The Ramsey Show - App - Crypto Ads Haven't Aged Well (Hour 1)

Episode Date: October 28, 2022

Rachel Cruze & Ken Coleman discuss: Paying off a new spouse's student loan debt, A Crypto.com commercial that hasn't aged well, Buying vs. renting when you first get married, The order of paying off a house vs. car, Selling a company. Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 Weekdays from 2-5pm ET Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3nInETX Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6 Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy

🎵 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Pods Moving and Storage Studio, it's The Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life and your money. It's a free call anywhere in the country at 888-825-5225. And I am Rachel Cruz hosting this hour with bestselling author and Ramsey personality, Ken Coleman. So we are taking your calls about anything, life, money, relationships, career. So give us a call. And if you like the show, if you guys enjoy the Ramsey Show, whether it's on YouTube or podcast or traditional radio, make sure

that, you know, tell your friends about it. Share the news. Talk about, you know, kind of even what you find interesting and introduce your friends to it because our goal, it's why we sit in these chairs for three hours every single day and do a live show is to help America.

We want to really hit against the toxic culture that's going on and hopefully give some hope and some direction for what's going on in your life. So again, give us a call at 888-825-5225. All right, up first of the show this hour, Catherine in L.A. Oh, love Los Angeles. Hi, Catherine. Welcome to the show this hour. Catherine in LA. Oh, love Los Angeles. Hi, Catherine.

Welcome to the show. Hi. Thanks for having me. I think I need some tough love as I sit in my Tesla. Oh, plugged mine in about an hour ago, Catherine. I appreciate that. Well, there goes the tough love

because Rachel loves her a Tesla. I do love a Tesla. Yeah. Mine's paid for, I'll say. Oh, very nice. Perfect. So we don't have to sell it. We're doing good.

Check. I think I have so many complicated questions until I play over what I think you guys are going to say to me and I know the answer. So I was debt free, a millionaire with a property that was, you know, had a lot of equity and, you know, some money in the bank and a good income. And I was a single mom. I was widowed at 39. And I had a nice nest egg, no debt. I met a fantastic man. We got married a few years ago. And with this awesome guy that, you know, adopted my daughter came a massive amount of debt to the tune of close to a half a million dollars. And it was school loans and some credit card and some high interest short-term debt. And I want to know, you know, the nest egg that I had built up was mine, but it's ours. The home equity, we sold that house, bought a house that we could all live in. We still have

a lot of equity in that house. But am I paying off his school loan so that we can be debt free. We have two paid for cars. We have a lovely income. I just really have a hard time paying off his past life. Yeah. And I hear that. And I, you know, I feel like it's easier for us to kind of harp on the ones that just got married and they're like, oh, it's his debt, my debt. Like you've just entered into a marriage, you know, but when you've lived two separate lives in a sense, right. Because you got married later,, oh, it's his debt, my debt. I'm like, you've just entered into a marriage, you know. But when you've lived two separate lives in a sense, right, because you got married later, had kids, and it's like you're merging these two lives, I think it's a harder pill to swallow.

So I hear that, Catherine. So don't say that this is, I'm not saying that it's just easy because I do have my answer and it is kind of black and white, but I want you to hear that it is hard. Like I get that. I absolutely get that. that it is hard. Like, I get that. I absolutely get that. But here's the benefit. Let me say that.

When couples can come together in a sense that you say, okay, this money that was mine, now I've entered into a marriage, and that means I am becoming one with someone else in every area of my life. And there's a sacrifice to that, right? You could put in money. You could put in time with that. You can put in maybe the way you want to raise kids, how you want to spend holidays. I mean, you could insert anything into that. And we just find that couples that have a sacrificial spirit, in a sense, to say, hey, I'm laying everything down and together we're going to build a life as one. They thrive and not just financially, because financially I believe they do, because you can

run a race so much faster when both of you are on that same page. But I think it's even deeper than that, Catherine. There's a spiritual element there that when you say everything that I have is yours, even this nest egg and as hard as it is to be like, oh, when you become one with that person, it does something in your marriage. There's an intimacy and a richness there. Now, I'll let Ken jump in a second. But my other asterisk though, Catherine, is I really want to make sure that he's done with this, right?

If his spirit is and his attitude is, God, I was so stupid. I took out all those loans. I wish I didn't. Never doing it again. We're living debt free. And it's this attitude shift as well that you guys have the same value system. Then I feel like it would be easier to say, yeah, we're in this together. Now, if he doesn't and he's still kind of messing around with debt and it's a value system of yours to live debt-free, then we have a marriage issue there, a values issue. Does that make sense, Catherine? Absolutely. And I so connect with what you said. I think where I've played this is, you know, I put our house on a 15-year mortgage. We paid off both of our cars and I have him putting all of his income into his school loan payments every month

and I hit the house really hard and I make sure everything else is debt-free. I don't know that if I just paid those off, if that money that he has every month that's going off those loans would just disappear. So I don't know that. I feel like we're on the same page when we talk retirement, but I don't know if short-term he would have the intensity to get that loan debt off and that money might just disappear somewhere else. Okay, that's what I was wondering because I could feel that you were like, I know what you're going to say, and I know that there's something that's really eating at you. I have two questions. Are you guys shared bank accounts? Are you guys doing all your Are you guys shared, you guys shared bank accounts? You

guys doing all your money together? Are you guys separate bank accounts? Separate bank accounts? Yeah. I could tell. I pay all the bills. I know. But here's my point. Here's why I asked the question. That's what's eating at you because you've got some natural psychological tension. And that's why Dave, and as an extension, we for decades have said, we want you. And Rachel just gave you the whole unity thing.

And so you agreed with everything Rachel said. So if you agree with everything Rachel said, and I know you did, so you guys need to combine bank accounts because that's where the tension is coming from. You're like, this is my money. I've worked hard.

And then you're like, I'm having him put all of his income into the student loan. And so therein lies the tension by which you called today. So I listen, first of all, let me say, I completely understand why you feel the way you feel. I share Rachel's opinion on, I get it. But you guys have decided to be married and it's a long-term play, yes or no? Yes, absolutely. Yes. So today we combine bank accounts. I still like the strategy. You've taken all of his income. I love the intensity, but I would not do him on the student loans and you on the house. It's no, we're going to put this in the baby steps. So we're going to put the student loans in baby step two. And you've done this before.

And so both of you attack the student loans and then both of you pay off the house. Yeah. And Catherine, hold on, because Austin's going to pick up and we're going to give you a year subscription to Ramsey Plus and it has every dollar in there, which is our budgeting app.

And I was just texting with my husband this morning about a horse and I was like, what's this Venmo? Where should it go? And so I want you guys to budget together for three months. Okay. And I want to say by February, there might be a more emotional ease for you to pay everything, pay it all off together as a team.

Once you guys have been, even from a tactical sense, budgeting together, it's coming out of one account. Like there is a unity there versus a separation like Ken was saying. So Catherine, I hope that helps. But stay on the line. Austin will pick up this is the ramsey show one of the most common pieces of advice i give folks trying to get out of debt is to sell the car. And I get it. That's easier said than done. Selling a car takes a lot of time and hassle unless you use CarWiser.

CarWiser is a free service that gets you the best offers instantly from dealers around the country. And it couldn't be simpler. Just enter your vehicle's information and boom, you've got offers to choose from. So go to CarWiser.com slash Ramsey. That's carwiser.com slash Ramsey. Welcome back to the ramsey show so there was a i don't know funny funny is that the word a funny commercial an ad that came out exactly one year ago today and it has not aged well, Ken. Oh, you're talking about Matt Damon. It was only funny in that it was so

cheesy serious. I remember it was like these big, bold historical moments. Do we have it? I think we have it. Let's roll this. With those who almost adventured, who almost

achieved, but ultimately, for them it proved to be too much. Oh, devastating. Then there are others. The ones who embrace the moment. I'm a snowy mountain. Look at this guy.

And commit. Yes. And in these moments of truth, these men and women, the airplane, the Wright brothers, mere mortals, didn't get that one. airplane. The Wright brothers. Mere mortals. Didn't get that one.

Whoa. They're just in the club. As they peer over the edge, they calm their minds and steel their nerves with four simple words that have been whispered by the intrepid since the time of the Romans. Wait for it. Fortune favors the brave.

Crypto.com. Yeah. So, okay. So I remember watching that. That was perfect. That's like, I thought it was a Velveeta commercial. Like we were going to see a block of cheese float through the sky. So bad.

And so this is fun because this was a year ago and you want you know there's a term now the kids use on social media what is it like this tweet didn't age well oh yeah you've heard that phrase well this commercial did not age well let's just look at the numbers uh by the way i like matt damon okay none of this is an attack on matt damon you know the guy got paid handsomely to say all those ridiculously cheesy lines yes uh had you uh uh calmed your mind and did what Matt Damon told you to do and you spent a thousand dollars uh worth on bitcoin that day um it was worth 60,608 back then near its peak price which is pretty amazing it would now just be worth 340 dollars oh boy oh so i don't know if fortune favors the brave or the wise i think it's the wise now am i saying i mean dave and i've talked about this you know just just kind of privately about

cryptocurrency i mean right now it is so wildly speculative not just because of the ups and downs but because these kind of things rarely go unregulated. That's the whole point. It's going to be unregulated. Governments kick. Well, guess what? No. The Biden administration has already come out and say, well, we're going to come out with ours. Other world governments are going to do the same thing. And so when something is unregulated, it's also unprotected and you can lose your shirt and a whole lot of other things. So pretty interesting. And we have some fun at this because this is why we preach wisdom with money.

Don't be speculative and take this. Because Matt Damon could talk you into going, oh, wow, I want to be like Orville and Wilbur. Right. And I want to fly a plane. And I want to invest a thousand dollars. Thank you for knowing the Wright brothers' first names. Somebody has to. Well done. Well, you've invest $1,000. Thank you for knowing the Wright brothers' first names. Somebody has to. Well done. Well, you've got to make fun of me sometime during the show today.

But, I mean, it's just playing on our emotions. I know. To get us to do something and then walk around going, hey, I'm really brave. And what you really are is you're an adult. You're a moron. If you make a decision financially like that with no background, no research, and it's a wild risk, you might as well

just take $1,000 and burn it. Well, for me, it's the long-term track record. That's what I always go back to, right? If I'm going to put my money in something, I'm like,

I just want to know that there's like, it's not everything's being predictable, right? The market, you know, who knows what's going to happen after November in the midterms in the market.

We may see something move. Like, you don't know. We don't have a crystal ball. But you can look over the scope of time on something. And for me, if it's my hard-earned money that I've worked for, I want to put it somewhere that I know. Right. And have pretty great certainty that over the course of time, I'm going to make more on it. So, yeah, the crypto thing.

It's such a fascinating thing because I just feel like so many celebrities make more on it so uh yeah the crypto thing and it's so it's such a fascinating thing because i just feel like so many celebrities have jumped on it well of course they jumped on they get paid handsome money to do yeah i know but he doesn't even know what cryptocurrency is it's not like there's like an online bank that all the you know that's like it's just it's pretty funny just the just that whole genre and they've attracted the celebrity pop culture aspect of well our colleague george camel likes to call crypto what does he call mary k for young men it's a great line and i will say this really quick before we move on the thing i love about that commercial that is so ridiculously funny is it's all about these big bold moves and it shows a dude making

his move in a nightclub like what was that doing in there i still don't get this like here's here's a guy climbing mount everest here's space astronauts and then here's some dude hey i just don't get it so anyway well one year ago today matt damon challenged you the fortune brave favors the brave you would have been better off taking that a thousand dollars and playing craps with it in Vegas. Especially with me as you're at your table. You are the hot hand. You have the hot hand. No question about it. All right. Up next is Cy in Utah. Hi, Cy. Welcome to the show. Hi. How are you? Doing well. How can we help? Well, I just have

kind of a two-part question. Trying to just plan for the future. I'm 21 and my girlfriend is 21 as well. We're just trying to decide, you know, how we should go forward with looking for a place to live. We want to get married sometime next, maybe late spring, early summer. And with the way house prices are right now, we just weren't sure if we should rent or look into a small, cheaper home. But I was gone for the past two years serving a mission for my church, and so I wasn't making any income during that time.

I've been home since May and I've been working, started a trade school. And my girlfriend has been saving like a mad woman for those two years as well. She's managed to save about $83,000. Oh, wow. Good for her. Yeah. Yeah, she did. She did awesome there. That's great. Well, let me tell you this, Cy. One of the things that we have found is in that first year of marriage, I would just rent. I wouldn't put the pressure of finding a home because you'll soon find out very quickly that a home ownership in general is just very expensive. And there's just a level of responsibility that you take on

as a homeowner. And if you don't have to have that, especially your first year marriage of transitioning and kind of figuring out life together, and you're able to just rent and you have a landlord, you let the housing market do what it's going to do. But you guys then have a chance to say, okay, what part of the city do we want to live in? You know, where specifically do we want to be? How far do we want to be from our parents? How close do we want to be from our parents? Boy, that's a key detail. All of that.

You just learn a lot about life and each other and even what you want. Like as you live life together, even over a year, you start to see, okay, here are the things that we really value that we are going to want in a home. And you just don't know all of that before you're married. So I always recommend pausing that first year of marriage. So you're looking at, again, spring, summer of 24 to buy something. And you guys have time. Don't rush it.

You're okay. Everyone's going to be like, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house, buy a house. Renters go to hell. Buy a house, buy a house, buy a house. And it's like, you don't have, it's okay. It's okay. You're not throwing money away. You're being patient and you're being wise. So that's what we always recommend. So the other part of my question then is a lot of people in my family have been kind of pressuring me to maybe get a credit card now and start building credit so that I can help her to

maybe take out a loan eventually. And I don't know if that's the smart thing to do or not, because after listening to the show, I'm pretty terrified to get a credit card. Yeah, totally. Well, the reason that you build up a credit score, yes, is some people would say, well, to get a mortgage. And that is true. You use a credit score to get a mortgage, but you also don't have to have a credit score to get a mortgage. You can do what's called manual underwriting, but you guys are going to be current on a job and with other bills for, I think on average two years. So the process does take a little bit longer, but it's worth it. It's not worth going in and playing the credit card game and trying to get your points and get your credit score up and do all of that. It's worth just

staying debt-free. You guys having that black and white value system, I think is really helpful to stay together. We're not taking on any debt, but hold on the line. Austin's going to pick up. We're going to give you Financial Peace University for you guys as a wedding gift for it to come. And you guys go through it together and then you guys make these decisions together. But hopefully you come to the same page. On Wednesday, we announce our very first Smart Conference weekend, a full weekend here in Nashville, and it'll actually be our very first event at the new Ramsey Event Center. This is very exciting news.

So fun. Oh, we cannot wait to host you guys. And Nashville, I mean, it's a destination city. Come on. Hot chicken, waffles, chicken and waffles, country music. cannot wait to host you guys and nashville i mean it's a destination city come on and hot chicken waffles chicken and waffles country music i mean you never know who you're gonna run into i know it's so good and smart conference it's it's probably one of my favorite events that we do it is the biggest event that we do at ramsey and it is a jam-packed event so that we cover every

area of your life so again we're hosting it at the new Ramsey Event Center. And it's going to be the entire weekend. And it's not only, again, going to help you in your life, in every area of your life, but we're going to make it a full Nashville experience. And we've got a Friday night, then all day Saturday. Which is so fun. The stuff that we're scheming and dreaming about for that friday night you just never know who's going to show up i know it's so great you

know what i mean you never know here in nashville we got some good friends in nashville we do know you never know we do but the personalities will be speaking um all day saturday and maybe even friday we'll see but it'll be myself dave ramsey, Ken Coleman sitting here next to me, George Campbell, Dr. John Zaloni, and Christina Ellis. And here's the deal. We only have limited tickets for this event. And the platinum level is already sold out. Is it really?

Two days. Already sold out. People want to come to Nashville. Yeah. So there's things that obviously these are going fast, but we still have only VIP and general admission left. Wow. And every pass will include a souvenir badge

to commemorate the grand opening weekend, which is so great. The Ramsey Events Center is a shining city on a hill, literally. It's a monster edifice that is just beautiful. It's awesome. It is awesome. So that weekend is April 14th and 15th.

Again, it's a Friday and Saturday, a Friday night and an all day Saturday. Spring in Nashville? Are you kidding me? It's wonderful. Tickets start at $79 and you don't want to wait. So go to RamseySolutions.com to reserve your spot at Smart Conference.

I can't wait for that. Can I wear linen that early? Or do I have to wait until Memorial Day? Do you know what the cutoff is? Not many men in my life ask about linen. Is it jacket or pants? I don't know.

I started thinking about a spring event and getting all fancy for the people. And I thought, is it too early for linen? No, April feels right. That feels good.

I typically wear the linen for Easter Sunday. I like to break out the linen seersuckers. You're a seersucker. Stacey really likes Preppy Ken. She does. Wow. And I do too, let's be honest. You know, man, that like takes me back to college. We did seersucker in college back in the day, but not so much anymore. There's nothing wrong with it. And to really, to really to really prep you can yeah and i like to wear the saddle shoes with them so that just really brings the whole outfit whole outfit so that's definitely a reason to come i might do it if you come to smart conference despite dave's objections i will wear some seersucker pants with uh with some saddle shoes i think

fantastic and it's worth every penny worth every penny you pay for it. Yeah, there you go. All right. Next up, we have Drew in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Hey, Drew. Welcome to the show. Hey, thanks for having me, guys. Absolutely. How can we help?

So in the past five months, I recently bought a house. So I'm new to having a mortgage. And I might have bought a car, too. new to having a mortgage and I might have bought a car too so I have a car payment and I just wanted to know what you guys recommend me doing as far as paying them both off like I'm guessing you're going to say do the car first but I just wanted to see what you guys think like what I should do. Sure how much do how much do you make a year, Drew? Um, I make around five grand a month. Okay. And how much is the car payment? Uh, 600. Okay. Um, how, what other debt do you have? That's it. Just a house and car. Just that. Okay. How much is the car worth? I think in today's market, like 40 grand.

Okay. Drew, I'm going to tell you to sell the car. Okay, that's what I thought. Drew, your car costs as much as you take home. You know what I mean? It's almost what you make in a year. Yeah, I know. Drew, how old are you take home. You know what I mean? It's almost what you make in a year. Yeah. I know.

Drew, how old are you? 21. Yeah, that's great. You're fine. Listen, we all make mistakes. We all make mistakes. What kind of car is it? It's a Subaru WRX.

Oh, yeah. Okay. Got to get rid of it. 2021. I know. Come on, Drew. Because here's the deal. No one should ever pay that much for a Subaru.

That's $600 car payment a month. Can you imagine if you just kept it? If you just had that money? So do you guys recommend I just take what I have saved and buy like a beater car? Yeah. You got to save up for something a little nicer.

It'll motivate you to get something better than the beater. Okay. How much do you have in savings? Around $15,000. Okay. Good for you. Good for you. So wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. So hold on a second. What's the car worth, you think? Car's worth what I, I just bought it when I bought the house like six months ago. All right. So you basically zero out a little bit. So you would have, so you would have, do you have any other debt? No. Okay. So you got $1,000 in the emergency fund, yes? Yeah.

So you got $14,000 to work with. Yeah. Dude, let me just tell you something. I'm very passionate about this subject because I'm looking for a car for my 16-year-old. Yes. So I'm looking all the time. All right? Dude, listen to me.

You can get way better than a beater for $14,000 right now. You absolutely can. Okay. Yeah. So I love your spirit, but you don't have to get a piece of crap. grand right now you absolutely can't okay yeah so i i love your spirit but you don't have to get a piece of crap not with what you've got andrew i would even i would even back it down not i wouldn't spend all 14 grand i would yeah keep some in savings because you want to have a three to six month emergency fund so you'll get that pretty quickly um and then once you have that

complete then you can look to see so i would buy something now seven to ten yeah seven to ten keep the keep the remainder you know build up your emergency fund whatever that is and then from there you're like okay you can save then save up and and and you can keep stepping up and carve that's the great thing about obviously the market's a little strange right now but that's the great thing about cars is i'm like you can continue to like you can drive something you can kind of make it look all nice sell it right now maybe sell it for more than what you bought it for possibly I gotta look into it and then keep just stepping up so you a car is not something that you feel you have to have you know it's like a house we want you to have it more than five years but a car you can keep stepping up whenever you want so that's the thing and I just don't want this six hundred dollars I want you to start investing into retirement i want you to start

doing things for the long term and paying off the house early and this six hundred dollars is going to go so far for you true so far for you so um i would just chalk it up to saying hey i do it today i made a i made a mistake i got in the heat of the moment buying a new house want a new car i want to be an adult in 21 i'm out of my own and you got a little a little ahead of yourself true so i would uh i'd sell i'd sell the car and do it now like don't wait for this to wear off and somebody else to talk you out of it yes you know that's what i worry about young people we got so many people that are older than them that have a place of influence in their life yep and and they tell them to do stupid stuff you know know, we had a, we used to have a video. I wonder if we still have it. It was an old video back when I started speaking right out of college. This was 13 years

ago. I used it in my presentations for high schoolers. It was called drive free, retire rich. Yeah. And Alan Harris, who used to be on the content team here, he voiced it and it was this great four minute video and it showed instead of having a car payment if you invested your money yep and you invested a car payment every month yeah and then on the side you saved up some money and you kept stepping up in car basically what you could make in just interest on that mutual fund by the time you're like 55 would pay for new cars for the rest of your life taking that interest like i love it's just the power of where are you putting your money and when you're putting your money in a car payments and in a loan and paying interest on something that's going down in value

for the most part i know used cars are weird right now but do you mean it's just this mindset shift of how do i use my money to work for me yeah instead of letting it work for the bank yeah and that's what ends up happening when you take out a car payment. That's absolutely right. Yeah, I love it. I just think so many people get, I mean, there's a very popular subset or set of videos out on TikTok of people just telling everybody with a giant smile on their face how much they owe and what their car payment is.

Like it's a badge of honor. And people are like, we owe $1,200. And they're like all excited about it. And it's just become the norm to where it's just like, hey, everybody does it. So, when you even think about how detrimental it is to our financial life and our life in general. And what it could be. Used cars are great. Paid-for cars are even better.

Yes. Thanks, Drew, for calling. Hope you make the right decision. Sell the Subaru. This is The Ramsey Show. so Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I am Rachel Cruz hosting this hour with Ramsey personality and bestselling author Ken Coleman. By the way, I should have emailed you before the show or maybe a courtesy text to tell you to wear your UT stuff

because I know you're very proud. We were at a live event and you were telling everybody that would listen, you know, go Vols, which you should. Go Vols. And I'm wearing the Michigan gear today, the Michigan Wolverines undefeated. So both of our teams are in the top four, I believe. Which I still, it still just makes my heart glad when I hear that.

I haven't heard that phrase. I know. For the University of Tennessee. Welcome. Welcome. The water's nice. We're the winningest program, by the way, in college football history. Michigan is.

Total wins. So I just want to point that out. And we play Sparty, our heated rival this weekend. I think that you're, because Neyland Stadium, Neyland, as as some would say is slightly less seats than michigan the big house i know but we're the two largest two largest stadiums i know and tennessee's what 106 somewhere in that range i should have my point is is i should have had you wear some tennessee gear i didn't let you know i should have actually had my old uh sweatshirt on this morning. My Tennessee crest. Yeah, lady out in the lobby right now at Ramsey Solutions watching. She's touting her Wisconsin gear.

I don't know why. God bless her. So sorry. They're terrible. So sorry, Kim. But we still like her. Fall is great, though. A little bit of trolling and trash talk to start the segment, James.

Fall is great, though. We love football. We love football and trolling. Especially college football. Yeah, it's fun. It's the best. All right. Up next, we got Tracy in Nashville. We love football. We love football and trolling. Especially college football. Yeah, it's fun. It's the best. All right, up next we got Tracy in Nashville. Hey Tracy, welcome to the show. Hey, how are you guys today? We're doing great. How can we help? So my husband and I are going to be receiving some money at the end of this year and we're

not sure what to do with it. How much? We're calling for suggestions. Okay. Between what we're going to be receiving and what we have in the bank, we're going to have about $700,000. Whoa! That's great. How much is that? I'm curious, how much have you guys saved? How much of that $700,000 is what you saved

versus what you're going to receive? We saved $130,000 of that. Okay, so it's a lot coming from the sale of this. That's great. Good for you guys. Give Rachel a snapshot here. So do you have any debt?

We are debt-free. House two? Yes. Everything is paid off completely. Amazing. Our income is between $350,000 and $400,000 a year. Whoa. Good for you guys, Tracy. Well done. This is all new. Amazing. Our income is between $350 and $400 a year. Whoa.

Good for you guys, Tracy. That's excellent. Well done. This is all new. This is all just kind of transpired within the last few months. Okay. So we're not sure what to do with this one coming in, and then we're not sure what to do with all the extra that we're now going to have on a monthly basis. Okay.

So what happened in the past few months that created this big of a change? A firm that we were a partner in was merged with another company, so we received our investment return. Okay. I got you. I got you. And will you still be making that kind of money after this all happens? Yes.

You will. Okay. That's great. Well, well done, Tracy. That is very exciting. So, you know, when it comes to this kind of thing and there's no debt, you have obviously savings, you know, it gets down to those basics, Tracy, that what you do with money, you can give it, you can save it and you can spend it. And I recommend doing all three. So I would sit down with your husband and I would look at

and say, okay, what are things that we are passionate about that we want to give to? And I would really plug in to as many as you guys want, but maybe two places, whether they're ministries or whether they're nonprofits, but something that you guys really have a heart for. And I would encourage you to dig into all of that and give some of this, the amount up to you, what you want. We always teach giving 10% and even more, but I would recommend that. I would put some in investments. I would continue to fund retirements. And then you guys can look to see, okay, what else we want to do? Do we want to open up a mutual fund, throw some money in? Do we want to do real estate? Because with this kind of money, you could buy a property if you wanted to and kind of get into real estate as an investment. And then you guys need to take some of this and

enjoy it and go on a nice trip or buy something that you've wanted to buy for a while. You know, I would recommend to enjoy some of it as well. So it's really those three buckets want a nice trip or buy something that you've wanted to buy for a while you know uh i would i would recommend to enjoy some of it as well so it's really those three buckets um which is what's so funny about money to me tracy is like those are the three things i teach my kids is you give you save you spend and it's just the truth of what we can what we still do today and and i would recommend yeah doing doing all three uh tr, I would look up several smart investor pros at ramsaysolutions.com right here in our area. And I would sit with a minimum of three

if you don't already have one. Do you have one already? We do. And they aren't aware of this money yet. We just found out this week. Okay, great. Great. Okay, so let me-

Get a game plan before we tell them. Great. Because what we have in the market's down 30%. So I'm not sure I want to put it in the market. Yeah, but you know that it's a discount right now, and especially for you guys where you're at. You are financially in unbelievable shape. I haven't stopped investing in my 401K. I haven't stopped investing because I'm getting stuff at a discount. Just to give you an idea, I don't know what it's done in the last day, but two or three days this week, the market was back up.

So, you know, this is the roller coaster. It's how it goes. Just, I'll revise my advice. I want you to go sit with your smart investor pro. You guys already have a relationship and go, hey, here's what's happened. And I think Rachel's advice is tremendous. I think I would give, first of all, I'd celebrate. I'd spend some, do something great with that kind of windfall. Make a memory for crying out loud. That's what Stacey and I would do. We'd go, okay, we're going to carve out, I'm serious, carve out some of this money and do something that you'll talk about when you're 80. I'd do that.

I think Rachel's right. I would give a nice chunk of it out of gratitude and making an impact, and then the rest of it I would invest with your SmartVestor Pro and multiply that windfall for more celebrating, more giving. So I think you're in great shape. Sit down and come up with a plan, and they'll walk you through all your fears. By the way, tell them that. You got to sit with your Smart Investor Pro and go, you know what?

I've seen my accounts take a 30% ding. I want to sit on this. And let's just walk through it, talk through all the scenarios. But I think you guys are in great shape, and I'm you have a smart investor pro you can trust and uh this is amazing but hey great can i just tell you i want you to have a little dream session tonight like like what's that big memory that we might make you know let's go celebrate with some of this kind of just been shocked about it all for sure a little while and there's that's right that's right so helping you come out of the shock let's dream a little bit come up with a great trip

or some unbelievable thing and then come up with a crazy blessing for somebody and i think that'll bring you down to earth pretty quick absolutely thanks have a great weekend awesome thanks send us a postcard i I know. Remember those? You didn't know what a postcard is. I don't know. Yes. You're always making fun of me, my old age and all this stuff. I am youthful.

I would like a postcard. I would like a postcard from Tracy. From Tracy. Wherever she goes. Dear Rachel and Ken. Hi. Here's where we went. Had a great lobster meal in Fiji today.

Thought you'd want a picture of it. I don't know what it is. You know, and what's funny too, I'm like, you know, with, I guess with a certain amount of money, and Dave says it all the time, but he's like, you know, once you eat, you know,

too much lobster, it can start to just taste like soap. I'd like to try that. There's a point that like, stuff is just stuff, and stuff is not wrong. It is okay to have nice stuff, so we are definitely not against that.

And just like we told Tracy, go and enjoy some of it um but man there is there's just nothing like hearing about a single mom yes who's struggling and you just show up with a car and you're like here you go oh here's a car that's exactly right or there's a family you know that's doing foster care and you just go and show up with a thousand dollar amazon gift card yes because that's nothing for tracy right now seven hundred thousand a thousand dollars would freaking change someone's life in that way right like true i mean it's that kind of stuff that come in and just like take care of someone's christmas oh man just had no hope at all i mean

you're exactly right there's so much fun in that. There's no five-star resort that's going to give you that feeling. Yes. And I think that's true. We want you to do both, right? Do both. And that's the fun of all of this is that you get to experience. But I think that when I talk to a lot of people in the money space, that generosity piece is not always there in teaching. And so I do want all of you

listening to, to, to let that be a motivation to, right. Those of you that are getting out of debt, you know, you're in baby steps one through three and you're pushing forward, like go and enjoy and have fun with your money, use it as a tool and enjoy it. But also dream about like, man, what are the, what are the crazy things we could do one day? What if we paid for someone's adoption? Right, just have these dreams. You know what I think would be fun? It's so fun.

Show up and meet somebody and go, hey, we're going to Fiji for the next 10 days, and we're taking you with us. You're not going to stay with us, but we'll take you. We'll just take you. We'll drop you off on the other side of the aisle. That's great. Well, that's a good hour in the books, Ken. Thanks to everyone in the booth,

all you gentlemen back there. Thank you, Ken. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, it's Rachel Cruz, co-host on The Ramsey Show. If you want to do your debt-free scream live on the show, visit ramsesolutions.com slash debt-free scream. We'd love for you to come to Nashville and tell Dave your story.

That's ramsesolutions.com slash debt-free screen. We'd love for you to come to Nashville and tell Dave your story. That's ramsaysolutions.com slash debt-free screen.