.38.84.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

And what was he making?

[Caller Jennifer]

He makes 50. 60. So 5060.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

How much is the child support?

[Caller Jennifer]

So the child support's not killing. It's 500. It's 500 right now. We go back because he's late. Laid off, so the court knows that he's getting laid off. So we go back in February because she wants, she wants, like the gut, the.

[Dave Ramsey]

All of it.

[Caller Jennifer]

Yeah, the gun, the good stuff. And so thankfully, they.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

They.

[Caller Jennifer]

And she. She surprises too, that she came to court and was like, oh, well, I was laid off too. So now we're like, oh, what?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Like, yeah, you didn't tell us that you were laid off.

[Caller Jennifer]

We were transparent and let her know that, oh, gosh, you know, he received a layoff and, you know, we're done in December. But then we found out, like, because she's remarried. But then we found out she's not remarried and she's. She had a ceremony. She's married.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Can I, Can I, Can I bust in here? Because I'm not in your situation, but if I were in your shoes, I can see why this is a pain point. I can see how it's annoying. I can especially. I mean, this woman's in your life whether you like it or not. If I could make this way more. If I were in your shoes, I'd be picturing the child. Because the fact is, if you make a human being, you got to pay for them, period. Like the same way you pay for money to raise your kids. Kids, that's just part of it. So I'd be thinking way more about the kid, as much as you can imagine them think about what that 500 is doing for them and try to keep her out of that vision as much as possible.

[Dave Ramsey]

Now, this is not ex wife support. This is child support. Right? Yeah, that and that. You know, and honestly, when he is working, what is the child support?

[Caller Jennifer]

We don't know yet. So.

[Dave Ramsey]

Because he's never paid child support.

[Caller Jennifer]

No, he did. Well, so he, she actually was unawarded child support and alimony, which she went for the first time she was. Because when he laid everything out, he paid everything already. He paid her car insurance, he made cell phone, plus all the, all the kids. So what the court decided was just disparaging income. He got family support. So he used to pay about 500 family support with the stipulation that he continues to pay everything, all after school care, dental, you know, all the things.

[Dave Ramsey]

Things.

[Caller Jennifer]

Plus her car insurance and her cell phone and stuff. He still had to do that for two years.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, but that's over now. That's over now.

[Caller Jennifer]

That was over.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you married into that though. You knew that when you got married, Right? Okay, so let me, let me. So that was how much total in a month that he was paying?

[Caller Jennifer]

So she, he.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Oh gosh.

[Caller Jennifer]

To total all the bills. I don't know. All the bills were like all the medical, her car insurance, whatever, probably.

[Dave Ramsey]

So when you go back, it's not going to be any of that. It's going to just be a percentage of his income?

[Caller Jennifer]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, good.

[Caller Jennifer]

In February it'll be whatever.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's really good. Cause really what that does is it disconnects her from misbehaving and wanting it paid for. Okay. She just gets a fixed amount of his income regardless. But she doesn't get it anyway. Kiddo gets it to Jason just for the child. So we're paying this for this child and you knew this when you came in. It's not his fault. It's not your fault. And it's not even benefiting the lady, the ex wife. It's just benefiting the kid. And truthfully, the reason I ask how much is most, most of the time in most states, the child support that is paid is not enough to raise a kid.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

It's a very small amount.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. So he's going to pay a lot and it's going to be bothersome, but it's still not enough to raise a kid. And so. Yeah. And how old is the child?

[Caller Jennifer]

We have two. Well, he has two. So he has a seven year old son and an 11 year old daughter. And then I have two.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller Jennifer]

So I have a family of six over here.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

How old are yours?

[Caller Jennifer]

So mine so. Oh my God, you guys, we're in the thick of it. We have a 7 year old, a 10 year old, an 11 year old and a 12 year old.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So then this is easy for you to imagine these kids when you write that $500 check or whatever it's gonna be. It's easy for you to imagine. Okay, yeah, they. They go to ballet and they go to. You know, they have soccer and they have school lunch. You know what this money's going for, they need new boots, all that stuff. That's what you. You need to focus on the. That and you need to get practical about this. You need to have it somewhere when. Where. When you start to spin out and you're thinking about her and you're thinking about him and you're thinking about the past because you. You told us a lot of stuff that's not even currently happening anymore. You need to focus on what is happening today and what is the benefit. And just remind yourself, here's why I'm doing this. I gotta refocus, and I think that's gonna help you.

[Dave Ramsey]

His youngest is how old?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Seven.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. She got 10 years. 11 years.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's really not much in the scope of life. That's not much.

[Caller Jennifer]

It's a me problem. I just.

[Dave Ramsey]

We're not picking on you. I think it's normal to have the emotions that you have. You asked how to handle them, and we're just suggesting we redirect them and compartmentalize them. The way you've described it with your language was it's all about her. And Jade's point is none of it's really about her other than she's obviously a test pilot for a broom factory. Yeah. So, I mean, you know, there's a reason she's called the ex, and so we get that part, but that's normal dealing with exes. There's a reason they're gone. And so. But, yeah, you're gonna be in weddings together, and you'll be at other things together in the future and for the rest of your life. And it'll get easier and easier. But, yeah, I like the idea that we're getting away from paying individual expenses, like her cell phone. That sounds kind of ridiculous and personal. I would be much more torqued about that if I were in your shoes than I would just writing a child support check.

[Caller Jennifer]

Yes, that was very difficult.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

When I first learned my partner.

[Dave Ramsey]

That was stupid. That was just a bad idea.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But that part's over.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, it's gone. That's all.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That part. It's done and gone. So, you know, wrap the. Put a bow on that.

[Dave Ramsey]

I have a feeling you love your husband. And I have a feeling you actually love his kids.

[Caller Jennifer]

I do. Of course I do.

[Dave Ramsey]

So this is their mother money. Yeah. And you would help them because you're a good mom.

[Caller Jennifer]

That is really helpful.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, that's. That's the right way to do it. Yeah. You're heading in the right direction for sure there. So I'm proud of you. It's a good question.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

It is good.

[Dave Ramsey]

I appreciate you being vulnerable and coming on the air with us and talking about it.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

It's such a human way to feel.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

You know.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. It's hard. I mean, kiddos are kiddos and that's where we are. Thanks for calling. We appreciate you being with us. Fun watch. Wow.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I like that video situation. That's nice.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. I mean, that's super. I mean, we get these calls in there on the air, on the phone. It's anonymous right here. What, you just walked up.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah. Right into her house.

[Dave Ramsey]

I like that. That's. And on a very personal, intimate question.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Oh, yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

So very interesting. Very interesting.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's not easy. That's not an easy situation to deal with.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, but I mean, I'm, you know. So I guess some advice would be for everyone out there, if you're going through this, don't set up a situation where you're paying for individual bills like that with the ex. Like, for God's sakes, her cell phone. That one's just whack. Whack.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Well, then you're in their life without wanting to. You're judging how they're, you know, judging the cost. Judging.

[Dave Ramsey]

I want them to be away. That's the reason their ex go away. Yes, way away. Way, way. Go find an away place to be. You know, I don't want to know what your issues are. I actually know what they are and I don't want to know about them anymore, you know, and so, yeah, I don't want to know about medical. I don't, you know, you deal with your stuff. There's an idea. That's what you signed up for when you became the ex. You deal with your stuff. And here's what the law says I have to do to take care of my baby. And I will do take care of the baby. That's what I'm going to do. Wow.

[Caller Jay]

Wow. Wow, wow.

[Dave Ramsey]

Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Fair Winds credit union studio. Jade Washall, number one best selling author, Ramsey personality, is my co host today. I am Dave Ramsey. Your host, Albert Einstein famously said, compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it. He who doesn't, pays it. If you invest $100 a month and you got average stock market Returns for the past hundred years or so, you would hit around 12%. $100 a month invested, invested from age 25 to age 65 is $1,176,000. How is it that $1,200 a month for 40 years becomes $1,000,000? $1,200 a year for 40 years.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

There you go.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, becomes, it's called compound interest. So compound interest, Buffett described it as a snowball rolling down the hill. So, so a little snowball picks up a little snow the first time it comes around, the next time it comes around, it's larger and it picks up more snow. The next time it comes around, it picks up more snow and the next time it picks up. And that's called a mathematical geometric progression. And so compound interest shows you that interest works on a curve. It is not a straight line. So an example of that is if you took a $500,000 mortgage. Now, interest rates currently on homes for a 15 year fix is 5 and a half percent. Okay? So if you took out a 5% loan, we'll call it, to make it easy, on a half a million dollars, your payment on that 15 year fixed rate loan would be $3,953. If you doubled the amount of time that you're in debt from 15 years to 30 years, you would think if you didn't understand compound interest that your payment would be half. So 15 should be double what? A 30 is correct? Well, it's not. It's only 33% more to be in debt half, 50% of the time. That's right, because the compound, because you're doing away with the principal and doing away with the need to pay interest, and so you pay a lot less interest and so your payment is only 33% more to go to a 15 year from a 30 year. It's not double. But if you don't understand how the math works, you think, oh, a 15 and a 30 is a thing. So a couple of weeks ago, President Donald Trump came out with this crazy idea for 50 year mortgages, to which instantaneously, my friend Seth Dillon over at Babylon Bee does a Photoshop of me in intensive care. Dave Ramsey's in intensive care in critical condition after learning of 50 year mortgages. Mr. Get out of bed. And I really look pretty sick in this. Here's the dumbest thing, okay? All of my 65 year old and 60 year old and 70 year old friends sent that to me, laughing because it's the best dad joke ever. But none of my 25 year old friends thought it was that funny. They didn't even get it really. It's like, I don't understand, but I did look pretty sick in there, Seth. I mean, did you really? You doctored the face up and everything. The guys at Babylon Bee, I look kind of old. You're like, water, I need water. Yeah. So Babylon Bee is funny. They're friends of ours and they're always pick on me, but it's good natured and we love them and they're great. But here's the thing. President Trump actually realizes, I suppose, because he is a, a math guy and a real estate guy, that the difference in a 50 year mortgage and a 30 year mortgage is more about looking like he did something to help people.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

Than the math is. This is a political stunt by President Trump if he actually knows what's going on. Otherwise it's an ignorant stunt by President Trump. I don't know which one it is because the difference in a 50 year mortgage and a 30 year mortgage as we just described, you would think it would be, would be almost half, but it's only 16% less. So your payment on a 50 year, on a half million dollars is 2,200 bucks. On a 30 year is 2,600 bucks. You save a whole $300 by going in debt an extra 20 freaking years and you save $300 and this is gonna fix America's housing crisis. Oh, horse craft, Trump. That's absolutely asinine and you know it. It's ridiculous. I mean, come on.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Not to and then talk about the interest.

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, this is like Joe Biden saying he's forgiving student loans when he knows he can't. Okay? It's just the same, it's political stunt. You know, you can't do this. The law won't let you do it. But you're walking around strutting around, acting like you did something you politicians. So Trump's like, I'm gonna give him a 50 year mortgage, like. Cause he's got billions of dollars of mortgages on all these, these New York buildings. And he just loves dad. He thinks it's awesome. He and I have disagreed on that since back in the Larry King days. I remember y' all remember Larry King.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Oh, Larry King Live.

[Dave Ramsey]

Of course. We used to do those TV shows and they had like six people on there. Looked like Brady Bunch. Looked like the Brady Bunch. We're in the boxes on the Brady Bunch. And Trump would be in the left hand, bottom corner and I'm up in the other Corner and I'm yelling at him about getting out of debt and he's like, who is this hillbilly on the thing with me? That's the first time he and I ever talked was I got in a big fight with him on Larry King like 25 or 30 years ago. I actually like President Trump, Trump in general. And I've been around him several times. But this is an absolute bogus political stunt and he knows that. He's over laughing at you people going, oh, 50 years, we're not going to have to pay anything. We can get a mortgage for almost nothing. Compound interest, baby, we just explained it to you. It saves you almost Nothing over a 30 year mortgage, 16%, but you're almost 100% more in debt.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But talk about the fact that it's a trap in that. Because I've heard a lot of people say, well, well I can get it, it's a great place to start. And then later on I can move something else.

[Dave Ramsey]

There's a great place to start to go to a payday lender too. It's a great place to start to go to a pawn shop. This is an absolute stupid statement.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

They're not thinking about when you, when you do that, how quickly are you gaining equity? It is absolutely.

[Dave Ramsey]

Except the house goes up in value. Yeah, but you know, you could get an interest only loan and it would be almost the same thing. Basically they had interest only loans for a while. You remember those? That was stupid on steroids. Hello, 2008, we're calling and yeah, does anybody remember stup on steroids? I remember it. How about a one year adjustable rate mortgage tied to an index that already started in the hole your first day. In other words, if you had to adjust it the day you took out the mortgage, you would already be going up. That's how all the one year arms are set up. By the way, boys and girls. This is why it's stupid. The game is rigged. So what you want to do is if you're going to get in the game, you want to get out as fast as possible, not plan to stay in. So you're not saving anything by taking out a 50 year mortgage. Mortgage, Sorry, President Trump, bogus move. You either knew it or you didn't. But now when you hear this, you'll at least know. And I was on a call with him just a few weeks ago on some other stuff.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

You told him it was dumb.

[Dave Ramsey]

No, it wasn't out by then. It came out about three days after that. But I'm not gonna you know, he'll hear about this or he won't. I don't. It doesn't matter. He's not taking Dave Ramsey's opinion anyway. I can tell you that he is not worried about what I think at all. You're not worried about what anything thinks. But. But bottom line, boys and girls, this political move, okay, whether you love Trump, whether you hate TRUMP, a 50 year mortgage has no mathematical substantiality to. If it cut your payment in half, we could talk about it, but it cuts it 16%. Don't be stupid.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

If you're interested in lowering your payment, $300, just get a slightly cheaper house.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, whoa. Mic drop.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Whoa.

[Dave Ramsey]

This is why we pay her the big money right here, boys and girls. When you're tired of feeling stuck with money, there's just one solution. To get different results, you have to do something different. No one accidentally wins with money. You have to have a game plan. And that begins with our get started assessment. Go to ramseysolutions.com start answer some questions and we'll show you what steps to take next. Don't stay stuck. Take control of your money. Starting Today, go with ramseysolutions.com start. Tis the season time of year when we talk about giving. We're gonna be doing our giving edition, the special giving edition of the Ramsey show in December. We want to hear stories from you about how you have given generously sometime in the past. And maybe you tipped a waitress $100 or $1,000 or bought Thanksgiving dinner for a family who couldn't afford it. Or maybe you blessed someone in need by giving them a car. Maybe it was something other than that. We want to hear something that makes everybody be inspired to give. Generosity is the most fun you can have with money. Maybe you've been on the receiving end and had your life changed by someone who was generous to you. Well, we want to hear from you either way. Go to ramseysolutions.com/put giving in the subject line. Tell us a little bit about the story. And we do this every year at Christmas time. It's one of our most popular shows. It's coming up on December 18th. So start sending in your stories on giving today. Today, let's celebrate living like no one else so later you can give like no one else. Robin is with us in Orlando. Hi, Robin. Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

[Caller Robin]

Thank you for taking my call. I really appreciate it. You're the only person I think that I want your opinion on this. My husband wants to buy a $300,000 car and it Just puts a rock in the pit of my stomach.

[Caller Jay]

So my question, what is the car.

[Caller Robin]

Like a Shelby?

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, wow, really?

[Caller Robin]

Oh, see, now you like it. See, that's my finance guy, Matt. I say to Matt and that Michael.

[Dave Ramsey]

I'll go with it. Listen, it's a very cool car, but so the question is just, you know, how much is $300,000? In yourall's world, what's your all's net worth?

[Caller Robin]

Close to 20.

[Dave Ramsey]

20 what?

[Caller Robin]

Million.

[Dave Ramsey]

So you have $20 million. Okay.

[Caller Robin]

Yes.

[Dave Ramsey]

And are you retired or does he work or.

[Caller Robin]

We're retired. We retired last year.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay.

[Caller Robin]

Sold the business. And we are, yeah, fully retired. Plenty of investments. I mean, I really have no reason to say no to this except something in me says, this is absolutely ridiculous. This is the worst idea he's ever had. But I don't want to cut a problem and say that. I need somebody to tell me which direction to go.

[Dave Ramsey]

I think you should say that. And I think then, I think, then I think you should say that's how I feel. But my brain tells me that we have the money and you've worked hard a really long time and this is a small amount of money to us. My heart doesn't understand that and my stomach definitely doesn't understand that. Because you remember the old days when y' all were broke and couldn't, you know, couldn't afford to go out to eat, right?

[Caller Heather]

Oh, yeah.

[Caller Robin]

I always took care of the money. And yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

So here's the thing. I've gone through the same stuff, Robin, Sharon and I have. And you know, we've got 1100 people working here. We buy the coffee for our team. The coffee bill at Ramsey Ramsay blows my freaking mind, okay? Because my mind still remembers my 28 year old self that was bankrupt and couldn't feed my kids. Right. My emotions still feel that. My mind, though, knows that the company took in $300 million last year. We can probably pay the coffee bill, right? We can afford. So the math, the math says it's no big deal, but the emotions are remembering the past, not the current. And so I have to use my intellect to go, it's okay to buy coffee for 1100 people because it really is a small percentage of our overall budget and overall world. And here's the thing. When Sharon wants to buy something expensive or we want to give away $300,000 to charity, to a ministry, okay. In your situation, we ask ourselves, if we took that amount of money and burned it in the kitchen floor, would our life change? So here's the thing. The stock market will move on your $20 million worth of investments. More than 300 grand in the next 60 days, up or down, and you won't even look at it.

[Caller Robin]

That's true.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. So it's not. Because it's not. It's not relevant. It's not going to kill. Yeah. If it moved 20. If it moved $18 million out of 20 million. Yeah. I'm starting to have a duck fit now, girl.

[Caller Jay]

Okay.

[Caller Robin]

I like how you put it.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's a small percentage of your world, and you. You will survive. And it's the. The thing that makes you want to scream is remembering how hard it was in the old days to get to this point. And it's hard for your emotions to keep up with the math.

[Caller Robin]

$300,000 car there's just outrageous.

[Dave Ramsey]

It is. It is outrageous. You know what else is outrageous? You got $20 million, girl. That's freaking outrageously wonderful. That's so wonderful. You know why? Because y' all busted your butt all these years, and then you sold that business and somebody wrote y' all a big old channel check.

[Caller Robin]

This is very true.

[Dave Ramsey]

Luck didn't have nothing to do with this, girl. You paid a price. You worked overtime. Y' all know what. Y' all know what a callous looks like. What kind of business was.

[Caller Robin]

Was Construction industry.

[Dave Ramsey]

You definitely know what a callus looks like. You put up with some bull crap over the years.

[Caller Robin]

Yeah. Just make him so happy.

[Dave Ramsey]

But I'm not gonna make it.

[Caller Robin]

I want to talk to your wife and see what she says.

[Dave Ramsey]

She would say do it because I drive a. That's probably, you know, it's over 100, so. My raptor. My raptor. Our pickup truck is nuts. It's crazy. There's no reason anybody should ever have a truck like that, but it's a very, very small percentage of our world.

[Caller Robin]

All right. You've made me feel better. I appreciate it.

[Dave Ramsey]

I don't think you're being done. I don't think he's being done. I think you don't understand. I don't think you appreciate cars like he does. And that's okay. You don't have to. To. And I think you're a good lady for looking over his shoulder. And. And I. And I like. Don't you love the way she's. She really is asking the question. She's not telling us the question. You know what I'm saying? That Jade.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I do.

[Caller Robin]

Well, it's been eating me. And, you know, kind of funny, because I called a Couple of times. And then I would find out, well, you weren't on. But I couldn't hold on anyway, so I just happened to get right through. Through today because I knew I needed to ask you this.

[Dave Ramsey]

Oh, it's just me.

[Caller Robin]

I feel a lot better. Well, I just, I feel like you. You attitude with cars. And again, I wanted to talk to your wife more than you, I think.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, it doesn't everybody. We can't get her to come on. She comes on Rachel's show, but she won't come on my show.

[Caller Jay]

Darn.

[Caller Robin]

All right.

[Caller Jay]

He made me feel better.

[Caller Robin]

The rock in my stomach is a little easier. I will tell him. At least it'll get off my chest.

[Dave Ramsey]

But tell him you think it's dumb, but you think he's a earned it.

[Caller Robin]

That's the way I'm going to put it. I think it's dumb, but he has earned it.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's the truth. He has earned it. 20 million freaking dollars for a construction company.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I'm back.

[Dave Ramsey]

Back. Well, yeah. Did you go around the planet?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Once I went around the planet, I. I did an orbit and now I'm back.

[Dave Ramsey]

So when you live like no one else, one of the things we're discovering is, is we've shown people how to become millionaires, in some cases multimillionaires. Now, we didn't show them how to sell their company. They did that. We'll give them all the credit on that. But we've shown a lot of people how to build a really nice level of wealth.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But a lot of money is always a lot of money. Even if it's a smaller percentage. Everybody can look at $300,000 and go, that's a lot of money.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. I can look at that and say.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

You see what I'm saying? That part doesn't go away. I got to believe.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. And you know, and honestly, probably top of the market for, I mean, the Shelby, that's a. This is a special car, but it's special car. I don't know. I'm not sure. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Doesn't matter. Again, it passes the burn the money in the middle of the floor test.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Right.

[Dave Ramsey]

And so this is why you can't afford to spend 20. I don't know, let's just say $12,000 and go spend a week on FastPass at Disney when you have $20,000 to your name, you just spent all your money on Disney. Now, see, that's way different. You know, if we want to put this in a ratio with her, you can Afford a chick fil a biscuit.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I was gonna say that's drive through.

[Dave Ramsey]

That's your drive through biscuit. That's your drive through budget right there. So this is like you buying a biscuit if you got $20,000. Yeah, same thing. So 20 million. 20,000.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

But it doesn't feel somehow. It still doesn't feel that way. You know it. But it doesn't feel that way. Huh? Or does it feel. Did buying your raptor feel like a biscuit?

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, but it's the third. It's the third one I bought. Okay.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Okay. You got three biscuits.

[Dave Ramsey]

I've gotten practice. Sam. Hey, guys. George Camel here. Do you ever feel like insurance companies only care about your money and not what you actually need?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Well, there's a better way.

[Dave Ramsey]

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[Caller Jay]

Hey.

[Caller Heather]

How are you guys today?

[Dave Ramsey]

Better than we deserve. What's up in your world?

[Caller Heather]

Well, say. Just have a quick question. So my husband and I got a term life insurance policy through Xander when our son was first born. But that was 15 years ago. And since then life has hit a little bit. We are still making progress with our debt snowball. We're actually planning to pay off our last debt by hopefully February. However, we're not there yet. But over the years our income has increased quite a bit. So when we were first married we were making about 70 combined. Now we're making about 1 8. So my question is, why is it.

[Dave Ramsey]

Taking you 15 years to get out of debt.

[Caller Heather]

Well, you know, maybe weren't so gazelle.

[Caller Jay]

Intense, like not at all.

[Caller Heather]

Okay, Right, right. But we're getting there now. So we're getting really close and we.

[Dave Ramsey]

So everything. You still have a mortgage and you still have what else?

[Caller Heather]

We have 8,000 on my student loan and we've got our mortgage and that is, is all we have left.

[Dave Ramsey]

Wow.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So what's the question today?

[Caller Heather]

So the question today we are curious. Do we need to consider increasing our life insurance through Xander, given that our income has gone up? I know the Recommendation is like 10 to 12% of your overall income or because we're so close to being debt free, do we not need to take that approach because ultimately will be self funded through insurance?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

No, you need to extend because self. Being self insured would denote that you've got a massive nest egg of wealth that can cover you when those situations arise. And you don't have that just yet. If you keep going with intensity, you will. But if you play the next 15 years like you've paid the played this last 15 years, you're still in debt.

[Dave Ramsey]

You'Ll still have a mortgage.

[Caller Heather]

Well, we are definitely not looking to do that. We're definitely looking to get to attack that mortgage as soon as the student loans paid off.

[Caller Robin]

So everything.

[Dave Ramsey]

When you have enough money, when you have enough money in investments that the income off of the investments will support you. If he dies, then you're self insured. You're not there. We want you to be okay if something happens to him and you're not there. Okay. And we want him to be okay if something happens to you and make sure the kiddos are fed and so forth. And that would be that. You know, and so if you had a million dollars and it was producing 10%, that'd be a hundred thousand dollars.

[Caller Jay]

Okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

And that's not even. That won't even take care of you now because you're making 180. And so you'd need about $2 million in investments right now and zero DOL debt in order to be self insured. Equal to, you know, having the right amount of life insurance. So no. Yeah, you need to increase your life insurance and buy new policies. If your 15 year fixed policy is running out by you gotta reopen, buy new ones. Yeah. And yeah, and here's the thing. If you do get intense, if that did happen and you get out of debt and you look up and there's a million or $2 million in investments and zero debt, then you let it cancel the life insurance you don't have to keep paying it, you can just call them and cancel it. But if you're not, if you don't smoke folks, and you're not overweight, life insurance doesn't cost anything. It's very inexpensive. So 15 year level, 15 to 20 year level fixed rate. And the idea is that during that 15 years you pay off your mortgage and you get out of debt and you build, build up some investments and the kids grow up and leave. That's right, during that 15 to 20 years. And so we don't have kiddos to take care of. We've got a pile of money and you, you work your way into a net worth that allows you to be self insured policy. And so, but you guys have been slow so you get to re up your life insurance and, and then you can always drop it later. But for right now you're not ready.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

That's a good question.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. Felix is in Los Angeles. Hi Felix, how are you?

[Caller Jay]

Hi Dave. Thank you so much for the opportunity to be on the show. I'm calling today to get more, to get your advice on my current living situation. I work for a government utilities agency in Los Angeles as an engineer. I currently live in downtown LA. I'm paying about $3,000 in rent per month and I just turned 30 this year. And I watch your show. I hear you know, your advice about ownership and owning a home someday and that's a goal for mine, for my, for my life as well. And I wanted to get your thoughts on, you know, renewing my lease, which expires this month, or going back home to stay with my parents.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Well, how much do you bring home every month?

[Caller Jay]

So after tax I bring home about somewhere between 6,000 to $6,500.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So you're, what you're telling me is your rent's 50% of your take home?

[Caller Jay]

Yes, it's, yes, it's around that if you include utilities and you know. I know, yeah.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

So I think, you know, there's, there's one of two things that can happen here. You can either figure out a way to bust free and Suddenly make, make $20,000, you know, a month or you can look for some place that's far less expensive for rent. What would you do if you moved, you know, away and moved towards where your family is? What would you do for a living?

[Caller Jay]

Well, I would still be an engineer. My, my, my, my, my family stays in Fontana, which is about maybe 50 miles away from Los Angeles. So I would.

[Dave Ramsey]

You have an engineering degree?

[Caller Jay]

Yes, I have A bachelor's in civil engineering and I have a master's in environmental engineering.

[Dave Ramsey]

And you make $70,000 a year?

[Caller Jay]

Well, that's, that's, no, I make around $105,000 a year.

[Dave Ramsey]

How long you been out of school?

[Caller Jay]

I graduated with my master's in 2023 and shortly after is when I moved to LA and got my, my job in Los Angeles.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah, I mean, you're living in one of the most expensive places, places in the country, so that there is always going to be a limit because of that. So I, I, if I were in your shoes, yeah. I'd be looking for other places. Now, Fontana that you mentioned, I mean, have you priced it out? What's the difference? What could, where could you, could you get a one bedroom and what would it cost? Would it get you to the 25% range?

[Caller Jay]

Well, in, in LA, it's very difficult to find a place to stay.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

I'm talking about Fontana, like you said.

[Caller Jay]

I'll be staying with my parents.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay, so Felix, here's the thing. What you want, staying with your parents is not your, is not your play because it doesn't take you to the future you want. You've said no, you said nothing about where you want to be in 20 years, in 10 years, and how staying with your parents is going to get you there. All we're doing is solving the immediate problem by going backwards. So, no, I'm not going to do that. If I'm you, I'm looking for a new job that pays 150,000 in a market where the rent is half of what it is in la and you make a move for your career, you're a single guy and you go out there and make some money and get your cost of housing down. Because if you're working for utility, your bumps, your increases in pay are going to be moderate to poor.

[Caller Jay]

Yeah, it's a government job.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah, it's going to be moderate to poor. The pay is already low and it's not going to get better. You're going to get cost of living bumps and nothing else. And so as an engineer, you can go out there and make twice what you're making now in an area that costs half what it costs to live in la. And that puts you in a position to build a life, a financial life, including home ownership. But the ratio you're to going, giving me right now, going back to your parents doesn't solve it. No, that's regressing. Instead of saying, how can I move forward? So I'm going to be figuring out a way to move forward. Either a different kind of engineer application for my master's in engineering in Los Angeles where I make a lot more, or a different city or both.

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[Dave Ramsey]

Our scripture of the day, Ecclesiastes 3, 11. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He's also set eternity in every human heart, yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. Andy Warhol said, they always say time changes things, but actually you have to change them yourself. All right, this is true. Megan's in Detroit. Hi, Megan. What's up?

[Caller Robin]

Hi.

[Caller Heather]

I love you guys. I just want to say that first and foremost, but my question is, my husband and I just got married in September. And this year so far, we've been really working the debt snowball and paying for our, like, paying off some of our loans while saving for our wedding. And the plan was when we finished saving and paying for our wedding, we would go back and really like, work our debt down. And six weeks before we got married, my little brother died. And yeah, it's not really what I pictured this season to look like. And I guess my, my question is, I'm just curious on your perspective of like taking a break from the debt snowball in the first year of this time.

[Dave Ramsey]

What happened to him?

[Caller Heather]

He was in an accident.

[Dave Ramsey]

How old was he?

[Caller Heather]

23.

[Dave Ramsey]

What was his name?

[Caller Heather]

Rocco.

[Dave Ramsey]

Rocco. Okay. I'm sorry, Megan. That hurts beyond belief. And you were obviously close. Yeah.

[Caller Heather]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

And how old are you?

[Caller Heather]

29.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. All right, well, You're welcome to do whatever you want to do. It's your life. Okay. And if you and your husband sit down and say, we're going to take X number of time off and just, we're not going into debt, we're not going to grief spend, but we're just going to take some time off at the intensity and cry a little, that would be perfectly fine. What I would recommend is a, that you stay on a plan because you can have a tendency to drift and go, well, I'm having kind of a Down day. So I'm going to overspend. It's called grief spending. Okay. And you don't want to do that. You don't want to lose ground. You won't like that later when you look back at it. Does that make sense?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

It's easy to medicate grief with spending. A lot of people do it, and so be careful with that. But if you say, okay, we're going to slow off on the intensity, we're just going to pay the bills, go no further into debt, and just give ourselves a little cushion for some time to get to where we can breathe again. Well, that would be a human act. There's nothing wrong with that.

[Caller Heather]

What's like, I guess, because I know this is not really like a unique situation. I mean, it feels unique to me. But you guys hear this call a lot. Like, what's a good amount of time to give yourself before you start to.

[Dave Ramsey]

You know, we don't get this call a lot. We get the call where it's a spouse and that's the one I've answered many times in the 35 years. But I don't know that I've gotten a call from a sister with a 23 year old that was killed in an accident. I mean, that's a different kind of thing than your spouse.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

It could be a good idea. And I. I'm just talking out loud. It could be a good idea to give yourself a time limit so that you don't stay wandering for too long. Almost like, okay, I did my thing, it's time for me to get moving. It's kind of like when you're sitting on the couch, after a while you need to just get up and stretch your legs and move around again.

[Dave Ramsey]

What's your household income?

[Caller Heather]

So after tax from our day jobs, we bring in $9,800 a month.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And how much debt do you have?

[Caller Heather]

We total 59, 951.

[Dave Ramsey]

Okay. And you're obviously the nerd of the family. You know, everything to the, I love you, you're awesome. Okay.

[Caller Heather]

I love my husband. He's not like a money stressor or.

[Dave Ramsey]

Why don't the two of you talk about it and pray about it and say, all right, how long do I need to get the majority or enough of my heart healed that I can focus? Okay. Because we do know this about grief when you're addressing it, if you address it properly and you may need to sit down and talk to someone about it, may need to get a good therapist involved. But if you're Addressing it properly. The pain never leaves completely, but it does get further and further and further in the rear view mirror. And it's not that we're going to forget, get rock over. That's not the point. Or that his death is not going to be unimportant at some point. That's not what I'm saying. But I am saying right now it's taking up a lot of your head space. A year from now it will be less. Five years from now it will be less. Would you agree with that?

[Caller Heather]

I hope so.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. You don't want to be sitting in exactly the same place of pain and he wouldn't want you to. So we just say we acknowledge that it's hurting. We sit down, get some help with that, and we walk through it. And so, you know, you two talk about it and I don't really care, but I would highly recommend a, that you stay on a system where you're not spending more, you're not going further in. That's a big deal. The two of you agree to that. But we're not going to work six jobs. We're not going to, you know, we'll go out to eat. We're going to take some time off here. We're not going to throw money with the debt snowball. Like, it's like our life depends on it. We're not doing any of that right now. And we're going to give ourselves a period of time. And so I'll give you just a guess, but it's not a professional guess because Dr. John Deloney is not here. Okay, I'm just Dad. Okay. I'm just the old man. So it feels like that you need 60 to 90 days. And I think at the end of that time, if you're working on this, you're going to have a lot clearer head. That's my guess. But this happened right before the wedding. And then you had the wedding. So you had these two huge events all within a couple of minutes of each other. And now we're going into Christmas and Thanksgiving and so it's like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Agreed.

[Caller Heather]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. So you get the other side of the first of the year and let things calm down a little bit and get a little bit more boring because boring has not been your life lately. And then that's kind of when some of this will flush out, I think. But that's just an old guy talking, not a professional. Does that feel right to you?

[Caller Heather]

I think so. I definitely. Like, it's hot. Like, I want to Be intense about paying off our debt still. And then when I go to do it, I just. Just don't want.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah. It's not the most important thing to you right now. And that makes sense.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. This saps some of your strength, takes some of your energy away, and that just means you're a good person. It means you're a good sister. So I think you and your husband pray about this. I think I would sit down. Are you guys in a good church?

[Caller Heather]

Not really. Like, we. Yeah. No, not here. I started looking around.

[Dave Ramsey]

I think I'd be looking around and, you know, find a good therapist, find a good pastor to sit down and unpack some of this with and put it on the calendar that 1 March were go time or something like that. I don't care if you Decide it's the first of April, but it doesn't need to be 20, 28. Right?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. So I think that'll give you some peace. You're a very analytical, detailed person, and this drifting is not something that gives you peace you need. It's going to give you more peace to say, all right, I'm going to work on this hard, this grief thing, and I'm going to honor Rocco very intensely for this period of time. Time. And then I'm coming out of the fog on this date. And if you give yourself that as a set desired future, a set goal, I think it's going to help you because of the way your brain works. Am I reading you right?

[Caller Heather]

I think so. Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Caller Carl]

You're.

[Dave Ramsey]

You're a good sister, and you're a good husband, or you're a good wife and your husband is lucky. So you're. You're going to be great. Okay. Yeah. And. Yeah. Take. Take a minute.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Minute.

[Dave Ramsey]

Take a minute and breathe. You should. If you didn't, you'd be weird.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah, Right?

[Dave Ramsey]

I mean, that'd be weird, wouldn't it? I mean, just to act like this didn't happen. That's gonna blow up. And. And it did. And it did happen right before your wedding. I mean, come on. Right?

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

Yeah.

[Dave Ramsey]

Yeah. I mean, this is like. Yeah, this is hard. It's a bad medicine right here. So, yeah, sit down, talk to somebody, kiddo. Set a date prayerfully with your husband. I think you're gonna be great. She's gonna be great.

[Jade Warshaw Ramsey]

She's gonna be okay.

[Dave Ramsey]

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