The Ramsey Show - App - DAVE RANT: Society Does Not Owe You a Job! (Hour 1)

Episode Date: February 26, 2020

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions Broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is done, cash is king, and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Thank you for jumping in. Open phones at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Maryland starts off this hour in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hi, Maryland. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hi, yes. I recently just started following you.

I'm interested in starting the baby steps, but I don't know if I should start or where to start. My husband is currently military, and I'm a stay-at-home mom. I don't know if it's smart to start the baby steps now because I'm not working or I'm kind of stuck. Okay. Well, I mean, there's not anything keeping you from stopping them. What the baby steps is for is just what to do first what to do second when i can find some money and we generally find money by getting on a budget making the dollars that we have behave sometimes we find money by selling

things sometimes we find money by taking more jobs but But, you know, basically when I get some money, what am I going to do with it? And the first thing you're going to do before you even worry about that is get yourself on a written game plan. And then when you can squeeze dollars out of your existing budget, what am I going to do with them? Well, that's the baby steps. Are you behind on anything? No, not behind on anything. I think we're in a pretty good place. I kind of got us in a place where we're only about $20,000 with both cars, $900 and a credit card.

We have about $2,500 coming in monthly with his pay and about $1,600 going out, and that's including car notes and stuff. So his income is $30,000 a year and you owe $20,000 on your cars? No, he's bringing in about $40,000, and that's after tax. Okay, well, that would be more than $2,300, unless you're getting a huge tax refund. Yeah, we get about usually yearly about $11,000. $11,000? Yeah, we get about usually yearly about $11,000.

$11,000? Yeah, usually. Okay, well, that's one thing we've got to change immediately. Because a tax refund is like buying a shirt at the store, and you take it back, and they give you money back. That was your money the reason you got eleven thousand dollars is because you gave the government throughout the year eleven thousand dollars too much out of his check so you need to change his withholding immediately okay and start bringing home an extra what eight hundred nine hundred dollars a month okay because that's and that's going to help a bunch all right that's

good now is housing furnished uh well we're currently on base good that's what i mean that's that's furnished housing okay and what about food um yeah food we usually do a little over 200 a month for food we have yeah so his food is furnished, but then do you have children? Yeah, we have three kids. He's only deployed, so he's getting a little extra money in now. So I want to know the best way of how to handle that extra money and not blow it. Good. Okay, the first thing we're going to do is, which is the most expensive car?

We have a 2015 Equinox, which is currently costing us $460 a month. Yeah, that needs to go. And I thought about that. I'm like, maybe we just need to get rid of that car altogether. Yeah, you need to get rid of that car altogether. You can't afford that car. Yeah. It's killing you.

Yeah, and I just recently got an expedition last year, which I just refinanced it last week and got it down to uh 130 160 dollar a month payment because what do you owe on it um it's seven about seven yeah yeah there we go okay yeah the equinox needs to go bye-bye yeah here's the thing okay you cannot build wealth when you have cars that total up more than half your annual income and you do and you do and you know the little girl down inside of you knows i'm thinks i'm wrong but the the woman who's no no i really the woman who's a grown-up knows i'm right right you know as a grown-up that i'm right. Right. You know as a grown-up that I'm right.

It's just not what you want to do. It's like, you know, don't take my gummy bears away, right? But, yeah, you got to get rid of that stupid thing. So, hey, so I'm going to adjust your withholding. I'm going to get rid of the Equinox. And we're going to get another car for $5,000 or $6,000 we pay cash for soon or we pay it off really soon. Well, we have a paid-off vehicle.

We have three. We have one that's paid off. Oh, good. Well, that makes it real easy to sell it then. Yeah, it needs a little work, but it's not a lot of work. That's $460 a month. You've got a lot of money to do a little work. Yeah.

So we've got a little bit to play with here. I'm kind of trying to figure out which way to go. Then work your way right up those baby steps and you'll be fine right yeah i think i think hey listen here's the thing we have a system a class called financial peace university it's nine weeks long and you go to the class in a local church in your area but it's also online. And it comes with a one-year membership to the whole online thing, and that includes the EveryDollar budgeting app tied to your bank called EveryDollar Plus. It's all included.

It's about $600 worth of stuff. I'm going to give it to you free. Okay. But here's the way you're going to use it, okay? You're going to start going to class, and he's going to watch the same video you're watching to use it okay you're going to start going to class and he's going to watch the same video you're watching while he's deployed and he can look at the every dollar app and track with the budgeting and you guys can communicate and make these decisions together while he's

deployed okay because all of this is online as well okay if i give it to you will you use it and get your life straightened out? I absolutely will. All right. Hey, we appreciate your service to the country, kiddo. Hold on. Kelly's going to pick up, and we'll get you guys in the class. With that online aspect with the EveryDollarPlus and watching the videos, it's great for the Financial Peace University.

The way we've redesigned it is really, really great for spouses that are separated by deployment or one of them is a truck driver and travels all the time or whatever. If you're not able to be at home all the time, it's a way you can still work together. As long as you've got, you know, Internet connectivity, you'll be able to work together on this and pull it together. So that's why we're so excited about it um particularly the military application like that it's just perfect for for you folks in the military so um it's really really cool yeah it's amazing isn't it kind of weird y'all how all of us do stupid stuff and we know we know when we're doing it it's like the little kid you know he's doing something mischievous and they're looking at but they're you know they kind of

got that little look on their face that they're looking at their daddy you know looking at their mommy going yeah i just did something i mean even my little grandbaby's little toddlers you know four or five years old, three years old, they do something. They cut their eyes around. They look because they know, we know, we know when we're doing something stupid. Now there's a few times you do something stupid. You find out later it was stupid, but most of the time, you know, I'm signing up for a $460 car payment. Look stupid up in the dictionary. You'll see my picture. You know.

You know when you're doing that. I know when I'm doing that stuff. We all do it. But it's just, you know, the thing is, is to adults devise a plan and follow it. Children do what feels good. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Are high health care costs getting you down? Are you confused trying to navigate your options? Do you wish you could find an affordable biblical solution to your healthcare costs? Based on New Testament principles, Christian Healthcare Ministries, or CHM, helps Christian

families, churches, and ministries join together as the body of Christ to share their major healthcare costs. Christian Healthcare Ministries is the original health cost-sharing ministry, a Better Business Bureau-accred organization, CHM members share to pay each other's medical bills. It's not insurance. It's Christians financially and spiritually supporting each other. It's what Christian Healthcare Ministries has done for over 35 years, and our members have shared over $2.5 billion in medical bills. To learn more, Thank you. Thanks for being with us, America. Myra is in San Francisco. Welcome to The Dave Ramsey Show. Myra? in San Francisco. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show.

Myra? Hi, Dave. Thank you for taking in my call. Sure. I just need your advice on something. Okay. I purchased my townhouse 10 years ago when the economy went down for about $300, and now it's probably worth about $800.

My question is, I was thinking of either selling it or renting it out versus renting it out, and I'm trying to move to Southern California where my family is. Our household income is about $120, which is below poverty over here. So, I mean, baby step number three, working on, you know, saving. So what do you owe on your townhouse? I mean, baby step number three, working on, you know, saving. Good. Yeah. So what do you owe on your townhouse? I owe about $220,000.

Wow. Okay. So you'd walk away with $600,000 and be able to use that to buy a property when you move to Southern California? Correct. So I just want to know. I mean, I'm confused. I'd like to just rent it out because rent over here is one bedroom. What's that? I would sell it. I'd like to just rent it out because rent over here is one bedroom. What's that?

I would sell it. You'd sell it. Okay. Because you use the equity out of it to buy your next property in Southern California. Yeah, and I'll be jumping the baby step number five or six and stuff. Yeah, that's fine. Nothing wrong with that at all. And you've made a good profit on it, and you get out of there.

Because let's play it in reverse. If you were sitting in Southern California in a house you owned, would you borrow money to buy a townhouse in San Francisco as a rental? No. No. No. And so the only way you end up with this as a rental is by default, not by strategy. And so, no, I would sell it, take your money, and move to Southern California. It never rains in Southern California.

So there you go. Alicia is with us in Washington, D.C. Hi, Alicia. How are you? I'm doing well, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up?

Okay, so I have a quick question. So I would like to move out of my parents' house. I'm 26 years old, and I want to make the move to Nashville, but my parents are kind of on the fence because they want me to stay at home and continue paying off my debt at a faster pace. So I'm just trying to figure out what would be the best move for me. Okay. How much debt do you have? I have about a little over $50,000 in debt from student loans, car loans, things like that.

How much do you owe on your car? I owe $9,323 on my car. So 10 on the car, 40 on student loans, car loans, things like that. How much do you owe on your car? I owe $9,323 on my car. So 10 on the car, 40 on student loans. That's correct. Okay. And what do you do for a living? I'm a claims representative at an insurance company. What would you do if you moved to Nashville?

That I am unsure of. I'm looking to continue doing claims representative, but I'm not sure. I don't love it, but it pays well. What are you making? I make about $46,000 a year. Okay. All right. Well, cost of living in Nashville is less than D.C., without a doubt.

So if you made the same money, um you know obviously you would have to pick up rent and utilities that you don't have now uh and so it reduced your get out of debt plan on that but 50 000 making say 50 000 in nashville how long would it take a single lady to pay off um 50 000 in debt making 50 000 probably a couple of years, you know, and that's living on beans and rice, and, you know, maybe a little more, between two and three years. If you stay home, how much does it cut back on that? Well, the amount of rent, plus or minus cost of living change, right? And so, you know, $12,000 a year, yeah, that could be substantial towards this.

So it's okay to do either one. I find people out on their own when they've not done it with rashness or done it unwisely tend to grow up more, accelerate faster in their careers than people who live with their parents. Mathematically, it sounds appealing to live with mom and dad, but there's something that happens to Alicia when you are standing on your own two feet, buying your own groceries and paying your own light bill that causes you to accelerate in your development. And I've seen this with my grown kids as they would come home from college, live with us three months, and then they'd move out on their own.

Something changed when they moved out on their own. It was just a different level of whatever. It's not saying you're inept or something. You're not because you're having this discussion. You're not begging to sit there and do nothing. So I think your mom and dad probably are not quantifying that part of this equation. So I'm going to probably move if I'm you. Okay.

Thank you so much. I love listening to you, and I've listened to you my whole life. I didn't accept the principles right at first, but I'm really trying to get out of debt and doing well with that. Well, come on to Nashville. We'd love to see you. Thanks for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225.

Haley is with us in Chattanooga. Hi, Haley. How are you? I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? I am just wondering, my husband and I, we were looking into selling our home.

We just had our son. He is eight weeks old. So eventually we wanted to move due to the school district, but then we had decided the payment would be too much. We like our payment. We like where we are as of right now. But we are wanting to do some updates to our home so we were looking into refinancing because it would also get rid of our pmi that we pay which is 60 a month due to it being an fha loan so we were just curious if it would be worth it to take out some of the equity and go ahead and do those updates that we want to do no okay you should pay cash for those

we're not going to go further in debt to buy decorating or a new kitchen or whatever and um and yeah it's very wise to not move for school systems when your child is eight weeks it's a little premature do you think that it would be worth it to put the money into our home to do those updates since we'll eventually be moving? It can be. Here's your equation. What is your property worth today? What's it worth today? When we talked to the realtor who also, she said she used to do appraising, said about $125,000.

Okay. And what is the most expensive home on your street or the three contiguous streets? About $139,900. Okay. Well, then you wouldn't want to spend more than about $10,000 or $15,000 on your updates because then you would be the most expensive home in the neighborhood in order to break even. Mm-hmm. That make sense?

Yes. What kind of updates are we talking about? Mostly just our kitchen. For the most part, everything else is updated, but our kitchen is still pretty much kind of the original. What would you think the budget would be to fix up the kitchen? I would say at most $6,000. I probably would do that for two reasons.

One is it's going to increase your enjoyment of the home with a new baby, and you're planning on staying there a few more years before you make the move into the other school system. And then two is a kitchen is a real holdback on a property selling well. People buy kitchens. They don't buy hallways. They buy kitchens with a house attached. The places, you know, they buy cool rec rooms or, you know, family rooms or whatever, nice backyards,

and there happens to be a house attached. So if you've got a bummer kitchen, it pretty much shuts down the discussion pretty quickly when they walk into your house looking at it, and especially if you're in an old enough neighborhood where a lot of the kitchens have been renovated that you'd be competing with so yeah i do that i think that's a good move see what we're doing is we're not over building the neighborhood if you told me i want to do a sixty thousand dollar addition i would be going no because. Because it would be $120,000 plus $60,000 would be $180,000. Nobody looks at $180,000 homes around you.

There's not any. So you would have overbuilt the neighborhood and you're going to lose your butt. So you'd never do $60,000. But $60,000 puts you in the $130,000 range and you've got one of the nicer houses in the neighborhood now and you can get out of it. You're not going to get killed. You always want to be middle to the bottom of the neighborhood

if you can be. Top of the neighborhood at the most, but never the top of the neighborhood. Never, ever do that. It's not going to appreciate. You can't get your money out because people looking for a house with that price don't drive down that street. They drive down a different street. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Thanks for joining us, America. Taylor is with us in Cincinnati. Hi, Taylor. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave.

How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I kind of have, it's almost a two-part type question. My fiancé and I are getting married next March, and we're both working on 3B, on saving for a house. And essentially, I'm trying to figure out do we need to wait a year or two years to put that down payment? Because we both have been able to put back quite a bit within the past year. And then my second question is, when we go and we

put this down payment on our house either a year or two years from now, how much should we possibly put back for an emergency fund? Because I've been used to myself living on my single income versus actually having a house and having another income into the mix. Well, I think you'd calculate what your estimate of expenses are

and just take your monthly expenses times three to six months of expenses, and that's how you set your emergency fund aside. Okay. You're right. I think it would be more then than it is now with the house coming on, but you'd also have more income to deal with as well. So that's good news. How old are you two?

We're both 24. Cool. How much have you got saved for a house um for me right now i've got about 32 put back and then he has about 2 000 put back right now has 2 000 10 000 10 000 and you've got 32 000 so 42 000 way to go good job and uh you're waiting a year to get married. Why? The reason is because we had some family emergencies that happened this past year, so there's a lack of PTO and availability to get married this next year. Oh, okay.

Cool. All right. Well, you would not buy a home until you're married together. Exactly. For certain. And then your question is whether to do it right then or whether to wait a year. The advantage of waiting a year is you will probably make a different decision on the home. Okay.

Because after living together for a year, being married for a year, knowing each other for a year, I always laugh and say it takes about a year to know how close to your mother-in-law to buy okay but all that means is you're getting to know each other and you'll you'll probably make different decisions so i would wait at least six months um not because you need to from a money standpoint but i just think you'll make a different decision on the house. I think you rent a little, you know, take a six-month lease on a little apartment and just pile up cash, some more cash while you're doing this, and just enjoy being married. Enjoy that phase of your life starting off, and then start looking for a property. And, you know, you're going to learn about each other. You're just going to relate differently once you are married than you do now.

It's subtle, but it's true. And I just think you'll make a more wise decision. And there's no rush to buy a house. There's nothing evil about not owning a home, you know, for a short period of time while you're having patience to make a better, wiser choice, and that's what I would do. Lauren is with us in Phoenix. Hi, Lauren.

Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, how are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? I would love to get your insight on a big decision that I need to make. I've recently had a new job opportunity come to me. I currently make about $89 in a regular salary position, and it has really good leadership pathways.

But the opportunity is to transition to contract work with another company, making a potential $120 to $130 a year. And I've never done contract work, so the risk makes me nervous when we're paying off our debt. But the opportunity to pay it off faster with higher income is really enticing. Okay. Which one gives you the best life 10 years from now? You know, that's hard to say because right now it's safer to be in a regular salary position. I would probably say the job I'm sitting in now. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Okay. We're trying to pay off our debt, so the opportunity to make more money over the next couple of years is enticing. So we can get all of our debt done, and then I feel like I could go down different pathways with my job if I wanted to, and I'd have that freedom of not having debt. Oh, you want to go down a different pathway with your job when you're debt-free? Potentially. I'm not sure.

I just mean it would allow me to explore different pathways if I wanted to i wouldn't feel that i needed to stay in the field i'm in okay all right um well i mean long term the uh you know your your current position is probably your best bet um unless you want to hop careers if you want to hop careers then let's just go make the most money we can make doing anything for a short period of time and then hop careers because that is long-term taking you where you want to be. So it might be time to do a little soul-searching on that. Again, what do you want to be doing 10 years from now

and which of these steps takes you there the best? I want to be debt-free so that I can do X, Y x y or z with my career i don't care which it is and then ask and look back on because what you don't want to do is take this deal uh just because it's short-term thinking to take the contract deal unless you're going to be short-term anyway because you're hopping careers and here's the thing with contract. You're going to pick up 7.65% more in taxes. You pick up the other half of your payroll tax called self-employment tax. Okay.

And so that's going to amount to about $12,000 here. And so if you make 120 on contract minus 12, the spread on this is not that great. Right. You know, 90 to 108 or whatever it is, that's not a huge, huge jump. And I don't know what else you're losing in terms of benefits and other stuff as well, health care. I mean, you're probably not making a $10,000 spread if you've got a decent benefits package where you are on this jump. So it's not as big as it sounds.

And that's if you get $130,000, I mean $120,000. So you're going to pick up some extra taxes. You're going to have to pick up all the benefits. And like you said, you're taking more risk, probably. But I have a feeling that you're probably pretty marketable anyway. So you're going to land on something. So I don't I don't think. But a good way to help your critical thinking skills, I always use it.

And when I'm looking at something is, you know, if I buy this, if I do this, if I make this move, does it further where I want to be 20 years from now? Or does it just make me feel good in the moment? If it makes you feel good in the moment, it's usually the wrong decision. If it's a money and a career decision, you know, what I want to do is the right thing. If it happens to feel good in the moment, that's great, too. But broke people always have short planning windows. People who build wealth have long planning windows. And that's what I'm talking about.

So you just look out there 10 years and ask yourself, will the 10-year-from-now version of me like me for doing this? Does it make the 10-year-from-now version of me smile that I did this? And, you know, in that case, you pull the trigger on it and you go do it. I'm okay with either one. This is not a huge raise. It's not a huge raise. So there needs to be a real reason to do it. Justin is in Columbus, Ohio. Hi, Justin. How are you? I'm good. How are you, Dave? Better than I deserve. What's up? up well i kind of have a different question for you i don't have any debt i found you a couple years ago like own my car no credit card nothing like that it's more of a like a life question of i make like 40 000 a year at my job at the

distribution center i work at and i'm i'm considering should i go back to school because i i got straight into work out of high school cool should i go back to school because i i got straight into work out of high school cool so i want to go back to school do something like that or do i keep how old are you 23 okay what do you want to study um i've always wanted to be a teacher like i loved helping kids i'm a soccer coach now cool yeah i go back to school and be a teacher. Pay cash for it. Yeah, of course. Right. Yeah.

I'd definitely do that. All right. It's just... Listen, here's how I answered that. 33-year-old version of you, just like I was just saying a minute ago to the other caller. 33-year-old version of you, you're 23 now, is going to be smiling when you're a teacher. They're not going to be smiling if you're in the distribution center. Right.

Go be a teacher, brother. We need good teachers. Have at it. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. Thanks for joining us, America. We're glad you are here. Our question of the day comes from blinds.com. They have a 100% satisfaction guarantee. That means even if you mismeasure, you pick the wrong color, they will remake your blinds for free.

You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos they run every month, you'll save even more. Use the promo code RAMSY to get the best possible deal. Rules and restrictions apply. Today's question comes from Wesley in Utah. He visits DaveRamsay.com and says, Dave, my name is Wesley. I'm 17. I'm a junior in high school.

Wondering what I can do now to start building the best financial future for myself. What are my options in terms of saving and investing? I have about $5,000 saved in the bank and I make about $2,000 a summer. Well, Wesley, I know there's a lot of people barking about college out there right now. College is just too expensive and you just can't afford to go to college and you can't get a job if you go to college and all that kind of crap is floating around out there so here's my perspective as a guy who actually has 854 people working on our team meaning i hired them going to college and studying something that is usable in the marketplace is, by and large, a really good idea. So getting a degree in communications or business or you want to move into the medical field and be a nurse or a doc or whatever,

those are all wonderful things to study. Now, studying something useless and doing it in a university that costs 26 times too much and you get a degree in left-handed puppetry is a bad idea. Okay? But there's people that do that. They come out with a PhD in German polka history and then wonder why they can't get a job. But that's dumber than a rock.

And then they're $200,000 in debt because they went to some stupid prestigious school that they couldn't afford. Now, if you want to go to a prestigious school, I'm fine with that as long as you pay cash for it. So all of that to say, Wesley, what I would plan on doing if I'm 17 years old is I can prove to you mathematically the best possible investment you could make would be into Wesley. the rate of return on a reasonably priced education in a field of study that actually is applicable in the marketplace, it's you're going to make more money on what you spend to go to a state school than it will cost you. And you'll make more money on you for the rest of your life because of that

than you would on a mutual fund investment. So I could show you some tricky numbers and do double backflips and we could do all this compound interest stuff and it would be really sexy and cool. If you're 17 years old and you invest $5,000, when you're 87 years old, you'll have $84 million or whatever. It's not that. But I mean, I could show you all that stuff

because it's actually amazing if you start investing at an early age what you will have. But the truth is the best rate of return is a budget-conscious, high-quality education in a field of study that is usable. It's the best advice I can give you. So if I'm 17 and I have $5,000 and I make $2,000 a summer, I'm piling up money to make sure I go to college debt-free. And I'm going to go to an in-state school,

maybe to a community college for the first two years and get the basics out of the way at a third the cost, a fourth the cost, or zero cost, depending on what state you're in. And then I'm going to go to a good state school in-state tuition and study something that's actually usable in the marketplace. And so I've got a friend of mine. His son just graduated with an engineering degree. I've got another friend of mine.

His daughter just graduated and his son too. But his daughter got a degree in uh supply chain and logistics and uh those young people are coming out with an undergraduate degree making eighty thousand dollars a year straight out of school and they have they can they can make upward of six figures within five years in the marketplace that is a very usable degree and it's kind of fun if you're a math nerd like me but um anyway it's what do you want to study what do you want to be i understand that you need to find something you're passionate about but for god's sakes do not get us you know get a phd in gender studies and then wonder why you're

broke that's just dumb okay if you want to study that that's fine and if you got the want to study that, that's fine. And if you've got the money to study that, that's fine. I'm not mad at you. But society does not owe you a job. So go at it, folks. But let's not all decide college is a ripoff. College is a ripoff if you don't need to go to college. Some people need to go be a heat and air person or be a welder at the trade school and be an apprentice electrician. You can make really good money doing those things. If you want to go do that and work with your hands and that's the way you're wired, great. Go do that. I got no issue with any of that.

Not everybody needs to go to college, but this idea that nobody needs to go to college because we've got a bunch of idiots that have run up $1.6 trillion in student loan debt, getting degrees that are useless. That's ridiculous. Your critical thinking skills are off, which is kind of humorous when we're discussing education and you have no critical thinking skills. So anyway, all that to say, Wesley, one more time, you, son, are your best possible investment. I would save up and pay cash for college,

and that's what I would do if I were in your shoes. Oh, by the way, it's what I did. I didn't quite pay cash. I had $3,600 in student loan debt when I got out in 1982 when I graduated, when the dinosaurs roamed the earth. All right, Heidi is with us in Vancouver, Washington. Hey, Heidi, how are you? Hi, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So I am a 44-year-old stay-at-home mom, and my husband is 48. He makes $175,000 a year, and we have yet to get term life insurance, and a bit of a mistake.

So we're trying to correct that, but I'm curious to know if it's a wise investment for one reason. He is a type 1 diabetic, and he's also a nicotine user. So the best estimates that we have gotten from any insurance agent has been over $300 a month. So I'm wondering if we should still go about doing that. And we were looking at a 20-year term that's giving us about $200,000. Yeah, that's really very, very expensive i agree having no having no insurance is not a good idea what does he do for a living he is a vp of sales and marketing okay um type one is i'm not i'm not medical i'm not a medical person but i've just been around the insurance business and

financial planning business for 1,000 years. It's often diet-controlled, correct? This is actually, he is insulin-controlled. He's on a pump, and he is in good control. The thing that actually makes it... Is he still overweight? No, he's not overweight. The thing that actually makes it more expensive is the nicotine.

Yeah, that doubles everything. Yes, but as of right now, that doesn't seem to be changing, and so I just have to go with that. So you smell bad, you have bad breath, you're going to die from it, and your insurance is double or triple, but we don't want to lay them down. Yeah. Okay. That's dumber than a rock.

I've had that conversation, and I just got to leave it alone for now. Oh, and they cost money, like a lot. Yeah, but the consideration is that I was looking at a 20-year term. Yeah, I think you take a shorter term and you may you may have to take less coverage because this is just because of his health and his habits he's your your life insurance is just ridiculously expensive but i'm scared to death you walk around with nothing though yeah something happens to him you make he makes 175 how many kids have you got we have two kids uh the youngest is 15. The older one is 18.

My reason for looking at the 20-year term, though, was because I have not worked outside the home in almost 20 years. I was looking at it as a he's 48, so therefore it would get me to retirement age. Well, the thing is, you're making plenty. He's making plenty of money, so you should be able to get the kids out of the house and be debt-free, you know, working our system. And then your need for life insurance goes way down at that point. You just need if you had a half million dollars,

million dollars in mutual funds, no dad and no kids at home, and he dies, you'd be okay. And that's what I'd be working towards. I wouldn't be working towards keeping insurance for your whole life. But you guys need to get real disciplined on your working our baby steps, and that'll help you do away with your need for insurance. Hey, it's Kelly, associate producer and phone screener for The Dave Ramsey Show. This episode is over, but if you heard about a product or service and didn't have a chance to write it down, don't worry.

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