The Ramsey Show - App - A Powerful Debt-Free Scream on World Suicide Prevention Day (Hour 1)

Episode Date: September 11, 2019

Rachel Cruze, Budgeting, Debt   Tools to get you started:  Take TDRS listener survey to win a $100 Amazon gift card, click here: http://bit.ly/2krRePv Debt Calculator: http://bit.ly/2QIoSPV Insurance Coverage Checkup: http://bit.ly/2BrqEuo Complete Guide to Budgeting: http://bit.ly/2QEyonc Interview Guide: http://bit.ly/2BuGnZE Check out other podcasts in the Ramsey Network: http://bit.ly/2JgzaQR 

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. This is your show, America. Thank you for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225. At the bottom of the hour, number one bestselling author and Ramsey personality, Rachel Cruz, will join me for a half hour taking your calls. So if you'd rather talk to her than me, you can get in right now. Although you'll have to endure me, too, because I'm still here.

The phone number is 888-825-5225. Rachel, at the bottom of the hour you jump in now and we'll let you be ready for her when she comes on the air with us starting this hour off is going to be rob in north carolina hey rob welcome to the dave ramsey show hey dave i want to say uh thanks for taking my call but i have to ask you how you doing today ah better than i deserve sir how are you great. So me and my wife are 100% debt-free. We are about one-third the way through our emergency fund. We own two properties, our primary and a rental. We want to purchase a third property. To do that, we're going to sell our primary home and should get about $150,000 in equity. I wanted to know what the best thing to do with that equity is. My thoughts were put the whole thing down

as a down payment on the property that we're going to purchase. But then I was thinking I could also take some of that and pay off the loan on my rental property. What do you owe on the rental property? $60,000, and it's worth about $300,000. What's your household income? $100,000. Okay. And how much equity will you get out of your house?

About $150,000. Oh, you said that. I'm sorry. And what price range are you get out of your house? About $150,000. Oh, you said that. I'm sorry. And what price range are you going to buy in? We're looking at about $350,000. Okay. So you'll have a mortgage of $200,000 or you'll have a mortgage of $260,000. Correct.

Hmm. Effectively, you would be borrowing money on your new house to buy a rental so i'm not going there i think i'm gonna leave the rental laying where it is put as much as you can down on your house and then you can make the decision as you work your baby steps four five six which of those two you want to attack the rental small enough you may want to go ahead and attack it with your income and then attack additionally the mortgage after that on the home. And then make sure the $200,000 mortgage on a 15-year fixed is no more than a fourth of your take-home pay, and then you're in line with the stuff that we teach.

Mackenzie's in Florida. Hi, Mackenzie. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. Thank you so much. Hey, what's up? How are you? I'm better than I deserve.

How can I help? Great. So I have a question about, so I'm basically $35,000 of debt from student loans and a car and some bills, and I want to start a life coaching business, so I'm wondering how I should go about doing that. Are you working now? Relative to my debt, yes. So I'm working now and I'm living at home with my parents and I'm making, and so I've just been kind of confused about, I started the business and I had a few clients

and I was doing high ticket sales and making pretty good money, but then I kind of fell off and the business started working again. And it's kind of been this, this okay start the business and then I go back to working so right now I'm in sales and I'm in a job okay I'm confused why can you not work your day job and work your life coach thing as a side hustle yeah why not why why didn't that work because I wasn't making enough. I was a barista in my regular job, which wasn't even paying my bills. Oh, okay.

So your regular job sucks. Okay. Yeah. So I've been trying to get a better regular job. Okay, cool. And then that kind of took over the coaching part, so I got kind of more focused on. So who are you life coaching? What kind of a person is coming to you for life coaching? Yeah, so like women looking for help with their health.

And I was doing health slash life coaching. So women who are looking to like overcome things like anxiety and depression. And yeah, women who are like struggling with that i got you and so you're degreed in one of these areas i yeah i'm a certified health coach oh okay well that makes sense all right yeah um what i would love for you to do i mean it's okay to run your life coaching business as a side hustle until you get it up and running, and it really doesn't interfere with your debt because you're not going to spend any money on it to amount to anything. It's not like you have to produce $100,000 worth of widgets or something to do that. So all you got to do is just take clients, and they give you money.

And so that's not a bad thing. That helps you get out of debt. It doesn't hinder it. But if you're talking about opening an office and spending a bunch of money or something no i wouldn't do that i would just say let's just use the life coaching to be the health coaching to be a side hustle good hustle grind make some money throw it to debt that kind of a thing and while you're doing that we need to get you a better job you know and hopefully it'll be in that field and uh out of the coffee shop that would be the main goal that you want to do hang on i'm going to send you a copy

of ken coleman's book the proximity principle i think that'll be helpful for you it is uh it's a really good proven strategy that helps people find the careers they love and um he really walks you through some good constructs to make some decisions on this. So, yeah, hold on. I'll have Kelly pick up and we'll send you out a copy on that. Again, Rachel Cruz is up at the bottom of the hour. If you want to talk to her, the phone number is 888-825-5225. Number one bestselling author of Love Your Life, Not Theirs and YouTube Sensation these days.

I think that's something you say about YouTube people. Do you call them sensations? I think that's a proper phrase, but I have no idea. But she's a big deal. We know that. Stella's on Twitter. My bank has a service fee of $12 a month if If we don't keep $1,500 in our account, should I increase my emergency fund to the $1,500 just so I don't have to pay the fee? No, I'll probably just change banks.

I mean, really, Bank of America sucks. You shouldn't be there. Oh, how did he know that? I'm just guessing, but i think i'm right yeah you you know get a small town local bank or a good credit union that has free checking for someone that they're trying to get their business instead of um gigging you twelve dollars a month on that and yeah you know if you if you want to throw an extra 500 in something you can do that but i bet you you can find one that for a thousand dollars in your emergency fund will waive your checking um as a matter of fact you go and talk to the branch

manager tell them you're getting ready to leave if they don't uh go ahead just give you free checking with a thousand dollars in the account instead of 500 he might or she might be able to work that out however these days in banks branch managers don't have the power that they used to but it'd be worth asking one is on instagram my wife and i just got married we don't have the power that they used to. But it'd be worth asking. Juan is on Instagram. My wife and I just got married. We don't want kids for several years. Famous last words. Is it okay to just skip baby step five for right now? Sure.

You don't have a baby step five. Saving for children's college. You don't have children. So it would be, you would not do baby step five. Don't save for kids that you don't have. Yeah, you wait till that all happens, brother. Hey, thanks for the call, man. Or the follow on Instagram, which is now up to about a million six.

That blows my little mind. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Are high health care costs getting you down? Are you confused trying to navigate your options? Do you wish you could find an affordable affordable biblical solution to your health care costs? Based on New Testament principles, Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM, helps Christian families, churches, and ministries join together as the body of Christ to share their major health care costs. Christian Health Care Ministries is the original health cost-sharing ministry, a Better Business Bureau-accred organization, CHM members share to pay each other's medical bills. It's not insurance. It's Christians financially and spiritually

supporting each other. It's what Christian Healthcare Ministries has done for over 35 years, and our members have shared over $2.5 billion in medical bills. To learn more, visit chministries.org. That's chministries.org. Christian Healthcare Ministries is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Live Events. chministries.org. in the lobby of ramsey solutions on the brand new debt free scream stage they're here grant and michelle are with us hey guys how guys. How are you? Hi, Dave. Welcome, welcome. Where do you guys live?

Memphis, Tennessee. Well, welcome. Appreciate you coming up to Nashville. Very fun. How much debt have you guys paid off? $40,000. All right. How long did this take you?

Two years and six days. I love it. Fairly precise. And your range of income during that two years and six days? Started at $56,000, ended at $56,000. There you go. All right. What do you guys do for a living?

I'm a police officer in Memphis. Okay. And I'm a stay-at-home mom. Fun. With our two boys. Very cool. Well, thank you for serving your community, sir. Thank you.

We appreciate it. All right. Neat stuff. What kind of debt was the $40,000? Good old student loan debt. Time to get rid of Sally Mae. Got to. Kick the old woman out of the house.

Navient and Nelnet. I love it. Very fun. Good for you guys. So what happened two years and six days ago that put you on this journey? Before we began our journey, I experienced a pretty significant mental health crisis. Some of it was tied to my job, but I can't blame it on my job. It's not my job's fault.

So there was anxiety. There was depression. There was a pretty long bout with suicidal thoughts. Had to take six weeks off for therapy. Once we got that, we knew that something needed to be different. We knew we wanted to change as a family. We knew we wanted a house. But the biggest obstacle to that was the student loan debt. So about six months after I took six weeks off, I was able to change shifts to work in the night shift, higher ways alpha, if you're

listening. That allowed us to go to the night shift, High Airways Alpha, if you're listening. That allowed us to go to the financial peace classes that our church, River City Church in Bartlett offered. We made all the classes together. We started about, I think the second class was when we officially started counting our debt snowball. Two years, six days, we got it done. Wow. Wow.

So how are you doing yourself two years and six days later? I'm a lot healthier. Good. He's like a different guy. Yeah. Okay. There is something connected, and I'm not a mental health professional. I don't know anything about it.

But there's something connected with hope and traction moving forward towards a goal that I believe I'm going to be able to hit that walks someone through what you've been through. And the money piece sometimes can be a place that you get a hold of something and you go, okay, this is a victory I can have. It's a very tangible victory. Sometimes it's terrible. Sometimes it's unpleasant.

Sometimes, you know, you'd rather drag your face across concrete. Yeah, yeah. But it's so incredibly necessary, particularly when you're able to overcome that this is just ones and zeros. It's not just ones and zeros. There's got to be a meaning and a purpose more fundamental and deeper than the ones

and the zeros. Oh, yeah. You won't do it if you don't. No. It's too hard. Much too hard. You have to have a why. And in your case, it became the tail end of a healing story is what it amounts to.

That's what I'm hearing. Yeah. Yeah. Well, congratulations, man. Thank you, Dave. I'm proud of you. Thank you. You fought off a lot more important stuff than debt here. story is what it amounts to that's what i'm hearing yeah yeah well congratulations man thank you dave i'm proud of you thank you fought off a lot more important stuff than debt here definitely yeah and and got rid of some debt too by the way very very good so what do you tell people the uh the key to getting out of debt is? There has to be something foundational to,

there has to be a, there has to be a meaning. There has to be a why. You know, um, Frederick Nietzsche said, he who has a why can bear almost any how. And,

um, for us, it was the latching on to changing crooked paths, changing things that had been damaged, renewing things that had been broken, putting back together things that had been torn to pieces and cutting off a lot of dead wood. And at the same time, building something new because the debt was our biggest obstacle to a home. So we were able to buy our first home after we got rid of the student loan debt. We have two beautiful boys at home, Noah and Jude, who don't have to from this because I'm pretty sure if I read right, today is National Suicide Prevention Day.

Oh, wow. Yeah. And I don't believe in coincidences. And we lost a pastor friend of ours yesterday nationally to that, and I've lost three friends to that this year. I'm sorry. And so you told us the key of how you get out of debt. What do you think the keys were to your recovering

and moving away from that depression? What were the things people gave you as they retrained your brain to move forward? I mean, what would you tell somebody out there that's listening right now? Regarding your own personal power, two things. One, invest your power and your strength and your efficacy in the places that you can have the greatest contribution. And most of the time, that's not going to be some great call is out in the world. It's going to be you and your own personal transformation and the people that

are closest to you. So on the one hand, you're powerless to affect anyone else and make them do what you might do if you were in their shoes. My personality, I tend to over empathize with other people and part of that is good. But the other side of that sword is I tend to overestimate my own ability to bring about the change that I would like to see in their lives. While at the same time, since I'm focusing so much of my effort out that direction, it left me drained to be a better husband and a better father. Yep, your tank was empty. I realized I could bring about the most change and do the most good. It was in narrowing my focus, eliminating things that weren't essential, and focusing on home and me. Because a certain portion of depression is often this sense of powerlessness that I can't get unstuck.

And you can't get unstuck when all your gas is out of your tank because you're poured it out all the time. That's what you're saying. And you're not stuck, dude. have you the traction you guys have had in your lives and the forty thousand dollars is just the that's just the that's just the gravy on the biscuit on your story man you got a great story god's been good to you thank you dave yeah and probably the scariest part for me personally through this was that because I'm a stay-at-home mom, I didn't contribute financially to the debt being paid off. I had to pick up slack at home. And also because his job was such a catalyst with his mental health issues, that fear that as he worked overtime that he would, you know, get back into those.

Right, relapse. That he would relapse, that he would get back into those wrong ways of thinking and stuff. And so my perseverance was a much quieter perseverance. I had to trust that God was going to keep him balanced. And also I was there going going this isn't a race nobody is putting a stopwatch on us or anything like let's just keep

going one step at a time it is a marathon he's more of a sprinter and I'm more of a slow goer and so we kind of balanced each other through it I kind of suspected that alright you guys are special. What a great story.

Thank you. I'm so proud of y'all. Thank you. Got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Everyday Millionaires. That is the next chapter in your story. That's the next thing down the pike. This is just the beginning. The things are going to go from here are absolutely going to be incredible for y'all.

I can see it very, very clearly. Well done, y'all. All right. It's Grant and Michelle, Memphis, Tennessee. $40,000 paid off in two years and six days, making $56,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free!

I love it. Woo-hoo! Boom! That's how it's done right there. Oh, man, oh, man, oh, man. Way to go, you guys. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, guys. At the Dave Ramsey Show, we really value your input.

It helps us to know what's important to you so we can deliver relevant content to help you crush your money goals. We just launched a brand new survey, and we'd love your feedback. It only takes a few minutes, and you'll be entered to win a $100 Amazon gift card. No purchase necessary. Take the survey at DaveRamsey.com slash survey or text survey to 33789. Joining me this half hour, answering your questions and making a special announcement, number one bestselling author, Ramsey personality, my daughter, Rachel Cruz. Welcome back.

Yes, thanks for having me back on. So fun. When I was teaching Financial Peace University and you were a child way back there. A child. A child. A mere child. A mere babe. I was starting to discover accidentally because people kept coming up to us going, you know, this financial class changed our marriage.

And I kept going, what? Because I really didn't grasp the connection, how deep the connection between marriage problems and good marriages as well and the way they handle money is. And, of course, we started recognizing that in the early years of this business, of this Ramsey movement. And then as you've come into your career here, one of the things you've observed as young married is the same thing with your friends. And so we've ended up developing this whole money and marriage event and really a whole discussion with Les Parrott and you. Yes. Yeah, Dr. Les Parrott's a marriage expert. And so we found that the need was constant.

I mean, like you said, from even 30 years ago to now about couples getting on the same page and working with their money, because it's very difficult to win financially if you're running on two separate tracks. And so to get couples and giving them the tools to communicate better, get on the same page, work together. And then on top of that, their marriage changes within that because you suddenly for some people they're on the same team for the first time in a long time in their marriage or maybe ever or maybe ever and so developing this event money and marriage was so fun we did this we've probably been on for we've been doing it for probably three years two or three years now and so the first half of the event is dr les parent and he's talking all about marriage. That's like his expertise. He's a psychologist, marriage counselor, brilliant on ways to communicate with your spouse,

how to have a good fight with your spouse because there's bad fighting, good fighting, and all of his tips. I mean, he's so great. And then the back end of the event is talking specifically with couples. I come out on money and working together and the conversations you need to start having if you're not already. And as you said, we've done these for several years and you're getting ready to go out on maternity leave, but you'll be back after the first of the year. Yes.

And one of the first things you'll be doing when you get back is we're announcing today a destination deal here in Nashville. Come to the event and a bunch of other stuff. So we're going to be doing the event on Valentine's Day, the 14th of February, Money and Marriage. It's a Friday night. It's a Friday night here in Nashville, and Les and Rachel doing Money and Marriage. But for the first time ever, we're going to do some other stuff. Yeah, we decided to add it on because we did a Money and Marriage event last Valentine's Day here in Nashville, and we polled the audience for the backstage experience, which is like a dinner before, which is less than myself.

And out of the like 150 that were there, all of them but two people, this is a true story, all of them but two people were not from Nashville. And we were like, oh my gosh, people flew and drove from all over the country to come. Well, Nashville's a destination site now. It is. But I was shocked at the number. I thought maybe half and half. And so we're like, man, this is great. It's a fun city to come. Well, Nashville's a destination site now. It is, but I was shocked at the number. I thought maybe half and half. And so we're like, man, this is great. It's a fun city to come to,

so let's just build out a whole weekend getaway for couples. So Friday night is the event, and then Saturday morning is an add-on package that you can add on with your ticket where you'll come here to the headquarters, the new headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, and we're going to do a live segment taping of the Rachel Cruze show.

And I'll have breakfast with you guys and we'll just chat and kind of hang out that Saturday morning. And then that evening, we have... Another add-on.

Another add-on, yes. That evening is for where Country Music started, the Grand Ole Opry. So there's a VIP tour. You'll have seats. There'll be a great artist, I'm sure, on that evening.

And so you can go with some fellow money and marriage uh attendees to that event hosted by us at remsey solutions special backstage at grand ole opry experience yeah very cool so can they do the morning thing with you and and not do the grand ole opry or vice versa yes so there's two separate possible a la carte add-ons for your Nashville weekend after you come to the Friday money and marriage event exactly that's wow that's neat I know it'll be really fun very cool yeah well I mean let's people enjoy our town because we got a good town oh the food's great the people are great it's fun Nashville's a great city so make it a weekend getaway with your spouse uh It's going to be, it's fun.

It was fun to kind of build this out and be like, okay, what would people want to be doing? So we planned this all around you guys thinking ahead of what would be exciting. And selfishly, I'm like, oh, it's going to be great to get out of the house with a new baby. I'll come hang out with adults. I'm going to miss it. I'm going to miss it. I'm speaking at Hillsong in Sydney, Australia. You're speaking at Hillsong?

In Sydney, Australia. I think it's right that weekend, probably. Or maybe the weekend before, but I'll be in Australia. Oh, man. Brian Houston. Tell him I said hi. Well, I'll see Brian. He's coming up in October, too.

Oh, my gosh. This is going to be fun. So you never know. I'm going to miss it. But I'm going to miss your event. That's a hard... Yeah, that's it. Well, I mean, you can come australia you can come to nashville decide which one you want to do but yeah that's all yeah the uh uh this will be fun yes this will be fun very very cool

and um as much fun as i make of you and all of your people that watch the bachelorette you bachelorette people i make so much fun even at family dinners we give rachel like down the road and i'm fine with it and she's just very she's just proud she's very secure in her bachelorette fandom oh gross and so uh unbelievable so now then but now you you have a very popular YouTube with a Bachelorette coming on. Yes. So the latest episode of The Rachel Cruze Show is all about how people waste their money on trends. So there's a lot of trends out there just in general, whether it's financial products or lifestyle.

And so I thought, well, a trend in our world today is reality TV. And what's my favorite show when it comes from reality TV? The Bachelor franchise. Bachelor, Bachelorette, Bachelor in Paradise is on right now. I mean, all of it. I'm great with the whole shebang. I love it. Gross. So, Caitlin Bristow, who was a contestant,

you don't know this, so I will enlighten you. Yes, you'll have to. Caitlin Bristow was a... She's a big deal and I don't know it. She was a contestant on The Bachelor. Okay. She didn't get picked with the final rose whole thing, but then she ended up being the bachelorette. So then she was like the full guest. So she was the jackpot of guests in that franchise for me because I was like, okay, you get to

get, I get to ask questions about both sides of it. And it was fascinating. And we talk about money on it. We talk about money on it. So just about like what it costs to go on, what they pay for, what you have to pay for. Did she say some of those girls buy stuff on credit cards to get to be ready? Oh, she said almost all of them go into debt. In order to get the pleasure of getting turned down nationally in front of everybody else.

There's more to it than that. There's a little bit more depth to that show than that. James, we're going to do a stupid tax hour and invite some of these people on oh my gosh i would love nothing more go into debt go into debt to get the opportunity to be embarrassed on national television well they're not all embarrassed but to her point she was a waitress in vancouver i mean like you know they don't like have all this money to buy all these clothes. And so they do.

They go into debt. So we talk about that side of it. And then on the flip side, though, when they leave reality TV, kind of entering back into the real world of, like, jobs. Do you get your job back? You know, we talk all about that. So there's some financial principles within the interview. And then, of course, I just go bachelor crazy and ask her all the questions I've always wanted to know about rose ceremonies and the dates and the one-on-ones. And all of this is on your YouTube show.

It is. Hey, the podcast of this episode, it spiked up. I know. I'm sure. Your listeners may care nothing about The Bachelor, and that's fine. But yours, however. The Rachel Cruze Show ladies, it's fascinating. So anyways, that's fine but you're the racial cruise show however ladies it's fascinating so anyways that's the latest episode but but she's what yeah so she's a segment on the whole show

but the other parts we talk about um just trends in general and watching yourself and your contentment and your value and what you're buying with your money and all that so fashion trends all that kind of stuff how it drains your bank account. Exactly. Yeah, you really, it takes a lot of money to be trendy. Yes. Well, we talked about this last time I was on the show, was that article about even just the middle class and being normal,

not even just trendy, but just being normal in America today and how much it costs people and all the things and what to buy. Yeah, because middle class is what we used to call upper class. That's right. So, yeah, it's a hard episode, too. So we talk a lot about the emotion behind spending as well. All right. So the Money in Marriage event and weekend following is February 14th and 15th.

The Rachel Cruz Show YouTube show subscription as well as you can subscribe to it. You can watch it on YouTube free. Obviously, it's on Facebook as well. You can subscribe to it. You can watch it on YouTube free, obviously. It's on Facebook as well. And, of course, there's the attached podcast to all of that. And you, too, can learn the secrets of the Bachelorette joining Rachel. So there you go. I was very fascinated by it. I can tell.

Back with your calls for Rachel Cruz right here on the Dave Ramsey Show. Joining us this half hour, number one bestselling author, Rachel Cruz. Be sure and check out her new YouTube show that has dropped. They do an episode every two weeks, and the new one has the contestant from The Bachelor on there, along with discussing all kinds of trends that will drain your bank account. So be sure and check all of that out. All right, Jariah is with us in Idaho. Hey, Jariah, how are you? I'm good, Dave. How about yourself?

Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, quick question for you. I am on baby step two right now. And I am slowly paying off my snowball two right now. And, um, I am slowly paying off, um, my snowball debt right now. And I have a vehicle that I purchased last year and right now it is worth $35,000. Um, and, uh, I wanted to see if I could sell it, but Kelly blue book and the dealerships around here are only telling me that it's only worth $15,000. And I wanted to get your opinion on whether or not I should continue to try and sell it,

or is this something that I'm kind of stuck with to pay off? A dealership in Kelley Blue Book should not be giving you the same numbers unless you're looking at trade-in value. And so your difference in trade-in value and private sale on that car, if trade-in value is $15,000, private sale is is 15, private sale is probably 20 to 22 would be my guess. Okay. And so that starts to change the numbers a little bit. Yeah. So you must have rolled upside down from another car into this one. There's no way otherwise this car went down that much. Yes, sir. That's exactly what happened. Okay. All right. I figure. So what's your household income?

I make about $50,000 a year. Good Lord. Yeah, this thing's got to go. But you're going to have to take your time. You can't sell it for $15,000. That doesn't make sense. Yeah. So let's find out what an individual would be willing to pay for it.

If you looked up Trader.com or Private sale on kellybluebook.com and then based on that you've got to get a loan for the difference i assume this loan is not at your local bank no sir i've tried getting it through my local bank and they won't uh they won't touch it they won't cover the amount you're upside down no sir okay then you've only got one option and that's work six jobs and begin to pay it down yes sir until you can get rid of it i mean you got it you have to cover the difference with something either find someone that will give you a loan for that amount or work it down by just working extra jobs man that's a mess sorry about that kevin is with us. Kevin's in Florida. Hey, Kevin, your question for Rachel.

Kevin? Hi, Kevin. How are you? Hey, Dave. Oh, man, I'm excited. Thanks for letting me on the show, and thanks for teaching financial education to everybody. Thank you, sir. Can you speak directly into your phone?

I'm having trouble hearing you. Okay. We're going to put you on hold until you guys can get this phone stuff straightened out and i'll come back to you uh all right let's go to stacy in minnesota hey stacy what's up hi excuse me how are you better than i deserve how can i help um okay my daughter turned me on to you and she loves your show. So I have a question. I'm 55 years old and I recently got divorced and we had a bunch of rental property and in the divorce, I ended up getting cash and I'm not sure what to do with it. How long were you married? 26 years. Wow I'm sorry it's a hard time for you. How much cash did you get? Well I have 250,000 cash and I have 250,000 dollars that I borrowed to my ex-husband at 5%, and I'm going to get over the next few years more big chunks of money.

You mean you loaned him another $250,000? Yeah. Why? Well, because I didn't know what to do with it, so I'm getting 5% on that. Yeah, but I can think of a lot of people you would loan money to. Your ex-husband, after 26 years, wouldn't be on the list. As far as, I mean, it's hard to believe, but I do trust him, and he would, whatever. Okay.

So. All right, do you own a home? I just, yes. Okay, is it paid for? Okay. So. All right. Do you own a home? I just, yes. Okay. Is it paid for? I owe $100,000. It's worth about $400,000, and that interest is $2.75. What are you doing for a living?

Real estate. Agent? Yes. Okay. All right. Cool. Rachel, ideas? Yeah. state agent yes okay all right cool rachel ideas yeah i would say so does he have the money the 250 yeah and i can get it at any time i just did not know what to do with sure the other two the other 250s in the bank getting 2.25%. Wow. So I don't know where to put it.

Yeah, do you have any other debt besides the house? I have one rental property. Well, actually, three rental properties, but two are paid for. Any consumer debt, credit cards, car loans? No. Student loans? Okay. Nothing.

So I would take it and throw $100,000 of of it at the house go ahead and pay off your house and if you are are you investing in any kind of retirement or is your real real estate are you leaning on that as retirement or what's your retirement plan that's what i'm asking i have about about $200,000 in a simple, I think. Okay. But so basically I have $500,000 I can put somewhere. Yeah. I mean. You could get $750,000 if you didn't want to be in the business of loaning him money.

Right? Right. Well, and he'll get a loan somewhere else if I want it. Good. Do it. Yeah, I would get the money back from your ex-husband tomorrow. This is what's called an unsecured loan. Unsecured loan.

If he decides not to... I'm sorry? Oh, go ahead. Sorry. Do you have collateral? Yes. What? Some of the horses that we owned okay so you have a lien against some of the other houses if he doesn't pay you correct

foreclose you're right and it's recorded properly with an attorney with the state yeah okay all right well that's not quite so bad then. What you have is a mortgage loan. Right. Yeah. Wouldn't make me mad if you were out of the business with that, but it's okay. So, yeah, what I would do then is let's just send you to one of our SmartVestor pros, because it sounds like more than anything else you need to get just begin learning about investing of all kinds. You know a lot about real estate, obviously, already,

but let's start learning about mutual funds and other things to where you don't have this default to leave money in a savings account at 2%. And I think the more knowledge you have, the more your confidence will go up, and it would be normal in a 26-year marriage ending to have your confidence shaken a little bit as a part of your heart being broken. And so take your time, learn. There's no rush on any of this. And then let's begin to move those dollars towards a positive investment,

an investment that's doing a whole lot better than what you can get over at the local bank and some good mutual funds and those kinds of things. You know, Rachel, sometimes when we're talking to people on the show, it's the pain from something in their life like that, like that situation, or a job loss or an estranged child or whatever, a grown child that's having all kinds of trouble, whatever it is that's breaking your heart. It takes intelligent people. And all of us, when we get in pain like that, we're in a fog.

And it's hard to move then, isn't it? Well, it is because life, the weight of it, it's blinding. And what you see are the issues in front of you, which, to her credit, is it's the divorce, it's the marriage ending, or it's a death or whatever, whatever the case may be. And so to be able to step back from those events properly, and some of that just takes time, but not only to heal from those, but to start gaining access and wisdom and understanding how life works outside of your norm, because your norm for 26 years was you have a new normal um yeah it was a was a marriage and so being able to gather facts like what you were saying and start to just be on this train of learning and learning the self-sufficiency of having to make decisions on

your own it's a hard change but it's a good one and then that's when the confidence comes back like you were saying exactly good stuff rachel cruz my guest this half hour be sure and check out the entire weekend that's available with the money and marriage event valentine's day make it a nashville weekend check it all out at rachelcruz.com davramsey.com or you can talk to ramsey concierge team at 888-22-PEACE 888-227-3223 dropping by. Yeah, thanks for having me on. This is James Childs, producer of The Dave Ramsey Show. Did you know you can now listen to The Dave Ramsey Show on Pandora and Spotify? For all the ways to watch and listen, check out our show page at DaveRamsey.com slash show. The Dave Ramsey Show.