The Ramsey Show - App - Cut Up Those Credit Cards so You Can Actually Chase Freedom!

Episode Date: August 23, 2024

Welcome America. You have joined the conversation here on the Ramsey show conversation about you, your life specifically, your money, your work, and your relationships are the topics of the day. I'm Ken Coleman. Jade Warshaw joins me, and we're ready to go for you. Here's how you jump in. 888-825- 5-2-2-5.

888-825-5-2-2-5 is the phone number. I've got a little extra juice today because after the show, we're rocketing out of here, Stacey and I, to go see our son play his first Friday night football game of the season. It's football time in Tennessee. It's football time in America.

Some of you don't like football. You could care less. And I don't care that you could care less. Are you ready for some football? But I got a little extra juice because that means that fall is in the air. So I may tackle somebody in the lobby today. I don't know. I'm just going to warn you all.

I might just get too fired up and tackle somebody. We'll see what happens. That's inappropriate, Ken. You ready to go? Yes, I'm ready. Yeah, of course I'm kidding. Look at me. If I tackled anybody, I'd break. I'd break. Not a big fella. Not a big fella. All right, let's go to Newark, New Jersey is where we're going to join Kat. Kat, how can we help today? Hi, guys. Thank you so much for taking my call. You bet. How can we help you? So I'm a 25-year-old nurse. I've been a nurse for about three years in New Jersey, and I'm in grad school part-time. Every time I get to baby step one, I end up using it to pay off my credit card bills for the month. And even though I make a good salary, I'm chronically

overspending and living paycheck to paycheck. And my debt is minimal. So I feel like I'm missing a huge opportunity to spend. So I'm hoping for some advice to break that cycle. All right. Well, I'm going to turn you over to the budget queen herself, but I'm just curious, what is your income? Without overtime, it's about 95,000 with overtime, maybe 110. Oh my gosh. You're going to get scolded. That's really good money. That's really good money, Jade. You're doing a great job. What's causing you to use credit cards when you have actual cash money, as they say? I think I have this false sense of security. I spend money before it's there. So I'll put it on my credit card and then

when I get paid, the first thing I do is pay off that credit card and then I have no more cash left. So what's happening is you're overspending on the credit card, then you're having to dip into your $1,000 in order to cover the difference. Did I understand that correctly? Yep. And that makes exact sense. I want to validate that there is a very clear reason that that's happening.

And it's because we know that, I mean, studies have been done that when you spend on a credit card, you do spend more money. And in the range, the percentage, it grows depending on what it is that you're spending money on. It could be anything from 5%. It could be upwards of 13% for things like fast food. And it could be up to 100% more for things like events, concert tickets, football tickets, things that you enjoy doing for entertainment. And so it makes sense that you're going over and spending more than you would if you were using a debit card and sticking to a budget. So all that to say, I think there's a really simple, you know, anecdote for antidote. That's right. Antidote for this problem. And I

think it's you getting out your credit card right now and slicing it up. What do you think about that? I had a feeling you were going to say that, so I'm ready to do it. You're ready to do it? Let's do it on air. All right. So here's how we do this. You've got to get it really close to the phone so we can hear the snip, snip. snip snip. Tell us when and count us down so we can all listen. Alright, let's see. It's a metal kind of metal card. This should be interesting. You've got to go Hulk status on that one.

Alright, I'm putting it close to the speaker here. I'll tell you when I'm about to do it. Okay. Three, two, one. Oh, boy. Did you hear it? I heard it.

I heard a snap. Did it cut? It cut a slice. We're doing the rest right now. Ready? Okay. Did you hear it? Oh, that's good.

I feel like it's a bit of a crunching. There we go. I heard that. What kind of card was it? It was a Chief Prime Freedom. Oh, Prime Freedom. Yeah, they had to add prime to freedom as if freedom's not enough. Oh, this is prime.

Let me tell you something. Prime Freedom. You are now actually free. You now are. Exactly. These credit cards don't give a rip about your freedom. I can tell you that right now. But Ken and I actually do.

We want you to be free. And I truly do think that this is going to be the start of a situation where you're not having to dip into your emergency fund every other month. Hey, do you have Every Dollar? No. Okay. I mentioned it before. And for anybody listening, Every Dollar is our budgeting app here. It's the best budgeting app there is. It makes it so, so easy to budget, Kat. Even somebody like me who's not really into apps and technology, it's very simple. It's very intuitive. It goes on your phone or your desktop. We're going to send it to you for free because this is the key to you really making progress with your money. Because nothing, Ken, nothing is more frustrating than finally getting $1,000. And then you have to go right back into it.

That will make you want to quit. That right there. But with every dollar, you're going to feel victorious and you're going to keep going and you're going to make progress. You're not going to take one step forward, two steps back. One thing I want to add real quick, Kat. My mentor, one of my mentors, John Maxwell, leadership guru, friend of our organization, has said that a budget is telling your money what to do.

And very simply put, that's about as beautiful of a definition of a budget as anything I've ever heard. And that's what's going on with you, Kat. You've got to just get intentional. Now, Jade's giving you every dollar, and that's the mechanism. But the mechanism itself won't work unless you work it. So you've got to decide, I'm going to get intentional and at the start of every month, tell my money what it's going to do. Right now, you're just doing whatever you want to do, right? Yep. So I just wanted to put that in there. We're going to give you a wonderful mechanism, Jade, but you have to actually make it work or it won't work. It doesn't magically do it for you. That's right.

And Kat, I want you to find me on Instagram. Do you ever go on social media? Oh, yeah. I follow you. Okay. She's already with you on the gram. I'm talking about it all the time. I'm really trying to help people optimize their budget,

streamline what they're doing so that it's really working for them and it doesn't feel like a hassle. It feels like something that they enjoy doing. It's working for them. So make sure to tune into that because I'm, I mean, all the time I'm coming on there giving tips. So I think for you, you're going to get off this call with every dollar you're going to, you've already cut up the credit cards. Bravo.

Very, very good. And yeah, now you can actually chase freedom. There's a notion, but you got to be intentional. So hang on the line. We'll take care of you. Jade, i want to come back to that there because again i love your story stacy and i have our story you and sam paid off almost a half a million dollars in debt you don't do that without budgeting and i mean budgeting like to the penny yeah what is the mindset for someone like a cat people that are listening right now joining all the time and they're going, okay, I understand the functionality of a budget,

but I want you to give them, you got a minute here, I want you to give them, what do they have to do practically to start to make the concept of a budget work? Well, I always say a budget needs to be three things. Detailed, realistic, and flexible. Love it. So important. The detailed is when you go in there and you're really thinking through, what do I spend money on? Anything from those fixed expenses like rent or mortgage, your car payment, right? To variable expenses, things that have the ability to change like your gas bill or your groceries, things like that. And even those odds and ends that come through,

you're taking your son out of town to a football game. That is added cost. So you're budgeting through those things. You're being realistic. Yeah, I'm a family of four. We're growing. Groceries cost more now. So you're being realistic in the amount of money that you're setting in each category. And then you're being flexible to know, hey, no one's perfect. Things pop up. I forgot I had that thing on auto pay and it's coming through. So I take from one category in order to make it work. And I'm constantly balancing that budget and being flexible with the numbers. That's how this thing works. Tell people where to go to get every dollar. All right. You can go to every dollar at ramsaysolutions.com slash every dollar. There you go. All right. She's Jade Warsholutions.com slash every dollar. There you go.

All right. She's Jade Warshaw. I'm Ken Coleman. Don't move. More Ramsey Show coming right up. What does the future hold for business? Ask nine experts and you'll get 10 different answers. Economic growth or a recession.

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closing the books in days, not weeks, you can spend less time looking backward and more time focusing on what's next. And speaking of what's next, download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning at netsuite.com slash Ramsey. It's free at netsuite.com slash Ramsey. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. Thrilled to have you with us. 888-825-5225 is the phone number for you to jump in. Jade Warshaw is with me. I'm Ken Coleman, and we're here to coach you up today. We're going to coach you up with your money, coach you up in your professional goals or advances so you can make more money. And what's the relationship stuff going on around all of that?

We'll coach you up there as well. Hey, for those of you who feel like this is a big year coming up, we're just getting into the last two quarters of the year, and 2025 around the corner if you can believe that uh and you want to make some real marks coming up um you've got to be intentional uh the dreams and plans have got to be supported by goals and time so we're excited to announce the new 2025 ramsey goal planner is officially on pre-sale that's going to help you get organized and track your progress.

It's not just an everyday planner that you've seen in your favorite store that you go to. Ken, toss me that planner. All right. I'll just do that. Toss it on over here. I'm not going to toss it because it could hurt you. Yeah, it's substantial. You're right.

It is. I was talking about that the other day. By the way, that could be a safety device. It could protect you if someone sneaks up on you. You whack them right in the head. You knock them on the head. That's right. Exactly right.

The reason she's so excited about it is because she, she being Jade Warshaw, Rachel Cruz and Dr. John Deloney teamed up to put some great practical content that will help you with your money, your faith, and your relationships. And it's on pre-sale, which means it's the best price you can get for it. It won't ever get lower than this. $35.97. $35.97. Last day to pre-sale, which means it's the best price you can get for it. It won't ever get lower than this. $35.97. $35.97. Last day to pre-order, September 2.

And then the prices go back up to $49.97. So this sells out every year. You can get it at ramseysolutions.com. ramseysolutions.com. It's a little price is right moment here. You're going to model it for us? Planner people are planner people. Like they want to know what's in it.

And one of my favorite things about it is the calendar orientation. It has the calendar like you would normally see it, you know, on any sort of calendar. But it also has like agenda style in there to where you can write out what you plan to do for those days. There's places where you can journal. There's places where you can, you know, write down your monthly notes. I like using it for those days. There's places where you can journal. There's places where you can write down your monthly notes. I like using it for meal planning. You can go in there and put your plans for there. There's a place where you can write the books that you're reading, the podcasts that you're listening to. There's Bible verses. It's really, it's a lot. There's even financial

trackers in the back. So if you're're tracking to save tracking to pay off your house all right there's not a better planner than this and i just saying that because i love it yeah it's uh it's a handsome item it is and one added bonus here oh i'm just going to be honest every year this has happened every year for the last three three years i bought one for somebody else and then i'm jealous when i see it and i turn around and buy one for myself because there's i know somebody in a building probably get you one for free this year oh i pay for it i know a few people listen you pay for it i helped write it yeah but that means you shouldn't pay for it no it's the op it's like when you make your first dollar and you put it in a frame i buy everything i've

come out with i buy i bought money's not a math problem i bought the gold planner i bought i gotta tell you something right now i've never bought one of my products you want other people to buy you gotta buy it i made it i don't need to buy it america needs to chime in on this, Kim. That's a budget item that needs to be revisited. Listen, just know I bought it. Oh, we know. I got a lot of questions, but they don't need to be answered. There are other questions that need to be answered. But I love how you gave me the guilt trip.

What? You want to? Like, uh, uh, I wrote it. That's true. Okay. Anyway, Robert's up next in Miami, Florida. Robert, how can we help today? How's it going, guys?

Thank you for taking my call. Sure. I recently opened a business and it's IT and tech repair, things of that nature. I've been running it for two and a half years now, actually two years, five months and 17 days. And, um, every month has been fine, money-wise, numbers-wise. Everything's in the green. Nothing's in the red or the black. Nothing seems to be going wrong,

but I seem to be having this perpetual fear that there's like a skeleton in the closet, so to speak, that something is going to come up, something's going to happen, it's going to cause some problems. Okay, let me jump in there for a second. Something is going to come up, something's going to happen, it's going to cause some problems. Okay, let me jump in there for a second. Something is going to happen, and there will be a problem. I want to go ahead and just, so there's no need to be afraid of it, because it's going to happen. It's called life. It's called running a business. So what we need to do is stop clutching our pearls and freaking out and start preparing for it. When I was growing up, I lived, Jade, on the coast of Virginia. And because we lived on the coast of Virginia, hurricane season, which we're in right now, was a pretty normal thing.

And when the forecasters would say, we might be in the track of this deal many, many days in advance, it was a normal thing in our neck of the woods where we would see people go that live right on the ocean or had businesses on the ocean. Robert, I hope you're listening to me. And they would go buy plywood,

three by four inch plywood and heavy, thick stuff. And they would board the windows. They would go get sandbags. In other words, they would prepare for the coming storm. And we never knew for sure if the storm was going to hit us. You lived in Florida, you understand this. But you still prepared knowing that the storm was going to come. And if it missed us, great. You're more prepared for the next time. Then when the next time actually hits, you're prepared.

So, Robert, I'm thrilled to hear that your business is healthy and your fear needs to turn from fear into vigilance. Okay? Vigilance is different than fear. Vigilance is why we put soldiers on the wall. If you ever had a fort when you were a kid or watched old movies, they'd have a soldier going across the top of the fort looking out for potential danger. So financially, to be financially vigilant is what we want you to do. And so here's how you do that. Okay. We call it retained earnings here at Ramsey Solutions when we teach business owners

how to prepare for a rainy day. It's the same thing as an emergency fund that Jay teaches people when they call in for their personal income. And so you need to have a very robust retained earnings account. So it would be a savings account. And it is there for when maybe a problem arises that costs you a little something or maybe a lot. But instead of it breaking your business, it's just like having to use the emergency fund in real life. Is that at the crux of what the fear is about? Is that thing that breaks your small business and takes away your ability to work for yourself? Oh, no, no, no. I have, pardon, pardon to say this, but I have six figures in reserve. I'm not worried about that. The hoard and the keep is not the problem. It's how should I say this? Um, uh, in education and schooling, I was always like the

top of the class. I was at the top 1%. I was the big fish in the bowl, so to speak. Okay. Now that I'm out of the bowl and into the ocean i feel kind of like a little fish in a big body of water and i've never felt this before oh that's not what you said i know you see well now you two explain it to me well you said you were afraid of a skeleton in the closet which that's the wrong metaphor i think you're just worried like you're not the top dog like there's real competition out there and you're going to have to fight to maintain what you have. You're probably going to have to fight harder than you ever had to maybe in high school or college to maintain what you had because it was a smaller pond. And now you're out in the world.

Good for you to get that. So what's the fear, though? So I get that. But what bad happens as a result of you not being the biggest, baddest fish? Well, I mean, how should I say it? I feel like you said, I'm clutching the pearls. Hello? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I don't know how you say it, because I think we're back to the original thing. You're afraid of something bad happening. You can't even define what bad happening is. It's everything that's minor. So for example, let's say I fix around 2,500 computers a year. My ticket number almost reached up to 2,600 last year. For example,

client comes in, isn't happy with their work and requires a refund. I know I have the hoard and the keep and I have everything to maintain it. I just feel as though it's a mistake that I made or that was made by my company. And I'm worried that something will come from it. I think that becomes a pattern, my friend. And there's there's a part of this that's like, I'm afraid on my commute to work that I'll get in a car accident. Like there's a part of this that's like you some of it you can control and some of it you absolutely cannot control. Yeah, you might have people come in and make a bunch of returns. And then you'll adjust and you'll fix it.

People are very flexible and people are very adjustable to whatever is going on in their life. And I think that if you've been able to get this far, when the rain comes, you'll know how to flex and adjust and do what Ken said. Prepare and mitigate whatever issue is taking place. We're not worried about you. Yeah, you've done the work that we asked you to do on savings. Now just do good work. Yeah. And if you screw up, say, I screwed up. I'm going to fix it for free. This is The Ramsey Show. There's a time in your life and at the baby steps for renting, but you don't want to do it forever

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on the American dream of home ownership today at churchhillmortgage.com. That's churchhillmortgage.com. This is a paid advertisement. NMLS ID 1591. NMLSConsumeraccess.org. Equal housing lender. 1749 Mallory Lane, Suite 100. Brentwood, Tennessee 37027. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show, where we help you win with your money, win in your work, and win with your relationships. 888-825-5225 is the phone number. I'm Ken Coleman. The fabulous Jade Warshaw joins me this hour, and we are here for you.

Let's go to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania next, where Amanda is waiting. Amanda, how can we help today? Hey, Jade. Hey, Ken. Thanks for taking my call. I'm so excited. Well, we're excited too. What are we excited about? I'm hoping you guys can help me settle a debate between me and my husband regarding if we should sell my car. Come on, Ken. High five. That's our favorite. We love this. We love getting in the middle of marital debates about things. It's very exciting. Sometimes it turns into a debate with Jade and I, so you just never know. It's a double bonus. Okay, so set it up for us, but as you set it up, we need to know, America needs to know,

what your side of the debate is and what his is, and then we'll dive in. How about that? Okay, so I think that we should sell the car and pay off debt. He thinks we should keep the car because he believes that it's safe and it's a great car and we are pregnant right now, so he wants something that's safe for the baby. Okay. All right. Okay. Now, I'm going to walk you through some quick questions and then Judge Jade and Judge Ken

will get involved. Okay? All right. Okay. So how much debt do you have? About $70,000. What is that comprised of? Break that down, please.

It is $42,000 of student loan debt, and the rest is an IVF loan. Well, what about the car? Is the car paid for? The car is paid for. So I actually discovered Dave about 10 months ago. I didn't really understand all of everything that he practices, but I got gazelle intense and I paid about $63,000 of debt off in the last 10 months. Wow. Good for you. And the car being a part of it. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I've got 42K student loan and 28K IVF. Yeah. All right. And what's the car worth if you were to sell it?

About between 26 or 28, so like 27,000. Okay. And what would you drive? Do you have a second car that you would just, what's the plan in your mind? I was thinking, I was just looking before I called you guys and I found some reliable looking cars for about $10,000. So that would be what I would budget to buy a beater car. Leaving $17,000 over to put towards debt. Correct. Okay. And what is you guys' salary? What do you guys bring home? $140,000 a year between the two of us. Okay. And is this your only vehicle or is there another one? And what's it worth? My husband has a vehicle. It's paid off. It's probably worth about $10,000. Okay. What is your vehicle? The one that we're thinking about selling? It's a 2021 Subaru Ascent. Okay. So this would be... I'm ready. I'm ready to decide.

Yeah. I'm ready to decide. Yeah, I'm ready to decide. You can keep asking questions. I've already reached my conclusion. Do you have any more questions, Judge Jade? Let me think here. So the plan would be if you sold this car, the baby would ride in whatever car anybody's driving, right? Yeah. That's correct.

His car is a... what's his car? It's a, I think it's a 2013 Nissan Frontier. Fantastic. Great. And you're in the, what's the car that you priced out around 10 grand? What was that model or something in that range? It is, it's a smaller version of the Subaru Ascent. Oh, okay.

I don't know what the model's called. Absolutely. I'm ready to rule. I'm ready, too. Ladies first. Okay. You go first. I'm going to say I'm on your side.

I would sell it. Yes. And here's why. Here's why. I concur. I just needed to get that in really quick because you're going to say what I'm going to say. Go ahead. I concur.

Here's why. Okay. You're not above the guidelines of car. You know, we always say if you had more than 50% of your take home pay in cars, I'd be like, you got to get rid of one of these. If I thought that there was no way to pay this off in two years, I would also for sure definitely say you've got to get rid of it. And that those two things aren't true, but you do have a decent pile of debt here and you're able to clear $17,000 of debt

or you're able to put, yeah, $17,000 on your debt and you're still able to drive a pretty nice car. And so- And the baby doesn't know. The baby doesn't know the difference. Exactly, he doesn't know. No, he doesn't have a clue. Part of me, and here's the other trade-off I want to say.

You guys said we're going to spend, we're going to go into debt for ivf and in many ways this is you guys paying it back and saying instead of going into debt this is us you know what i'm saying swapping that money out and i think that's going to give you a lot of peace going into this too i agree your husband's a good man i'd show on YouTube. You can rewind it and he can see that we both have ruled in favor of Amanda. Nothing personal to your husband. There might be some pride involved there. The nicer car. Every man wants his wife to have a nice car, a nice house. And for the baby. And the baby. But the baby doesn't care. And then when the baby becomes a toddler, he's going to destroy the car. He's going to dump his bottle, his juicy juice cup. There's going to be goldfish everywhere.

Applesauce on the window. I mean, honestly, I wouldn't get a nice car until the kids are teens. That's a fact. That was our personal. That's what we did. Same. They destroyed it. Same.

Destroyed it. It was like a zoo. The time will come, Ken, when we get our G-wagons. Come on. But today is not the day. And I'm not even letting them in the car. I'm not even going to let them in the car. They're going to be adults.

I'll be 21. Dad, can I ride with you? Nope. Take your shoes off. Why? Because I have trauma from all the years you destroyed every other vehicle I had. You just stand there and look at me, and I'm going to zoom on by you. I know.

That's right. I love it. Amanda wins. We've ruled in your favor. Michael is up next in Minneapolis. Michael, how can we help? Hi. Yeah, I, so in 22

I got an inheritance that allowed me to pay off my house. Nice. And since then I've kind of felt directionless. Directionless professionally, personally, financially, or all three? Kind of all three.

Yeah. Well, what did you set out to do at some point before you turned 22 and got this inheritance? What's been rattling around in your brain? No, I'm not. I'm talking about in 2022. Oh, I apologize. Okay. How old are you no no no i'm 50

oh you're 50 well what do you do for a living software engineer do you enjoy it um i enjoy the work i'm not too happy right now with the company okay now let me tell you something that's called right thing wrong place You're doing something that you enjoy, but not in the right place. And so you're in a new financial position where you have, I would assume, not just financial freedom, but emotional freedom. Is that true? Yes. All right, my man, I'd start looking. I think this is the directionlessness is because you were maybe in the grind or felt like you were working for a living or working to pay off things.

And now all of a sudden, this infusion of money has changed your perspective. And this is a good place to be. I'll tell you what I'm going to give you because I don't have time to unpack it with you in the couple of minutes we have. But I'm going to give you as my gift when we put you on hold here, the book, Find the Work You're Wired to Do. And in it, it has the Get Clear Career Assessment. I don't think that you are somebody who has no clue what they want to do. I think you just might need to say, let's let my brain and heart start to align and go, I can actually pretty much go do a lot of different

things right now, and I would begin to allow your heart to explore and see some things. But we have some clues in that you enjoy the software engineer or certain elements of that work you don't like the culture in. So I'd begin looking now for at least that type of work in a culture that is healthy and that has a potential ladder for you. But I think it's at 50, it's like, what do I want to do with a third of my life? Because that's what work is between sleep and family or friends or hobbies or whatever. That's the other third. I'd also start to do some work on like excavating what your why was, because if the why behind the what wasn't substantial enough then i could see you

feeling aimless if the why was just because i want to pay off my house because i want to have money and savings because i want and if it was a shallow why then i could see you feeling like okay then what am i supposed to do whereas if the why is much deeper you know about the the type of life that you want to live how you want to feel how you want others around you to of life that you want to live, how you want to feel, how you want others around you to view you, how you want to be able to give to others. Like, dig deeper on that why, and I think that it's also going to help with some of that aimlessness. Yeah. And your purpose statement that is a part of your report that you will get in the Get Clear Assessment, it's going to be a mirror for you. And you're going to see this is what I want to do. And I understand the why.

Now I can begin to look for the where. So really good call. Excited for you, Michael. This is a fun new chapter. I just turned 50. 50's the new 40. So there you go. I just did what it was.

Hang on the line. We'll get you the Get Clear Assessment in the book, Find the Work You're Wired to Do. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. Thrilled to have you with us. I'm Ken Coleman. Jade Warshaw joins me. The phone number for you, America, to jump in is 888-825-5225. 888-825-5225.

All right, so we like to cover relevant items items from the news stories from the news uh that have enough data around it and enough of a a movement of activity that it could affect this very very large audience and uh so this is a money related story jade and uh so here we go this is uh caught off the press in my hands here this is an article from the cut the team loves when i do that it uh really freaks the sound guys out but that's just an old technique that rush limbaugh made famous and i like to bring it back um so here we go this is an article about 20 somethings that are taking what is now being called a mini retirement and uh in the article, it's referred to as a sabbatical or adult gap years. So we're living a day and age, by the way, where we got to be cute the way we describe something. Okay. It's a sabbatical. All right. So this is what's happening. A lot of younger people in

their 20s are taking significant breaks from their jobs or leaving a job and taking a significant break before they come back to work. Okay. Okay. And this is a specific quote from a young lady in this article. I've recently decided that working for three years and then taking a year off is how it's going to be for me. Now, this was a teacher who started setting aside some of her money for her mini retirement in a high yieldyield savings account. So this is a routine that she's going to do. She is saying, this is going to be my life. I'm going to work for three years. I'm going to save money, and then I'm going to take a year off.

Okay, so that's a concept there. Okay, so far I'm not bothered yet. All right, so then the question becomes, what about health insurance? Okay. Debt payments, student loan payments, rent, the ability to save for your actual retirement down the road. And she says, I'm not sure what I'm going to do about health insurance, but she believes she's going to be able to save for retirement.

So all of this, to me, is a big nothing burger. This gets a headline, and it gets this interesting story. I see two negatives, Jade. Okay. You tell me yours and then I'll tell you. I think consistently investing in a 401k or Roth, some type of retirement vehicle. Has to be. I think that's a negative. If you're taking a year off and you got to adjust for that. What are you doing? Unless she says, I'm going to be saving 30% of what I make or whatever that ratio would need to be to cover the year. So you can address it. I'm just saying the only negatives I see is if you weren't addressing your retirement strategy. Your debt. That's right. And then the other negative is in her case,

and I think it's one of the few fields where she can probably get away with this, and that's the teaching industry. A lot of industries, if you're taking a year off and you're just bouncing between schools all the time, so let's say she does it over a 10 year period, she's at three different schools. It may not be a big deal in teaching but i will tell you in the corporate world if they start seeing multiple jobs every other year or there's just a lot of separation there's downtime they're looking at the gaps in other words on your resume yes that can create a massive red flag so if you can adjust for that or address that challenge then I say go for it I she's saving up the money if she if she's telling us the truth I think if you're doing this right and you hit on a couple of the

things I think a couple other are I mean of course you got to be debt free you can't do this with debt laying around you've got to have the obviously the right amount of savings to Ken's point, whether that be emergency fund savings or retirement savings. But I do, I like when people think outside the box. I like when people go, you know what, I'm going to create a life that I love to use Rachel's framework. And this is how I want to do my life. So much of what we teach is about living like no one else. So later you can live like no one else. And if this live like no one else and if this person has put those things in place i'm like more power to you and i love that you came up with this idea i love that if it's sound financial strategy then you do what you want to do and i'm going to tell

you something this will freak some people out um this may be an article i'll talk about later james but i've been doing some homework on this and there's some pretty forward-thinking people like the founder of LinkedIn, a really well-known dude for kind of predicting things. Work is continually changing, and the next five to ten years, the way we work today, all I'm going to say is, may not look anything like the way we work in the future. I'm interested in that. It's going to be very interesting. A lot of travel and remote future. I'm interested in that. It's going to be very interesting. A lot of travel and remote work. I'm just telling you. These generations are pushing back on it.

I mean, you can't. That's right. There's a lot going on around on social media. I see memes like this probably every day, which is basically saying if the average lifespan is 76 years old, it's like I'm supposed to work till 65 and then I get 10 years to do what I want.

Yeah. People are like, that doesn't sit right with me. And it's interesting to hear people's, I mean, this is one of those pushbacks. You know what's going to make that possible is AI. Yeah. So the reason I'm saying that, I'm not going to get into the whole thing here, but the ascension of AI, and I'm not talking about robots doing everything for you. I'm talking about making the ability for a person to run their own business truly anywhere, anytime in the world. That's what AI is going to do. So it's going to make it easy and easier for people to pretty much go, yeah, you know what? We're going to Bolivia, kids. Get your mountain gear uh you know so i'm just telling you quality of life i mean yeah this is not gonna be that abnormal in the future and you're already seeing it this is a

version of it yeah ken coleman you heard it first it's not my prediction i'm just reading what very smart people are saying are we gonna be in flying cars uh i'm not i'll watch you self flying cars I'll be like hey kids look Miss Jade and Mr. Sam I prefer to feel the wheels on the pavement would you get in a self driving car nope I wouldn't either listen if we're

going to go to that then I'm just going to go ahead and get a chauffeur yes a driver i'm with that but i need to trust a human being you know uh you know i preferably with a nice british accent you know mr coleman where would you like to go today yeah that's fantastic that's what i that's more my speed i this this report this is very interesting to me. I have to say I'm, I'm very, now have you heard also, because here's, here's the, the negative side of the forward, I'll put forward in quote, forward thinking. Okay.

First, you get ideas like this that are like, okay, I could see that working. The other side is I have seen also with the 20 somethings taking their own, I can't remember what the term is, but they'll just say, I'm going to take a vacation. Yeah. And they don't even put in the time. No. They don't even tell anybody. And they're like, no one's keeping tabs on me anyway, so I'm just going to take a vacation.

Happens all the time. That's crazy talent. It is crazy. But this is also a backlash. I'm glad you bring up vacation because I was talking about this on the Ken Coleman Show recently. Millions and millions of Americans are not using their full vacation. And this is the older generations because they're like, they're afraid that if I take my vacation, my boss is going to hold it against me. You have to be seen. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And this younger generation is like, uh-uh. And they're almost a little too careless about it. But to your point, what's

happening is, and what's fascinating about this article is, the millennials have been the largest demographic in the workforce for some time now. Probably about five to seven years. Okay.

So I'm Gen X, you're a millennial. It depends on the scale you look at. Oh, really? Yeah. Okay. You need to receive that.

I was giving you the millennial label. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Either way, the point is,

my generation- I want your generation for the music. That's all. Right. Yeah. Okay. Either way. The point is my generation. I want your generation for the music. That's all. Right. Right. Appreciate. Thank you very much. We're so memorable. They just gave us an X, not even a cool name like millennial. We're just generation X. But the point is, is that now Gen Z is coming into the workforce. And so in about five to seven years, you're going to see Gen Z and millennials, the dominant drivers of work culture. So to your point that you made earlier, a kind of a nomad, a professional nomad, that's already a term that exists where people are like, well, I do my work from anywhere around

the world, but this is taking nomad to another level in that I'm literally going to check out of the workforce for a year and then I'll come back. Well, I think COVID obviously shifted that.'m literally going to check out of the workforce for a year. Yeah. And then I'll come back. Well, I think COVID obviously shifted that. It's going to be fascinating. It was like first we had the shift with COVID, and then we've got this influx of AI technology. So I feel like those two things combined, it's the way of the future. You heard it here first. Let me tell you something.

You nailed it. The pandemic woke people up to go, I got one shot on this globe. How do I want to spend it? Yeah. Which, by the way, we should have been thinking about that from the get-go. That's true. But really fascinating as we see the world of work and how we make money change. We're going to be on the front lines for you. Good hour, Jade Warshaw. Thank you, ma'am. Thank you to our fearless leader, James Childs. Thank you, America, for listening. We'll be right back. Before you know it, this is The Ramsey Show.

Welcome to The Ramsey Show, where we help you win with your money, win in your work, and win with your relationships. The phone number is 888-825-5225. 888-825-5225. I'm Ken Coleman. Jade Warshaw joins me. And we're excited to be together. We always have a good time answering your questions, coaching you up.

So let's get right to it. We're going to go to Lafayette, Louisiana, where John joins us. John, how can we help today? Hey there. First of all, I really appreciate you guys taking my call. I was just looking for a little advice, one financial, two kind of family relationship style. My father, he's 75 and has lived alone for a couple decades, fell victim to a romance scam. And he funneled every dollar he had into it.

And my brother and I, we ultimately did an intervention with him and, you know, cut off that hemorrhaging. But now he's just in a rough place. He barely has a couple dollars to his name, just living pension check to pension check, barely taking care of just the bills. How much did he funnel into it? About $150. Can I tell you something?

This is the second call that we've taken on this in the last two weeks. I was on the last time, John, when a lady called in, and it happened to her mother. Oh, gosh. It's just the catfishing. It's just unbelievable. Such an awful scam. So how can we help? What do you think is the biggest challenge, or where do you think we can try to give you some practical wisdom here?

So it's super difficult, at least for me. I get super wound up in my own head because, one, I'm involved, you know, and it's very difficult for me to separate, you know, logic from emotion and everything. I think problem number one is the enormous amount of distrust and tension in the family presently, and that goes both directions. This has taken place over the period of about a year, and, you know, it started out, hey, I met somebody, and, you know, the question was, well, where? You know, I'm happy for you. Congratulations, and then it's like Instagram, and, you know, from moment number one, I'm like i'm like okay slow your roll you know this this is a little bit cautionary and then that was

immediately met with like well why aren't you happy for me you know so that's the kind of distrust that has been from moment number one yeah uh for the entire year my attitude was please slow down don't do this so he didn't trust that you had his best interest at heart? No, he did not at all. And for an entire year, I was basically yelling at him, please, please stop, this isn't good. Does he acknowledge now that he has actually been scammed? Because the call we got last week, the mom was still believing that it was bad.

Is he in a place of realization now that he, in fact, did get scammed? The mom was still believing that it was bad. Is he in a place of realization now that he, in fact, did get scammed? I don't think it's 100%. I think he's majority there. But, for example, he still communicates with these people and has not shut them off. That's exactly what the last call was like. Can I get clarity? Is it a person that he thought he was maybe dating? Has he ever met these people in person?

No, no, never. And from all the details, and I have plenty of details, I'm an open book. So, you know, I'll provide whatever and also keep me on track. But this was a very very organized thing uh all the transfers were non-transferable through gift cards or cryptocurrency i don't believe these people are u.s based at all yeah um they use encrypted chinese chat programs i think it was called and this doesn't ring any bells here's the the thing. I'm not trying to be ugly, but you've got to be really lonely, I think, to get to this point where it's this glaringly obvious and you're still clinging on to it. Have you notified law enforcement? I have done everything in my power. The only organization that would take a report from me was the FBI, and I did indeed lodge that.

But in terms of any local or state law enforcement, they told me straight up that they cannot accept anything from me on behalf of another person. Got it. So he has to be the one that says something and tries to – because these guys are so organized, you can almost kiss that money goodbye. So if I'm in your situation, you've got to get to a point where you're going to need some support and help to have an intervention here. Yeah, because he still thinks he's going to get a return on this money. Is that right? Yeah. So the original scam, I think that ship has sailed in his own mind. I think he believes that it's all gone.

So I don't think he's clinging to the original idea. But now we're in this weird zone where he's avoiding me and he's not straightforward to me. I'll ask him, you know, he's probably ashamed. Are you still talking to me? Yeah. He's probably ashamed. But I can understand that. The question is, going forward, you said he's spent $150,000 on this.

All he has is his pension. How much is that, by the way? What does he get every month? I think it's maybe on the underside of $3,000 a month. Are you concerned that he's not going to be able to sustain himself? I think that that should be enough to continue his quality of life. Okay. So this is really just how do I repair the relationship?

It's not a financial question at this point, yeah? Well, it is financial as well. Again, he's not straightforward with me about what does he do with his money. John, listen. It's not a financial thing. That's why Jay's asking that. You can't do anything about this.

The only hope you have of giving him some financial advice is to restore the relationship. That's why Jay's asking that. I mean, I hate to tell you this. There's very little you can do. I think you have two options. I think it's either a's asking that. I mean, I hate to tell you this. There's very little you can do. I think you have two options. I think it's either a super tough love. I don't know if you've got any siblings. If you did, it's a all hands on deck, come to Jesus.

We are having a living room fallout, and we're going to take a stand and say, you need to know the facts, and then wash our hands and walk away. By the way, the come to Jesus meeting doesn't have to be ugly. There's no yelling or screaming, but it has to be a confrontational situation. The other option is you're on your knees praying and you are just trying to restore the relationship with the hopes that he sees that you respect him still and love him. And then he maybe allows some type of help I don't know what else to say I'll add a third option I you know I I'm a letter I would write a letter maybe because

sometimes when you talk in person things get lost or people are filtering it through tone or whatever but maybe sitting down and just writing a heartfelt letter and just saying how you feel saying what you hope and that way it's something he can go back to and read again and keep copy for yourself put a copy for him and that way even if you start to feel some type of way you can go back and say i've already said it i wrote the letter you know and it's just kind of that it'll help keep you steady to know i've already said this and i've already let him know it's on paper. He won't forget, you know, that sort of thing. That's the only... I want to gift you with two books. I believe

we have them here, Christian. I believe we have them, Necessary Endings by Henry Cloud and Boundaries. And these books, I think you've got to grasp this. You're an adult. He's an adult. There's so much broken trust here and all kinds of wacky stuff going on. And I think you need to be okay walking away, not from your dad, but walking away from trying to fix this mess. It's not your mess. You didn't create it and it's not yours to fix. And I don't think you can fix it. I agree. So hang on the line. I'll get you some help. This is, we're rooting for you, John. I hate that this is happening. I can't imagine, Jade, anything more sad than this.

And again, second time that this has happened. I'm profoundly sad just thinking about an older parent who gets scammed because their heart is lonely. Yeah. This is The Ramsey Show. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. All right, so I was born and raised in Texas, and I love the myth of the lone cowboy. You know, the guy who doesn't need anyone or anything.

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We want you to win in all three. I'm Ken Coleman. Jade Warshaw is with me. And the phone number to jump in is 888-825-5225. Try not to say too many things at once when you're live on the air sometimes. It's tough sometimes. Every once in a while, I get on a roll a little too fast. It is time for today's question of the day brought to you by WhyRefi. Now, we do not recommend refinancing on everything, but for distressed private student loans, there is WhyRefi. We trust WhyRefi because they help you with a low fixed interest rate you couldn't get anywhere else,

and it's going to help you stick to your budget and get out of debt. Learn more at YRefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y.com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states. All right. Today's question comes from Ken in Mississippi. My man. All right.

He says, I had a work performance evaluation after being at my current company for six months. I got nothing but attaboys and received no criticism for the job I'm doing. Then they offered me a 50 cent raise per hour. I just wanted to know how you guys felt about that after a performance review of nothing but great feedback. Am I being selfish or should I just accept it for what it is and hope for better compensation next time? Well, Ken, you are being selfish, but selfish in this particular interpretation, Jade, is not bad. No, you got to look out for yourself. Thank you. Thank you for picking that up. Of course.

That word selfish gets a really negative thing, but when it comes to your money and your compensation, you are your agent. You are your manager. That's right. This is your livelihood. So all of the feels around this scenario are what I would call absolutely normal, dare I say, healthy. That's good.

In other words, he gets a good review. He's sitting there and he's getting all positive attaboy and then they go i love how you i love how you dramatize it even in the question it was like i think she was in a few dramas in plays when she was in school uh and so in this situation jade um it's a it's a it's a shot to the chest 50 cents yeah i'm gonna tell you something if you don't feel something when you get a 50 cent raise it's a little insult then something's wrong with you yeah and so i would say ken uh you are being what i would call properly selfish in recognizing real feelings that should feel that way. Because I'm objective.

I have no skin in this. And I would feel that way if I put myself in your shoes. So now let's get to the second part of this. Should you accept it? I don't know. Because here's what I would be asking. And so I'm going to play your agent. I'm going to be your agent.

And then I'm going to give it to my assistant agent. If Jade and I are agenting for you, I'm going to say, I want to find out, is that a normal raise? The average in the United States, and this is not a law, if you look at the numbers, annual raises usually fall between three and 4%. Again, no one's beholden to that number. 50 cent raise is really, really low. That's right. So the question becomes, Ken, why is it only 50 cents? Is the company struggling? Good question. You got to ask that. That's a good question. And if the company's struggling, we all got to tighten the belt in our personal budgets. And so I'd want to know why only 50 cents and dig into that. And, uh, and then you have to decide from there. Okay.

That's the now answer, but I want to look at next is I don't want to keep feeling this way because you keep showing up year after year and you feel this way. It's not good for you. It's not good for you. Thoughts? That's the thing. Uh, that's a good question. Ken, if you ask and say, Hey, what's going on?

You know, I've done, know, I've done some research. I know the standard. Is the company doing all right? And let's say he says, well, you know, no, we're not. Then it's like, okay, well, am I up for the ride of sticking it out until the- Last part of his question, should I hope for better compensation next time? No, brother brother it's getting lower it's only going lower from here probably i don't like hope when it comes to compensation

yeah do you i love hope and i think in this case there's probably a lot more fish in the sea that have fatter pockets uh when it's time for you and the mixed metaphors that was strong yeah fatter fatter gills we got to find some fish with fatter gills that's good truly though i i'm with you i don't want hope in that i want to put my hope in me and and the lord and action i'm not gonna put hope in well it was 50 cents this year well can talk about motivation i hope they bump it to a buck 25 next year talk about the role that that sort of thing plays in the motivation of the worker. Okay, so if you feel as though you've been devalued,

it's a slippery slope to where you devalue yourself. That's good. That's what happens. That's very good. So you're saying he would start doing things to throw himself off. Yeah. What do you start questioning? I'm only worth 50 cents? That good that's that's tough stuff that is tough uh but that's the real real uh so anyway

sorry about that ken i would be looking for greener pastures uh if it were me i agree um but you know again and by the way anybody in that situation can i just say this very quickly get the get clear assessment in the book find the the Work You're Wired to Do. It's one purchase price. Get the book, and I'm going to tell you something. Lay it over. Take the results of the assessment. Read the book. It's a 45-minute read. For this reason, J.D., it'll help people go, where could I go? Yes. This is not the only thing I can do. Gosh, that's a really important theme for me is for people to see I got options. Even when you can't see them, I promise you, you have got options. So that book is really going to infuse you with the confidence to know. 100%. It's not just that.

That's not my only. Yeah, I love that. It's about self-awareness. And by the way, on the other side of self-awareness is confidence. You cannot be confident if you aren't aware. That's true. So there you go. Just a quick, that's why I put that resource out.

It's a fabulous little resource. So there you go. All right, to the phones we go. Ed is up in Columbia, South Carolina. Ed, how can we help? Hey, Ken and Jay, thanks for taking my call. Sure, what's up? I just have a question about paying off a mortgage. And until

I wouldn't have made this call, I knew the answer and listening to your show and listening to Dave. But I was notified that my job is being downsized October 1st. Oh, man, I'm sorry about that. Thank you. And the thing about it is I still want to pay off the house, but I'm concerned that I should leave the cash in case we need it. Give Jade the numbers real quick. Walk her through the numbers. Okay. Would you want me to walk you through the numbers? Just tell me what you want. How much is the payoff? Yeah.

Okay, our payoff is $113,000. The house is worth $400,000. Okay. And my wife and I in the last two years have saved $190,000 in our savings. Okay. What of that is your emergency fund? It's not, I don't, I don't, well, if I was going to take the emergency fund out of that, it would be $50,000. Okay. So it's $140,000. You got $140,000 up for grabs. Yep. And that leaves you with $50 50K there. Typically what we would say in a time like this where you're kind of in a crisis mode, I would tell you not to do anything major like jump into sums of money. How quickly do you think you can find new work?

And is your wife also working? Those are my two questions. My wife is working. I actually, I work two side hustles. I listen to Dave a lot. So I started working two side hustles to save to pay off the house. So will you be able to, if you keep those two side hustles, your wife works and you get laid off,

is that enough to cover the bills and cover your life if you pay off the mortgage? 100%. We're debt free. Our cars are, we don't know anything but the mortgage and our net worth. Yeah, I do it. I think so too. I do it. I think so, too. I do it. You've still got $50,000.

You're still able to make your bills even without this job. That's right. And now you're lowering your expenses by not having a mortgage. It's just taxes and insurance. Yeah, I do that. You getting a severance of any type? No, they don't do that. But you know what?

You got a head start. You're right. That's right, baby. Listen, I'd be looking for a job as soon as you hang up the phone. 100%. I already have been, and I'm fortunate. I'm a professional salesperson, but I also have a lot of experience in retail. Great.

Hey, you guys are awesome. So, in listening to you guys, I'll be at Walmart or Target or Costco. Come on. You know? Pay the house off, Jade says. Yeah. You guys are awesome. You've done an excellent, excellent job, and this is the fruit of your labor.

Good job. And download. You guys kept me off the ledge, and I wouldn't be in this situation if I didn't listen to your show, so I appreciate it. Well, good. Do you like country music? I do. You ever heard of an old guy named Johnny Paycheck?

I know who he is, yeah. Download his song when we hang up. It's called Take This Job and Shove It. You can take this job and shove it. Because he's paid his house off. I know, right? Come on. I'd be like, hey, you guys let me go?

Guess what I did? Yeah. I paid my house off. There you go. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Come on, man. That's real financial peace.

That's why we do what we do. Ed, you're the poster child. We're happy for you. This is The Ramsey Show. So if you feel like the system is working against you, try a biblically-based alternative to health insurance, Christian Healthcare Ministries. CHM is a health cost-sharing ministry that's helped hundreds of thousands of families like yours take care of over $11 billion in medical bills since 1981. And CHM has also helped them stay true to their values and avoid miles of red tape. And CHM support goes far beyond meeting financial needs.

They'll also help meet spiritual needs. Members become part of a family who will pray with them and for them when they experience a medical event. So listen, y'all, there's no better way to take care of health care costs. CHM programs start as low as $98 a month. So learn more today and join at chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries.org slash budget. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman. Jade Warshaw is with me. The phone number is 888-825-5225. 888-825-5225.

One of our favorite things to do on this show is to hear the stories. For those of you watching on YouTube, to see the stories of what's on the other side of these baby steps that we preach. They are known as our debt-free screams. In the lobby of our Ramsey Solutions headquarters here, we're looking at them right now. Lovely young couple. Grady and Brittany, how are you? Good. Tell us where you're from.

Portland, Oregon. Portland, Oregon. All right. Well, this is exciting. You ready to share the story? Yes. Okay, let's go. How much debt did you pay off?

$81,680.97. Oh, to the penny. I like that. All right. And how long did that take you? Nine months. Oh, wow. Nine months.

Okay. What were you making during that time? $185,000 to $215,000. Ooh, what'd you do to get the raise there? An income? Well, I got an increase at my job and then he got a promotion and then I also sold some clothes. Nice. What kind of work do you guys do? I work front desk at a dental office. And I'm in operations for a food distribution company. Okay, great. All right.

Wow. So really good income and fantastic stuff. All right. So break it down. What was the debt of the $81,000? What was it all about? It was student loans, credit cards, and a car loan. Car payment. Car payment. My truck. Yeah. Okay.

All right. What kind of truck was it? We got to know. Tundra. Oh, man. Cool, cool, cool. All right. Well done.

Well done. So what happens nine months ago that you're like, you want to know what? Game on. Everything needs to change. Well, about a year ago, we started looking at where we're at, where we wanted to be, dreams we had, want to own a home. And it's like, wow, we can't afford any of this. Like what needs to change? And so I'd heard of you guys a long time ago. Thought I was too smart to need any of that. Clearly, I wasn't um so I started watching clips online Brittany overheard me and was like what are you watching and then so she got hooked instantly started watching every lunch at work oh yeah just watching in her car and going

through it so we bought the books started reading got the started budgeting um big thing for me too was just combining our incomes I was wow yeah wow. Yeah. I was not about that. And she was, and finally, wait, tell me more. We were roommates. Tell me,

tell me more. Cause that is, Ken can attest to this. That's one of the things that we get the most pushback on is, Hey, you got to combine. What was it? Grady that made you go,

you know what? I'm wrong. I got to change this. Tell us more. Well, just looking at the results, clearly we couldn't afford a home. We couldn't do the things we wanted to do. So what I was doing was wrong. What do you think about that, Brittany? Yeah. I was like, even before we started this, I was like, come on, are we going to combine or not?

He's like, no. So I've got to ask because Grady, I come from a family. I don't know if this was your case. My parents, it was all combined. Yeah. So that was a foreign concept to me. Honestly, until I actually joined Ramsey Solutions, we began to hear stories about it. It was always foreign to me. Like, oh, really? So I'm curious, is that the way it was in your home, Grady, growing up, your mom and dad's separate finances?

Or was this some kind of trust issue or some weird thing you had going on? Probably just. I wanted to be in control. And, you know, if it was mine, it was mine. And yeah. Yeah, that sounds about right. So how long into this watching videos online and all this do you decide we got to combine everything? It was probably less than a month.

We jumped in pretty quick. Wow. And when you say we jumped in, I mean, so I picture when you were telling the story, Grady, that Brittany's like, who are you talking to? It was like the Jake from State Farm commercial, you know? You know what I mean? It's like, oh, it's Rachel Chris. Oh, it's Jade Warshaw.

How quickly did you jump on board, Brittany, as soon as you realized what he was listening and watching? I was all in. So it was easy for you. You're like, I've been waiting for this moment. Oh, wow. Oh, yeah. Okay. Interesting. watching i was all in i was like it was easy for you like i've been waiting for this moment yeah oh yeah okay so you get you you get addicted to the show which it is very addicting yep you you said you got the books and what else did you do was it and then you yeah we signed up for fpu like a month later jumped right in and went to the class we looked forward going every sunday yeah

we were sad actually when i was over. Yeah, we were. What was the hardest part of this process for you two? For me, it was just I'm so used to like oh, if I want it, I'm going to buy it. Like, you know, so just like learning like patience and like, okay, well, I can get it later.

This is more important. And then you know, I realized I was spending like over $100 on Starbucks every month. I didn't need that. Gave myself a budget of like $30. And it was like a treat. So like every Friday, I would get myself a coffee before work.

And I love that. It kind of worked out. So it's that intentionality of looking at what you're spending, understanding delayed gratification. Yes. No doesn't mean never. It just means not today. Yeah.

I love that. Yeah. And for you, Grady, what was the hardest part? Very similar. I always thought I could just out-earn stupid and that's not the case. So it's just paying attention to what we're buying, have a plan.

For me, credit cards, I love the points and all the rewards. So getting rid of those was a little bit of a struggle. But it all makes sense in the end. And like we talked about combining the incomes, being intentional together. I mean, that was great beyond just our finances, our relationship, just talking about where we want to go and having goals. I mean, it was really, really cool. Grady, I love hearing this from you because you are the target.

I just want you to know, like, you're the one that we're like, beep, beep, beep, like zone in on him. The guy who loves the credit cards, loves the points. I want to keep my money separate. Like this is, this is making my heart very happy right now. Yeah. You're her favorite demographic, Grady. It's very exciting. So I think we've got the answer already, but for young couples, anybody listening that's in this journey or they're kicking the tires, what would you all say is the key to getting out of debt? For us, or for me, it was just start.

Like just jump in. Just the momentum piece. Just jump in. Yeah, exactly. Because if you're not going to start today, when are you going to start? That's right. You may as well start today. Absolutely.

Brady, anything to add to that? Or is that it for you? Yeah, it was really just starting, jumping into it. I mean, it's one of those things that we always talk about in life, like, oh, I'll do it later. It's not perfect timing. I mean, you just got to start and just go through it. It's not going to be perfect.

You're going to make mistakes along the way, but as long as you keep moving forward, it's like. So how does it feel? You guys, you come up here, you're moments away from the scream. What's it like to be on the other side of this at this stage of your life? It feels really good. Stress-free. I know she talked about, she just didn't like opening up the account.

Like, oh my gosh, how much do we owe? I dread making that payment. I'm like a sinking feeling when you look and you're like, oh my gosh, I have this much on my credit card or this much left on my loan. Like, I didn't like looking at that. How old are you two? I'm 34. I'm 36. I love it. How are you going to celebrate? One thing to do to celebrate besides the debt-free screen. I mean, we're here for vacation. So this is a celebration in and of itself. And we're going on a cruise next month. Yeah. That's exciting. That's great. Okay. That's a lot of fun. What are you dreaming about? What's the big dream now that you're united on getting out of debt and living differently?

What's the dream conversations? For me, it's a house. Yeah. Definitely. I just want to own a home. Come on. Yeah. Come on.

And you will. You will. What's your timeline for that? A couple years. Yeah. All right. Very good. What's the price range for somebody like the young couple in Portland?

It's a lot. Too much. it's very expensive to get a home out there good for you guys yeah oh wow who's your support group do you have people that walk besides your FPU class I'm guessing who else did you have in your corner our family yeah that's great wow this is it doesn't get any better than this right here you You guys are amazing. I love it. Yeah. I mean, here they are, a young couple. And you guys are investing, I'm guessing, now into retirement. You're walking through all this. You're starting to walk through all the baby steps. That's exciting. So really, really fun. You look at this couple and they are the American dream. That's it. When it getsized yeah or it gets categorized into something it still happens they are they're they're they're gonna get there and uh it's really really fun

so fun stuff all right well let's do this we've got grady and britney from the portland oregon area they paid off 81 000 and some some some i forgot what you said there. Over nine months with a range of income from $185,000 up to $215,000. Let's hear your debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! There you go! Wow! Another young couple with nothing but freedom in front of them. I know, that's right. It can still be done, Ken. The dream is not dead, as you said. That's absolutely right. Hey, if you're out there watching or listening, we want to help you. You can do it.

You deserve that freedom, that having no debt has an effect on you. And it's generational, folks. Yeah. It's generational. I wish you could see the gigawatt smiles on that young couple over there. It feels really good. All right. She's Jade Warshaw. I'm Ken Coleman. You're listening to The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. I've been doing this show for over 30 years and some of the saddest calls I have taken

are from situations that are completely preventable. Yeah. And what's so hard is I feel like one of those, especially the ones that I'm like, oh, it's terrible. People that call in and their spouse has passed away suddenly and they don't have life insurance. When you have to think through how am I going to pay my bills in the middle of next week, in the middle of all that grief, like it's just it is it's terrible. So life insurance is the one thing, especially as a mom with three little kids that I'm like so big on for people to get because it's inexpensive. Zander is the place that Winston and I actually get all of our life insurance. And it doesn't cost much because Zander shops among a gazillion different

companies. It doesn't cost much. You just have to admit that someday you're not going to be here. You got to say it out loud and you got to say, I'm going to say I love you to my family by taking care of them and taking the time to put this stuff in place. The cost of stinking pizza. To get a free quote, call 800-356-4282. That's 800-356-4282, or go to zander.com. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman.

Jade Warshaw joins me. The phone number for you to jump in America is 888-825-5225, 888-825-5225. All right, let's go to the phones. Ray is joining us in Boise, Idaho. Ray, how can we help? Hey, guys. Thanks for having me on today. A long-time listener and really enjoy your stuff. Thank you. How can we help today? So, um, I have a question about, uh, partnerships. Um, I was listening to Jade the other day and she had a really great call with, you know, some groups that were dealing with some partnership issues and it's always kind of been on my mind. So I wanted to call in and chat about it but I I'm a about eight years ago I bought into a firm uh for a large sum of money and uh got myself into four different partnerships um it's been kind of up and down with it I there's really good days there's some days I'd you know I think my partners want to throw me in the ocean and vice versa, but how many partners has been able to work? Uh, there are four of us. Um, I'm

the junior partner and there's three older gentlemen. Each of us are spread out about 10 years. Okay. Um, but you know, when I looked, I guess, Jay, this is the, what I'm trying to reconcile in my mind, you know, Dave always says that I guess, Jay, this is what I'm trying to reconcile in my mind. You know, Dave always says that partnership's the only ship that doesn't sail. Yet, when I've looked at some of the top earning jobs, you know, that he's done in his research, you're looking at accountants, lawyers, engineers, many of those industries are organized as partnerships. And from living it for the last eight years, I can see that there are some great benefits. I can see some of the downsides as well. And so, you know, this last week, I sold out of one of the first four partnerships that I bought into. I'm trying to clear my debt off working through baby step two still.

Good. And it was kind of a relief. I'm like, man, this is awesome. And so do I need to continue with that? Should I be looking to exit the other ones and go out on my own? Or are there certain industries where this is just more of the norm where you're better off to stay in and keep going? Or what industry? better off to stay in and keep going. What industry are you in? We're a public accounting firm. Where I'm located, we do a lot of agriculture and kind of small business taxes and financial statement work for our local clients. Well, let's compare why you chose the company of the four partnerships that you're a part of, why you chose the one you chose to exit and how does that compare with the other three that are

existing does that make sense obviously you chose the one that you exited out of for a reason and the question you felt relief after that so then the question is do those same problems that existed in the company in the in the partnership that youited, do those same problems exist in the other three partnerships as well? No, they don't. The one I exited was a passive rental partnership. We owned a commercial building. We were leasing it to a medical facility. My partners wanted to do a transaction in there that I think was becoming very complicated. I, I do work for the medical group that's in there and I didn't want to complicate my, my relationship with them.

And it also had a large gain where there was some cash to be had. And so I said, look, I think this is a good business. You guys pay, buy me out and I can go pay off my debt. But the, the other three entities are our operating entities, either buildings that we own and operate or, you know, our main business operation, much more complicated, but not impossible to exit at this point. I feel I have enough experience. I could if it was. What's your debt load? What's your debt load? What are you trying to clear? I have about $160,000 left. About 20 of that is on the house. The other 140 is mostly a building and then the original book of business that I bought.

I am interested in you clearing out your debt on this, especially when it has to do with things like your home. I don't want anything putting that at risk long term. Can I ask a quick question? Go ahead, Kim. Just real quick, Ray. I'm following along with Jade here, but of the three other partnerships, one is accounting. The other two are real estate related. Is that what I'm understanding? Yes. It's just us separating our real estate that

we own and renting it back to the operating entity. It's the same partners, but there's different entities set up for tax reasons. We're tax accountants. We love to be creative. Oh, okay. I got you. Okay. Okay. Sorry, Jade. I just, I wanted to make sure I understood that because the question that I have here is, is if you were somehow get out of all this, do you want to go work for yourself and be a solo accountant or CPA or whatever? Or is this the type of thing, much like a law firm where it is, it is advantageous to have partnerships in that form? That's what I'm trying to understand. Well, that, yeah, that, that's really my question

for you on the research. And I've never really heard this dealt with on the show before. There are some advantages to working together like this. I mean, when I have a question, you know, my partners have all been in business longer than me. So there's a lot of experience and things to lean on. If I have to be gone for a day, it's not like my clients can't reach somebody. I would treat this like we treat. Here's the way I would treat this. You know, we have a lot of teachings on here about real estate, right? One of our teachings is, you know, you don't do real estate deals unless, if it's not your primary mortgage, you don't buy real estate unless you buy it in cash, right? That's a teaching we have.

But plenty of times people call in here and they already have acquired rental properties and they're making money on the rental properties even though they took out debt to get them, right? And we don't immediately say, sell all your rental properties. You've done this poorly. We say, well, if it makes sense, you're making money. And for now, this is working out for you.

You've cleared out your debt. It's not causing any issues to you. Yes, we may have said go about it differently, but you didn't call us, then you're calling us now, right? And so in those cases, we would say, yeah, keep your rental properties. Try to clear out your debt and do that as quickly as possible because you still have a really great asset here. We just think maybe you went about it the wrong way.

And so in your case, I'm going to treat it that same way. You've got these three existing partnerships. If they're making money for you, if they're going to allow you to clear out this debt very quickly, if right now they're not causing a problem to you, for me, I would keep my hands off it and keep watching it. To Ken's, his vocabulary is remain vigilant on this and, you know, set a point to reevaluate and if if you feel like you know what i think i would gain more peace from getting out of this do so that's what you did with the other partnership and ken what do you have to add i think you said that beautifully

uh the only thing i would say to what jade is is teaching her she's right i love kind of keep my eye on this thing and you're by the nature of what do, your hands are in it. Your eyes are on this stuff all the time. I think that if you feel like the partnerships that you're in right now are too complex, and that's an emotional feeling based on your logic, then I would say that's the point to start to simplify. And the best way to get out of complexity is through simplicity. That's right. And so unwrapping those partnerships to the extent that you can. I agree with Jade 100% on this.

I would let that gauge of kind of that feeling in the pit of our stomach to go, this is a little too complex and I don't think it's advantageous to me. I think it'd be better to simplify. I think when that becomes really, really clear, I would go right with Jade's advice on that. I think that's probably the thing I'm feeling. It's a feel thing. Does that make sense, Ray?

Yeah, it does. And looking back over, my firm's been in place for almost 100 years now, and so I've looked at some of the exits and stuff of our other partners. And I guess, Jade, what I noticed with exiting the other partnership was there was just a certain piece that kind of settled in. But now I'm not having to worry about this anymore. Perfect. As I get this debt paid off, I see a light at the end of the tunnel. And I'm like, things are going to be good.

I think Ken spoke to that. That's the simplicity. And I think judging from what I hear you say, I think you want to make one more exit, at least one more. To see if you get that same feeling, to see if that piece increases. Am I right? Yeah, if I do one, it'll have to be all three because it basically goes together as a unit. And eight years ago, I was lacking in a little bit of experience. Now I feel like I do know how to go out and run my own office. I think you're ready to do this.

I do too. It feels like you're getting there. You're convincing me. And so that's what I was waiting for. And you made that turn all on your own volition. I think it's time for you to make this exit. And I think it's time for you to pay off your debt and experience peace. All right.

Good call. You got this. We're here to walk you through it. This is The Ramsey Show. Welcome to The Ramsey Show, where we help you win with your money, win in your work, and win with your relationships. 888-825-5225 is the phone number for you to jump in. We're here to coach you up.

We being Jade Warshaw joining me, and I'm Ken Coleman. Excited to have you with us. 888-825-5225. Mary is joining us in Ann Arbor, Michigan. If that's where she's at, that's the home of the undefeated 15-0 national champion. Let's go. Michigan Wolverines, my beloved team. Go blue.

Got to get that out of my system. Mary, how can we help? Hi. Thank you for taking my call. I just had a question. I really just wanted your opinion about this kind of money-making idea we've gotten for our teens. The idea is this, that instead of them getting a job while they're in high school to spend that time applying for college scholarships, and I was just curious what

you guys would say to that, basically their job being to apply for college scholarships and put themselves through college. I'm old school, so I think it's both and. I agree. Not either or. Okay. So they should do both, apply for scholarships and get a job. Unless you've got some sort of vision that you can sway Jade and I on that, like how much time are they spending on scholarships and then what do you think that's going to yield versus can they

work and also sit alongside you and and and do what's necessary to apply for scholarships i just i just don't think it's that big of an roi to only focus on scholarships is that is that your idea or their idea um there was someone else's idea We actually know someone who did it and just paid a tiny bit for their college in the last year. How many hours did they spend a week applying for scholarship? Oh, that's a good question. I'm not 100% sure. I'd want to know that to answer your question. You see what I'm saying? Because if they said, I think on average, it's going to take 30 to 40 hours a week to be able to get the scholarships that I got. And, and, and there's some sort of, you know, evidence for that. Then I think Jade and I's answer is probably very, very different, but you don't even know how many hours they spent. And I'll tell you

this, this is, and I want Jade to weigh in too. I'll just say this. I think there is so much value in working when you're a teenager that is far more greater than the money they will make. I agree. I just believe they've got to learn how to get talked to the wrong way by a customer. They've got to learn. I hate to say this. They've got to learn how to get mistreated by a coworker. They've got to learn how to get their butt chewed by a boss. How to iron their work shirt and tuck it in every day.

Thank you very much. Show up on time. All of that. I just think that's invaluable to character development. I know I sound like a 90-year-old, but so be it. No, yeah. That really resonates with me. I was unsure about that piece like well

then how are they getting this i don't know experience out in the world a little bit yeah i think it's a combination and um you know maybe you set the ratio and say hey you're only working saturdays and sundays and then monday through friday after after school you you know start on the scholarship trail you know however you want to divide that up is fine. Yeah, good question. Thank you for the call, Mary. All right, let's go to Marvin in Atlanta, Georgia. Marvin, how can we help?

Hey, guys, can you hear me all right? Yes, sir. What's going on? All right, so in a bit of a pickle here with my wife, so I have a small business that, a small niche videographer business here in Atlanta that I've been doing now for about going on a year and a half. The business has grown a lot faster than my expectations. You know, I was paying some invoices the other night and my wife was in the office with me and she happened to see that I had about $65,000 in my business account.

Now, all of our revolving debts, you know, credit cards, student loans, car loans, things along that line, they total to about $45,000. Okay. So my wife is very hands-off with the business. I let her control our finances. Other than that, in terms of our paychecks from our jobs and things along that line. Okay. So she was very surprised to see that large sum of cash in the account. I've been using, I've been stacking up this money this year because I want to bring somebody on full-time next year and there's also some gear I need to buy in order to also expand my business so once you call the money was kind of itching to me well let's just get out of debt pay all the debt down and be done with it me on the hand, I'm more so on the lane of using the money to expand the business.

Just for a little context here, in the past three months, I've had to turn down about $25,000 worth of work. Because you can't do it. Exactly. All right, time out, time out, time out. 20-second time out. All right, I'm calling a time out, Marvin. Could you not have pivoted in that moment and said, all right, I'm going to find a contractor and I'm going to take that business? I know that you didn't have the time to do that,

but could you not have found someone to do that? So the main issue that I've run into with that is I can't find people that have the necessary gear to get the job. But that's a different question. Hold on a second. I've been there.

So you go rent that gear. Yeah. You provide the gear, you provide the lead, and then he gets a percentage and you get the bigger percentage. I promise you, Marvin, I lived in the Atlanta area

for 11 years and if someone offered me $25,000 for a job, I'd have said, done, send you the paperwork right now, and I'd have been on the phone to two people. I'd have gotten the person who can handle the equipment, and I'd go rent the equipment, and you still pocket money. Marvin, am I telling the truth or not? You are.

No, Marvin, see, it's easier when you agree with me. As a person whose entire business model is based on contracted workers, I'm telling you, this is the way to go. If you can do this, this is wonderful. It makes it so much easier for you. The overhead is so much lower. That's what I would do. So he's really going to hate this.

I think if I were in your shoes. I agree with your wife. I agree with your wife, too. I would say, okay, I'm going to keep the $20,000 aside and that's my retained earnings. And then I'm going to pay off this debt. And you can decide after the debt is gone, how much you want to keep in your business savings as retained earnings, six months worth of expenses, whatever you want and do it like that. And I would do the contract model until you are forced to have a employee on the books i agree and in your in your type of world you don't need employees you do not

why would you do that you do not that's the way that i guess i guess i was i was thinking about it from the logic of like you know listening to a lot of the stuff that you guys say what i thought about you know i definitely did think about oh i could just rent the gear and pay somebody but i guess i was thinking of well if i just keep renting and renting and renting you could buy the gear eventually i do think you should buy the gear eventually yeah but pay the debt i was i wanted to you know save up enough to just buy everything i needed outright and then when it's time to get people to work i can just say hey here already have the stuff.

You'll get to that. You'll get to that point. You got to walk before you can run. You're going to get to that point. Right now you're renting and you're factoring that into how much you're paying the contractor, how much you're keeping for yourself

so that you have a decent margin and you're also able to pay the guy. But you got to think about it. Some money is better than no money, right? You making your little cut is better than not making any of this $25,000 cut. And Marvin, good on you, man. You're crushing it to the point where you've got a side business that could pay off your personal debt.

So Marvin, pay off the debt. But on your way home tonight, go grab your favorite steaks, get some flowers for your wife, walk in the door and go, babe, you're right, I've seen the light. This is The Ramsey Show. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. Thrilled to have you with us. 888-825-5225 is the phone us. 888-825-5225 is the phone number.

888-825-5225. I'm Kent Coleman. The incomparable Jade Warshaw is sitting next to me in the studio today. So we're here for you. Let's go to Pierce, who joins us in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Pierce, how can we help? Hey, Kent. Hey, Jade.

Thanks for having me on the show. I'm excited to hear from you guys today. Well, we're excited to talk to you. What are we talking about? So my question is, should I take a month off of work to go to a training program to up my income while I'm in baby step two? And will you lose your job if you take the month off? If I take the month off, I'll be moving into a job as a flight attendant for one of the major airlines in the U.S. And I currently do work at my local airport servicing multiple of the airlines there. So it'd be similar work, but I'd be moving up and a significant pay

increase. How much? Yeah. How much? So right now I make about $18.50 an hour and I'm 22, so that's not terrible for someone my age, but I know I love aviation, and I'm trying to use the proximity principle to be around people. Come on. The work that I love. Come on, Pierce. Yeah, and so I'd be moving up to starting pay for training is $30 an hour, and then after six months they move us to $32 to $35. Done and done.

I feel like this is a no-brainer. The month off, you're not going to be struggling financially. You're not living off of credit cards during that month, correct? I am not, but I am currently living paycheck to paycheck, and I have my student loans. And it's just kind of stressing me out a little bit not to have that money coming in to be able to pay that. I'm going to turn you over to the budget queen. I'm pretty sure she can make a way for you. This is all about budgeting, Jade.

He's got a saving plan for one month. This is all about budgeting, Jade. He's got a saving plan for one month. Yeah. Let me ask you this. Is this window of time to do this training? Is it one time only or can you choose when you're going to do it? Well, the nice thing is I have my interview coming up this month, so I haven't gotten the job yet, but I've passed multiple of the interviews already. I think I have the qualifications to do so. Once I get the job offer, I can choose to either go to the training program in two months or I can choose to prolong it and go in six months. Excellent. So we've got time. Perfect. So what I'm going to say is, yeah, let's keep moving forward as though you're getting this job. The goal here is you're in baby step two, so you should have a thousand dollars saved.

That's not part of this. But for baby step two, you need to save up a month's worth of expenses so that you're not struggling while you're doing this training. And then you need to calculate how long it would take you to get the first paycheck. So maybe this is a six week thing all in all until you move from one paycheck to another

and kind of make sure you're doing accurate math to calculate that out. And then you say, okay, how much money is that going to be? What's my bare bones budget going to be for six weeks? I got to save up X amount of dollars and then I can make this transition smoothly. Nobody gets hurt. All the bills get paid. Yes. My only concern with that is that for the first six months I'm on call 24 seven. So I don't know, you know, when I'm going to be working, when that income's coming in, it's a little bit, you know, unpredictable. Okay. Wait a second. So the unpredictability to the schedule or the amount of hours?

Um, kind of both. Um, I know that I should be, you know, getting at least a little bit, it's probably going to be a lot of weekends, holidays and stuff. Can they ballpark? Have they given you some sense of how many hours on the low end? I'm guessing this is a program that happens all the time, so they understand people have to pay bills, so there's got to be an explanation behind this. So do they give you a range of what minimum amount of hours would be versus maximum? Yeah, I was told that it would most likely, obviously, in aviation, there's a lot of overtime, unpredictable delays, I was told that it would most likely, obviously in aviation, there's a lot of overtime, unpredictable delays. I was told I'd probably be getting, you know, a thousand to

1500 a week, hopefully, for the first part of that until I can get that steady schedule after the training is done. How many hours were you working at the 1850 an hour job? Typically 40 to 50. Okay. So part of this is you're making almost double what you were, not quite double, but almost. So you don't need as many hours in order to kind of suit the needs of your previous budget. Does that make sense? So if you could find a way to make sure that you're at least getting part-time hours, 25 hours a week, you should be making enough money to fit your budget, right? What you're used to living on.

Yeah, that's most likely what it's going to be because I know most flight attendants work about 12 to 15 days a month, at least for the first part of their training. Okay. All right, so do the math. Yeah. You've got to do math and then we're not so scared. The math plugged into the budget, that's how you know if this is going to be doable. And make sure you find out, like we're talking, sometimes you're talking in terms of hours. I noticed some days you're talking, sometimes you're talking in terms of days. Sometimes, sometimes you're talking in terms of amount of money per week. So let's, let's figure

out what, how we're going to speak about this. Are we going to speak about it in hours? And is that what we're going to ask about? And if somebody says, yeah, you'll work three days a week. Okay, yeah, but how many hours is that? Make sure you're really drilling down to find out how much money is going to be in your pocket every time you work. And that way you can see, okay, how much am I going to get these first 30 days? What do I need to save? And that's going to inform the work that you much am I going to get these first 30 days? What do I need to save? And that's going to inform the work that you're going to need to do in order to save up this money in order to do this.

Don't jump into this until you have this money saved. Otherwise, it's going to be a burden. Yeah, this thing that you've longed for is going to stress you out. Now, having walked through this with you, do you feel like, okay, I shouldn't be really scared of this. I'm going to be able to walk into this if I just simply do what Jade tells me to do. And I plan for that month and the time it takes to get hired. And can I just add to it? I think Jade, you would agree. He probably needs

to plan for a little bit of this irregular income too. Yeah. I think once we do what we're doing here, which is basically we're getting a month and a half ahead or two months ahead, once you're on irregular income for a good while, I like being a month ahead. That way you know, hey, if this month didn't go the way I planned, you're not up a creek without a paddle. And that's a general practice, Pierce, for people who are on irregular income. You just kind of have extra money sitting because if you're on commission, if you're in sales, if you're in real estate, you don't necessarily know what the next month is going to bring and it brings you a lot of peace to be a month ahead. Yeah. Okay. So do you think it's a smart idea even being in baby step two to maybe

save up a little bit more than that thousand dollars? No, I don't. This is about you making a career transition. I'm not trying to alter the baby steps. So this is about you making a career transition i'm not trying to alter the baby steps so this is about saying okay yeah thousand dollars saved that is your emergency fund the money that i'm talking about is not necessarily for an emergency it's just what keeps your budget running so that that's the differential there your thousand dollars is for emergencies emergencies are things that are unexpected, unplanned, and they're urgent. You must take care of it. It's, you know, your car blowing up. But what I heard, Pierce, tell me if I'm right, what I heard from you is about two months. Two months of his expenses is a nice

bridge. Yeah, I think so. And it's going to help you make this transition and it's going to be there as, you know, the money's up and down. What's that number? Do you know? Have you done enough of a budget or can you at least ballpark for jade right now what is what would two months expenses look like what's that number probably about four thousand okay how long is it going to take you to get that um and my current job oh no no no no no no don't limit that yeah like you're you're busing tables you're driving people around town in Grand Rapids. How long would it take you? You're busting your tail to make four grand. How long would it take you? Selling stuff. Maybe six months. No. No, you can get it. Come on, man.

You can do this. Pierce. We're not saying just at your current job. We're saying with you putting the full force of your time behind different odd jobs and side jobs plus your current employment. You know, I do do DoorDash as well. So I think if I do that, maybe I could get that down to like four. Yeah. Okay. I like that number. I'd like you to be a little bit more aggressive. I mean, it's like this fun project where you go, I got to come up with four Gs.

Because you're in baby step two. You should be putting at least a grand of margin on this debt every month anyway. So if you weren't doing that before, now we've just kicked you in the butt to make sure you're doing it from now on. Yeah. But see, this is to motivate you, because look, do you feel what we're teaching you? Do you feel it? Oh, if I had two months of my expenses above and beyond my emergency fund, I'm not touching the emergency fund, two months of my expenses

as I take this flight attendant gig, you're feeling good about that, are you not? If that's in the bank? Yeah. I'm not sure. I'm not sure Pierce is feeling it. We're looking for the juice, Pierce. I think I can do it.

You can do it, my man. You got six months. Yeah, you got this. It was two months. We said four months. Until his first program. He's got some time. Yeah, he's got either three months or six months, I think.

Thank you for bailing me out on that one. There it is. All right, Pierce, we believe in you, man. We gave you what you need to do, so go do it. All right, we have to take a break. The good news is we're coming back. This is The Ramsey Show. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show.

I'm Ken Coleman. Jade Warshaw joins me. The phone number for you to jump in is 888-825-5225. All right. Big news today, Jade. I know you saw it. We were talking about it. Jerome Powell. Yes. The big, big, big wigs. Big kahunas. Big kahunas out in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. If you don't know what I'm talking about, which many of you probably don't, Jerome Powell's our Fed chair, Fed Reserve, Federal Reserve. And so anyway, you're going to see, he said, we are going to not only halt the raising of interest rates, but there is a cut coming. Now, that's not completely directly tied to mortgage rates, although they've been coming down.

Mortgage rates have been coming down, yeah. They have. And a cooling on all of this does have an impact. So I bring all that up, Jade, because there are a lot of people that are sitting on the sidelines right now on whether or not they should sell their house or they're ready to buy. And now is the time, as we say, buy the house, date the rate. That's right.

And so we want to talk about those of you who are thinking about that. Our Ramsey Trusted Program is the only way to find an agent that you can trust to keep you on track. Because making a purchase of a house or selling a house for most people is the biggest financial transaction they will ever make. That's right. And you've got to do it the right way. And we send you to some of the top agents in your area who we trust. We've vetted these folks out. You get to sit down with them, interview them.

Do you have chemistry with them? Do you like them? Do you feel good about what they're teaching you so that you can make an informed decision? They are your guide. And so the Ramsey Trusted Agents are who we want you to go to for all of your real estate needs. You can find an agent for free at ramseysolutions.com slash agent. That's ramseysolutions.com slash agent.

Shelby is up next in Tampa, Florida. Shelby, how can we help? Hi. How's everybody doing? Hi. We're doing well um uh i was calling because i know i made a like bad mistake by investing in crypto oh and it was more of actually a scam oh no thinking out and um on the internet yeah not but not the not the best sounding decision i've made in my life. Okay.

How did it happen? I was thinking it was a mutual friend on my social media. Very, felt very real, very legitimate. Convinced me to invest, to, you know, grow my funds. And obviously it wasn't. Oh, man. How much did you sink into this? Oh, $45,000. Ouch.

And, you know, single mom here, and, you know, it's not like this money. Unfortunately, I received my money due to the loss of my mom a few months ago. So this was an inheritance? Yes. Oh, no. Was it all of it and no no i still have 125 000 in investments through a company and then what i want to know more about

that by the way i want to make sure that's in the right spot it's through a legitimate no it's it's uh i'm going through currently right now like northwestern mutual okay an insurance company no it's whole life yeah a life insurance okay i'm gonna tell you right now it's not invested properly and you called you called a couple of money experts and we're sitting here telling you if you want if you want insurance you buy insurance if you want investments you go to investment providers and insurance providers are not investment providers you are not getting a good rate of return at all and if i were you i would take your money out of those whole life

policies i would get you term life in place first my daughter i have a whole life policy for my daughter and the term life for myself. Okay, your daughter doesn't, how old's your daughter? Nine. Okay, let me walk you through this really quick. Here's what we're going to, we're going to deal with the crypto later because honestly, that's not really the thing that's on fire right now. It's gone.

It's not coming back. Mistake made. We're never going to. No, I know it's not coming back. And that's why I'm saying, that's why we're not gonna spend much time on it what i care about is this 125 000 here's i'm gonna give it to you in a nutshell insurance the purpose of it is to the one of the main purposes of it is to obviously mitigate things that you can't pay for and in the case of life insurance the purpose is if there's somebody who is dependent on you um for your income you want to make sure that if something were to happen to you, they're covered.

So in this case, yes, a policy on your life makes sense, but not a policy on your daughter's life. That doesn't make sense. So I would lift the policy off of your daughter, take that money, put it back in your pocket. And for you, I would keep your term life in place. How long is the term? 15, 20? For mine? Yeah.

All I know is it's term 80. I actually don't know much about it. It's been a whirlwind. It's been a whirlwind. Here's what I want you to do. I just transferred over money from my investment. I transferred money over to replenish what I've lost and leave it there in a high yield. Yeah, I think you're kind of running like a chicken with your head cut off.

Yeah, my mom was like the, you know, like the breadwinner. I guess you could say like the very scholarly breadwinner was going to school for her PhD. So I felt like a lot of responsibility landed on my shoulders and I'm making bad choices. How old are you? 29. Okay. Hey, I hate that that happened to your mom. You're really smart too, though.

Yeah, you got what it takes. You got what it takes you got what it takes and I know how it feels to hear a bunch of lingo and money jargon and and it feels like that's for those people they understand it but it's hard for me to understand I was that person but I'm going to try to make this as easy as you can possibly understand it and if you have a question just ask it's not a dumb question it's not a stupid question no you know i was thinking about taking the 60 000 that i transferred over and pay off my car so that way i'm alleviated from car payment yeah i like that putting the money towards something else that's a great that's a great decision i'm not paying off right away because i'm on a student loan repayment program through my employer.

How much do you owe? They match me every month. $14,800. Yeah, pay those off too. No, pay them off. The only reason why I haven't paid it off, and it's because each month if I pay up $100, my company, well, not my company, but the employer that I work for, the job I work for, they matched me at $100. So it's like I'm getting double. No, because you're not figuring in interest and you're not figuring in peace.

It will take you forever to pay off those student loans at that rate just so you can get $100. Yeah, pay them off. Let's honor your mom and let's honor your mom with peace and freedom on your part let's get your debt cleared i like the idea of paying off your car let's pay off your student loans what other debt do you have uh just 1300 in credit cards but it's only yes three which is easy pay off those student loans pay off those credit cards how much was was the car? Did you say 40? The car?

No, 30. Okay, 30. So you can clear off all of those and still, you know, that's the 60K you were going to put in the HYSA instead of putting it in the high yield. Just pay off your debt. Be completely debt free. Get all those payments back in your pocket and then turn around and take whatever six months of expenses is for you and put that in an HYSA. And now you're set. When you do that, you are set. You can breathe.

Yeah, I was set up that way and went backwards. It's okay. Listen, we're telling you what to do, not what you should have done. We're not getting on you. I still hear this response mechanism in you that's like, well, listen, pull the money out of northwestern mutual pull it out of that that that that that that insurance fund and use the money the way that jade's telling you to use it and all of a sudden you wipe away all that burden and you know what so you lost 45 to a scam everybody's

done something dumb with money. All of us included. Give yourself a break. That money's gone. You're not, you know, a moron. You can learn from this and move on. And take whatever's left. Take action. Take whatever's left after you do those things.

If you want to invest that money, don't put it in whole life. Go to RamseySolutions.com slash trusted. And you're going to find people there to help you invest this money the way I would do it, the way Ken would do it. And we're not a scam. We're real people, flesh and blood. If we jack you, you can come in and slash our tires. I'm just saying we're real people. We're not fake cowards on the internet. We're real people. We're going to do this thing right for you. You can trust us. Love it. All right. Don't move. Quick break. We'll be right back with more of The Ramsey Show. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman. Jade Warshaw is alongside. The phone number is

888-825-5225. Our scripture of the day comes from Luke. Luke 9, 23. Then he said to them all, whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. Our quote is from Mitch Albom. One half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it. Okay. Sounds like a recipe for getting out of debt. Uh-huh. Taking control of your life in any area. All right, let's get to the phones.

Laura is in Columbia, South Carolina. Laura, how can we help? Hi, I was listening to y'all during the pandemic when y'all were talking about community college. I took y'all's advice, went to community college, got a merit scholarship to university. I'm a senior. What's the thing is, is I'm disabled. I've never worked a day in my life. Most jobs are not possible for me to do, and I've always known I'd have to work with my brain instead of my body. I'm scared to enter the workforce, and as a consequence of putting my all into college, I accidentally won a fellowship that affords me the right to go to almost any state school,

and even Ivy League, if I wanted to. Wow. Wow. I don't know if I should give up disability, go to grad school, or stay on disability. Or no, excuse me, give up disability and enter the workforce and don't take up the scholarship and don't go and don't pursue my education and continue it further. Or I don't know what to do. Okay, let me just, okay, all right, I'm so glad you called. Do you mind telling us what is your disability, and how, and what kind of work can you do, because you've obviously done an incredible job in school, and you're very bright. So what are your limitations? I have a genetic bone and joint disorder. It also causes me to faint. If you're familiar

with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and postural orthotic tachycardia, I have those. I can't stand or sit for long periods of time. I do most of my classes on the computer, so I would be looking for a job in local, regional, government, or nonprofit work. Okay, let me ask you this. Preferably remote. Okay, let me ask you this. If you did not have those physical limitations, knowing what you know about yourself, what would be something that you would love to try professionally or something you know you'd enjoy doing? I would like to work for the state or federal government on education policy.

So you really love education policy? Yes, sir. Okay. And if you were to get one of those jobs, can you do that remote, or would you have to do, because I'm thinking state and government jobs, those are not remote. Have you looked into that? I have.

That's the pipe dream, the realistic dream is a remote job for a nonprofit somewhere. I failed to mention I have no debt, but if I took the scholarship, it would cover 75% to almost any state or Ivy school. All right, so let's dream here. What if you just picked an Ivy League school, assuming, again, you could do everything online, yes? A few, yeah. Okay, that's what I thought. So what would that higher ed degree be? What would you get, a master's, PhD? Master's of public policy. Okay. You know who you are, girl.

100%. And I love that. You love policy, and you're talking to a policy wonk, okay? I mean, I'd make Jade's eyes roll back in her head if I start talking policy, and James would turn my mic off. I know what you – I know you. I see you, I hear you, Laura. So I'm going to tell you something. It's 2024. I'd like to see you before you make either decision, because you kind of asked Jay and I, okay, should I do this, this, or this? I think you need to do

some more research here. And I think the research is solely around if I were to take that scholarship offer and I were to get that master's in public policy, with my physical limitations, is there a way? I would want to know that. I would want to know the multiple ways. You understand what I'm saying when I say it that way? Yes. Okay, good. I'd want to know the multiple ways. You understand what I'm saying when I say it that way? Yes. Okay, good. I'd want to know that first. Now, I'm going to say something else.

I also think that the timing is right, and I think you're going to have to work at this, because I think there's some small-minded people that would hear about your situation, and they would consider that a polite nuisance. But I think there's some big-minded, big-hearted people who would go, you know what, let's figure out a way to do this. You know what I mean? Because I understand for you, the idea that you could faint at any remote is that correct or is that just the preference i'm trying to work every day on physical therapy um right now i could pull i'm not even going to say i think i could hold down a part-time job because i don't think i could just physically right if it was remote maybe but um i'm trying my best but can i tell you

something how did you undergrad degree i've got is worthless yeah i know but i think it proves something to you how many hours a day were you putting into the undergrad work sometimes 15 usually about 10 sweetheart if you can put 10 hours into a undergrad degree from home you can put eight hours into a job from home 100 there's nothing different it's you standing at a computer it's you taking calls it's you flipping books it's you highlighting things it's you reading all of those things i mean am i wrong no that's why I brought in Jade. I wanted to see if my colleague is hearing what I'm hearing. I just hear a freaking workhorse. Who doesn't believe that she can actually do it, but you've actually already done it, I guess is what we're

trying to say to you. I'm scared to enter the workforce because I'm afraid that I'm going to give up all my benefits and I'm going to be homeless. Okay, okay can't explain it. There we go. Okay. Now we're getting somewhere. But you can acknowledge to us that you can work eight hours a day remote. Yes or no? With my brain, 100%. That's what we're saying. Yeah, you've already done it. You've been doing it.

You've proven it. We're on team Laura right here. We're trying to cheer you up. So let's talk about the fear piece, okay? You have no debt. Do you have an emergency fund? No. I have about $40 in my bank account, and that's usually where it sits.

Okay, and what is your benefit? What's your disability payment coming into you every month? About $1,500. I live out the school food pantry. Okay. All right. I'm on public housing. Jade, let's do the calculator here.

I'm going to have Jade help me out here. So if she's making somewhere between 18 to $22 an hour, let's just do $20 an hour, just for round numbers. Uh, because with your, with your skillset, um, so you do the math 20 times 40. Uh, and so you're going to be, here's my point, you're going to be making more than your disability payout. And we're going to teach you how to build an emergency fund. And we can walk alongside of you. I want to get you set up with one free session with one of our financial coaches to help you see what my path looks like as I begin to make real money.

And you're not going to be homeless. See, that's one of the things about that disability payment. It will make you feel like I can't ever get rid of it when what it's really doing is holding you back. That's right. Jade, thoughts on that? It's the ultimate crutch. I think that taking out of the equation the things that you want to do and what you love to do, there's a lot of jobs out there that you can work on your time you can be remote and you can make the the money that ken is talking about twenty dollars an hour

forty hours a week you know four weeks out of the month and bring home thirty two hundred dollars instead of fifteen hundred so i think that just opening up your mind and going okay like there's there's possibilities here you coming up with work on your own, figuring out other things that you could do, uh, within the parameters of what you enjoy doing. I think there's a lot of options out there. I think fear is blinding you from seeing all of those options, but you're more than capable beyond capable. You've proven that. So that part is a, that's been established. I wonder Laura and Jade, what's the timeline? Um, maybe she gets a job and she stacks some money how soon would you have to say yes or no to these scholarships

um what i would say before february i would graduate in may i would have to move out of state by june i'm gonna challenge you we did this once before you started off the call saying that you heard us tell you to go to community college. You did it. You crushed it. Here's the next challenge. Go get one of these remote jobs that Jade is talking about. Could be customer service. Yeah. Could be anything. Let's just stack some money and just prove to ourself how much money we can make before February and then make your decision. Laura, we believe in you. You're crushing it. Good hour, Jade Warshaw. Always fun to be with you, my friend. Thanks, James Childs and our fearless band of

merry men behind the glass. This is The Ramsey Show. Take care.