The Rachel Cruze Show - Money Habits You Need to Change Right Now (with Dave Ramsey)
Episode Date: January 6, 2025💵 Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app! Are you ready for a fresh start when it comes to your money? In this special episode, Dave Ramsey joins me to share money habits y...ou can start changing today. Next Steps: 🎥 Watch my video 22 Expenses to Cut That You Won’t Even Miss. 💰 Register to watch our Ramsey Livestream: Take Control of Your Money. Connect With Our Sponsors: 🏥 Learn more about Christian Healthcare Ministries. 🔒 Get 20% off when you join DeleteMe. Listen to More From Ramsey Network: 🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 🎙️ The Ramsey Show 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights 🧠 The Dr. John Delony Show 💰 George Kamel 🪑 Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman 📈 EntreLeadership Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Today is one of my favorite episodes and yours as well every year because we kick off the new year with my dad, Dave Ramsey. Welcome.
Well, honored to be back as always.
It's been a year, you know?
Just like that. Real fast.
Just change it up, you know?
So, yeah, welcome back to the show because we're going to chat about this idea of having a fresh new start when it comes to your money and the new year is a perfect time to do that.
So, in the spirit of new beginnings, we're going to do a little state of the union.
and share some money habits that you may want to change.
Now make sure to subscribe and share this episode with a friend who might enjoy this conversation.
All right, I'll kick us off with the first one.
So a money habit to change this year is not knowing where your money's going.
If that is a habit in your life, it is for a lot of people.
They just have no clue.
They get paid and they just kind of live their life throughout the month, and then they get paid again,
and they do the same thing.
It's kind of this passive way of dealing with your money.
So being intentional and being purposeful is one of these things that winning with money, it's crucial to do.
Absolutely.
You know, I'm often asked by a reporter interviewing me, you know, what's the number one mistake as if there's one single thing that people make with money?
And it is not being intentional.
Just not paying attention.
When you just focus on it, you go, oh, that's smart.
Oh, that's dumb.
Yeah.
But you have to actually look at it to have that thought.
and this idea that it's all just kind of noise and it's around you and then you wake up 40 years later at retirement broke.
And you cannot let money happen to you.
You have to happen to it.
And we found over all the years at Ramsey of doing the work we do that the more focused people are just on the subject,
not obsessed with money, not worshiping money, but just paying attention.
Like you pay attention to your health, you pay attention to your marriage, you pay attention to your parenting.
and it all gets better when you pay attention to it.
Yes.
And I think people's, you know, speed bump with this one specifically is they feel overwhelmed.
They're like, oh, my gosh, if I have to pay attention to every little detail, I'm not great at details, I'm not great at doing this.
You know, that can be a roadblock for people mentally when they're thinking about this.
You know, it's not the details we're talking about.
It's the concept.
Just actually care about your money.
And then you can decide how far into the weeds to get with that.
Whether that's an investment choice or.
or whether that's getting on a budget, whether that's agreeing on the spending with your spouse,
you decide how nuanced and how much detail.
But you've got to pay attention.
I know what's going on.
Yeah.
So you mentioned the budget.
And that's a great starting place, you guys.
If you want to actually focus and realize, okay, this is where my money's going.
The best place to do that really is a budget.
And every dollar is the best budgeting app out there.
It's the one that Winston I use.
So I'll put a link down below and you can actually create a budget for free.
And so do that and start actually kind of getting in this rhythm of understanding, okay, this is where my money's going. It's really helpful.
Absolutely. Number two, not revisiting your investment strategy. If your investing's been on autopilot for a while, make sure you're contributing a full 15% if you're in Baby Step 4, not including your employer match to your retirement every single year.
Yeah. So we always say to pause investing completely while you're getting out of debt and getting an emergency fund in place. And then once you're doing that, you know, that's all completes. Then press play on investing that 15%. And then once you get to babysat seven, you can even relook at that as well. If you want to start maxing out things or going above that 15 percent, once your house is paid off, that's a possibility. Now, one thing that we talk about in this step that I get a lot of questions about on social media is we don't include the employer's math.
You just mentioned that.
So if your employer, you know, matches 4%, and you put in 4%, only that 4% that you put in,
it's counted towards the 15%.
It's not 8% you're looking at.
And a lot of people ask why.
So what would you say?
Well, when we ran all the numbers to develop the baby steps, and we ran case studies
from a single mom making $23,000 to a doctor making $250,000, under what circumstances
can anyone build wealth?
And in any budget, if you don't have any payments but a house payment,
and your house payment is reasonable, and you're living on a written plan on any budget,
the individual can find 15%.
And that's the only thing that we could find that's consistent.
So we can't always anticipate when we lay out these baby steps that you're going to have a pension,
or my wife's a teacher, and she gets this, or my boss does 6%, his boss does 3%.
You can control you.
That's all you can control.
And if you and you can put 15% aside, no matter what you make.
Yeah.
If you don't have any payments except the house payment and you got your emergency fund in place.
So if you do that, do that.
Quit looking for a reason to not put money in investing.
Yeah.
That's where wealth comes from.
You know, it's like, I want to be less wealthy.
No, no, no, that's not the plan here.
And some people, they want to go more than 15%.
No.
Just because we've got to get on to the other baby steps.
Yes.
We don't want to use up that money and have no money
for the kids' college and Baby Step 5 and use up that money, and we don't have any money left
to put extra on the house mortgage and get it paid off because the 401k and the house mortgage being
paid off, these are the two elements of the baby steps millionaires that we find all the time.
Yep, that's huge.
All right, number three is comparing your life to someone else's.
So, Christmas is over.
We have already scrolled through everybody's Christmas break and what they got for Christmas
and where they went for Christmas and all of it.
And that comparison game, though, it continues even into the new year. And this is something that is so subtle at times. It can be very apparent, I feel like, in certain moments. But it's just one of those things that it's like, it just kind of seeps in and becomes part of your rhythm. And you almost can be doing it without even realize you're doing it. And so the problem with that is as you continue to compare your life to other people and what they're doing, this standard of normalcy or what you feel like everyone is doing, right, is at a certain level. And if you're doing,
you're not meeting that level, naturally, internally, it's going to feel like, oh, I'm behind
or I'm failing somehow. And so understanding that your money journey and your path, personal finance is
called personal for a reason. I mean, seriously, being able to put the blinders on and just saying,
okay, regardless of what anyone else is doing, this is so crucial to my money journey is
not worrying about everyone else. And then the other problem is, too, especially on social media,
with people you don't know, you have no clue what's going on behind the scenes.
But that comparison game, I mean, it's been around even before social media, right?
The keeping up with the Jones's idea.
But it's an interesting mental hurdle for people to get over.
And once you're over it, to a degree, it's kind of like, okay, I can really focus on what's good for me.
And I'm not worried about everyone else.
I remember when you guys were little kids, we took a trip to Hollywood and we were on one of the movie sets.
And it was a full street of houses.
and the guide said, go up and go in that house, and you open the door, and there was nothing back there.
It was a facade.
It was just for the, it was just for other people to see.
But there was no real house back there.
And that's social media posts.
If you go through the front door, there's nothing back there.
There's people don't have a life.
They're deeply in debt.
Their kid's college fund is not funded.
They're fighting about money.
And with the, no, you cannot compare yourself to losers.
It's a bad idea.
Don't do that because you go through the front door.
There's nothing back there.
Their life sucks.
You don't want to be them.
So don't be them.
It's a really good rule.
I would rather just be a little calmer, a little more chill.
And when I open the door, there's actually a house back there.
Yeah, there's something going on.
There's some depth there, people.
Some depth.
It's good.
Believing the lie that you're really.
winning with credit cards. That's so cute. If you're scared to cut ties with the points,
what if this year you just tried it? Here's an idea. Okay. We've done the largest study of
millionaires ever done in North America. We studied 10,167 of them. We discovered that
89% of them did not have inherited money that caused them to be millionaires. They did it
themselves by saving and getting out of debt. And so then you ask, okay, what did they do to become
wealthy? And we asked them, and out of all the millionaires that we studied, the largest study
ever done, the number of them that said they became millionaires from credit card points was
precisely zero. None. None. We did meet a couple people that hit the lotto. We did meet a couple
people that hit big in Vegas. We met a few that did that, but zero became wealthy using credit card
points. Credit card points are not designed for you. They're designed for the bank and for Visa and MasterCard
to get rich, and you're doing a really good job of helping them get there. Besides that,
the math is absolutely assinine. Okay, you get 1% back on your Discover card. Woo! Okay, and that got me this,
I got to go out to dinner. Okay, good. Now, let's do the math on that. So that means you spent a hundred
thousand dollars on your discover card to get $1,000.
On what planet does that cause wealth building?
Or you trade $100 grand for a grant.
It's just, the whole thing is just dumb.
So try going cold turkey.
Just go, I'm not going to worship points and see how your life goes.
You're going to end up spending a lot less.
You're going to be a lot more in control.
Yeah, because I think that is one of the problems is when you start entertaining this idea of,
oh, points, we can do this and this.
You're like, well, we'll get a, you know, a Southwest card because we fly a lot.
So we'll do that.
But then also we buy a lot on Amazon, and they give you, you know, 3% back.
So we'll get an Amazon card too.
And then, you know, we want some hotel points.
So we'll get the capital.
You know, and you start realizing, oh, my gosh, you start opening this floodgate to this whole
other concept of money and dealing with money that then removes you emotionally,
completely from your purchasing, right?
I mean, like, when there is that middle man and you're using someone else's money,
statistically speaking, you are going to spend more.
And there's just something powerful about spending in the present.
You go out to dinner and you just pay for your dinner right there.
And not waiting for a bill at the end of the month.
So that delaying the bill causes you to justify and spend more.
It just does.
And I think that's the truth of it all is like this is where banks make their money.
I mean, the amount of people that – there are some people that pay it off every month.
We hear that argument all the time.
But the percentage of people that don't, what you're seeing, even to me,
me, I'm like, there's even this level of you're getting all of this free stuff because people
aren't able to pay off their credit cards, making the banks rich, which in turn is cycling back
to you. So, like, it's just like, it's this messy concept to me that I, yeah, just try it.
It's the chucky cheese of finance, all right? You go in, you put a quarter in, you play the game,
and you get tickets. Now it's a card. Now it's a card. And you get tickets. But it costs a quarter,
effectively, okay? And so, sure, sure, sure. And so, and you get this many tickets. And then you get this many tickets. And then this many tickets. And then this many tickets.
and this many tickets.
And you've got tickets that they'll fill up a whole bucket of tickets, right?
And you've got like $150 invested in these tickets.
And you can trade that for a stuffed animal that's this big that costs somewhere around
two and a half cents in China.
Okay?
It's the Chucky cheese of finance.
It's so true.
It's so true.
Golly, that's my kids, though.
And now it's all on cards.
They don't even get tickets.
It's literally on a card.
And then they go and they turn it in.
And they're like, oh, my gosh, we got 2,000 points.
Maybe Visa owns Chuck E cheese.
Oh, conspiracy.
Maybe not.
I'm kidding.
Conspiracy.
Conspiracy theory.
I love it.
All right.
Number five is keeping it debt around because the payments are, quote, unquote, manageable.
And we see this a lot kind of in the normal sea of the way people deal with money.
They're like, well, you know, it doesn't hurt, like, too bad.
Like, it's not great, but, like, we can pay the minimum payment of, like, the two credit cards.
Like, we're paying the car payment.
But, like, you know, I mean, we can make.
the payments, but it's just, you know, it's like this almost lukewarm way of dealing with money.
And what we have found over time is when you have principles in your life and principles around
your money and you actually stick to it, you're going to make progress so much faster because
this like, kind of like, it's almost this like lazy, okay middle ground approach to your money
is not going to cause you to be wealthy long term. And in fact, it just kind of keeps you in the cycle
that you don't even realize you're in. And so,
understanding that when you get rid of those payments, how much of your income then is freed up?
Even though you can quote unquote, like pay it, you're paying the bank.
Like you're making money for the bank and not yourself.
Yeah, it's, you know, like a couple years ago I started having this backache and I couldn't
get rid of it.
But it wasn't that bad, but it was okay.
It was manageable.
Yeah.
You know, and but then it got to where I'm like, you know, I was going in for my checkup
and the doc said, anything okay?
I said, yeah, I got a backache, but it's manageable.
And he goes, hey, if you'll do two things, you can get rid of the back egg.
If you'll lose some of this and quit carrying that around on your back,
and you know, you'll stretch in the mornings.
And I lost 30-something pounds, and I started stretching in the morning.
I don't have a back egg.
But it was manageable.
Mm-hmm.
You know, and it's just what it is.
It's a planned mediocrity is what it is.
It's, I'm planning to not be good.
You know, I'm planning to, you know, and I'm just, well, it's okay.
I'll go, it's just part of life.
I'm getting old.
No, it's not.
you know, lose the belly stretch.
It was not a hard thing.
You know what I mean?
It was really not a hard concept.
I'm so proud they went like health and nutrition.
Your doctor.
Who knew?
What a natural approach.
I love it.
Who knew a doctor would do that?
So good.
So good.
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All right, living crisis to crisis.
If you never put in the work to save your emergency fund, you're always behind paying off debt from the last catastrophe.
Baby step one, save $1,000 for a starter emergency fund.
And then after you're out of debt, everything with the house and baby step two, you finish the emergency fund with a fully funded emergency fund of three to six.
six months of expenses. I avoided this one until I went broke because I thought I could out-earn
my stupidity. No matter what happened, I could just make some more money because I'm a glass
half-full guy. I can always go make some more money. I did not understand the damage it was doing
to my anxiety level and to the anxiety level of my wife. And when we put the emergency fund in
place, we haven't touched it since, even for emergencies. We value it being there, the peace
gives us. It turns a crisis into an inconvenience. Yeah. Yeah, that buffer is, I think it's huge. And I think
when you get to that baby step three after you have no payments and you have that fully funded emergency
fund, there is a, there is a deep piece that comes when you hit that step. Because for 40% of
Americans, they can't cover a $400 emergency. So think about all the emergencies that come up in life.
And big ones, too, I mean, like job loss, medical issues. I mean, like big things that, again,
you have this issue, right, a medical issue, and then if you have no money to help cover some of that
stuff, you're going into debt. So now you have two issues, right, a money issue now and the crisis,
versus just being able to deal with it. And the peace of mind and the clarity, even mentally,
that happens when you just have margin and space with your money and your emotions, like it's huge.
It does. It changes your life. And so those are seasons of sacrifice, though, you guys. And I would say
sacrifice because the stuff for whatever it is that you're doing that's not causing those things
to happen, it's not worth the piece. It's not. So that piece is, I mean, it's everything. It's why you call it
financial peace. I mean, it really is shooting for that. And I feel like that's one of the first
moments that you really feel just like, oh, breath of fresh air. There we go. Love it.
So good. All right. Number seven, paying for random subscription costs without knowing why.
I'm so guilty of this. Literally in our every dollar app, we'll get like,
these transactions from Apple, and it's like $3.99.
I'll get one for like $10.99, and then something else, and I'm like, ah, and I have a
subscription line item in our budget, and so we just kind of drag and drop it.
And the other day, I was like, I need to actually, like, parse out and know, like,
what is this $3.99? Is it memory that I'm paying for? Is it Apple TV? Like, I need to, like,
figure out where these subscriptions are, because it is so hard. I'm like, can you sign up for
stuff, whether it's an app or something, and it just gets taken out? And you really don't realize,
It's like how much money is just leaving, and you don't even know what it is.
So it's wild.
Doing an audit on all your spending, including subscriptions, is just, you know,
it's paying attention to your money.
It goes back to the very first one of these 10.
Yes, for sure.
So get those subscriptions out of there that you're not using.
Oh, here's another one that's stupid that we're still paying for.
It just happened yesterday.
We're paying for an indoor trampoline park for our kids.
And I got this, and I got the members of it.
Here's where they get you.
Here's where they get you.
As you go in and they're like, oh, for three kids.
it's $15 each for them to jump, right?
So it's like $45.
But you could pay $50 a month and have a membership.
So if you come in more than once, it's paid for.
And I'm like, well, that's a good deal.
You know, you kind of go for that like bargain good deal thing.
So it's like joining a gym.
A hundred percent.
Oh, you should see these places.
That's crazy.
So then I sign up.
Well, then school starts in August.
We've not been since.
And have I been paying stupid membership?
Yes.
Yes, I have.
I have.
You canceled the indoor trampoline part.
I will cancel the indoor.
I just thought about it.
Wow.
I'm being convicted in the moment.
But it does.
It's that stuff that you're like.
But then you justify it.
You're like, well, on a Friday, if Charles wants to come, we could bring two.
I don't know.
You just go through it off.
But it's just money leaving.
I know.
I know.
I know.
There's my confessions.
These are my confessions.
Not talking to your family about money.
This goes for spouses and kids age appropriately.
It laid a foundation in our kids' lives, and we set our kids up to make even better financial decisions.
So age appropriately.
We don't want to scare.
If you've got financial trouble and we're not going to scare the four-year-old, that's not what we're talking about.
But we did teach the little ones at a very early age to work, and work can simply be filling the dog bowl.
Work can simply be making your bed.
It doesn't have to be anything super strenuous.
We didn't send them to the salt mines or anything like that.
So live on, you know, work, give, always do some giving.
Every little kid loves to give.
It's easy to teach them that.
They naturally do it.
And they want to give too much and you have to just help them, you know, have a balance in there.
Spending wisely.
So work, give, save, and spend.
And so they need to be saving something.
And then same thing with your spouse.
We're talking through everything.
Where there's a low communication level in the household, there's a high correlation with being broke.
When you're not talking about it.
Right.
And it's not.
Well, and I think some people, they avoid the conversation because it can trigger fights and arguments and all of it, but especially within a marriage.
Like, if that's the thing that keeps bubbling up, that's the issue you want to work on.
So it's not the thing to sweep under the rug.
It's actually the thing to dive into.
Okay, so talk to me about when we're talking about kids and money, the tactical stuff like that, working, giving, saving, spending.
Learning to do all three is really important.
So you don't want them just to spend everything.
you don't want them just to save everything.
You don't want just to give everything.
You've got to learn how to do all three.
Because, again, you're training them that when they leave the house, this is how you handle money.
But then there's the emotional side of money that is not always talked about either.
And that's, you know, the contentment side, the gratitude.
It's kind of your approach to money.
And I think one of the biggest myths about our family is that we are, like, obsessed with money or all we talk about is money.
Everyone's like, oh, gosh.
You ever talk about it.
I know.
Right, that's my thing, is I'm like, gosh, I mean, mom and dad, like, it was always just in life, like, every other topic.
I mean, seriously, it was like, you know, but I don't know, politics and drinking and money and church.
I mean, like, it was like all these elements of life just gets talked about in conversation more organically.
And I think that's way more of an effective strategy.
But what would you say to a family that maybe is further along on the baby steps?
They are starting to build wealth.
Things are a little bit easier.
It's not as strenuous for them.
right now. How do you talk through and explain and understand that money, it's not an idol. It doesn't
become a God. It has a proper place in your life. And if it doesn't, that can ruin you, right? There's a lot of
scriptures around that warning. So, like, it's those intangible parts of money that I think people
are really curious about. Well, I think you're right. I mean, the humility, the gratitude,
the contentment. Those are character things. And that's good parenting to teach your kids,
those things. And if they're walking out gratitude, just please and thank you, then that leads
immediately to I'm not the center of the universe, which helps with contentment. Because contentment
is if I get, the opposite discontentment is if I, in the money spaces, if I get more stuff,
people will like me. Yeah. But you create likable kids when they're kind, when they're not
self-centered, when they have gratitude. And please.
and thank you and so forth.
And so that sets up the idea then that I can live on less than I make.
That sets up the idea I don't need debt.
That sets up the idea that I can actually give physically some money.
I can actually spend physically some money.
But buying that thing doesn't define me.
It's just a thing.
It's just a transaction.
There's just a thing going on here.
It's buying that hamburger doesn't define me.
Buying that purse or that car later on doesn't define me.
And so it's not my identity. I'm not what I drive. I'm not all those things. And so that's what you're teaching the kid in the rhythm. And you're teaching them with work ethic, again, those same things. Money comes from expending effort. And, you know, I meet 50-year-olds that haven't figured that out. Yeah. And so it's a great gift to give that to your children. Yeah. So good. So good. All right. Next, number nine is upgrading your car every time it's paid off. So this is a cycle.
that a lot of people are in when you're in that kind of car loan world and you end up paying off the car
in four or five, six years. Like, all right, time to get a new one. And you just keep in that cycle.
So if that is a habit you are in, break that habit and say, hey, we're going to pay off the car.
And the car is probably going to be great and still very drivable. So keep driving it.
Don't feel like you have to get a new car. And then in fact, what you can do is save up the car payment
that you're usually paying for that payment and save it. And then over time,
that account builds up and then you can sell your car, use all that money you saved,
and then upgrade that way versus getting back into that loop of car payments.
Chevrolet and Toyota, Honda, they are not going to pay your bills when you retire.
They're not going to see in a food basket.
Not going to happen.
And yet we give them the largest portion of our money.
The car purchases, the largest purchase Americans make other than their home.
and we meet people all the time with $7, $800, $1,200 car payments,
and then scratching their head and wondering why they're broke.
And the irony is that sometimes you find $60 or $70,000 or even $80,000 worth of cars
sitting in the street in front of a home that is at best called a middle-class home.
and with a one car garage that's full of crap that they bought on Amazon.
And so here's what, this is what's going on.
You have become a consumer at that point, not a producer.
You're not an investor.
You're just consuming.
And you are, you are dooming yourself to stay in that social strata instead of becoming
wealthy when the cars parked in front of your house are embarrassingly nice compared to the house.
That tells you what's going to.
going on. So your cars should always be an embarrassment for the other reason. They should be the
worst car in your neighborhood because that's going to indicate that you're leaving that
neighborhood. Whatever neighborhood it is. I mean, if you're in a wealthy neighborhood, it doesn't
matter. Yeah. I mean, you know, you should have the worst cars in the neighborhood. Yeah. Back before
housing went crazy, but, I mean, you think about five years ago, you know, and getting a home for
200 grand, you know, outside of Nashville was reasonable. And then when you look at
and some of the cars are 80,000.
It's almost half the price a car is of the home that it's sitting in front of is what you're saying.
And the car is going down in value.
Right, right.
So we're putting our, not just status, but you're putting literally your financial means in something that is going down in value and is not going to help you long term.
Versus a house, right?
Going getting a house.
That real estate is going to go up.
So put your money in things that are going to help you long term, not something that's going down in value.
Yeah.
It's, it is so, yeah, the car thing is so interesting to me. And that's back to the peace idea that, I mean, we talk to people all the time on the Ram's show and they're like, okay, you know, we're living paycheck to paycheck and you're kind of asking about some of the expenses. And they're like, we're just out $400. Like we're $400 in the hole every month and you're kind of, okay, food, you know, how much is your rent or mortgage? Okay, that's not terrible. You know, you're kind of going through. And then you're like, okay, what about your cars? And they, oh, we have two car payments. How much of the car payments? $600 each. $1,200. I'm like, well, there's your $400.
in the hole. Like, get rid of them. Like, it's just a car. It is just a car. And then I gave myself
the challenge because a lot of people like, well, you can't find the $5,000 car or you can't find
a $4,000 car. And I went on, I think it was Auto Trader. It was just that last week. I literally
Googled it in Nashville. And I was like $400, $4,000 cars in Nashville and auto trader. Y'all,
it was just boom, boom, boom, boom. And not terrible looking cars. I mean, this was like,
you would never know. Like I see it. I'm like, oh, that's not terrible. Now I had a, you know,
70, 80, 100,000 miles on it, right?
So they're maybe six, seven years old.
But they were not this like mix-matched color,
like this idea you have in your head of like a crappy car.
It didn't even look like that.
Like they were reasonable, decent cars.
And I'm like, okay.
And you're not going to be driving that for long.
Yeah.
If you'll do the stuff we're talking about in whole,
you can drive anything you want later.
Yeah.
I didn't drive a $4,000 car today.
And you didn't drive a $4,000 car today.
Yeah.
But there was a time I did because I drove like no one else because I lived like no one else so that later I can live and give like no one else.
I remember that brown.
What was the brown car?
That's the memory I have going to school in.
The brown one?
Yeah.
It was brown.
Yeah, it was nasty.
What was it?
It was a Mark 7.
It had like 200,000 miles on it.
And the roof, there was like the lining of the ceiling of the roof.
The headliner.
Yeah, it was all separated.
So literally.
It would drop down on the kids' hands.
It was good.
Well, it kept your hair flat.
It was good.
We didn't want any bumps.
No bumps.
That's actually the car we delivered the books out of the trunk of.
Yeah, that's the one I remember is the brown one.
It was an ugly car.
Yeah, it was great, you know.
Do what you can, people.
And look, we all survived.
Your kids will be okay.
Your kids will be okay.
Yeah.
None of them died in the old brown car with the loose headlight.
It was actually probably safest.
I bet that was a tank.
It was a tank.
I mean, I bet if you hit into that.
Land yacht.
Yeah.
Yeah, that was it.
All right, number 10, not prioritizing generosity.
Giving changes everything.
You got a whole year in front of you.
Let this be the year that you make giving a regular part of your budget.
You will help some other people.
You will change your life forever.
Yeah, there's.
of power in living life with an open hands and making that a rhythm and a part of your financial
journey, regardless of where you are financially, starting that habit this year. Huge.
Yeah, you, um, nothing is more attractive than a generous person and nothing is uglier than a
selfish person. Generous people make better spouses. They make better moms and dads. They make
better employers and employees. They make better humans. And I'm not talking about even all the
time generous meaning handing out money out of your fist, right? Although that's definitely part of the
equation. It's the generous person that holds the door for you. It's the generous person
helps you pick up the groceries when the stupid bag has a hole in it and they roll all over the
parking lot. It's the generous person that stops because they're not self-centered. They're other-centered.
And the interesting thing is, as you build the generosity muscle, you are forcing yourself away from the natural human state, which is selfish, along the spectrum towards selfless.
And honestly, you're just much more attractive.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's amazing the quality of your life and your relationships.
And the way you just view everything is just different.
I mean, it really is.
It really is.
So, yeah, making that a part of your rhythm in 2025.
is huge. All right, if I could recommend one thing that everyone should be doing with their money in
2025, again, it was getting on a budget. We talked about this at the beginning of this episode,
but I think it is huge in a really great way is by joining our Ramsey live stream, take control of
your money. I'll put a link down below and we will be there on the live stream chatting about
your money this year. That's on January 23rd. So make sure to, yeah, click that link and join us
because we want to help you be empowered when it comes to your money. That is what.
We come to work every day.
It's free.
And it's free.
Look, you're saving money already.
It doesn't cost $50 to jump in the indoor trampoline park.
Give it to you for free.
It's cheaper than the trampoline park.
Cheaper than the trampoline park.
Most things are.
If you want more tips from the one and only Dave Ramsey,
make sure to check out to the episode 22 expenses to cut that you won't even miss.
You can click here.
Or if you're listening on podcast, click the link in the description.
All right, you guys, happy new year.
Remember to take control of your money and create a life you love.
