The Ramsey Show - App - Bad Money Habits and Good Relationships Don’t Mix

Episode Date: November 28, 2024

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Dr. John Deloney, number one best-selling author a couple times over and host of the Dr. John Deloney Show, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Madison is with us to start off this hour in Atlanta, Georgia. Hi, Madison. Welcome to the show. Hi, Dave.

Hi, John. Thank you so much for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So I'm in a predicament that I've actually made myself. I got married, second marriage for both of us, not quite six years ago. And at that time, I had been through a pretty bad divorce and had a pretty traumatic first marriage. So definitely was healing from that and met this wonderful man, so nice to me and kind to me. And I just felt head over heels in love with him. Um, I knew he was broke. I knew he didn't have any money and that, that just didn't matter to me. He was just so nice to

me and I loved being treated nice. So, um, we got married. Um, I did have him sign a prenup because I was, uh, expecting to inherit a large amount of money from my parents' estate at some point. I hadn't at that time, but I knew that that would be in the future. And so he did sign a prenuptial agreement and didn't have any problems with that. However, I started our relationship with just paying all the time. I paid for everything. We'd go out for dinner, I would pay. I already had a place where I lived that I paid for and, you know, et cetera, et cetera. So I understand how I've kind of set a pattern. And at the time, it didn't bother me.

And, you know, I also want to add this man's a Christian man. He knows the Word of God. You know, we really, I really have put this in God's hands and asked for his help. But I just, I just can't figure out where, why there's just, there's no spirit of generosity with him. He just, I've brought up several times, you know, can you please pitch in, just kick in. I don't expect half and half. I have plenty of money. I don't need his money. It's just on principle, I just need to know that I'm not just the only one that's supporting us. I feel like I'm the breadwinner. So he doesn't earn an income? He did. We are both retired now. He does not have any retirement. How old are you, Dash?

I'm 60. He's 64. He took Social Security early. He was working at that time, and then when you start taking Social Security, you can only work so many hours. You can only make so much money. So that knocked his availability down to where he really couldn't work very much. But since then, we've both retired and relocated. So what do you feel like the core question is? I think I'm just trying to figure out if I'm being taken advantage of.

Is this just something where I'm being, you know, I've brought something up several times and I just, nothing changes, nothing, it just stays the same. And I don't know if I, well, I guess what my next step should be. Hold on, this isn't a money issue. This is a respect issue.

You don't respect the man that you're married to because like i i bring home i i i bring home a quote-unquote income to the house but my wife my god almighty if she disappeared the house would go away so i don't look at her and say wow you're not contributing to this thing and I'm paying for dinner all the time because my money is our money right and and the home that she keeps and runs and her small business like that's ours too but there's a mutual respect there so this doesn't have to do with money and you mentioned earlier you don't want a thing. You don't want your marriage to be where you're paying for everything. It is.

That is the world you set up. So the only thing you can do from this point forward is to create something new. But this is a respect issue. This isn't a, I just need him to pitch in issue. Have you been very clear about what you need? Or has it been a, ah, you know, like, man, I sure am paying for a lot. And he might be thinking, well, it's our money. Have you been very clear with him? I'm, I'm not, no, I'm, I'm very afraid of confrontation. I get very

nervous about, uh, talking about something like this. And then you end up in resentment land because you spend a ton of time having imaginary conversations in your head don't you yes yes that's cruel and unfair to him and doubt yes so if you're going to be mad on your brain too yeah if if you're going to be mad at him he at least deserves to know what he could do give him a path back to relationship because right now he married somebody with a lot of money, and he might think he's fulfilling his duties as your husband by being the fun-loving guy that just whatever, whatever, partridge in a pear tree.

He needs to know you don't respect him. Yeah. I do love him, and I don't want anything to end. What does he need to do to be a person that you would respect? Because he doesn't need to work. You guys are retired. No. It's not a work ethic thing.

What is it that he's supposed to do that makes him valid in your mind? I think just pitching in, say, I don't know, $1,000 a month, something. Pitch in from what? Where's he got money? He has Social Security money, and he gets other money. So you guys don't have your finances combined at all? We do have a joint checking account, but he's never put any money in it. So, no.

But does he have an avenue to do that? He could, yeah. He could put money in there yeah because he's on the he's on the account but if he's looking at your vast amount of money in that account and he looks at his piddly his piddly um government check yeah see what i'm saying like he needs to know and i again i I think he's going to put $1,000 in that account, and that's not what the issue is going to be. Yeah. If he started depositing $1,000 a month in that account, you'd be right back here in six months.

I don't know if I would be. I don't. It's really, to me, it's like you just said. It's not about money. It's more about respect. And I think because this has gone on for so long and, you know, I've allowed it to go on so long and this pattern's been set now, I want to rewrite the rules, I guess. Well, since y'all are married, y'all get to rewrite them together. Right.

And so I think it's a matter of sitting down and having a conversation and say, hey, we've been married for a few years. I need you to do this to have me have positive, respectful feelings towards you. And what can I do for you so that you can have positive, respectful feelings towards me? Yeah. Let's put all of it on the table. Let's give each other a chance for success. Yeah. A hundred percent of what you don't say, he can't hear. Right. Yeah. I've been married 43 years.

I'm still working on that. Dave, I am too, man. I am too. The things that are in Sharon's head that I have never heard are amazing. But you're in trouble for them. I'm always in trouble. You better fix them. What's wrong?

Nothing. This is The ramsey show thanks for joining us america dr john deloney ramsey personality is my co-host today we appreciate you guys hanging out hey if you like what you hear around here we could use your help please help us subscribe click the subscribe button click the share button or share a link or tell somebody where you're listening or watching or wherever it is, you're YouTubing or TBNing or whatever it is you're doing. You know, Spotify, right?

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Hi, Shay. Hi. view please we'd appreciate it very much shay is whether shay is in daytona hi shay hi um so just to cut right to the chase i just took out my first student loan ever um super nerve-wracking it's for my master's in social work and it's about 45 000 that's without the interest so i'm just trying to figure out what's a great path to start on that, like how to tackle it super fast because I don't want to be with this debt for like 10 years. You just took out your first loan for a semester or you just finished a degree program and you have $45,000 in the hole? No. So it's like $6,000 a semester, but they just gave it all to me at once.

So it's $45,000 is what they gave me at once. Who's they? I've never heard of that ever. It's financial aid, FAFSA. So they just cut you a check and deposit it for $45,000? Well, not into my bank. It goes directly to my school. And then they start paying it that way

so it's already given to my school and my school just takes it out okay so you're starting your master's and you just finance the whole thing well i hear dave i bet what's happened is i bet they have you've been approved for the entire program i bet they don't have a check for 40 i bet your university doesn't have a check for $45,000 because they wouldn't prepay like that. Because you could quit, you can drop out, it could be a whole thing. But my guess is you were approved for the program and the school gave you a letter that said you've qualified for $45,000 in federal aid and every semester you're going to have to re-up and re-up and re-up and re-up.

Okay. That's my guess as to what happened. I've never heard the government prepay. So you're just starting your master's yes you're spending 45 000 to get a master's in social work to make what kind of money not enough it's about 90 grand which would be salary yeah the Yeah, the salary for it. There's no way you'll make $90,000. That is the salary in Florida for it. Where? Right now. I work at a hospital.

And a starting social worker with an LMSW makes $90,000? Not starting out, no. But I've been doing social work and case management and all that stuff for years so with the experience and once i get it they're going i'm already making 15 right now so they're bumping it up wow i've that's that's extraordinary i'm good for them because that's that's a that's a field that needs more people that drastically is usually underpaid i would i as a as a guy who's, I've taught graduate school and mental health programs. I've lived this world.

What I would plead to you is to, you make $50,000 a year. I would cut back for the next three years and cashflow this program. Please, please, please don't chain yourself to the federal government and then try to go into a serving profession.

It's a recipe for burnout, and it's just going to melt you from the inside out. Please don't do this. Yeah. Yeah, that was one of my big fears. It's just like, I definitely don't want it lingering for so long, too. And when it comes to money, I just have really bad anxiety over it. The way it doesn't linger is you don't take it.

Don't take it. Don't take the check. Pay cash for your degree is what John's saying. $6,000 a semester. Go pay it outright for the three semesters plus your 3,000 hours, whatever you have to do. Your hospital not got any financial matching for education? No, because I'm not a nurse. They only have it for nurses.

Okay. And what enticed me to it was because they said at first that they would, and then when I got here, they said, oh, sorry, no, it's just for nurses. Yeah, I'd find another place to work, too, while you're at it. I'm serious, 100% serious. If they're going to lure you in and then they're going to bait and switch you, that's a company without integrity. I wouldn't work for them.

Gotcha. And I know this is a radical shift, but I would go to the school and say, hey, I need my semester by semester cost. And they're probably going to tell you, well, it depends if you take six or nine hours, whatever, and say, what is a full-time and what is a part-time student going to cost? And then you make $50,000 a year until you find another job where you'll make $60,000. I want you to cash flow this program. cost, and then you make $50,000 a year until you find another job where you'll make $60,000. I want you to cash flow this program. So what we're trying to tell you is that uneasy feeling inside of you when you're called is real. It's right. And it's telling you, don't do this.

And we're telling you, it's right. Don't do it. The best way to get this degree is pay cash for it and, you know, look for someone, maybe another employer that pays $90, 90 when you're out, but also will help with the education like this one promised, but it was reneged on. And so let's do a couple of things here that are pretty radical. But if you kind of just, you sound pretty chill, and if you kind of just allow all this to happen to you, it's going to step on your face.

Don't allow this to happen. You need to stand up, square your shoulders, and head straight into this with your teeth, you know, with a warrior yell, girl. I mean, you need to get after it. John's in Jackson, Mississippi. Hey, John, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave, how's it going? Better than I deserve.

What's up? I have a question about getting an SBA loan to purchase a business. What's your thoughts on that? Never. Never? Never, under any circumstances. Okay. It's a disaster.

Why would you buy a small business? Well, so I travel 10 months out of the year, and my wife stays at home with kids, and it's a taxing life. Yeah. We're trying to find a happy medium for everybody, and we stumbled what we think is a good opportunity, per se. What is the industry that the business you're looking at is in? Making signs. Okay, and how much is the purchase?

Approximately $1.2. Million.2 million dollars yes sir for a signed franchise it's not a franchise it's a person that started the business and he's looking to retire okay all right um let me give you a different way to skin this cat maybe okay but um let me uh 80 percent of small businesses fail in the first five years okay the number one cause of small business failure when we survey them and we work with 10 000 small businesses and entree leadership right now is what's called cash flow problems cash flow problems is a uh a phrase that means a lot of things, but it primarily means two things. I can't pay my debt payments, and I didn't pay my taxes on time,

and I get screwed by the federal government. And so you're going to have a million-two floating around your neck trying to drag you down while you're trying to run a business this guy's already been running for a few years. And that's like trying to swim with an anchor tied around your ankle. It's a bad plan. So let's go at this a different way. What is the net profit on his business?

He pays himself a salary. No, what's the net profit on the business? On average over the last uh four years is around 250 okay a million two is a little rich yeah okay we know that part of it we're just we're in the beginning process we're trying to figure out here's how i have here's how i've taught some people who hand the business to the next generation and want to be bought out, or they have the employee or a buyer like you that want to be bought out. I don't want you to get payments on a million, too,

and Fauci decide we're having another quarantine. Me neither. Okay, that'll put you into bankruptcy court, sir. It did a bunch of people. Because nobody making signs, they were making plexiglass, but they weren't making signs. So you were screwed if you'd done this two years ago. So learn a lesson from that. Now what you can do is agree to pay him 80 or 90% of the profits after you take a basic small salary out until he gets his million.

And about a million is about what it's worth but if you make 250 000 a year on it and you gave him 90 of it you'd have him paid out in four and a half years versus getting a loan per se exactly and he'd get his money really really fast that way but you're living on a wage to get till you get him off your back. But if profits go down, you're only committed to give him a percentage of profits. So you're not, you're not bankrupt. Then SBA will come take your house, dude. What does the future hold for business? Ask nine experts and you'll get 10 different answers. Economic growth or a recession. Business taxes will go up or down. AI will help us work or it will replace us all. But there's no such thing as a crystal ball. That's why more than 40,000 businesses have

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Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today hey guys we would love your help and if you'd like to help us here's how you can pretty simple doesn't cost you a thing but a few moments of your time subscribe to this show when you're listening on podcast or youtube click the follow button or the subscribe button whatever it is uh make sure you share the show and that can be clicking a share button or it could be that you clip the link and send it to somebody and say, hey, listen to this show. Make sure you leave a five-star review. Hit the likes.

All those kinds of things like that really help drive the algorithms that push the show to the front of the various platforms that we're on, and we're on almost everything. So thank you for being there. We appreciate you. We know that there's a bazillion of you new in the past six months based on our numbers and our data analytics and so forth. Thank you for showing up. We're glad you're here, but help us by sharing, subscribing, following, and leaving five-star reviews. Justin is in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Hey, Justin,

welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, thank you, Dave and John. It is awesome to talk to y'all. I'm excited. Absolutely. How can we help? So my wife and I are on baby step two, and we're trying to get really gazelle intense to pay off our debt. And I wanted to see if you and Dr. John could speak to the physical and mental challenge of working 80 to 90 hours a week. On the physical side being like, you know, fatigue, lack of sleep, and on the mental side, you know, your mind is telling you to call it a day when you still need to grind out, you know, those last few hours to make a really good week. Why are you losing sleep? You have plenty of sleep time left. Well, I guess like, you know, a day you work 16 hours and you have, you know, an hour commute and, you know, eating

and stuff like that. You may get, you know, five to six. And on a longer day, you know, you may get four hours of sleep. I often see folks try to continue the life they were living before they went gazelle intense and they tried to squeeze it in meaning i used to watch um all the shows well now i have to just watch my two and there's an hour right there or there's an hour and a half and i want to go to every single little league game well during gazelle intensity you're gonna probably have to miss some games because you gotta work some shifts and that's okay because you're playing a longer game but i would wonder

how much how much all in are you yeah that if there's some of that and yeah you check your actual time audit on where your actual hours are going um number one um then sleep is necessary the second thing though is is you're not asking yourself to do this long term this is a short sprint right it's not a it's not this is not sustainable for five years um that's not what we're asking ourselves to do and i got a feeling just in talking to you that you have done uh in the past maybe in sports or something else you've done something where you stretched yourself to a limit and um if you have if you're a person who's done that you've experienced what with any of us that have done that uh physical or mental or otherwise you never

return to the same shape after that. That's the benefit of the stretch. Yes, sir, I have. God has really blessed me with a body that can handle a lot. Yeah. And so, you know, once you've done a half marathon, you've done a marathon, you've done whatever the thing is that pushed you physically and mentally or whatever, then it changes your level of confidence. It changes the way your swagger, the way you look at the world after that

because you accomplish the goal and, you know, you break the tape and you go on through. So that's the way that I have done it. Number one, I look at it as a short-term play, and so it's not going to kill me because right before you die from hard work, you pass out. Don't worry about it. I mean, it's okay. so it's not going to kill me because right before you die from hard work you pass out don't worry about it i mean it's okay so but the uh so it's not gonna kill me and uh it's short term and then the second thing is is that i'm gonna get more benefits than just the money in this case you're doing it to make a lot of money to get out of debt okay but i'm gonna get character benefits emotional psychological, psychological, spiritual benefits, even relational benefits.

Because as a couple, we now know we can do things we didn't know we could do before. As an individual, I now know I can do that. Because before I did. And it gives me a different level of, well, if I can do that, then I can do another thing. And if I can do that, then I can do another thing. And that's what this is versus being the typical fat american sitting on their couch watching netflix and never stretches themselves at all and justin there's some incredible neuroscience that is obviously this doesn't um you can't you

can't game then or hack this system but you've known people who get under a squat bar and they feel that weight and they get that weird smile. And there's been people who get under that bar and it's like, ah, too heavy. And they get off. One of those people says, this pain is going to be worth this. Watch this. And then the other person says, I need to opt out of this pain right now. And so there's, it's the, your mindset as you're driving home, you can be like, I'm so tired. I hate all you can be like, I'm so tired. I hate all this is the worst. I'm so tired. I just clicked another click. How long you been married? We've been married five years. How's she doing with all this?

Um, that's interesting. You asked that, uh, one of the other kind of hard things for me is like, say that she has a day off and I'm at work you know when it's those last few hours when i still got you know four hours left and i'm already tired and she sends me a text like you know i miss you ready to see you i'm thinking myself i'm like man i'm ready to see you too i want to come home but i'm like you know i need to stay here another few hours yeah it's like i know you lost 50 pounds but here's some fresh baked cookies but also also again that's your bro, because she's reaching out saying, I want you to know I'm not at work with you, but I'm in this with you. Right.

And it's real easy for you to be like, oh, yeah. You know what I mean? So do your best to, I mean, you're all in a short sprint. Do your best to roll that out. The good news is she's not she's not whining about she's not going ha ha ha oh yeah you never you're never home with me why aren't you ever home with me she's not doing that to you she just said man i miss you i wish you were here because i'm i'm married to a country girl it's a hillbilly and if they learned one thing at her

house growing up it was unbelievable hard work she has no patience for people that won't work hard especially if it was her husband and so i got the opposite i'm like get your butt out of here and get this mess cleaned up what's wrong with you you know and so it was she kicked me out the door you know and so occasionally now when i don't need to work she's like would you go to work and get away you know like and so um you know so the uh uh but she but that so i had the benefit of a spouse that was beyond supportive supportive is not the correct term she supported you with her foot with her foot yeah that's it but i mean you know in your case you've got a sweet one that's being sweet and saying i i miss you but i'm proud of you so you might even tell her that just go hey listen

when you do that it it makes me not angry with you, but it makes me angry with this whole situation. It makes it hard to work five more hours. So if you would do that and just add to the end of it, I'm proud of you. You got this. It sure would help me. When my wife was pregnant with Josephine after we had had Hank, she gave me a list.

It was not a long list, but it was a short list. But she gave me a list of questions I was not allowed to ask in the hospital when she was in labor. And I said, why did you do this? And she said, because I know you love me. And I know you're going to ask, how are you feeling? Does that hurt? Are you okay? Do you need anything?

And she said, when you ask those questions. It makes me want to strangle you. I want to set my eyeballs on fire. Just enough to look at your face. Your eyeballs on fire. Right. So she said, the best way you can love me is don't do this. I'll let you know if I need something.

And so I think for you, just like Dave just said, if you let her know, hey, when you reach out, man, I know you're telling me that you're proud of me, you love me, but it just makes me hate being at work, which makes me hate myself and makes me hate all this. Can you just text me and say, I'm so proud of you? And I'll know that you miss me. When you're running the stadium stairs, you have no memory of doing that when you look at the scoreboard at the end of the Super Bowl and you won. Or you make that catch, yeah. You have no memory of running the stadium stairs.

Your brain allows you to do only the celebration. Justin, you're a stud, man. I'm proud of you. And I think you're going to be okay. The good news is you're smart enough to talk about it and say, I'm tired. You're smart enough to even take a look. Okay, I got to take a day. I'm done. I got to take at least a day. I can't breathe. You know where your limits are, but pushing those limits is not a permanent thing. It's not a way of life. It's a moment in time and the benefits are going to exceed the pain. I can promise you

live like no one else so that later you can live and give like no one else. There's a time in your life and in the baby steps for renting, but you don't want to do it forever because when you rent, you're still paying for a mortgage, just somebody else's. Plus, rent means instability in your budget because it always goes up, never down. So when you're ready to buy, make sure you work with a mortgage partner you can rely on. Churchill Mortgage. Churchill is Ramsey trusted to help you make the move from renting to home ownership wisely. Churchill understands that when you buy a home the Ramsey way, your mortgage payment will be a consistent, manageable part of your

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that up just a few minutes ago and i couldn't take credit for it because actually blake made it up and james found the old comedy bit you have does it a date on it? It doesn't, but I would believe early 2000s. It's got to be 20 plus years. Yeah. It's over 20 years ago. Easy. It was before there was color on TV, wasn't it? All right.

Here's from over 20 years ago what the Ramsey show, then called the Dave Ramsey show, might have sounded like. Nationally syndicated talk radio host Dave Ramsey show might have sounded like. Nationally syndicated talk radio host Dave Ramsey has often said that there is no magic pill for getting out of debt. Well, sorry, Mr. Ramsey, but there is. And it's called Detanol. Detanol is a 100% all natural drug that is guaranteed to control your spending and control your desire to overspend. One pill a day and you will no longer feel the need to spend money you don't have. We have created this drug because we care about you. Detanol, the pill that cares. Minor side effects may include fatigue, headache,

nervousness, sore throat, explosive diarrhea. Insomnia. I can't sleep. Drowsiness. Okay, stay awake. Horrible nightmares. Gastronomical trauma. Oh, my. Hallucinations. That rabbit just said my name.

Chronic halitosis. Woo! A slight cough and a runny nose. Detonol. Brought to you by the Credit Card Association of America. Credit. The easy way. Oh, this show used to be so good dave what happened

well we brought on co-hosts and co-hosts got rid of blake the good old days you used to walk uphill both ways in the snow yeah that was probably done on a cassette tape actually i'm trying to think to think. I know the voice on the disclaimers, Blake. The other voice, what I think was. Bill Hampton. Is Bill Hampton? Yeah. Is it?

Okay. So, yeah, that's, it's over 20 years then. It might be 25 years old. Yeah, that's funny. I don't care who you are. Still works, though. Timeless. No.

Timeless. All right. We'll have five orders on the RamseySolutions.com store. I guarantee somebody will ask for it. They can't find it on the website. Oh, you guys were advertising. Jordan is in Los Angeles. Hi, Jordan.

How are you? I'm doing well, Dave. Thank you. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? Yeah, so I just have a couple questions because I'm in just like a constant financial panic, anxiety, yeah. So I just have a couple of questions because I'm in just like a constant financial panic, anxiety, worry. A lot of it stemming from the environment outside of me. Um, I can go into

numbers with everything from personally in a bit, I'll give you a little background. So I, I had like a, uh, I did have a lot of early success in my late teens, early 20s. I'm now 27 within the entertainment industry and also just working my butt off. I've always been a good saver. And then unfortunately, COVID hit, which shut down my little role I had going on. And then also at the same time, I came down with a pretty severe debilitating underlying disease of Cushing's disease, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis that has developed throughout the years. So all of that has just led me to think that what is my future going to look like? Because it's very hard for me to do physical labor. My work right now is pretty limited. And I've just been stuck in this rut of,

I don't want to, I'm anxious to, when I have to spend something as small as like putting 20 bucks in for gas, all the way up to my rent, I'm just living in this fear and panic for my future. And I've been trying to think of an income stream because of my ailments. It makes it very difficult. And I've always been stuck going.

So that's what's frustrating because my body is holding me back I have like that entrepreneur mindset but I just don't know what it is for me Jordan how do you think we can best help you today son um I I don't know how to manage what to do with the money I currently have okay um. Um, what, how much money do you currently have? So I have, I'm incorporated, I incorporated when I was younger after I got a pretty nice job. Um, I have a, uh, in my business checking right now, I have, uh, about 24,500. I opened up a business CD, which has about 92,000 in there. I have a checking account of 8,000 right now. I have a savings account of 52,500. I have a checking CD of 40,600. Um, I have, I, uh, I, I did have, I wasn't a mutual fund when I was younger and there was some issues with the, the accountant who was advising it. Um, And so those got liquidated.

And during my time when I was young, I just watched a bunch of videos. And, of course, I bought a bunch of precious metals with a lot of that. How much is that? I have about 40 ounces of gold and 900 ounces of silver, which I believe right now is close to $100,000 total. Okay. So you've got about $100,000 total. Okay. So you've got about $400,000. Are you making any money?

Currently, and I do also have, I opened up a robo-advisor in Schwab recently because I just felt like I was just doing nothing with my money. Do you have a house, man? Where do you live? I live in Los Angeles. I'm still renting. Do you have an income? At the moment, I do not. I live in Los Angeles. I'm still renting. Do you have an income? At the moment, I do not.

I'm in SAG. Okay. Nobody's working, yeah. Yeah, and my disease makes it difficult. I would be willing to bet, just friend to friend, you struggled with anxiety when you were younger, right? It started in my late teens, yes. What's the first time you remember that your body kind of took off on you and it scared you uh in terms of my

health or my anxiety you both because they work together um yeah well uh about 20 years 19 19 years old my anxiety took off my health ailments kicked in a couple years later yeah and that's and and and again i don't want to get over my skis here and this this we could talk for hours on it but a autoimmune body is a body that is so red lined out that it's been trying to shut you down for a long time and it will find another way to shut you down right because it's it's tired of it's tired of fighting and swinging and running from everything and that's what you just described right and when you struggle with anxiety as a younger kid it sometimes looks different than it does when you're an adult but then when you take that angst and then you go put it up on a

stage or on a screen and all those voices telling you what how to look and what to stand and what you shouldn't do and where you should go man that's just a uh that's like taking a blender and putting it inside of a you know a jet engine right and spinning that sucker up and it doesn't surprise me a that you've been very very successful because you're clearly brilliant and you have been able to keep some of the anxiety demons at bay through achievement and accomplishment and attaboys. And it also doesn't surprise me that your body said, I'm shutting you down. I caught up with you. Yeah. Does that sound familiar?

Oh, very. It's very frustrating because, again, I will work and do whatever I have to do. Here's what's important. I don't think you're afraid of work. Yeah, no, you work. Dave's going to talk to you about the money. I want you to know that if you follow Dave's steps and clean up all your money and that's all you do you're gonna go with you on that journey and you're gonna have cleaned up money and you're gonna have an ounce of security

there and then your brain's gonna leapfrog to the next thing and you know that right because it's been leapfrogging on you for years yeah yeah so what what you've you while you've been an incredible income earner and it's apparent that you've done something that uh had incredible talent because people paid you a lot of money for it uh so uh what you'd never had in any of these situations is a sense of control you didn't feel like you're you felt like even though you had a big old pile of money you still didn't feel like it're you felt like even though you had a big old pile of money you still didn't feel like it was all in control and it still today doesn't feel like it's in control so i think there's probably a two-pronged approach here and that would be you called on the perfect day with dr john deloney here is um you're getting a sense of control in your life a sense of

the chaos pushed back and you choosing to set up really firm boundaries with a whole bunch of things and say, this is what I do, this is what I don't do, this is what I do, this is what I don't do, and you've got some very clear kind of a black and white type response to everything, because your creative brain allows you to work out about 73 scenarios simultaneously instead of yes or no. And you just need to get real simplified and go to yes or no. And so no, we don't do precious metals. Let's go ahead and cash those out and get those into cash. No, we don't walk around with no income. So let's try to figure out something we can put our hand to um yes we're going to send you a book called own your past change your future from dr john

deloney read through that because there's a whole lot of what's going on in that book is going on with you we'll send a building an unanxious life too i think that would be a good book for him we get it out of here yeah okay good let's send them both of those and throw in a total money makeover book. We'll help you with the money part too. But it's controlling the controllables that's going to get this moving. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, you guys.

I'm not a fan of the big banks, and you probably already know which ones I mean. But I do like credit unions because they're non-profit organizations that focus on their members. And I'm proud to endorse Fairwinds Credit Union because they share the Ramsey mission of helping people get out of debt and live generously. In fact, they design products to help keep you from going into debt in the first place. Fairwinds has been in business for over 75 years, and they serve hundreds of thousands of members worldwide. You can feel secure because your deposits are federally insured by the NCUA up to $250,000. It's easy to join, and Fairwinds partners with more than 5 000 credit union locations around

the country so you can bank in person wherever you live but if you prefer the online experience you can log on to fairwinds and do anything you could do at a physical location so go to fairwinds.org slash Ramsey to learn more. And while you're there, look at the combined checking and savings account bundle they created just for Ramsey fans to help you take control of your finances. That's fairwinds, F-A-I-R-W-I-N-D-S dot org slash Ramsey. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Dr. John Deloney, number one best-selling author, host host, Dr. John Deloney, number one best-selling author,

host of the Dr. John Deloney Show on the Ramsey Network, one of the more popular YouTube and podcasts in America today. He's my co-host, open phones at 888-825-5225. Jennifer is with us in San Antonio, Texas. Hi, Jennifer. Welcome to the to the ramsey show hi thanks for speaking with me today sure um i'm really appreciate it as i love you dave but i think my question is probably a little more for john so not to like hurt your ego or anything but i have hey he's got two phds i just have one and mine is in in his ego trust me it's doing just fine sorry sorry my bad i just i was like i never thought i called dave ramsey show and then not want to like totally focus on dave ramsey and papa dave you're so sweet you're awesome you're sweet how can we help i'll be okay how can john help um i'm calling because um so i had a bankruptcy

in 2021 and you know i'm debt free and well i'm debt free after you know paying um the kgb i mean irs and um and then i was one of the very few that had their public service. You know, I worked for the federal government, and I was one of the very few that had their loans forgiven. I worked for the federal government for 13 years, and I feel like a lot of shame. I feel shame about the bankruptcy, but then I also feel a lot of shame about the public service forgiveness in a way because, like, I mean, I took advantage of the program that was available to me.

And I'm proud of serving the government so long. But I guess I feel a little, I don't know. I tell people not to count on it all the time and that there's, you know, all the data shows that very few people are ever going to have it happen to them and don't want them to count on it you know i just happen to be in that window where it worked for me and so it's like i won the lottery but i'm like ashamed that i won it a little bit and yeah so jennifer jennifer i'm actually going to change direction a little bit is that okay okay yeah um when it comes to shame i can talk about it all day long but lucky for you you you have you call the number where there's more than just um academic answers i actually think the person you talk to is dave he's been there okay well see i have what do i know the two guys the guy with the phd doesn't know i can talk about

it but dave can talk from a lived experience, which is much more valuable. So what caused your bankruptcy? I made good money, but I have a disability, and I was only going to work like two weeks a month. After my brother died, the disability became so extreme. All these medical issues had come up. So even though I was following the Dave Ramsey plan, like...

Wait a minute, stop, stop. What's the nature of your disability, honey? I have major depressive disorder, and after my brother died, I became, like, suicidal, and it was real extreme. And so I... And you had debts that you couldn't pay because of that yes i was making bare minimum payments and then i went to the bishop to even get help so for a year about 18 months the bishop and i literally sat down at my church like every month

like how can we dig you out of this hole but the medical bills were still so high that I still couldn't even though I had this big shovel the medical bills just kept coming and then I couldn't I was really struggling to work over and over hey give me a favor Jennifer you take a real real real deep breath as deep as you can take it super deep and i want you to hold it for three two exhale there's a lot of people in the world that are giving you a lot of advice and running their mouth and telling you should be doing this and dave and i are not going to do that we're sitting here with you okay okay you don't have to i can i can hear you trying to outrun the shame in a circle right on the phone with us. You don't have to do that.

Okay. Okay? Here's the thing. We're with you. When I filed bankruptcy at 28 years old, the reason for my bankruptcy was I had borrowed too much money. I had borrowed it in such a way that it allowed the banks to come and take my freaking head off. It was my fault.

I don't think a person who has issues with depression, becoming depressed after the loss of their brother, is something you did wrong. So my actions were shameful. Your actions were not shameful. Well, I feel like the debt actions were shameful that I put myself in such a bad position. You were vulnerable because of that,

but you probably would have made it without bankruptcy if you hadn't been unable to work for a period of time. Yeah, the bishop said that. Actually, when we sat down, I mean, every month he's like, if you weren't so sick now, I think we could help you. Like he was helping me even with rent, you know. But at one point he said, you know, tithing and, you know, because we're stewards of the Lord's money, you know, he's like, this is a hand up, not a hammock, Kiesel. But every month I see that you're putting everything you can into pain, Kiesel. But I think this might be our only way out.

Okay, so let me ask you this. Yeah. It's obviously the loss of your brother, that tragedy is in the rearview mirror. Are you doing things to deal with the depression issues? Yes. So what I did in my case was I did some things to deal with my stupidity. And so I'm not going to make the same mistakes again, and therefore I don't have to sit and be wringing my hands about the shame

of the bankruptcy the bankruptcy in my case was caused by me so there was shame it was shame inducing for sure okay but the way I dealt with it to answer your question was I said okay how what steps do I have to take to be a different person that causes this to never happen again? If I take those steps, then the things in my rearview mirror, it's just one of the many stupid things I've done in my life that I don't have to do again. Yeah. And Jennifer, can we agree that sometimes you feel things and those feelings aren't true? Yes, that is true.

I know that to be true. I hope you're telling me that all the time. I know, but listen. Not all the time, but it does come up. Here's what you're going to do. I want you to keep a journal with you of the things you feel. When you feel like you're taking advantage of folks, and you feel like you should, I want you to write that down,

and I want you to hold it at arm's length and ask yourself, is this true? Okay. And I want you to be objective about it, because if you can't be objective, take it to your counselor, and say, is this true? Because the answer is you to be objective about it. Cause if you can't be objective, take it to your counselor and say, is this true? Cause the answer is going to be no. But when you have a feeling and you begin to believe that feeling, then your body's off to the races.

Yeah. Zero shame. Zero. For the, for the student loan forgiveness. No. And the shame on the, any part you had with irresponsibility,

you say, I'm not doing that anymore. Any part you had with irresponsibility, you say, I'm not doing that anymore. Any part you had with taking on too much debt, I'm not doing that anymore. But the depression taking you away from work, I'm not blaming you for that one, kiddo. That one's in your rearview mirror too, though. The beautiful thing about life is the rearview mirror is smaller than the windshield. That's called grace. Walk in that, kiddo. this is the ramsey show dr john deloney ramsey personality is my co-host today thanks for being with us america open phones at 888-825 two, five, five, two, two, five. Thanks for being here. Hey, based on our rankings,

we're in the top 10 podcasts in the entire world, top 15 podcasts in the entire world. Uh, and that has gone up recently, uh, based on our ratings on radio, uh, based on our Spotify and our Apple numbers and our YouTube numbers. There's a whole bunch of you that are new. Thank you. We're honored to have you in our audience. We will love you and we will tell you the truth.

And sometimes that will make you mad. Just be prepared because we love you and we will tell you the truth. That's what we do. And if you want to help us, we're not going to spend 300 million on marketing like uh so far we're not buying a uh like a football stadium or something allergies are bad this time of year and um but the uh if you want to help us you can subscribe follow the show whatever it is whichever way you do it click the subscribe button click the follow button click the share button and send it on send it on yeah send it on to them and uh good stuff let people know about leave us a five-star review mama said if you hang anything nice to say don't

say anything at all so five stars work thank you very much we're glad you're here we appreciate you being with us williams in san antonio texas remember the alamo what's up william oh good afternoon uh dave i uh had a rather unfortunate financial incident in our marriage happened last fall my wife uh got victimized in an internet fraud and not only lost a sizable amount of cash, but also took out some loans to help these people. And some of those were short-term credit card, things like buy and gift cards. And then there were two installment loans. One was for $23,500.

One was for $17,500. The rest of them, the smaller credit cards and such, I'm using the snowball method to take care of them, the smaller credit cards and such, I'm using the snowball method to take care of those, but I need advice on the installment loans. When it comes to this fraud, it's usually one of two things. Usually it's some sort of romantic interest or it's some sort of somebody crying out for help with medical assistance or some sort of injustice. What is it in your, in your, in your situation? Uh, uh, it would be, it would be the former, uh, my wife and I have been having, been having some, uh,

problems been together for 25 years, and things just kind of, I don't know, they happened, and I didn't see the warning signs. How's your marriage now? But it's much better. I've been getting therapy, and she has been too, and we've been making some inroads, man, just basic stuff like how we speak to each other.

I'm proud of you, man. That's hard. Well, here's the thing. I have a bunch of people tell me, well, I would divorce somebody that would do that, and I'm not going to throw away 25 years. I said I would make a full year as a concerted effort to get this thing turned around financially and emotionally, and part of the emotional thing is me. I realized I needed to do some work, and so we're both doing therapy,

and it seems to be benefiting. Well, you're a beacon of light for men who find themselves in emotional situations without the right tools and the toolkit, and you can do one of two things. You can just take up your toolkit and go home, or you can storm the gates of hell and try to find more tools, and that's what you're doing, man. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you.

Amen. Thank you. It's awesome. What's your household income, sir? Oh, $69,000. Okay. Does she work outside the home? No. We're both in our mid-70s.

No, we're both retired. Oh, boy. So there's money there to take care of the short-term stuff. What do you mean money? You have a nest egg? We still have some resources a 401k and I have some I have some money in my account All the debts are in her name. What is the how much money is in your account? $45,000 how much money is in your 401K? About the same.

And not counting these two installment loans, how much miscellaneous is there? The little credit card mosquitoes. Yeah, I'm going to say $9,000, $10,000. Okay. All right. Yeah, I'm going to say $9,000, $10,000. I've got an income tax refund check coming in. $2,000 is going to get knocked off for that. I would write a check out of yours today and pay off all the credit cards. That leaves the $40, 40 and close all the accounts okay now that is a gesture on your part towards the healing that you're searching for

the 40 is still sitting there we'll come back to that in a minute then i want to meet with her and her therapist and your therapist and however y'all are doing this marriage stuff and somehow you've got to get some checks and balances and start to incrementally rebuild trust that you're not throwing good money after bad and this doesn't happen again because in the back of your mind you're if i clean this out and this happens again i ain't got anywhere to go that's what's happening in the back of your mind. So you've got to know that this is solid going forward before you write any more big checks. But $9,000 in the scope of your life, you would pay that right now for healing. And I would. Yeah.

Yeah. Let's get rid of all the mosquitoes. Get it down to 17, 5, and 23, 5. And then let's just sit there with those two while we work on this relationship. And as your trust reaches closer to 100%, and that is going to require some demonstrations as well on her part and your part and healing and some time to rebuild. And as that is rebuilt and you approach 100% on that, then I'm going to start trying to figure out how to get those paid off. But right now, I want to clear the white noise, the clutter out of my mind with all these little bills.

Because every time you write a check on this, it picks the scab. It opens the wound. And I'm trying to get it down to right in just two checks that's very perceptive you're right now i mean i get pissed off all all over again every time you do this and you have to go through the whole process you've been doing in therapy start forgiveness again you start to have to go back through the whole thing and you just you start having all these conversations between your ears we all do this that's how i know i i wouldn't be guilty of it no not me but yeah but i mean yeah you write checks for things you're that remind you of bad things it's bad so dave at what point

does and again in service of choosing reality just owning this is where we find ourselves do two people in their 70s have to commit to going back to work for a year and earn another forty thousand dollars to pay these debts if she's of good health i mean i would talk to her therapist about this i'm not going to intervene in that but if she's of good health um sounds like both of them she's trying to re-earn trust. And, you know, I'm 12-stepping here. But, you know, make good, make amends. I think she goes back to work. Yeah.

And starts working on these other two loans. I think that's not because of financial, but just I think that's a representative movement towards owning this. It will give a place for that energy to go to. You know, make amends. It is a 12-step thing. And so you've got to go back and where you can correct the wrongs. It's part of being repentant or sorry, you know. And nobody wants to work in their 70s.

And that's where we find ourselves, right? And nobody wants to get scammed by a romance on the internet. But that's where we find ourselves. This is The Ramsey Show. Rachel, do you ever get these sketchy text messages that are like, hey, you need to update your address and verify so we can get you the package you didn't order? Yes, I have, George. Sketchy and never trust them. And that's why we recommend Delete.me. They help with that.

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It's amazing. So again, that's joindeleteeme.com slash Ramsey. Make sure to check it out, you guys. Thank you for joining us, America. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. The Ramsey show question of the day is brought to you by Y Refi. Student loan debt is a swamp of thousands of people and they find it hard to escape. So don't be another statistic in the student loan swamp. For distressed private student loans, there's YRefi.

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Marissa asks, how do you tell the difference between having the talent of compassion or discernment and the compulsion to help as a trauma response? Is it possible that a quote unquote talent may have developed as a survival mechanism and another talent not developed well due to trauma? I mean, my gut reaction here is it doesn't matter. It's an academic exercise. If you are helping other people to the point that you can't eat or stay whole or you are in an abusive relationship in order to keep other people from getting mad at you, then that's not healthy. I often say that the skills people learn when they're kids to survive can become some of the greatest skills professionally for them um but if if all it says doesn't matter i don't think it matters um am i missing the question dave no it feels like there's kind of two possible feelings for me. I mean, one is I don't trust a guy that doesn't walk with a limp.

Correct. So if you got it all together and you're perfect, you're full of crap, you scare me. If you survived? Yeah, but I went through bankruptcy. I lost everything because I was stupid, which informs my ability to do this. Right. stupid which informs my ability to do this right but i'm not doing it as a uh as a healing mechanism

to get over my past trauma i'm utilizing the that experience to give insight to the future that's a healthy way to do it yes i guess if you're doing it as a coping mechanism or you can be a parasite you can be a vampire using other people so that you feel better. That's a coping mechanism. You're not healed. Correct. Absolutely. So if the trauma, the damage from the trauma, the wound is what's driving this, I think that's a problem, isn't it? Yeah, and that's one of my rules is I don't talk about things.

You shouldn't be in the business of trying to sell things or help other people with open wounds. And how do you know the wound's still open? You shouldn't be in the business of trying to sell things or help other people with open wounds, right? And how do you know the wound's still open? Can you talk about what happened and your heart rate doesn't take off as though it's happening in real time? That's how you know. Can you talk about your mom passing away from an ugly three-year bout of cancer and you're not overwhelmed with emotion? You might still be sad. You might still feel heavy, but you can have the conversation.

That's how you know. If you're overwhelmed with emotion, you're not in a position to help someone else that's right um that's a dr young used to teach us don't bring your chaos to other people's hurting situation so um but here's the thing if you're good at a thing because you've got a scar that's healed god bless you use it yeah get out there man get out there a scar that's healed is the trick i think yes and i i might be wrong but i know you're 100 i i you know uh and that doesn't mean um i mean i i still think it's okay for people to criticize me and say how can you possibly give financial advice you're the guy that went bankrupt you know and i'm i get it you know i get that but i do have

insight because of that that someone who's never been bankrupt doesn't have right so here's here's another way to look at this so let's say you're a child um raised in the home of two uh alcoholics people who struggle with alcohol adult child of an alcoholic and you learned how to get really small and to make sure the people around you um were okay and you just learned that is it okay to then go into a job uh where you are ahead of hospitality somewhere where your job is to disappear and to help other people have a great experience no it's not a bad thing if you're doing it out of a compulsion because you have to like you were talking about earlier then it's not healthy because you're never going to become a whole because you're always going to be looking for healing out there. But yes,

if you have some talents that you learned while trying to stay safe and survive, that's amazing. That's like our friends who go over and they are Navy SEALs and they come back and they walk with business leaders who are going through challenging times and how to communicate under stress. And that's fantastic. You learn new talents under duress, and now you're using those to help the rest of us. That's amazing. So if she says the phrase,

the compulsion to help as a trauma response, would that be functioning out of the wound and not out of a healed wound? Absolutely, yes. Okay. Yes. So if you feel like it's a compulsion to help out of a trauma response and it's wrong but if you got discernment and compassion because of trauma that's a healed wound and that's a scar here's the difference i have to versus i get to a compulsion if i have to like when someone calls and says hey can you come serve at this local church thing you're like i've got to do this that's not a good that's not a good

thing that's childhood nonsense if you are you say you know what i get to go help over there that's pretty cool um then that's a gift then i would say you're well go get it go get it done that's interesting i like that great question very interesting question it's good you know what the um the other thing about a question like that i always think of is old bible teacher used to tell me is you know probably if you ask that question you don't have a problem right or you've recognized a problem and now you have a path to healing yeah but i mean you're wrecking you're seeing things at a proper angle yeah but and i'll tell you my initial that question, I just think the modern mental health ecosystem, universe, whatever, wants us to second guess and deep dive and yada yada on every single thing. And I think there is so much research coming out saying, go do the next right thing.

A lot of navel gazing. Go do the next right thing. And if you can help people based on what happened to your kid man that's the gospel right that's restoration that's all things made new go use what happened for good if you're healed yes or if you're you know doing it out of a healed place that's right you know so forth so good phone number here is 888-825-5225 david is in grand rapids hi david how are you hi i'm doing great thank you for having me. Sure.

What's up? Well, my wife and I, we've always refused to go into debt for anything other than a mortgage. Good. This last week, we just paid off our house. We did a 15-year mortgage, paid it off in four years, four months. You're amazing. Long story short, I'm 33. What's the house worth?

It's about $390 right now. Way to go. How much in your nest egg, in your 401ks and stuff? Yeah, so our Roth IRAs, between the two of us, we've got about $366,000. Dude, you're going to be a millionaire when you're 35. Way to go. That's the goal. Then we have mutual funds also. That's about $118,000. $118 a millionaire when you're 35. Way to go. That's the goal. Then we have mutual funds also.

That's about $118,000. $118,000. Wow, good. Good for you. Our total annual income between the two of us is approximately $120,000. The question I have, long story short, my in-laws own some hunting property. My father-in-law passed away this past May. My mother-in-law is ready to sell the property.

She wants to keep it in the family if possible. We would love to buy it. She's willing to sell it to us for $122,000, and she's willing to do a 0% land contract. No. And the terms are... Absolutely not. You have the money right or a check okay cash out your mutual fund cash out mutual funds absolutely you don't want to be

in debt to your mother-in-law it changes the way thanksgiving dinner tastes i'm not kidding borr or slave to the lender. The air in the room changes when you sit down with your master. Right. Don't do it. You know how free you felt when you paid off that mortgage? Yes. Don't screw that up.

Yeah. Okay. Especially on a hierarchy, I'd rather owe a bank than my mother-in-law. My mother-in-law is awesome, but man. Yeah, this is bad juju right here. And you got the money. Would it be dumb of me to buy the property? No, you got the money.

I would. I'd buy it. For $100,000, you got $180,000 in your mutual fund? How big is the property? It's about 55 acres. I mean, if the value is right, I don't think it's a problem. But pay cash for it or don't do it. If you can't pay cash for it, don't do it.

And never do a land contract. You'll get screwed over six ways from Sunday on that. Ooh, I could do a whole segment on land contracts. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, you guys. Health insurance costs are only moving one way, and that way isn't down. And if higher costs aren't enough, the wait times to see your doctor are longer, and it's harder than ever to get anything approved through the bureaucracy.

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Just go to Ramsey Solutions or go to download the network app on Apple or Google Play or whatever, and you can join it free, and you listen to all the whole show, or you can listen to the last segment, whatever you want to do. It's all there for free from the Ramsey Network app. You can also enter questions. This question comes from the Ramsey Network app. To ask a question without ever having to call in, you can click the link in the show notes or download the app for free.

Once you're in the app, you can navigate to the Ramsey Show. Click Ask a Question and submit your question for the show. All right, the ramsey show uh click ask a question and submit your question for the show all right the question is from brianna says i was one month from my lease being up and i had to leave early due to a domestic violence incident i notified the property management company and sent them the email with proof of the protection order but just the other day i went to check my credit and they put a four thousand dollar debt into collections i'm appealing it but if that doesn't work should i just pay it okay um what what happened to you is wrong and horrible but it does not release you from a lease a protection order does not get you

out of a lease you're you're appealing to their mercy at that point yeah if they want to let you out if you were working if you were one of my tenants, I would let you out. But you can't just send them the email and go, I'm out. It's not a get-out-of-jail-free card, no pun intended. So, you know, you are liable for that last month. I don't know how it got to $4,000 for one month. You had one month left on the lease, and they're going to four thousand dollars i'm not sure what flip were you renting but um or they added a bunch of fees yeah or something or maybe

the bozo stayed behind torch the place i don't know i don't know what happened here but you are still liable even though you had a protection order even though you sent an email that does not this is not a one-way thing where you just go, oh, I'm out. No, you're not out unless they choose to let you out and they didn't respond. You don't have a response from them, or at least you didn't mention it if you do, saying we're going to let you go. If you've got that response, then you owe zero because they said we're going to let you go, so you're free.

But I don't think you got that. I think you just sent this to them and you thought that got you out.'s the way this is worded anyway and it does not get you out i'm not an attorney but it doesn't get you out so um uh you know what i would do i don't know if you need to appeal it um i would just call the property management company i'd go in person if you're in the if you're in the town go over there and try to meet with a senior person and uh see if you can negotiate you you're gonna have to pay some money because you you know you just kind of walk you you were in a horrible situation you needed to leave i'm not telling you you did something wrong but the assumption that you made that it got you out of the lease was incorrect right and so you you're going to owe some money now you got

to go figure out what and what you can settle it for you if it's a four thousand dollar of legitimate charges or a bunch of them that are just beefed up or whatever you might settle it for that equal to that one month's rent and uh but you're going to end up paying something i think i don't think the judge is going to go oh well you had a order. You don't have to honor your contract. It's like saying I got a protection order. So I have to pay my car payment. No, that's not how it works. So sorry.

You know, you're going to end up paying something, Brianna. And the sooner you can get to somebody and get a settlement negotiation begun, you're better off to do it in person and you're better off to do it with the actual people, not the stupid lawyers. But if you can get that pulled off, that's going to be your best route, because you're not going to get out of Dodge on this without paying something. Joe's in Chesapeake, Virginia. Hi, Joe. How are you? Hey, Dave. How's it going? Better than I deserve. What's up? So beginning of this year, my wife and I decided to take our debt seriously, and now we have paid off $30,000 in student loans and credit card debt.

Good for you. Mostly from my job, and I've been fixing and flipping lawnmowers, trucks, equipment, tractors, all kinds of stuff. Cool. How much money you make doing that? Honestly, normally about $4,000 to $5,000 a month. Wow. Good for you.

Yeah. You're good at this. Yes, sir. Yeah. I've been working hard. I'm a caterpillar mechanic. That's my career. Yeah. So I just kind of buy what I can and fix it up.

Well, you know how to turn a wrench. Good for you, man. Yes, sir. Yep. My question is, I'm at the point where I need to start my emergency fund, three- to six-month emergency fund. Good. And I've been looking at the high-yield savings account, and I see that the rate of return is, the one I found that I applied for was 5.31%.

My mortgage, I only owe $119 on it, the house that we built ourselves. And the interest rate on that is 4.3%. So my question is, why should I not just put all of my income into the high-yield savings account as long as the rate of return is greater than the interest owed? Because if you make 1% on $100,000, it's $1,000. You don't have a $1,000 problem. You have a $119,000 problem. The secret to paying off your mortgage is not making 1% spread on a high-yield savings account.

The secret to paying off your mortgage is do what you did with the $30,000 and pay off your mortgage. Okay. The actual math of this theory that you're running won't buy you a biscuit. Okay. That's what I'm saying. So you're making more money on tractors than you'll make on this in a week. Uh-huh. You follow me? Yes, sir.

If you got $100,000 at 5% and $100,000 at 4%, the spread is 1%. 1% of $100,000 is $1,000 dollars per year you make that in a week flipping tractors so it's not it's not enough it's not enough to screw with it's so just pay off your mortgage get your emergency fund done and then go ahead and go through the baby steps four five and six and you'll be in great shape man yeah and i like to take that thousand bucks and divide it monthly and eighty three dollars that's your sleep tax and you'll more than make that back eighty three dollars a month to sleep deeper than you've ever slept in your life because nobody can take your house away yeah yeah just just pay it off as fast as you can just nail it hammer do it do it do it don't mess around with it don't play games

good for you good question all right sam's in syracuse hi sam how are you i'm good dave how are you better than i deserve what's up hey so i kind of i feel like it's a dumb question but um you're in the right place. I have been a couple of dumb guys. We got you. Hey, so I've been with my girlfriend now for almost a little over a year. Um, I accumulated a large sum of debt, uh, before I, uh, got with her while I was in the military and I want to move forward with our relationship. We've discussed it for the last two months or so. I have the money set aside for the ring. How much? About $3,500.

How much in debt do you have? I would say it's roughly around $50,000. And what's it on? It's a few things. So one of them is a credit card, which is $25,000. One is from a repo from a previous relationship. What do you make a year? I make about $65,000 a year, I would say I pull in about you 24

forty two hundred twenty six twenty six okay I almost like I've done this before okay and you're saying you're saying you want to wait to get out of debt to get married I and that's the thing is like I you know I've heard a few different answers to that question that I have. Unless they're this answer, they're wrong. The correct answer is get married. Okay. If you're pledged to get out of debt and she's pledged to get out of debt with you

and you're aligned and in agreement on your money, get married. That's one of the big reasons why I fell in love with her. You know, I was very open and honest. Don't tell her I think I've got $50,000. Tell her I have $49,462 in debt. And it's exactly this. And this is exactly what I'm going to do to get out. Because I'm the kind of man you want to marry because I'm getting this done. I'm a go-getter.

That's who you need to be. Don't give me, I think I make, I think I'm in debt. Get it exact and kill it. This is The Ramsey Show. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Dr. John Deloney, number one best-selling author, is my co-host today, Ramsey personality and host of the Dr. John Deloney Show. Own Your Past, Change Your Future was his first one.

You can check that out, or How to Build a Non-Anxious Life, second number one bestseller. It just came out last fall. Check it out as well. Jonathan is with us in Fort Myers, Florida. Hey, Jonathan, what's up in your world? Hi, how are you doing today, Dave? Better than I deserve. What's up?

So I had a situation happen a couple years years ago, uh, during COVID my mother passed away. Um, she was actually, uh, killed by her, um, her new husband. Oh my gosh, man. Yeah, they were both in their late seventies. Um, and they, uh, they left me with quite a bit of money. So, uh, I had never, uh, I never made more than about 85 grand a year and then was left with a couple million dollars. And I, I hope I've been doing the right steps, um, with what I've done with it. I just wanted to get mostly some reassurance that I've been doing the right things or what you would recommend, uh, moving forward with this. Oh my gosh. How have you navigated the last few years with the loss of your mom? You know, the first year wasn't too well. You know, kind of went backwards probably a little bit, and then I got a couple kids, and I tried to get myself together

and be better for my kids, and I think I've been been doing pretty well the last two years how old are you Jonathan uh 36 okay and I assume he the the husband's been put in jail uh no he killed himself afterwards oh my gosh yeah in our in our house that we grew up in oh i'm so sorry well that just makes it i mean managing two million dollars that you don't know how to manage is freaky enough and then you put this layer on it it just gets super freaky right yeah yeah it's a little more than that um we were left about two two million two and a half million from our parents, and then he left us another $1.1 million.

Oh, wow. Which we weren't expecting. We didn't know that we were written into as well. Wow. Does that money feel weird, or are you happy to spend it? I've spent, I haven't really, I wouldn't say I've spent it. I've used most of it to live off of the last couple years from the new husband. He left us two IRAs, a traditional IRA and a Roth IRA.

So I've been pulling out. Let me get past all the – and just answer your question. So how much money do you have today? Today? Let me just flip over here. I've got total between properties and everything. Yes. I would say about $3.5 million, $4 million.

Okay, all right. And you're still working, making $80 million? No. I haven't been working since the day she died. Oh, wow. Okay. What did you do for a living? I worked in restaurants mostly, bartender, sommelier, and server. Okay.

And the reason I didn't go back to work was a lot of that, the reason why I made good money was because i was i was always forward about my my life and talking to people about things in my life and i just felt like i couldn't do that anymore well you can't go into this story part of the story anyway wow okay are you are you married still or single no i've never been never been married. I'm single. You said you had kids. Okay. Yeah, two children. One that I have full custody of, one that I split custody.

Okay. An important part of your recovery moving forward is you're going to have to get a job. Yeah. You're going to have to get a purpose, a thing to do, a thing to go to, a thing that you are a part of, that the world's going to be better because you were a part of it. You got that? Yeah, I feel that as well. Okay.

Yeah, it's time to go back to work, Jonathan. Doing something. Yeah, I'm actually starting a business this year, a tour boat business. A what business? Tour boat? A tiki boat, tour boat. Oh, okay. All right.

You're buying the boat and gonna yeah do tours and do trips on the boat when uh the boat's going to be delivered in um april or may of this year and we should be operating by june okay what did you spend on that boat uh 220 000 total okay okay all right now you're going to be leaning in, learning how to run a business, learning how to handle and operate the boat. You're going to be leaning in on all of this. I really want you to go make a living for your sake because at 36, doing nothing is not a plan, okay? Emotionally and spiritually. John's right about that.

Now, so let's pretend that you're making a living. You don't need this money then, right? So now we just need to invest this money well. Yes. Okay. Jonathan, I buy two things for investments. The first thing I tell people, and I was with a bunch of wealthy people this weekend, do not put money in something you don't understand.

Don't do it because I do it. Don't do it because somebody else says to do it or you read an article once that's a that's a nightmare way to lose money put money in something you understand now that may mean you need to go to school a little bit by sitting with an investment advisor and letting them teach you uh but i buy real estate that i pay cash for because I like the real estate business. I've done that already. Okay. And I buy mutual funds. And that's all I buy.

Okay. I've got about a total of about $1.8 million in real estate. Okay. And it's making money, right? I have one house that's going to be worth about $1.2 million, and I'm planning on renting that. Going to be? When? Why is it not worth that now?

It's about to be finished being built, and I think in March or April of this year it will be done. Okay. All right. So you're going to have some. And then I have another rental house, and then I have the house I live in. Okay. That's fine.

Great. Now manage those to where they make a good return on the amount of money you have tied up in them and then sit down with a good uh someone like a smart investor pro you can find them at ramsey solutions.com and they'll help you sit down and start to understand some mutual funds and invest it but i mean if you make 10 on three million dollars average across that those investments then you'd have 300 000 a year coming in uh if you don't touch it in seven years that three million at 10 would be worth about four million would be worth about six million in seven more years it'd be worth about 12 and seven more years would be worth 24 that's 21 years from today you're 36 that puts you at 57 with 24 million dollars i like that okay that's you working providing your own living not touching these

investments and letting them just grow at an average growth rate of 10 a year and that's invested in mutual funds and real estate now it's a little more complicated than that, but basically that's how the math will roll out. The trick here to the thing is put money in stuff that's steady and is predictable, not super conservative, but we're not taking any big risks here. We're not trying to reinvent the crypto world or some bull crap like that. And don't buy a tiki boat for a quarter million dollars

and then six months go and be like, well, I'm going to do this and I'm going to buy a snow cone stand and then you're going to small business yourself broke. Yeah, stay on track with that. And so you're now in the tiki boat business for the next decade, buddy. And you're going to make a go of it. You don't get, John's right, you don't get to change. thanks for joining us america we're glad you're here if you like the show you can help us

by subscribing click follow click like click subscribe whatever the particular platform or format you're listening or watching the show on tell people about where you're hearing the show talk radio or watching on tbn whatever it is you're doing thank you so share click the share button some of these things have a share button and you can just send it to your buddy that's cool that's all that stuff helps us immensely because you're basically our marketing budget. That's how much we think of you. So there you go. Oh, and by the way, leave a five-star review.

We'd love that, too. Thank you. All right, Max is with us in Detroit. Hey, Max, what's up? How are you, Mr. Andrews? Better than I deserve. How can I help? Okay.

Quick thing. My dad and my mother, I had last year, my dad caught, he got sick and he had got lung cancer. So I live in Michigan. So I had been traveling back and forth taking care of my mom and my dad through the chemo and just past of last January, he just passed away. He didn't really. Oh, thank you. He did really good in the stock market, but when he got sick, we didn't realize until after the death that so much money had been lost through the investments. So I put her back with my aunties and then back in Chicago, that's where we originally were from. Months have kind of passed, the healing time a little bit, it's kind of easier. But she's been really on me about moving her back to Florida and just quitting my job and just taking care of her.

Okay. So you talked about a series of investments. So is there a lot of money that your parents had? Well, you know what? When we started, when my dad was talking to me, we was at about $725,000. But now we're down to $400,000. Why? Because no one took care of the stock market when he got sick.

Well, honey, the stock market hadn't gone in half. Well, whatever investments he had, it went down. No one took care of it. Who's taking care of it now? My cousin took place of it. He was the only... Who's taking care of it now? My cousin took place of it because he's the only one that really kind of was investing in the family.

Why is your cousin taking care of your and your mother's money? Yeah, Max, this is a this one's going to be gone overnight in a vapor. I don't know because he was the one who just... My mom was like, like well nick knows how to do the stuff in investing and kind of how old is your mother uh 86 yeah okay we still have the house in florida it's fully paid for but the thing was you live in detroit what do you do for a living? I work at the casino.

Okay. Do you want to live in Florida? No. I want to actually go to Texas where my children, I have all grown children and grandbabies. And my ultimate goal was getting back to Texas. And then this had happened to my dad. And now my mom is by herself. I'm an only child.

So here's what your mom needs to do. She needs to call Nick and now my mom is by herself i'm an only child so here's what your mom has to do she needs to call nick and get her money and she needs to sit down with you and a good investment broker and put her money to work the money that the four hundred thousand dollars will earn for an 86 year old can hire her someone to help her to help take care of her right that's what we that's what she wanted to do she's like that's what she needs to do and that's not you that's no then that's what i feel sometimes but then the whole family's like the only person i don't care what the whole family don't get a vote max doesn't want to go they don't get a vote max now if your mom wants to move with you to texas then you can lay that out and say i'm happy to have you come move in

with me in texas and we'll hire some skilled nursing or whatever we need at the house i don't know what taking care of her means but max this all these people telling you what to do living their life getting to use you like a like a nintendo, they don't get to do that. It's not their life. They don't get to vote. I feel bad. Why? What'd you do? Because I'm an only child.

What'd you do wrong? But if you invite your mom to Michigan, you've been taking care of your mom. You've been taking care of your dad. You're a parent's dream. Yeah, they didn't want to go to Michigan when I said, let's go to Michigan. But that's where their daughter lives. That's their choice.

If they want me to take care of them, they have to come where I am. Yeah, she's a grown-up. She gets to make adult decisions. She does not get to dictate to you anymore with her mother voice. You are like a grown person, and she's an 86-year-old old woman. Right. And she is, trust me, Dave and I talk to to enough people she is beyond the moon that she has raised a daughter with integrity who cares about her family and loves her mom enough to have walked

alongside her as she lost her husband and you lost your dad that's amazing yeah but so i want to give you a line okay your mother tells you what to do by throwing out guilt trips. She's a travel agent for guilt trips, isn't she? Yes, it works. All right, I want you to do this. I'm taking the plane with it. When she drops it on me, I take the plane with it, and I'm like, oh. Why don't you say it's not going to work anymore? I have to get over that part.

All right, Max, I'm going to give you a line, and I want you to tattoo it on your heart, okay? Okay. This is not my line. I don't remember who came up with it, but here's what it is. I want you to choose guilt over resentment every time. Because if you don't choose guilt over resentment, you are going to end up hating your mom that she took away moments with your grandbabies from you.

And that's not fair to her. That's not fair to you. Right. And so I'd rather feel guilty that, hey, I want to be with my kids and my grandbabies, and I want their great-grandma with them, but she's a grown woman. If she chooses Florida over all that, then she chooses Florida over all that. Yeah, she gets to choose.

As long as she's of her right mind, otherwise the court will choose for her. But if she's of her right mind, she's used to getting her way. She's been bossing people around for about 86 years and getting away with it. And she's probably also wading through that with it and she's probably also um wading through that grief and she's put a leash on you and said you dragged me through this grief and whichever way i want to go that's not how that works not how that works yeah so mom i love you and i'll be happy to help you we're going to get your money if i'm going to help you here's the terms you're going to live in texas where i'm moving to to be near the grandbabies and you'll

see your great grandbabies and we're going to get your money from nick and we're going to live in Texas where I'm moving to, to be near the grandbabies, and you'll see your great grandbabies. And we're going to get your money from Nick, and we're going to put it with a professional money manager that will help us and teach us how to create an income so we can hire some help to take care of you while I'm at work. But you can live in my home, and I will love you and take care of you. I am not coming to Florida. If you don't want to do that, those two things, it's okay, mom. It's your choice. The law says that you are allowed to make your own decisions and it says I am too. And so I'm going to Texas. Love to have you. Otherwise, I'll come see you in Florida when I got some days off. And if you want me to help you set up some care over there, I will. But I love you, but I'm sorry, I get to choose.

And I want, let's say she does choose Florida. I want your heartbreak to not be that you finally decided that your life had value too. I want your heartbreak to be be my mom chose a retirement village in another state over me and her grandkids and her great-grandkids that's heartbreaking that'll break my heart that's a total like 180 to it's your job to completely cancel out your life and live wherever she tells you to live and do whatever she tells you to do um it's it flip that thing around man flip that thing around yeah she does not have a vote unless you give her one so take her vote from her on where max lives

don't get a vote anymore mom and you have to say it out loud but you can say it in your mind just smile and go you know you don't you don't get to decide that now and dave uh just the added complexity sometimes that parent says well then you may just not have access to this money then whatever and you have to decide is your soul for sale right yeah yeah that's that's perfectly okay because apparently i didn't have access to start with it nick has it yeah nick's got it the cousin nick the cousin don't let your cousin sell your house or manage your money those are those are new ramsey rules i just made up. You just made them up on the spot. Deloney Ramsey. Deloney Ramsey. Those are probably pretty good rules.

This is The Ramsey Show. Thanks for joining us, America. We're so glad you're here. Cole and Abby are with us in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage. Hey guys, how are you? Great. Happy to be here. Honored to have you. Where do you live? We live in Franklin, Wisconsin, which is about 15 minutes south of Milwaukee.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I love it. Welcome to Nashville. Thank you. Good to have you guys. And how much debt have you two paid off? We paid off $195,994.09. I love it. How long did this take? 34 months. Good for you.

And your range of income during that time? We started at $134,000 and ended at $173,000. Very cool. What do you all do for a living? I'm an occupational therapist. Okay. And I'm a production manager at a CPG company. Okay.

Very cool. Good for you guys. Wow. What kind of debt was the $196,000? Mostly student loans. Yeah. We had about 10 in credit cards, about 23 in car debt, and the rest of it, almost $159,000 in student loan debt.

Wow. Yeah. How ironic that this sunday student loan payments start back but not for you no way we know a lot of people that didn't pay any during the forbearance yeah i think i can count on one hand including us the number of people that continued to pay and hammer it out yeah we do too why did you do that because like we sitting around here obviously we're talking shop it's like just we've been trying to get people to do what you did why did you do why did you do it all your friends didn't do it the government said we got you and you knew

they didn't like why did y'all keep paying yeah we're uh in our 30s we're old enough to know uh you can't wait on the government uh but the other thing is that we wanted to set ourselves up for our future, right? Someone bought us Financial Peace University for our wedding, and we sat down and talked about our whys, our baby girl we have now two months, three years ago when we started, she wasn't in the picture, but we knew one day she would. And we didn't want to try to be buying a house and buying cars with cash and funding her college while having the student loan debt hang over our head. And me, the nerd, I did the math with the interest before the forbearance.

It would have been $1,000 a month for 21 years for us to pay off the student loan debt. And that's not something either of us wanted to sign up for. Wow. Yeah. So how long y'all been married? Three years this past June. Okay. So you've been doing this the whole time you've been married?

Yeah. We got married in June. And then because of COVID, we had like our reception in september so it was in that uh september reception we already been married for four months when we got financial peace university okay so somebody gave you that as a gift for your wedding yeah and then you you went to the class yeah it was virtual during covid right yes covid yeah but yes we did the class and um we i've been listening to you for years before that and we were dave-ish and this is how dumb I was, Dave. I thought, that's a really good plan for other people, not for us.

And even going into the class, we thought, well, maybe we'll do it. Maybe we won't. After the first lesson or two, we were all in. We figured if we're going to do it, we've got to do it all the way. 34 months later, we're on to three. We're done with three. Now we're on to 3B, so we're excited for what's next. Even taking it virtually, it sucked you into the vortex.

Oh, yes. It did. I love it. Well, we're honored, man. Congratulations, you guys. Thank you. What did your friends say when you told them you were paying on your loans? Did they roll their eyes at you?

Yeah. Did they give it to you pretty good? Oh, yeah. Why would you do that? The same thing with the credit cards. What about the miles? What about the points? You can use that money for other things. We just, I don't know, we were just together in it the credit cards. What about the miles? What about the points? You can use that money for other things.

We just, I don't know, we were just together in it the whole way. And that was a surprising piece, actually, is how many people gave us slack for it, for having this be our plan. Did that give you energy? Like, I'll show you. Yeah, I heard so many times people say, oh, me and my wife are debt free. Well, except for our cars. You'll always have a car payment.

And we looked at them and said, then you're not debt free. We've our cars you'll always have a car payment and we looked at him and said then you're not debt free we've heard you'll always have a student loan and i look at him and say you will always have a student loan we will not always have a student loan so it's very motivating yeah and now you get to do toby keith how you like me now that's right that's right i like it yeah you should throw a party on october 1st just a like i'll i'll get everybody dinner because i know it's gonna be a hard hard night for me that's right we got no payment so we can afford having a celebration you guys are having a funeral all your buddies that uh were hating on you that's right I love it yeah just rub a little salt in the wound that'd be great yeah for you guys man I'm so proud of you thank you so who was cheering you on who were your cheerleaders a lot of our family obviously my mother's side of the family

was the one who gifted us fpu so they were huge in that um some of our friends actually introduced us to you as well and kind of kept along with us on the journey that's cool yeah okay um yeah that's about it our good friends uh britney and sam i want to give them a shout out because before we did this we'd always go out on the town, going out to eat, spending lots of money. We told them, hey, we're going to do this FPU thing, so we're not going out to eat anymore. And they said, that's great. You guys just come on over here.

We'll grill out. We'll do things at the house that are free. They were very, very supportive. Like that. That's a cool group of friends right there. Yes. And actually, you have a better time doing that than you do going to a restaurant. Oh, yes.

Yeah, we had more fun. Way to go, guys. Thank you. I'm so proud of y'all. Well, well done. Well done. Now, what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt? You pay off $196,000 in 34 months.

It's not a theory. You freaking did it. Everyone can do it on paper, right? It's a lot harder to do in reality. Yeah. I always say the hardest part is starting. The first two, three months when you're learning to budget and at the end of the month you have this money it's that's true it stinks to send it off to navient or toyota financial

or whoever but for us after those first two three four months it became such a routine and such a habit it honestly went by really quick just because we were like a well-oiled machine once we got the monthly routine of budgeting and paying off debt. It became exciting, actually. How much money are we going to pay off? Yeah. How much are we going to be able to fill in on our debt? It turns into a game. Yeah.

It's a mental game. Like, where else can we cut? Yeah. Where else can we increase income? Yeah. Yeah. And every month, we're like, yeah, we're $150 under budget. Let's go.

Yeah. It's not that much, but it's so exciting. Yeah. Throw it at it. Throw it at it. Y'all are almost too unified. Did y'all ever have a fight? We don't fight about money no no no this um we were on the same page pretty much before fpu but this really

solidified not just money but just all aspects of our marriage i think yeah yeah what was the hardest part i think getting started like cole said um but i also was surprised i think i was disappointed by people's reactions when we would tell them that we were doing this saying no telling each other no for things was hard as well but just the reactions that we would get this was such like an exciting thing for us to start on and so many people were doubtful or like that's not gonna last yeah um so that was kind of hard to kind of hear that from people. Well, you kind of figure out who your friends are. Yes.

You know, it's like, okay, you are Eeyore. Oh, it's bad. It's so bad. You're never going to make it. You're always going to have a car. Oh, now I know who Eeyore is. I always wanted to. That's it.

So yeah, good for you guys. Very, very well done. Hey, we've got the live and give bundle for you. That's the box that has all the goodies in it for you to give away and live. Baby Steps Millionaire's book, which is your next step for sure. The Total Money Makeover book to give away. Maybe one of those doubters or maybe one that needs to get moving. Same thing, Financial Peace University membership for you to give away.

And all of that's our gift to you to say thanks for coming down. All right. Are we putting a little baby in? She's ko'd right now but we can no you don't have to i just that's a sacred moment let it let it ride let her if she's chill i'm good i don't care i just didn't want you to i don't want to lose you the opportunity oh here she comes we'll just leave her in her little seat here all right that's perfect yeah what's her name presley presley all right presley you have no idea that your parents are heroes they have changed your family tree little girl yeah that's how old rachel was when i filed bankruptcy so you guys you guys are in a great place i'm so

proud of y'all congratulations thank you very good all right cole and abby Presley, hold your little ears. Alright, $196,000 paid off in 34 months making $134,000 to $173,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. 3, 2, 1. We're debt-free! Yeah! Yeah!

That's how that's done. I don't even think Presley woke up. That's pretty good. I mean, I think she's used to her dad being that intense around the house, so it's done. I don't even think Presley woke up. That's pretty good. I mean, I think she's used to her dad being that intense around the house, so it's all right. It's all good. He's yelling at football, too. That's exactly right.

He's more of a spreadsheet yeller, but it's cool. He still yells. Loves his spreadsheets. It works. But I'll tell you what. If the first 34 months of your marriage, you can learn to align yourselves together on goals. You set yourselves up to fight any battle to win any game that you run into after that, don't you? Well, it reminds us of that call we took earlier.

This is what we were talking about. This is exactly what we were talking about. You decide where you're going. Getting there becomes just a totally different trajectory. You're not riding side by side. You're riding in the same car, going to the same place, building the same life together. This is the Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today open phones at 888-825-5225

our scripture today is proverbs 24 16 for the righteous falls seven times and rises again but the wicked stumble in times of calamity Alice Cooper, mistakes are part of the game. It's how well you recover from them that is the mark of a great player. Ben is in Knoxville. Hey, Ben, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Thank you for taking my call. Sure, what's up? I wanted to ask what your thoughts were on fractional real estate investing. I've noticed there's been kind of a trend towards that

and seen a couple apps that offer that. And I know that real estate is, there's a shortage in houses overall and you don't advise for getting into debt. So I just wanted to hear your thoughts on, um, on all this stuff. Yeah. Well, in terms of buying rental property, I would buy it and pay cash and own it, or I wouldn't do it. Uh, I wouldn't do fractional if you, if you are not in a position to buy real estate and that's why fractional seems appealing to you. Then what I would look into is

if you're at that stage in the baby steps to do investing, you can look into an REIT, a real estate investment trust. It's basically functions like a mutual fund that buys real estate. And so you get the marketplace benefits, the returns of owning real estate, managing real estate, but you can buy into it with a few dollars like you would with a mutual fund i mean you get a mutual fund for thousand twenty five hundred five thousand bucks you can get in reits for the same kind of money and you can pick those up with your smart investor pro in the old days like when i first started this show reits were new and uh they were they were

they were killing their uh stockholders with are or their shareholders with fees. And so the net returns to the shareholders weren't very good. They weren't keeping up with growth stock mutual funds. Today, the better REITs, the good ones, are getting comparable returns to good growth stock mutual funds. So you're going to see 10%, 12%, 14% rates of return in a REIT. And if you're not in a position to pay cash, which is driving your fractional discussion, then the problem with fractional is that you don't have any control. And you're, you know, for instance, I talked to a friend of mine that day looking at buying

into a small business, and he was going to own 40 percent i said you're what's called a minority shareholder which also translated means you're up a creek because you have absolute they can they can run the thing in the ground they can make all kinds of bad decisions and you can't do anything about it because you can't outvote them and that's what you got with fractional they could run the property poorly they could choose the property poorly they could sell the property at the wrong time for too little and you got no say there's very fractional is just i'm not a fan hey when you own real estate depending on which um instagram you're following at 3 a.m one will tell you the point is cash flow one will tell you the point is somebody else pays off the debt that is the equity on a teeter-totter what's more important this cash flow that these

properties produce over time or the equity they produce uh as a house goes up in value or maybe i've made the most money on appreciation. Okay. On the equity? The increase in values. Okay. Increase in values. I make good money on the cash flows. And there's basically three places you make a rate of return in real estate. The increase in value, the cash flow, and the tax advantage because you can depreciate them. So you're sheltering some of the income.

So those three things actually create an actual dollar return to you. Of course, the appreciation you do not realize until you sell the house. So you don't, you know, if you got a house, you bought a house for half a million, it goes to two million. You don't get that million and a half until you sell it. But those three things together in real estate are calculated in what's called an IRR, an internal rate of return. And it's all three of those components mathematically added together. And on a piece of residential, my typical residential, I'll cash flow 8% or 10%. And I'm IRR.

Of the total value? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. My IRR on that thing, no, of what I paid for it, or no, total value. I'm probably cash flowing a lot more than on what I paid for it or no total value uh i'm probably uh cash flowing a lot more than i want i paid for it but the uh my irr over a 20-year holding period is probably 17 or 18 percent okay so that's probably what i'm making on it total okay but uh uh but again it's not i'm not i'm

not putting that in my pocket today so uh real estate's a little different in that regard um and there you go okay Okay, Andrea is with us in Fort Myers. Hey, Andrea, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Thank you. I have a quick question. My grandparents are having my mother the executor of their will. They live in a different state. Does it make sense for my mother to have her name on their bank accounts for seamless list or not until the time comes it wouldn't hurt uh how old are they they're in their 80s yeah i would the only reason is this it absolutely affects, okay, if both of them passed away and her name is not on the account, she has to go to the court right quick

to get control of enough money to begin to run the estate, and she's the executor of the estate. Okay? It just makes it, it adds a step, and it makes the first two weeks following death more clunky. Okay? But I wouldn't do this if you were 52 you're 82 though the people were talking about okay and i'm not i'm not suggesting they're going to pass away this year but they're more likely to statistically than a 52 year old

i'm 63 the executor i'm 62 the executor on my estate is not on my checking account okay if sure well actually she is because Sharon but if we both died the third the third party if we both died in a car wreck tomorrow uh the the executor isn't the third party executor is not on the account that's not what they're not what's happening so uh all of that to say uh you know when when we are approaching the end of life either because of our statistically because of age which we can say that in the 80s okay or you know you're you're fighting a a terminal cancer diagnosis or something like that then yeah go ahead and put the executor on there because it's going to make the first three weeks following death much uh much smoother does that make sense are you there not there okay that works too but that's it so you're not supposed to say people die but anyway they do i do i say it all the time

they do they do we've done 100% detailed research you're not getting out of this alive 100 percent um i actually i actually like this dave i've just sat with people who um somebody loves they love passes away and their job is to handle what happens next and man having to go through a court system to get your name on a checking account such a pain just have it on there it's great yeah yeah it just uh but you don't have to do that 25 years in advance either. No, absolutely not. That's weird. That's clunky and weird and not respond. I mean, you know.

So if something happened to share me today, they'd have the clunky. Yes. But life happens there. But on this one. But yeah, where you're dealing with people in the later decades of life, life, life, but the, oh my God, or you're looking at a terminal illness or something like that, that's when you would do that kind of thing.

So yeah, that does make sense in her case. That's what I would do. But it's not a philosophical thing. It's not a principle that if you don't do this, you've done it wrong. It's just tactical. Like, you know, you just got access to the money to pay the funeral home you know you got access the money to uh take care of the light bill at the house that didn't get paid that month well and hopefully it's part of a grander conversation about i'm this old now i'm i'm

gonna go ahead and park the car and i'm this old now and i'm gonna review the will with you and i'm this old now and i'm gonna go ahead and put you in the checking account as a due diligence you're gonna love the people who your family members that you're leaving behind so much that you're gonna get over your fear and over the awkwardness of having these conversations and you're gonna make sure everybody's on the same page it is the most functional relational functional thing that a family can do such a gift and uh the more dysfunctional the family the less likely that is that they're going to do this and they're the ones that really need to do it because if you're going to piss somebody off in your will you ought to do it while you're alive at least you get that's

the only way you get the benefit right yeah you can tell them about it you just go you're on cocaine you're getting nothing you know it. Just go ahead and tell them now so they can be pissed now. Or the way I told Sheila, I said, I want my funeral to be like this, and she said, I'm not doing chores for you when you're dead. When you're gone, I'm going to decide what's happening. That puts us out of the Ramsey Show

and the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus. Hey, it's Dr. John Deloney. If you love the show and want a deeper dive on your money journey, we have a weekly newsletter that gives you trending and helpful articles and tips on following the Ramsey way. Just go to ramsesolutions.com today to sign up for our newsletter. Again, that's ramsSolutions.com to sign up for our weekly newsletter.