The Ramsey Show - App - Build a Solid Financial Plan by Punching Debt in the Face (Hour 1)

Episode Date: August 8, 2018

The show about you

🎵 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I am Dave Ramsey, your host. This is your show. Thank you for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Haley is with us in Dallas, Texas, starting off this hour. Hey, Haley, how are you? Well, I'll try one more time. Push the button. There it goes. Hey, Haley, how are you? I'm doing well. How are you, Dave?

Better than I deserve. What's up? Yeah, so my husband and I are on baby step two, paying off our debt. And, of course, his car is now approaching its last leg. We obviously don't want to take on more debt by buying a new car, so I was wondering what your thoughts are, what we should do. What's wrong with this car? Well, nothing.

It's just approaching a lot of miles, and it's starting to wear down. We think we have some time left, but it won't be, like, we won't be through paying off all of our debt before his car makes it, if that makes sense. Yeah. How much debt do you have, not counting your home? We have about $65,000 left. And what's your household income? Our household income is around $110,000.

Okay. So how long do you think it's going to take you to be debt-free? You know, that's a good question. We want to be more gazelle intense, so we're learning to do that right now. But we've given ourselves about two years to get the remainder paid off. Yeah, I think that would be the most. Right. I want to do it sooner.

You don't think this car is going to make it two years? Hopefully it will. We're praying over it, it but if not we want to be prepared that's a good car when you got a car you have to pray over that's a good car oh my goodness gracious so if you saw that car what would it bring i'm thinking probably just a couple thousand. Okay. All right. Cool. All right. Well, what I would do if I'm in, and you've got another car, right? Yes. And what is it worth?

Well, what it's worth and what I have left on it are different. Okay. What do you owe on it and what's it worth? I owe about $10,000 on it. Okay. And it's worth about less than that? I would assume so, yes. Okay.

All right. Cool. All right. Well, no, what I would do in this case is keep going. And I would baby that thing and just try to keep it going, you know, try to put a little bit in it here, a little bit in it there, and let's see if we can keep it running. And it's basically a throwaway car in your situation.

Right. Meaning if it breaks something big, you're not going to fix it. You're going to take it to the junkyard and get 500 bucks for it, you know. Yeah, essentially. Yeah. I mean, if a transmission or engine goes out or something, you don't put in a $2,000 car, you don't fix that. You just give it.

It's a throwaway. You get salvaged for it and move on. And if that occurred, I would just push stop on your debt snowball, and the rate that you are paying is greater than $2,000, $3,000 a month anyway. And so if you just didn't pay extra on your debt, you would have $3,000 at the end of one month. And so you'd have to kind of struggle through for one month, buy a $3,000 car, and then restart again.

Okay. But I don't think that's going to happen. I think you're going to make it. I think what's happening is... I think we'll make it, too, but I like to be prepared. Yeah, you need to have a plan, and that gives you peace. If you know, okay, if this happens, here's what we're going to make it. I think what's happening is... I think we'll make it, too, but I like to be prepared. Yeah, you need to have a plan, and that gives you peace. If you know, okay, if this happens, here's what we're going to do. Bing.

Okay, execute the plan. Execute plan B, right? And it helps me to have that thought through, so you're wise to do that. And the weird thing is, once you do that, it's kind of like the car won't break now, you know? Right. But if you didn't have a plan, you're inviting it. Yeah. Yeah.

So I think you're, you know, that's what I would do. And whatever it is, you're not going to be driving it very long because at the end of 18 to 24 months from now, you're going to have no debt. And very quickly, one of the first things you're going to do is move him up in car. That's right. I mean, because you make $ things you're going to do is move him up in car. That's right. I mean, because you make $110,000 and that car is absurd.

You know? Yeah, we'll pay with our new car in cash and we'll drive and go do our debt-free scream. I love it. Look forward to seeing you soon. You can do it. If you need help, you call me along the way, okay? Thanks for calling in. Open phones at 888-825-5225 speaking of cars sarah's in palm springs california same subject what's up

sarah hi dave i'm honored to speak with you you too i just finished my fpu class i got sick and tired of being sick and tired as you say i. I'm a single mom. I'm on baby step two. I owe about $36,000. $25,000 of that $36,000 I know is a car loan. So I have an offer. Someone offered me $15,000 for the car because after listening to you, I thought I need to sell it. And now looking at the difference, I'm going to have about a $10,000 loan difference. I tried to refinance. I couldn't refinance. I tried to get a loan. And they said my in-debt score, as you say, is just below what it would have to be to get a loan. So I just don't want to make a bigger mistake.

How would you sell it if you don't have the ten thousand dollars well um someone offered me fifteen thousand so i was thinking if do i take out try to take out a loan for the difference oh you think you can get a ten thousand dollar loan i tried and they said i'm just off that my credit score is just below so i can't do that how would you do this then i'm wondering if like i've heard you say before maybe put the money in the bank and then try to pay the difference i'm not sure i'm yeah well you can't take this offer because he's going to be gone before you have ten thousand dollars right okay yeah unless you you know who's the loan with um foresight capital through honda oh they're not they're not they're not going

to do anything so you tried one place and they turned you down. I would try a few more places. What's your income? I make about $58,000 a year. Okay. So the car is not completely out of hand. It's just the biggest portion of your problem. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, by the time you pay it down $10,000, so you said you had 30 what in debt? 36. 5,000 in student loans and about 5,000 in medical. Okay. You know, if I'm in your shoes, what I'm going to do, I'm just going to tear into this to see how fast I can do it. 36 making 60.

That's like 18 months you can do this with no life, though. And you end up with the car. Yeah. And if you get down into it and you get the car paid down to 15, and that means you paid off $20,000 worth of debt already, and you don't want to go forward, then you can sell the car, right? Yeah. But you really aren't going to be able to do anything until then,

unless you find a loan today for $10,000 and go ahead and sell the car, right? Yeah. But you really aren't going to be able to do anything until then, unless you find a loan today for $10,000 and go ahead and sell the car today. I'm not doing that. I think in your shoes. Do you like the car? Yeah, I mean, it's just a Honda Civic. I just wanted something basic to get back to work, and once I got into it, I was

like, geez, what did I get myself into? Yeah, you bought an awful expensive car. No question about that. I know it's basic, but it's pretty expensive, given your situation. So, geez, what did I get myself into? Yeah, you bought an awful expensive car. No question about that. I know it's basic, but it's pretty expensive given your situation. Yeah, I'm going to try to hang on to it and pay all the way through it. But if when you get it down to 15, if you're kind of running out of steam, you can always sell the car at that point. Let's do that.

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Download Hotspot Shield today. Thank you for joining us, America. Ryan is with us in Wichita, Kansas. Hi, Ryan. How are you? Hi, Dave. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, Dave. We are in baby step six. And actually, our last remaining debt is not actually our house,

but just my student loan, our house, cars, everything is paid off. Well, that's not Baby Step 6. Baby Step 6 is house only, so you have a student loan, you're in Baby Step 2. Okay, well, just that then. Okay, how much student loan debt have you got? I've got $76,000. Okay, how much is in your emergency fund? Let's see here. We've got about $40,000 in cash. Okay, what's your household income? After all taxes, about $85,000. Good, and you said you got $100,000 in what? About $120,000 in retirement accounts. Okay. Any other non-retirement investments? No. Okay. And my student loan is just at 2%.

And I've just been wondering if I should go at it gazelle intensity for another year and just be done with everything, or if I should just... I've been paying on this thing for 11 years, and I'm an optometrist, and I'm just like, once we got our house paid off two months ago, I want to keep going at it and just be done. Yeah. Or if I should just slow play the 2% loan interest. Okay.

Well, if you're familiar with the baby steps somewhat, which led you to talk about that, I don't know whether you learned about them in the last five minutes or what, but you're familiar with gazelle intensity, so you know we teach people to pay debt off as fast as possible in baby step two, not counting their home, and then build your emergency fund. And so were you to follow what we teach in the Total Money Makeover or in Financial Peace University,

any time you have debt in baby step two and you have any savings, you would take the non-retirement savings, you would take non-retirement savings and apply it to the debt down to a $1 thousand dollar baby step one starter emergency fund and then you would tear up your debt as fast and as aggressively as possible you've kind of gotten this out of order by knocking the house out before the student loan debt exactly but that's not the other world it's not the end of the world it's not like you're going to hell or something i mean you just knock it out right so um uh uh it's not how i would teach you to do it but whoopee you're here

now right so yeah you know what i would do is i'd take thirty nine thousand dollars and throw it on this thing and then i'd probably be done by what christmas yeah possibly yeah or a little after and then i'll rebuild my emergency fund and then and only then would i restart my retirement savings are you putting money in retirement savings right now? We are. Our Roth IRAs and I also have a SEP IRA that I contribute to. Yeah, I would temporarily stop all of that while we're in baby step two, focus all of our energies on becoming debt-free, everything but the house.

In your case, everything because the house is done. And then when that's done, we rebuild the emergency fund. And when that's done, we restart retirement. And so you're going to take a year off of retirement. And if you're following our guidelines, and what I would do if I woke up in your shoes, you're going to take a year off of retirement. You're going to clean out that emergency fund, throw it at the student loan debt. The student loan debt is going to be gone fast.

It's going to take five, six months to do that, then five, six months to rebuild your emergency fund, and then you'll restart your retirement about this time next year. And if you do that, you're going to be sitting on a solid, solid financial plan. And as you have noticed, when you start talking about how low the interest rate is on the student loan, you're looking for an excuse to let it linger. A student loan will linger like no other debt it'll just hang around hang around like an unwanted brother-in-law i mean it will hang around you can't get rid of it's awful you know it's just uh you're just there it's just go home you know really you can't get sally may out of the house and the can't get Sally Mae out of the house.

And the only way to get her out of the house is just constantly punch her as hard as you can hit her. I recommend violence on Sally Mae. I really do. Get violent with the old woman. And just beat the snot out of her as fast as you can. And so, I mean, it's obviously a metaphor. So some of you politically correct idiots just calm your butt down okay but seriously beat this thing up get crazy on it and that's how that's how we've had all the success we've had getting people out of debt and ryan what you're what you've experienced is quite the opposite because as you said it's lingered for 11 years

but you led with well it's only two percent you know so don't lead with that lead with i hate this thing it's going away that's what does it just like that that level of commitment and total focus is what gets rid of the debt when that is gone you're in a position to win then financially you got no debt in the world you're making 85 grand you're gonna kill it at that point. Mark is with us. Mark's in Lansing, Michigan. Hey, Mark, how are you?

Hi, Dave. I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? I have a question. I'm 29 years old. I'm in my third job since I was 20.

And every time I work at a company for a while, and I should say each company I've worked for has been in a different industry, doing something totally different. And every time after two, three years, I started getting bored with work. I started at a company at the bottom, and I worked my way up in the service department. I'm a service technician, a mobile service technician. And every time I grow up the ladder, I get to the point where I'm the one that gets sent to all the problem jobs and the equipment that we work on.

And I get bored. I lose the challenge. I learn all the equipment. I know inside out. And then the next step that the company is offering me is to do something like a tech support or a management position, and that's something I don't want to do. I'm not much of a people person, I guess. I like to be alone working on stuff by myself. I don't see myself managing 10, 15 people. So how can I find something that I would have more of a challenge? I have a job offer right now for

something totally different again. Right now I work in the recycle equipment industries. I have a job offer for the marina, which is something different. It seems interesting because it's a challenge for me. Again, it's something new I can learn about, but I'm just scared that in three or four years I'll be in the same position again and bored with what I'm doing. Is it more money? It's starting out $2 an hour lower, but I get a guaranteed raise of $2 an hour for the next five years.

So I would be at $10 an hour more in five years. I would go from $22. What would keep your mind busy? The things I enjoy is something that three people have looked at. They can't figure out what's going on. You like solving mechanical puzzles. Yes. And you're good at it.

Mechanical and electrical. And you're good at it. I do a lot of automation. And you're good at it. Yes. What about moving to the next level and and that's start inventing things and building things? Since you know how to fix them when they're broken, would you not be able to build something that doesn't break?

Yeah, in a way, I would be able to, probably. I wouldn't really know where to start with that, I guess. I'm just wondering if something like some mechanical engineering classes might activate some of what you're doing. I mean, you're obviously introverted, which there's nothing wrong with that at all. There's a lot of very successful introverted people.

You want to deal with systems and processes and not people, which is cool. There's no issue with that. And the good news is you know that. And the good news is you know that about yourself. Well, you don't want to manage 15 people. You want to work on broken stuff. Right.

Okay. That's cool. So let's just use that and say, I'm just wondering if there's not a way to enter, you know, get in a mechanical shop that works on building prototypes for people. And that would be something new all the time, and you're trying to break something before it goes to market. You're trying to fix it before it breaks and anticipate the things like that. And that would be through the mechanical engineering world, the machining world, and that kind of a thing.

That's the kind of stuff I'd probably aim myself at if I were you. Check out some mechanical engineering classes, and check out some people that are building machine-type prototype things, whether they're electronic or whether they're machined items, I don't care. But that's the kind of stuff where you get the other side of this, rather than fixing other people's stuff, why don't you make something? Guys, let's talk about that timeshare pitch that you fell for. They promised you exclusive access to travel anywhere you want. Tropical beaches, mountain getaways, or whatever. Oh, my gosh.

They claimed it was the affordable way to travel, and then they convinced you it was a good investment. But here's the deal. Search any auction site for your exact timeshare and see what it's selling for. It's listed for a dollar with no bids. That's not a good investment. Now, I know I'm just adding salt to a very old wound, but look, if you tried calling the resort and they won't take it back, if you tried selling it and no one will buy it, call Timeshare Exit Team. Timeshare Exit Team will get you out. You'll have to be patient.

It can be a long process, and it costs money, but it works. They're so confident in their exit service that if they don't get you out, you get a 100% refund. Call 844-999-EXIT. It's free to talk. 844-999-EXIT. TimeshareExitTeam.com. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions, Miles and Laura are where there's... Hey, guys, how are you? Hi, Dave. Hi, how are you?

We're so excited to be here. Welcome, welcome. You got the T-shirts, the Nerd and Free Spirit T-shirts. Yep, that's us. All right. Self-made, obviously. Well done. Yeah.

Thank you. Well done. Where do you guys live? San Diego, California. All the way to Nashville to do a debt-free screen. You bet. Way to go. How much you paid off?

We paid off $71,450. Good for you. How long did that take? It took about seven months. Good deal. And your range of income during that time? It was between $180,000 and $210,000. Wow.

What do you all do for a living? I'm a pharmacist. And I'm a physical education teacher. Cool. So what kind of debt was the $71,000? It was a combination of student loans and solar panels. We had about $58,000 for student loans and $14,000 for solar panels on our house. Okay.

Are they working good? Oh, yeah. Good. They're paying money back then, huh? Now they are. Good investment. Worked out. Good for you.

Fun, fun. So how long have you guys been married? 11 years next week. So what happened seven months ago that made you turn this on? Well, about three years ago I had read the Total Money Makeover and thought, you know, we were doing all right. We were following our own debt snowball. We weren't doing all the other steps. And then about a year ago, driving to work, I just stumbled across your radio show and heard a couple doing their debt-free scream.

And it really resonated with me, and I felt really emotional listening to it. Like, they can do it. We can do it. You know, we make plenty of money to be able to accomplish this. So I went home, told him all about it. He's like, you're never allowed to listen to the radio again. Weird people are on the radio. Yeah, pretty much.

And so last summer, we were on our camping trip, and I just felt like more money was going out. We were trying to remodel our bathroom. We were investing our camping trip, and I just felt like more money was going out. We were trying to remodel our bathroom. We were investing for retirement, our kids' college funds, and I just felt like the needle wasn't moving very quickly the way I wanted it to. So we kind of came up with a budget and decided to be, you know, intense. We didn't really know what that meant at that point, but we just kept listening to your show getting more and more gazelle intense we went to fpu um everything we were all about it so miles she kind of starts this whole thing and brings it up

again on the camping trip this is bothering her what point did you put your toe in the water um when she first came home that first time she listened to it i definitely was on board, but I had kind of that skeptical look on my face probably. Yeah, I would have. Yeah, but the camping trip, we were just kind of setting goals. It was the end of summer, so it was before my school year started, and that was just really one of the goals that she wanted.

And I wanted to be more of a part of the budgeting process and seeing where our money really was going. I wasn't part of that process through most of our marriage up until that point. And so it made a huge difference for me to be part of that and see the budget and that's really what pushed me kind of onto the boat rather than swimming behind. When you see the numbers, you go, yeah, we can do this. It's the numbers.

Sometimes the numbers will give you hope if you write them out clearly. Okay. When you see the numbers, you go, yeah, we can do this. Exactly. Sometimes the numbers will give you hope if you write them out clearly. Yeah. And it was setting a firm goal for us at the camping trip. We set a goal of having just my student loans paid off by the end of his school year, so the end of June. And we actually paid off the student loans, the solar panels, and got our emergency fund funded up by that time. So we just were all in at that point perfect very fun very fun how's it feel it feels amazing yeah you know what was the biggest sacrifice amazon.com stay off a prime too easy yeah yeah it's no friction at all just Just send me stuff to my door. Yeah, painless.

Yeah. I would say eating out. I do a lot of cooking at home, and there are days after work that it'd be easier just to go out and not have to worry about it. And once we got going and saw how much that was taken up throughout the month, it was easy to let it go. So about the time you were getting started or while you were doing it, was there ever a big budget fight? No, not really. No? No.

Sorry. You guys are pretty peaceful. That's okay. You guys are pretty peaceful. You guys are pretty peaceful. Some people fight every month, and some have one big one at the beginning, and there's always interesting stories around it. Yeah. But you guys, once you both were on board and decided, it's game on then.

Yeah. Well, we're both highly competitive people, so it became kind of a game between us. Oh, okay. You know, like, oh, did you spend any money today? No. You know, did not spend any money throughout the day. And, you know, we just wanted to beat ourselves, beat the goal that we had set. So didn't you have good support or did people make fun of you? No, everyone was really supportive.

Yeah, that's good. We went through FPU also and that helped. It kind of also fueled the competition a little bit. Yeah. Hear some other people's stories. Yeah, that kind of goes, yeah, we can beat them. I can do it. I know we can do it.

We're competitive. Yeah, I hear you. I like that. That's the way I am. That's good. So is it your church or you just found a local church? We found a local church. Okay.

And we're actually trying to work at coordinating an FPU art church. Oh, wow. Well, thank you. Very cool. That's very good. Well, fall's a big time to do that, so that's perfect. Well, good job, you guys. We've got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Retire Inspired, number one bestseller.

That's the next chapter. Yeah. The story continues. The next chapter is millionaires. Yeah. You make a couple of hundred, you need to be a millionaire. We will be. Yeah, you will be.

You really will be. No question. We can't wait to hear from you on a millionaire theme hour and hear how you did it. Miles and Laura, San Diego, California, $71,000 paid off in seven months, making $180,000 to $210,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Just want to say hi to our kids at home, too. They're watching, and they'll be counting down with us.

All right. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Love it, love it, love it! Very cool. Very cool. Very cool. For those of you watching on YouTube or on Facebook or listening on a podcast and you didn't know what we were referring to with nerd and free spirit, what we've discovered, and it's kind of a joke, but it's kind of not a joke,

is that usually when you get married, opposites attract. One of you is a spender. One of you is a saver. One of you likes details and administrative tasks, like, quote, doing the bills. And one of you doesn't. And the one that likes the details we call the nerd. That's me at my house. I'm the nerd.

You know, the pocket protector for your pencils and all that, right? And the whole deal, the whole nerd thing, right? They're just administrative. That's all it means. Because usually one of you does that more than the other. The other one's called the free spirit. And the free spirit has fun. They don't like to be told what to do with the rules and systems

and that kind of thing. My wife is more the free spirit at our house. Oddly enough, she's a saver free spirit. I'm a spender nerd. Most of the time, the nerd is a saver, and the free spirit's a spender, most of the time, but not always. And the point is that there's opposites attract, right? When you're dating.

When you're dating, it's kind of cute. When you get married, it's what makes you mad. Opposites attract. Larry Burkett used to say, if two people just alike get married, one of you is unnecessary. So you need each other. You nerds need a free spirit so you have what's known as fun in your life. You otherwise would never engage in this thing called fun.

You would never enjoy your money. You free spirits need a nerd in your life so you don't have to retire and buy that cookbook, 72 Ways to Prepare Alpo and Love It. The nerd will have a plan for everything. They'll lay out a detailed process for accomplishing our goals. And they're big rule keepers, by the way, we nerds are. We like our rules, and you stick to the rules. Don't mess with the rules.

Free spirits, by nature, are big rule breakers. But the trick is when you can sit down together and you have a written plan that both of you looked at, both of you had a vote on, and both of you are in agreement on and we're in agreement on our goal our goal is to get out of debt because that gives us control of our most powerful wealth building tool which is our income we want to get that moving so we can win and um won't work you know you've got to be on the same page you to be on the same page. You've got to be on the same page. That written budget pulls the free spirit and the nerd together.

That's why you often hear people refer to that. That's in our Financial Peace University teaching. So this is The Dave Ramsey Show. Are high health care costs getting you down? Are you confused trying to navigate your options? Do you wish you could find an affordable, biblical solution to your health care costs? Based on New Testament principles, Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM, helps Christian families, churches, and ministries join together as the body of Christ to share their major health care costs. Christian Health Care Ministries is the original health cost-sharing ministry. A Better Business Bureau-accredited organization, CHM members share to pay each other's medical bills.

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You save money. Use the magic word, the promo code RAMSEY. When you're checking out, you get a better deal. Ron is in Michigan. My 82-year-old mother is being coerced into putting her $200,000 into an annuity. She needs some sort of income stream, but is this a wise move? Probably not. It's possible, but the very fact that you would say about your mother that she's being coerced,

that right there tells us that it's bad. Even if the product is proper, the people around her aren't right. Because her son feels like she's being coerced. There's a possibility a variable annuity might serve some of her needs. I wouldn't put the entire, if her whole nest egg is $200,000, I wouldn't put the whole $200,000 in there. But I might put as much as $100,000 in there. But i wouldn't do anything with anybody who was coercing me or my mother and so it sounds like there is a sibling involved and a pushy financial person and both of which need ejected from the situation so that mom can slow down, make steady, wise, peace-filled decisions.

You know, if there's not peace around something, if something has angst around it, that usually is an indicator it's a bad idea. You know, that little bell rings inside of you, God's Spirit saying, don't do it, don't do it, don't do it, don't do it. And so everybody's pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing. You know what I do? I just stop the train and get off. If I can't, on a major decision, if I can't get peace about it,

and Sharon and I can't get peace together about it, we don't do it. Whether it's a major giving, investing, whatever, business decision, long-term contract, or relationship in business that we're entering into, like hiring someone. If I can't get peace, a buddy of mine used to say, when in doubt, don't. And so the word in your email, Ron, that's throwing me is coerced. Even if it was the best product on the planet, an 82-year-old shouldn't be coerced into anything. Neither should a 22-year-old or a 52-year-old.

Margie is with us. Margie's in San Antonio. Hi, Margie. How are you? Hi, Dave. Doing well. I am 55, divorced after 30 years. Oh, my gosh.

Yes, I know. I had to get out of there. You know, family is very important, and staying in a relationship just to keep the family together and living with an abusive person mentally, physically, except it's just not good and healthy. So I moved on almost six years ago. Oh, okay. So what my question is, is I didn't get a lot of money in the divorce,

but I took, let's say, $90,000. I built my home on a couple of acres of land. It's now worth about $90,000. I built my home on a couple of acres of land. It's now worth about $400,000. So my question is, would it be wise to sell my home at this point, move to Arizona to help my brother and his wife take care of my mom and dad? They're in their 80s. Or should I have no debt debt everything i have is paid for um move to arizona sell my home take my 300 and something grand and um

invest wisely or just live very frugally as i have been anyway um, and live with my parents. They want me to live with them, which, you know, it sounds like a good idea, but it could be fine. They live with your parents, and you're going to move in with all of them? No, no, no. They have their own home. They have their own home. So they're wanting you to move in with Mom and Dad and take care of them?

Yes. I was thinking maybe for a year just to help give them a break and help out. How old are your mom and dad? They're 81 and 83. And how's their health? Dad just had a quadruple bypass, but he recovered wonderfully. Mom is okay. Has a few issues.

Okay, well, let's say you live there for a year or two, and you want to move back out on your own, or even worse news happens and both of them passed, and so you move out on your own. What are you going to buy then? Well, I have lived at some homes in the area. They live in Sun City, so I could get something for about $100,000. Well, probably $130,000, $140,000. And you'd have the rest of the money to invest. Right. Or should I

lease my home out for a year and go to Arizona? No. If you're going to make this move, make the move and sell it. I don't want you renting a house from Texas to Arizona. And a long-distance landlording, you'll end up in a bad, bad idea. And so, you know, if you're going to make the move, I would make the move. Now, I'm going to be your older brother for just a second, okay? Sure. I think you've spent a lot of your life serving other people,

and you work really, really hard to please others. Am I right? You're correct. Okay. That sometimes has gotten you into traps, and I don't want you to do this move and this life decision to take care of your mom and dad because other people want you to. It's a noble and wonderful thing to do that, but you should do it only because you have prayed about it and you want to do it.

I do want to. They didn't really say, hey, come up here and move in and take care of it. Because I had suggested that, well, maybe I should come up there and move in and take care of it. They just, because I had suggested that, well, maybe I should come up there and help out some. And, you know, I wish I could do two or three months, but, you know, I'm working and I've got my home, my pets, so I just can't run off and leave those things behind. But you would be quitting your job if you did this, right?

I'm a bookkeeper, so i could find something i could freelance bookkeeping something like that and your pets can go with you then yes i have um two dogs and a cat but they live in the new in the house with mom and dad okay all right just making sure and so as long as you've checked that out and this is something that you, I just didn't want your parents' need and your sister's pressure to cause you to just reform your whole life around them without it something you wanted to do. And if that's where you are and then you want to do it, I'm fine. That's fine. But, yeah, I would want to have a long-term game plan of what is the end game on this, meaning someday when you don't want to live there anymore or they pass

and you don't need to live there anymore, what is that next chapter of Margie's life then? Maybe stay in Sun City and continue on with the life you've built there. There'd be nothing wrong with that. But we need to know how we're going to do that with the money piece. And you outlined it well, so I think you've got a plan. I don't see a problem with it all, but I would sell the house if you're going to do this and put the money in an investment and be ready to make these transitions.

So, hey, thanks for the call. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Don is on Twitter. Should my wife and I have a larger emergency fund, considering we both work for the same company, not larger than six months of expenses, the range for your emergency fund is three to six months of expenses. If you're in some kind of a situation where you have higher risk, then you would lean on the six-month side of the three- to six-month range.

If you're in a situation where you have lower risk, then you would lean on the three-month side of the three- to six-month range. If both of you have jobs with the government, one of you works at the post office, one of you is a teacher, you have two jobs, and you have two very stable jobs. In that case, you could lean on the three-month side. If both of you work at the same company, but you both have jobs, well, you've got two jobs. That's good news.

But if the company went down, you'd have no jobs. And so that's higher risk. So you lean on the six-month side of the equation. If one of you owns your own business or a straight commission, you have more volatility in your life, then you'd lean on the six-month side of the three- to six-month equation. But I think anything past that, we're going to continue to work the baby steps. Six months is plenty. That'll allow you to do transitions in almost any situation.

That puts this hour of the Dave Ramsey Show in the books. Thanks to James Childs, our producer, Blake Thompson, our senior executive producer, Kelly Daniel, our associate producer and phone screener. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, and we will be back. Hey, it's Blake, chief production officer for the show, and here's a little tip for 2018. Go download our revamped Dave Ramsey Show app from the App Store. We're always listening to your feedback and adding new features to make it even better. Check it out. Okay, things are getting pretty weird out there.

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