The Ramsey Show - App - Are Used Car Prices on the Rise? (Hour 1)

Episode Date: May 10, 2021

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the 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. Thank you for joining us. Extra special day here at the Ramsey Show in Ramsey Headquarters. Our good friends Joshua Milburn and Ryan Nicodemus, known as the Minimalists, are visiting with us. We love these guys. We love the work that they do.

And it is so akin to teaching you people to live on less than you make, a concept Congress can't grasp. So honored to have my friends here in the studio. Guys, thanks for joining us. Hey, we're honored to be here. Thanks for having us. Dave, we love you, brother. You too, man. So the new doc is out.

Les is now on Netflix, and it's a huge hit. I mean, it's, as always with you guys, the only thing you had that harmed it was you put me in it. And so all the Dave haters now hate the minimalists.'s mandatory to to cancel somebody for something but anyway it's it's fabulous it's very well produced i love the scenes and uh your artistic touch as always standing in front of the brick walls and stuff and the angle camera angles and the reenactments of when you were working and all that kind of stuff it's very well done guys did you have fun on it oh man so much fun.

I wish I could say that we had something to do with that art piece of it, but really, our director, Matt D'Avella, he is a savant. So, yeah, the videography, really, I've got to give it up to Matt. I've got to give credit where credit's due. But, yeah, we had a lot of fun making it, and I'm really glad to see it going across the TV screens all across the world. Yeah, it's gone huge. Okay, let's backtrack because there might be someone out there who just emerged from a cave and never heard who the minimalists are.

And so we should upgrade their knowledge and catch them up to where the rest of us are. So minimalism and the minimalists. Give me the two-minute version of what it is and how you got here. Yeah, so it really started with two events in my life. My mother died. My marriage ended both in the same month. I was 28 years old, sort of at the pinnacle of my corporate career.

I was ostensibly successful, had all the trappings of the American dream. But for me, that also meant a lot of debt, a lot of stress, a lot of anxiety, and of course, in our world, a lot of stuff. The average American household has 300,000 items in it. I've had all of those things and more. And it's not that there's anything inherently wrong with the things. The problem is that I had so much stuff that I was forsaking the people closest to me. And I realized that all of my priorities were out of whack. I was so focused on so-called success and achievement and stuff, accumulating these things, they

weren't making me happy. They weren't doing their job. And I realized I needed to simplify my life. And that's really where this thing called minimalism came in. Minimalism is just the thing that gets us past the things so we can make room for life's most important things, which aren't things at all. That's not to say that Ryan and I are against stuff. The problem is we have so much stuff, it's actually getting in the way of living a meaningful life.

I mean, we're like most of us in America. We're just stuff obese. I mean, we just have stuff coming out of our ears. When you move and you have a box, I remember this when I was a kid and we were moving. You have a box that says seldom used kitchen items. That might be a sign that you have too much stuff yeah sounds like another name for junk drawer to me yeah yeah in the kitchen junk drawer seldom used gets ronco apparently sold this crap i mean you know i don't know but we buy everything in sight and

because we're sold everything in sight what did you call it in the documentary uh you called it stuffitis right stuffitis yeah yeah i mean, we unfortunately, we look at these things as a shortcut. We look at purchasing the new car, going on the vacation, buying the bigger house. I know for me, when I got into minimalism, it was because I wanted to get my time back. And the reason why I didn't have control of my time is because I had so much debt. And to pay all of those debt payments, I had to work a crazy job, 60, 70, sometimes 80 hours a week. And every time I got a promotion, I never thought to myself, oh, here's an opportunity for me to pay off debt.

It was always an opportunity for me to buy more. Yeah. Because I was looking for a shortcut to happiness. I was looking for a shortcut to status, a shortcut for significance, really, in some ways. Well, and our messages have overlapped for probably close to a decade now where we just say stuff like, you know, it's okay to have a nice car. It's just not okay for your nice car to have you. That's exactly right.

It's the same kind of vibe. It's this whole thing. No, stuff is not evil. But when you gorge yourself on stuff, you're going to get satiated. You're never satisfied. Yeah. It's called the hedonic treadmill. What we do is we get something, and that becomes our new baseline.

And so I went from the Toyota to the Lexus. And so when I had a Lexus, all of a sudden I needed two Lexuses. Lexi. They run in herds. Right. One was not enough. In our culture, it's always more more more more more we never stop to consider less and the only way to consider less is to identify what is enough in my life and

it when we identify we have enough things what are we making room for well we're making room for our values we're making room for contribution we're making room for our family and friends the people in our lives it's much more about that than it is about amassing more things into our ever-busy lifestyles. So less is more. The old maxim is where you came up with less is now. Yeah. Because it's so cool to be now. And again, when you want to read, this is not a thing to say you're spiritually evil

if you have stuff. No. It's not a thing to say stuff is bad at all. No. It's not the stuff's fault. No. It's that we put it on a pedestal, right? Right.

Absolutely. Yeah, I look at, it's easy to do. The advertisements we see every day, it's over 5,000 advertisements. That's a lot of noise. It's a lot of things seeping into our subconscious. So, I mean, the thing like minimalism really helps us kind of sift through all that noise. And what I really like about our documentary Less Is Now is it's really about starting over. It's about someone who is stressed out by their stuff,

stressed out by debt, who really is looking to make a shift in their life. We have what we're calling them everyday minimalists in this documentary, everyday people who have found a way to start over, whether they're single, whether they have families, and they've really been able to make some major changes in their lives to to live a more meaningful life it's impossible to sit and watch the thing the documentary though and not just go pause and go god there's so much crap in this house i'm sorry or you're welcome i don't know it's just useless you know i mean it's just useless think you know? I mean, it's just useless. Think about this, Dave.

We've been using this word a lot lately, essential. Essential businesses, essential travel. But now a lot of us have been stuck at home for more than we bargained, and all of a sudden we're looking around saying, what is essential in this house? And I thought I was going to need all these things, especially if I'm spending more time at home, but it turns out I need it less than ever.

It's just getting in the way. The documentary is Less Is Now by the minimalists, Ryan Nicodemus, Joshua Milburn are with us. And you guys be sure and check it out on Netflix. We're going to come back and talk a little bit more about this. But this is this idea of minimizing, this idea of simplifying. It's catching on. The minimalists have created a huge movement around this. This idea of minimizing, this idea of simplifying, it's catching on. The minimalists have created a huge movement around this,

and it gives you good pause psychologically to tap the brakes a little bit and just go, okay, what matters? What is real? I'm going to be intentional with this life spiritually. Godliness with contentment is great gain. Just breathe a little bit. Maybe if Amazon didn't show up at your front porch for a whole week, life would go on. Thank you, PRA. Who knew?

And gosh, I mean, you can, man, I'm telling you. Wow. All right, we'll be back with these guys for one more segment here in just a second. It's The Minimalists on The Ramsey Show. Ever wonder how to save more money or pay off debt fast? What about the right way to invest? Listen, I've been there, asking the same questions with no idea where to turn for answers. But here's the good news. You don't have to keep searching for answers.

Ramsey Plus will guide you every step of the way so you always know what to do next with money. Ramsey Plus is our step-by-step plan that shows you how to get consistent small wins with money and even some big ones so you can see exactly how you're making progress. Then we help you turn all those wins into better habits that last. You can be confident that you're doing the right thing with money, and that means no debt payments, cash in the bank for emergencies,

and a plan for your future. Get started today with a free trial of Ramsey Plus at RamseySolutions.com slash Ramsey Plus. That's RamseySolutions.com slash Ramsey Plus. Joshua Milburn, Ryan Nicodemus, the Minimalists are with me for a half hour, hanging out here with us in Nashville. Been friends with these guys for some time now. Be sure and check out TheMinimalists.com to check out their podcast, check out their books that are coming out. The new doc came out in January on Netflix, and it is a major hit.

Netflix is grinning. It's the second hit with a documentary you've had with them. And so they love you guys, of course, because you're making them bank. And it's a great doc. They allowed me to be in it. Several of my friends are in it, people that we know. And so, again, we've got so many values that overlap that we've been brothers of another mother for some time and then have gotten to be friends off the backside of that.

So $240 billion is spent on advertising today. That's a lot of money. Yeah. And when you think just about what is spent on a given item, or we think about the power now of Amazon or the power of Facebook marketing or the power of the data collection that Google has on individuals to custom offer you things that you just can't do without because the offer is so dialed in to exactly who you are. Right. I mean, you really if you don't have a lot of intellectual prowess, you are almost powerless to the sway that they put over the top of you in this and so we end up with just what we're talking about is the minimalists are

about minimizing your life not stuff is evil not money is evil not you're a bad person if you have a nice car it's not that kind of stuff this is not gnosticism it's minimalism right and so but it is about make your stuff have meaning and when you've got so much stuff you've just gorged on it it's just like all you do is eat candy and you've got no no nutrition in your life your stuff is giving you no nutrients yes there's no happiness coming from it the documentary is less is now and with all this advertising money spent we've all got to put our guards up uh because otherwise we just get sucked into this vortex of consumerism, materialism, and loss. So you guys have helped so many people by giving them a guideline, giving them a rule or a step.

So what's the first thing if you go, yeah, Dave, I agree with what you're saying. I agree with what Joshua and Ryan are saying. So what do I do now? Because I've got a house full of crap. Well, we start the film with a question. How might your life be better with less? And the reason we ask that question, it starts with the why to instead of the how to. The how to sort of manifests as soon as you understand the why. And that's what I love with what you do with your work is helping people understand the benefits of becoming debt-free. The same

thing is the benefits of simplifying your life, understanding the why. For some people, it's financial freedom. Sometimes it's getting your time back. Sometimes it's improving your relationships. Sometimes just, I want less stuff to clean in my house. My house is so full of clutter. But also realizing that physical clutter is just a physical manifestation of what's going on inside us. If you have a bunch of material clutter, you have spiritual clutter, mental clutter, emotional clutter, all of this internal clutter. And it starts with the stuff. But as we start decluttering that stuff, we're able to look inward. We also have some rules.

Like we have 16 rules for living with less on our website. It's a free e-book people can download. And I'll give you a couple of them here. One's the seasonality rule. We also call it the 90-90 rule. If you look at an item in your house and say, have I used this item in the last 90 days? If not, am I going to use it in the next 90 days? If not, I give myself permission to let go.

And that covers all seasons. So right now, did I use it in the winter? Nope. Okay. Am I going to use it in the spring? Nope. Am I going to use it in the summer? Nope.

All right. Let's get rid of it. We hold on to so many items just in case. Another rule we have, the just in case rule. Think about everything. That's a hoarder rule. Right, right. That's the hoarder excuse for everything.

I might need this later. Yeah, in some hypothetical future that doesn't actually exist. Anything that we're holding on to just in case, we can let go of because we can replace it for less than $20 in less than 20 minutes. Think about this, though. You never have to use the rule. Once you get rid of it, you don't miss the thing, and you're able to move on as soon as you let go. It's really cheap insurance, and it's definitely cheaper than

renting out a storage unit every single month to keep all that just-in-case stuff. That adds up for sure. Yes, indeed. The just-in-case surcharge. Here's one more for you. It's a tax on just-in-case. Spontaneous combustion rule. So if you have an item that's feeling a little bit burdensome

and you're struggling, I put so much meaning in it. Of course, if everything's precious, nothing is precious, right? But if I'm putting so much meaning in this, but ask yourself, how would I feel if this item spontaneously combusted right now? How would that make me feel? And if you'd feel a sense of relief, maybe it's time to let go. Yeah.

It does not mean you can burn your house down. No. Okay. Another good place to start, I think you mentioned your daughter, Rachel, had played this game, but the 30-Day Minimalism Game or the Hashtag Less Is Now Challenge.

It's a great way to start because it helps you get that momentum that you need in order to start decluttering your life. So the way it works is you find a friend or a family member who wants to get rid of some stuff. And we know that decluttering can be a little bit boring, a little tedious. So this makes it fun because you bring someone else in and then you make a bet to see who can go the longest each day of the month getting rid of items. So you start on day one. You get rid of one item. Then you go on day one, you get rid of one item. Then you go to day two, you get rid of two items. And then day three, three items.

And then, okay, so forth and so on. You probably get it. Whoever lasts the longest wins. If both people last the whole month, they both win because they would have gotten rid of about 500 items each, which is a great start. Yeah, that's a lot of junk. It is. Yeah, but watching the documentary, it was just like a lot of junk it is yeah but it can you know watching the documentary

it was just like a thing of you know scotch tape all right that's one thing yeah or what i mean it doesn't have to be like you sold your car right exactly exactly doesn't have to be a big item it can be it can be it doesn't have to be you could also i get you know i guess you could technically count like you know 12 paper clips on day 12 it's the box of cheating. Don't do that. Don't do that. It's the box. Come on. No cheating. Yeah, that's right. That's for sure. So we're consumed with spending. This economy basically exists on spending.

So, I mean, stimulus. Oh, wow. We're going to stimulate things. Yeah. We're going to stimulate things. And what this does, Rachel talked about it over dinner one night, because Rachel of our three kids is the spender, and she's obviously the one that is on the television, on the radio shows, does podcasts, best-selling books on money, which is irony of ironies. But Rachel, she talked about it.

It was almost like detoxing. Yes. You know, it was a cleansing sense, a sense of, I just feel better. Yeah. I'm complete in an empty room. And so there's nothing wrong with the stuff. It enhances my life. It augments my life.

But it's not me. It's not part of my identity. Unfortunately, it has become part of our identity. I am this thing. And we even use terms like I love my truck or I love my house or I love my bed. There's nothing wrong with enjoying things. We get confused when we love our truck but I also love my house, or I love my bed. There's nothing wrong with enjoying things. We get confused when we love our truck, but I also love my wife. I love my daughter.

It's a little different. Exactly. A little different. Yeah. The documentary is Less Is Now. It is on Netflix. Both of the documentaries are still on Netflix, as a matter of fact. You can go see the original and see the whole sequence that way if you want to. Joshua Milburn, Ryan Nicodemus are my guests this half hour. And, you know, we was working 60, 70, sometimes 80 hours a week to

pay all of these debt payments. And yeah, I saw minimalism as an opportunity for me to simplify, for me to get rid of as much debt as possible. And really, I mean, Dave, my original plan was to go be a barista. I was going to go serve coffee 20, 30 hours a week. But in order to get there, I had to get rid of some stuff and I had to get rid of some debt. Now, the minimalist was a beautiful accident. 10 years later, I still hope to be a barista one day, by the way. I just haven't got there yet. We've got a machine on here. If you want to make it so much people coffee. They would let me touch the espresso machine? All right. Yeah, we can let you practice.

But I really just wanted to get my time back. And that's what I think minimalism can help anyone do. Anyone who is dissatisfied with the status quo, anyone who wants an opportunity to start over, I think minimalism is a way that people can do that. I don't want people to mistake it for the way. We're not just saying it. Minimalism is a way. It's a tool that people can use to reclaim their time. Well, in an area that we're just so overwhelmed, it's time to get a little underwhelmed.

I mean, minimalism. Hey, new book coming out. You guys come back in July when this comes out. Love people. Use things. Be watching for it. You can probably learn about it at TheMinimalist.com. Maybe a pre-purchase. This is an advanced reader copy I got. I'm not giving it back either.

Love people. Use things. Because the opposite never works. Amen. We haven't signed it for you. Absolutely. Do it right now. Thanks, guys. Love you guys. Appreciate you hanging out with us, man. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Dave. We'll be right back. Change of gears here on the Ramsey Show. I am Dave Ramsey, your host. Rachel Cruz, my co-host today. And my daughter. Nice to have the minimalist guys drop in. Always fun to see those guys. They're just the nicest guys on the planet. They're awesome.

They're ridiculously nice, actually. Oh, yeah. Well, they're very nice and have an incredible message. Everything they do, I'm like, yes, amen, yes. Yes and amen. Yes and amen. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage, Bobby and Michelle are with us. Hey, guys.

How are you? Hello. Hey, Rachel. Hi, guys. Welcome. Good to have you guys. Thank you for having us. And where do you guys live?

Danville, Virginia. I love it. And all the way to Nashville to do a debt-free scream. Yes, Rachel. Hi, guys. Welcome. Good to have you guys. Thank you for having us. And where do you guys live? Danville, Virginia. I love it. And all the way to Nashville to do a debt-free scream. Yes, sir. Fine. How much have you guys paid off? $139,970.92. Oh, my gosh.

Love it. And how long did this take? Six years. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? $29,000 up to $85,000 this year. Wow. What do you all do for a living? We're both teachers. Oh,,000 this year. Wow. What do you all do for a living?

We're both teachers. Oh, good. Oh, how fun. What do you all teach? I teach fourth grade, and he teaches seventh, eighth grade math. Ah, good. Very cool. So what kind of debt was this $140,000?

Well, Dave, I'm sorry to say. Everything. We're normal. Actually, most of it was my debt. And I brought it into the marriage six years ago. And we took FPU as our pre-marriage counseling. And, oh, my gosh, I just got to tell you, as a man, to bring that kind of debt into a marriage and watch that debt settle on her was just very, very difficult. I'd been carrying that debt around for almost 30 years.

Didn't bother you until you said it on her. Did not. And then I saw, you know, at first she was like, oh my gosh, it's not that bad. We can handle this. We can do this. And then over the months I saw it settle in on her and it really broke my heart.

Well, the thing is too, I'm, I guess, like a unicorn sort of. I never had debt. I've never had a credit score. I had never taken out a car loan, loans to go to school, of. I never had debt. I've never had a credit score. I had never taken out a car loan, loans to go to school, nothing. I love your parents. I know, right? So I never had debt,

but I never really had a plan with money either. So I was still living paycheck to paycheck. So when I met the love of my life, I'm just like, oh, that debt's not that bad, whatever. I never felt the weight of the debt. Wow, that's interesting. Yeah, his debt's not that bad, whatever. I never felt the weight of the debt. Wow, that's interesting. Yeah, his debt-free journey, that debt got added little by little by little. And then when we got married, it's like someone took 300 pounds and put it on my shoulders and went, hey, here you go.

Enjoy carrying that. So what he was observing, that heaviness was real. Oh, yeah, yeah. About a year into our marriage it um yeah it was it was rough um and i remember our our our uh budget meetings were not good um we because we did um fpu is pre-marriage counseling we've never really had a money fight but some of those budget meetings were like okay how are we gonna how are we gonna put food on the table this month? Let's figure it out. At $29,000 that year, that first year, it was hard.

I bet. It was hard. So what was it, mostly student loans? No, a lot of student loans. I've got a PhD, so it was a lot of student loans. But I had three credit cards that had maxed out. And over the years, we had to deal with creditors. And we've taught almost 13 FPU classes, I think, in Little Red Men at our church.

And true fact, during some of those FPU classes, I was getting calls from creditors. During the class. During the class. It was hard dealing with those creditors, but we were able to negotiate those settlements and stuff we got sued by bank of america um actually went to court with a brief case and dealt with opposing attorneys on that wow a lot lots to tell there that we don't have time but um just it was a long six years we made several different job changes along the way so that we could line up our passions with our financial goals. And so now we're getting ready to enter our first summer break as teachers, completely debt-free.

We've moved into a new house and working on our baby step three. And so just absolutely loving life right now. And the best thing is the kids keep asking if we can do an actual vacation, a real vacation instead of day trips places. No day trips. No, wait a minute. The real vacation instead of day trips places. No day trips. No, wait a minute. The real vacation is the day trips. Come on.

I love it. Way to go, you guys. So you guys, I mean, this journey for you all, because you hear people, they start for different reasons, right? You hear some people like, yeah, you know, I just realized, oh, all my money's leaving, so I'm going to get out of debt so I can get my income. But you guys, I mean, it was out of pain. Out of pain.

Yes. And it is very visceral for me. I know I'm going to break down and cry when we do our scream. And it's very appropriate that you guys have the brave heart freedom because it is very visceral for me. So tell me, so from that pain, and now you guys are on the other side, standing on the stage, what was it like when you paid off that final debt? Emotionally, how are you feeling now versus then? I think when we first paid it off, I kept waiting for something else to happen.

It didn't really hit. Then one day, I was just driving in the car. Then I was thinking about it. I'm like, oh my God, we're debt free. Remember, I cried all the way home cause I'm like, oh my gosh. And it finally really, really hit because it felt like, especially early on when we would take one step forward, we'd get knocked back. Yeah.

Um, and we'd, you know, sell a bunch of stuff and be like, Hey, we're going to throw that towards debt. But then we had to put it in our budget because we couldn't pay the bills. So I just kept waiting for something to happen, and then it clicked. And I'm like, oh, my gosh, like we actually did it. It's amazing. I'm so proud of you. You guys are amazing.

Thank you. For me, it was not so much the final payment and calling her and telling her, yeah, we just did it. But the next week I checked my FICO score for the very first time in my life. And after being hounded by creditors, after walking into court with a briefcase, you know, because Bank of America had sued us, I did a credit check for the first time. And it said, there's no way to determine your credit score because you don't have enough credit history. Woohoo!

Yes! You joined the club, baby! I love credit history you joined the club baby i love it you joined the club she was already a member of it that is so awesome we are weird yeah so when people ask and they say you paid off 140 thousand dollars how did you do that what do you tell them the secret is oh my gosh um God, because that's something that's, you know, your faith is something that you always have, no matter what, you know, numbers in your bank account. Budgeting and absolutely teamwork. Teamwork. I think, yeah, I think because we did FPU as kind of our pre-marriage counseling,

we were both on the same plan and on the same team. Yeah. And so when it came down to a question with money or a budget or anything we just kind of fell back to that teaching um from the class we'd been through and it's odd like we really have never had a money fight and we've cried together oh my gosh so much so much um or been angry at Bank of America together. Oh, yeah. Yes, yes. But I think sometimes he had to rely on his faith to be strong or the other way around. I know one week in particular,

we had a horrific budget meeting. It was so, it's a train. That's a train. And so we went to church that Sunday and they had a guest preacher and he pointed us to and brought us up and everyone else was up at the altar

and he looked at me and he said hey it's a light and I'm like oh god thank you and I'm like why did you say that and he's like I don't know I felt like I needed to give you that message and I'm like oh thank you Jesus for those of you who don't know it's a light at the end of the tunnel that is not an oncoming train,

as the phrase we say around here all the time. So that puts that whole thing into context. Wow, you guys. Amazing, amazing, amazing. If I could say one thing to the people listening out there, there are a lot of debt-free calls and debt-free people, and I don't want to take away from any of it, but six years is a long

time. We went through a lot over those six years. We cash flowed a bunch of surgeries. There were a lot of ups and downs, but we always stayed committed. I just want to tell those people that are listening out there that don't lose the faith. You can keep pushing. It will happen.

Be intentional about everything that you do with your money. Amen. Bobby and Michelle in Spurge, Virginia. $140,000 paid off in six years, making $29,000 to $85,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We are debt-free!

We are debt free! That's what it sounds like after six years right there. Amazing. Oh, so much. So much. Rachel Cruz, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Best-selling author, number one best-selling author of several books. Her latest is Know Yourself, Know Your Money, New York Times best-selling book. Discover why you handle money the way you do and what to do about it. Now, your money conversations are about to get a lot easier. Rachel just launched the Know Yourself Money Assessment. The assessment will guide you to lasting progress toward your money goals and better money communication.

How does it do that, Rachel? Yes. Well, it's an assessment, which I love assessments. If you read the book, you know, at the beginning, I talk about understanding myself more. And you can do that, you know, through whether it's the Enneagram or DISC or Myers-Briggs. But even just taking a test, I'm like, oh, when you read the report, you're like, that's me. That's me. I love it because it gives so much insight.

So after doing this book, I was like, I want people to be able to have these conversations because the book revolves so much around your money tendencies, your dreams, your fears, how you grew up with money, all of that. And to be able to have it in a place that you can read your results of who you are around money, I think was just so important for yourself. But also, if you're married, if you have parents that you talk to about money, your kids, I mean, all of it. So it's a very relational type of tool to use for yourself, but also if you are married specifically. So it takes 15 minutes. You answer a bunch of questions and then you get a 30 page personalized version of all your results.

And if you take it with someone like with a spouse, then their results are on your results page as well. So you can kind of match up to see, okay, where are we on the same page? Where are we different? All of it. Yeah. Why do you make decisions the way you do? Are you scarcity? Are you abundance?

Are you a saver? Are you a spender? Nerd, free spirit. What are your money fears versus your spouse's money fears? And our team that built this, this product is over-the-top incredible. I'm so proud of the 30 pages that it spits out for you because it's going to have a line, and there sits your little picture, your husband's little picture, your wife's little picture, whatever. And you're looking right there, and you're going, oh, yeah, I kind of knew that,

but this kind of gives verbiage to it. And then you can talk about it. It becomes a communication tool. Know yourself, you know, is number one. Then number two, you've got to know your spouse. And you know why they do this. And, you know, when your mom is a saver and when she has that tendency towards saving, she's really not trying to kill all the fun right right right i just have

to remember that sometimes right that's right yeah and and to understand the why too so it kind of gets down very granular in all of that which is which is so fun so yeah you can take it obviously if you're married with your spouse or even just by yourself if you're single out there and you just want to understand more of how you're wired with money, you can take this assessment. Let me tell you, this is one of the best things that we have put out in a long time, and I urge every one of you to run over right now, take this assessment very quickly. It's at RamseySolutions.com.

It is the Know Yourself Money Assessment. Know Yourself Money Assessment. And we're not charging that much for it. What's the price on it? It's not on here. You don't know. The price point changed it to look at to see how many quantities. Yeah, we moved it around because I was arguing with them about the price.

Okay. Because it's really very, very reasonable. I do know that. So be sure and check it out. RamseySolutions.com, the Know Yourself Money Assessment. Mark is in Traverse City, Michigan. Hey, Mark, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave.

Hi, Rachel. How are you doing? Big fans. My wife and I use your principles, and thank you so much for everything that you've done for my wife and my family's life, first of all. Well, thank you. How can we help? Well, my wife and I are in baby steps four, five, and six right now.

We make about $130,000, $140,000 a year, and we've pooled up a bunch of cash right now to pay for my first vehicle post baby steps one through three. I'm replacing my beater essentially right now. And we have about $30,000 saved up right now to buy a half-ton pickup truck that we're looking for. But as you know, the housing market and the vehicle market are almost identical on the supply and demand issue that's having with it right now. And I'm a little leery about trying to buy a vehicle that I feel is overvalued anywhere between $5,000 and $8,000 only to have the supply chain issue get corrected in this fall. Do you have any opinions on the vehicle market right now in regards to that question? I don't have any opinions that would be based in fact-only feelings,

so I will qualify it with that. But as you've already ascertained, those of us in business have observed that when the factories quit making new things, the supply of new things was gone, meaning new cars. You can't find a new car. Certain brands, you still can't find them. They've cranked the factories back up, but you still haven't gotten them all the way to the car lots. And when there's no new cars available, guess what that does?

It sends all the new car buyers into the used car market where the used car buyers already were. Now you've got twice as many people, give or take, chasing the same number of cars. That is going to drive price up artificially until the marketplace gets some equilibrium, meaning that the supply of new comes in again and relaxes the strain on the used car market, relaxing the pricing. I don't know when that is. I'll give you a wild guess, but it's worth what you paid for it. I'm just telling

you i have no idea i'm gonna guess and say by fall you're gonna get equilibrium in that market it may take longer in housing but the and specifically trucks i mean mark honestly my team we were just doing a deep dive on specific used section cars suvs minivans like we've done these studies and found oh you actually have some information. Well, no, no. Well, just to say that trucks has been our hardest sector of car. I don't even know how you would say it. Vehicle.

Type of car. Because they do not lose their value. I mean, trucks hold their value. Well, they do, but not as much. Not as much. But, I mean, like, honestly, as we've done research to find good quality used trucks, we've been looking around the $25,000 mark, and they're hard to find. So when you said trucks specifically, for whatever reason. That's even more so, because probably, honestly, construction's put a strain on them.

Yeah, yeah. That's probably true. The other side of this coin is that I have the current beater that I'm driving around right now. It's a 2007. You know, I'm having to put a little bit of money into it to keep it going, and so I'm just trying to figure out when should I just metaphorically pull the trigger on buying the vehicle, regardless of its perceived value right now, and I guess that's where I'm struggling. What's your household income?

I keep putting money in, $130,000, $140,000. Okay. So if you overpay by $5,000, it does not end your life? No, it does not. So, you know, none of these are going to end your life. So it's just a matter, it's almost like a game now. It's just, you know, when do I buy this? Because I just want it, and by God, I have the money now, now that I'm out of debt.

And it's not the end of the world. It's not like, you know, if you were going to say you were going to lose 50 grand making 130, we've got to stop and think about this a long time. But five grand, I don't want to waste $5,000, but $5,000 over the scope of the next decade really does not affect you. Yeah, yeah, I agree with you. Yeah, so at some point the stress is over and you go, I got the money, I'm buying it. That's what my wife would say.

Yeah, and I don't know when. No, I'm just saying. I'm not saying that points today. It might be you say, okay, I'm going to drive this thing until the end of August or until it gives me one more repair equal to X, and then I'm out of here because I'm done screwing with this thing. Or whatever. You could put a timeline on it.

You could put a money amount on the beater repair on it and let that be your trigger to cause you to jump ship and go do the deal um or you could say i'm just waiting on these dadgum things to come back down and then i'll do it you know you could go you can put the trigger on it wherever you want but the point is if you really mess this up you didn't mess up anything bad right right given your ratios and your overall situation so pan back and look at the scope of your life pan back and look at the other thing and and go how much longer or you know and then that that frees you up to start looking for a reasonably priced truck today and at any time you found one you could just do it you don't

have to say i'm not going to be in the market. Right. You know, like housing market's kind of crazy. You don't have to say, I'm not going to be in the market. But you can say, I'm not going to bid up to $50,000 over what those houses are going for. Just to get in line with the 43 other people that are white hot and have the fever. It's crazy. You can say, I'm not going to get in that line, but I'm also going to kind of keep poking around.

I might stumble into a deal. I might find a sweet little old lady who wants to sell it to a guy just like me. And that's what you're looking for, right? You do find those things, and you don't find them if you're not out there wandering around. Just what you want to avoid is getting the fever. It's the fever that will get you. That puts this hour of the Ramsey Show in the books. Hey, it's Kelly, associate producer and phone screener for The Ramsey Show.

If you would like to do your debt-free screen live on the show, make sure you visit theramseyshow.com and register. We would love for you to come to Nashville and tell Dave your story. Thank you.