The Ramsey Show - App - Dealing With Family Drama (Hour 2)

Episode Date: November 8, 2023

МУЗЫКАЛЬНАЯ ЗАСТАВКА Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Camel, joined by bestselling author Rachel Cruz, who is a newly minted author of a kid's book called I'm Glad for What I Have, and I'm excited to read it to my little two-and-a-half-month-old. I've heard you can do that, Rachel. Many people message me.

You should. You should always be reading. Always be reading. That's beautiful. And she'll learn contentment from two months old. What a gift. What a gift it is. What a great dad you are, George.

I've been told that. For reading her. If I had a nickel,achel for every i'd have one nickel maybe from you oh that's fun well we're taking your calls at triple a 825-5225 we'll talk about your life and your money jared joins us in salt lake city to kick us off jared welcome to the show hi thank you sure what happening? Well, I was just kind of wondering your guys' opinion. Right now, me and my wife are full-time employees at the family farm, and we're going to move away, and my grandparents, who own the farm, are about to go on a one-year religious thing.

So they're not going to be around at the farm to kind of run things, so the only people left at the farm would be my aunt and uncle. And I kind of feel like when the time comes for us to leave, there's going to be some, you know, kind of we really need you to stay. And I don't really know what to do. How old are you? 23, and my wife's 22. Jared, I want to release you from any burden that you are feeling right now. You're carrying something that you don't need to carry. I understand why.

You're a great guy. But this is not your responsibility, this farm. It's not. This is something that you guys have chosen for a season to be a part of. But you're also 23. And if you handcuff yourself to something like this, especially a family business, there's going to be a lot of resentment

and a lot of pain that you don't have to carry and that you don't need to live in. So for your aunt and uncle, is it a story you've made up in your head, Jared, or have you all had discussions actually in reality about this? So I've discussed moving away with my aunt and uncle, and I'm kind of too afraid to talk about it with my grandparents. Because you really do need the help. But why does it have to be you?

Are you the only person on planet Earth capable of helping? Sometimes it feels like it. You're not. There it is. And they've probably made you feel that way. They're like, you're so helpful. We can't imagine doing this without you. You guys are so

great. And you're married, right? Yeah. Did your wife sign up to be a part of this family farm for the rest of her life? I guess not. You know, we kind of want to move away and farm. You know, we're really passionate about agriculture. That's really what we want to do. Well, you're not doing anything immoral here. I have a question. Why do you want to move away?

Is it just to kind of have your own. Why do you want to move away? What's the, is it just to kind of have your own thing? Is it, what's the motivation for that? Kind of to have our own thing. You know, my dad doesn't work there. So the kind of writings on the wall there, like I've worked my whole life, but I'd kind of just be an employee, you know? Yeah. And right now we rent my grandparents' old house, which also doubles as the farm's office. And there is nowhere near us that is even close to within budget, like at all.

What are you making? The only reason we can work there, I make about $40,000, and then my wife makes maybe about $5,000 to $10,000 on top of that. Okay. Is she working on the farm too? Yeah. You guys are severely underpaid. She makes $10,000 a year.

Is she working full-time? No, no. I guess my wife doesn't work full-time. I guess I said that wrong wrong but she just kind of does uh okay some clerical stuff you know um which works out good it works out really well because we we have a like a year and a half old and then we've got another one on the way so it's congratulations she can work and be a mom at the same time. Yeah. Yeah. So what happens, let's say you snapped your fingers, where would you go and what would you do?

Um, we would be farming, uh, down South from us and we'd probably be just farming produce. Um. But that means you would need to have some land. How would that work? So her family lives down south from us, and we'd probably maybe move in with them for a little while, and then... I want you to get your own place and have some independence. I want you relying less on family because it's going to add these weird handcuffed situations like you found yourself in.

So what would it take for you guys to live on your own, rent your own place, have your own financial stability, and then do your own thing? I've kind of looked at that. I need to get my CDL and then maybe have a full-time CDL job. I lined up right when I get out of the farm and then kind of use that money to buy some property. Okay. Do you guys have any debt? Um, so we got all our student loans paid off and the only debt we have now is my truck and I only owe like 17001,700 left on it.

Okay, so we can knock that out quick. What were your degrees in? I'm trying to leave it there to build the credit. We didn't finish our degrees out. Okay. So what I would say, Jared, if I were you guys, you're 23. You guys are figuring out life. You're starting a family, and you've had a great opportunity working on the family farm,

but you know in your gut it's not going to be the long-term play. So Jared, you're going to have to have the uncomfortable conversation. And here's the deal. To be unclear is to be unkind. To be clear is to be kind. And Jared has to be very clear, kind, be kind in the clearness. But you need to be very clear with your aunt and uncle. And I would have the discussion personally sooner than later. And just to say, hey, we don't have a time frame because you don't right now, Jared. I mean, you guys are talking about maybe we'll maybe we'll move in here. I kind of got to get this license.

You don't really have a plan right now. There's not a concrete like, hey, this is exactly what we're going to do. Step one, step two, step three, we can do it in 18 months. Boom. You don't have that yet. But you know it's coming. So I would have the conversation just out of respect for them so that they can plan and to say, hey, guys, here's kind of what our gut's saying. We're probably not going to be here full time. My wife and I, we're going to sit down we're going to create a plan, create a timeline and once we do that we're going to let you guys know that so that you have

the time to backfill our positions if you need to. But I just want to give you the heads up that we're not going to be here long term. You need to have that conversation Jared. And regardless of how they react, that's on them. Nothing in this means that you were born into this thing and you

have to do this thing, right? I mean, like that's, I work for a family business. I'm like, I would be miserable if I felt like this is where I had to be all the time and I was forced in it and I didn't want to have some awkward conversation. Life is too short, Jared. Life and your wife, your wife deserves a husband and you guys deserve a marriage that's yours fully. So don't live with someone else's expectations. So create a plan, communicate it early, and be guilt-free of it because that's okay. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Camel joined by the Rachel Cruz this hour.

And the number to call is 888-825-5225. This is a rare combo. When Rachel and I get to host together, we do host Smart Money Happy Hour, another show on Ramsey Network, where we have a great time. Usually with a cocktail in hand. Very different style. So we're a little bit more relaxed on that. That's right.

We're real uptight over here. We're going to do the Ramsey show. We've got this. We've got our intense voices on for this show. Yeah, we put on our big boy pants today. But hey, if you want to check out all of the shows, we've got so many on the Ramsey Network with our friends Ken, John, Rachel.

I've got a YouTube channel. So there's always something coming out from us. You can't be bored. You can't say we don't put out enough content. We're trying to help as many people as we can out there. So we appreciate all of you who tune in weekly. Yeah, and if you guys love it, will you share the show and subscribe to some of these, put reviews out there?

It's just really helpful when y'all spread the word, sharing it with friends and all of it. Again, we want people to get control of their money, and I think that's one of the best ways to do it. It's free. You can listen anytime. Cost you nothing. Yeah, so share it with your friends, with your family.

And again, subscribe if you can, leave reviews. All that's so helpful. All right, let's get to the phones. Danielle is in Los Angeles. What's going on, Danielle? Hi. Hi, you guys. I hope this was a fun one for you.

Thank you. We needed a soft toss here, Danielle. So my husband and I, we're 48 and 52. We have a lump of cash, about $112,000 right now that we'd saved up for taxes. Cancer messed with us earlier in this year. And so we just weren't doing anything with the money, but now we're past all of that stuff. And we are death free. Past cancer. Oh, I'm so thankful. That's awesome. Congratulations. Thank you. So we are behind on retirement savings for our age. We only have about $200,000 combined between the two of us. And we have a mortgage balance of $337,000 that we are very anxious

to pay off. We've like had a lot of things come up since we've been debt free in 2017. So we haven't been able to like push on the mortgage like I want to. And I want to know if you guys would condone playing around with the money a little bit, like getting a brand new car, which we've never bought a brand new car, doing some home upgrades, or if we need to be smarter and like just lump it into investment because we're so behind or push on the mortgage. What's your household income? We're at about 300k a year. That is good news. Okay. And outside of the retirement, what kind of equity do you have in the home? A lot. Our home is probably worth about 1.6 million if we were to sell it, but we're not. I mean, we're not moving. We have young kids still. But you've got about $1.6 million if we were to sell it, but we're not. I mean, we're not moving.

We have young kids still. But you've got about $1.2 plus million in equity in the home. Yeah. Okay. That's good news. But I want to have all of the equity. Sure. Well, you're going to knock this mortgage out real quick, making $300,000. I'd love to see you guys get aggressive now that you have this. But the question is, we have this pile of money. Is this above and beyond your emergency fund? Yes, we have an emergency fund besides this. Plus the $112,000. Okay. So if I'm in Danielle's shoes, I've got this mortgage, we're behind on retirement, and you want to buy a brand new car. And we tell people, just so the listeners are clear, the only time you should buy a brand new car if you want to is once you have a million dollar net worth. And the cars should add up to no more than half of your annual income. So you guys are not violating

any principles so far. But the question is the opportunity cost. That's what you're struggling with. Yeah. And we're thinking that we would probably spend about 60K, which sounds ridiculous to us on a car, but because we've never, we've always bought used cars. Okay. But yeah, I'm guessing, I'm wondering if like, it's just not worth it to do that yet. We should catch up or at least shovel this into. Do y'all need a new car, Danielle? What's your current? Okay. It's more just for fun. Yeah, no, I appreciate that.

It's because I drive a boring gray van and I want something more fun for me. Yeah. That would still fit my family. So. Okay. We may have different answers on this, Rachel. I feel like there's some middle ground here where we can get you a great car

and we can shovel a bunch of money into retirement. How much for the gray van could you get? How much? What do you mean? Like if you sold it.

Oh, how much could I get if I sold it? Uh-huh. I mean, probably like 10? Oh, it would be like oh, no, no, no. It would be more.

Probably like 25. So neat. We did a lot of it two years ago. So you're not driving a hoop to here. It has low mileage. Beautiful. No, no, no. It's a nice van.

It just doesn't excite you. Everything about it is nice except for that I know that, to me, I have trouble finding it in the parking lot because I forget what it looks like. It's that boring. I love it. Just slap a Live like no one else bumper sticker on it danielle i would yeah you can get 25 for it which is awesome um yeah you know i would probably throw another you know i'm just throwing numbers out 15 20 go get a great you i would get a used car i don't think you need a brand new one i mean ge, George and I were just talking about cars. What's the specific car?

What's the specific car? I'm planning on a specific model that's coming out next year. It's an electric van. You know, the VW Buzz vans that are coming out that are so cute, and they're electric, and it would fit my family, and it would fit our lifestyle. And how much is it going for? 60?

Well, there's no, I think all in all, it would fit our lifestyle. And how much is it going for? 60? Well, there's no, I think all in all, it would be about 60 for what we need. We need to like install an electric plug and do some things. So that would be my plan. Okay. It's really specific. Yeah. Well, you got time. Is the car even available? No. It's coming out next year. I'm planning ahead. I'm a planner. That's good. I feel like I'm the type where if I eat my vegetables and I finish my plate, then I can have some dessert. And so I feel like for you, you're in a similar boat where if we attack some of the mortgage, we put some of this and maxed out our retirement accounts for the year, I would feel good about money left over going toward upgrading the car. And if it's a year from now, maybe we start a sinking fund separately for the car to save to save to get what you what you want it's not like you guys i

mean we get people calling the show and their car is breaking down they have to get a new one or they have to sell it because they have too much car debt and they have to find another one you guys aren't in those dire straits you just hate the van which i totally you know understand that so uh so yeah i would do what george said i would kind of use this money split it three ways put some at the mortgage i would put some in retirement and then map out and say okay how much is left after that and then how much do we need to save per month and again you're not in a rush to get this up this new car but what if it took but what if it took 12 months and you put some money away every single month save towards it and then when it comes out or six months after it comes out and you're like, okay, we have the cash for it. And you kind of just slowly walked away.

I think you would feel more peace at that than just kind of jolting and, and making kind of a snap decision. I like the idea of planning and putting some money aside. The low amount that we have in retirement doesn't scare you. I mean, it scares me. How old are you guys? How old are you guys? We're 48 and 52. Okay. So we only have 200K. So let's say you had 12 more working years making $300,000. I think you can have a fine retirement if you max out all retirement, do catch up contributions. You may use a taxable brokerage account outside of that if you start to

run out of options. So you guys will be okay, but that's like, we're getting on a plan here. We're not just going to spend willy nilly for the next 10 years. And we're going to knock out this mortgage. Yeah. So I would have a set game plan. And I like to, if I was in your shoes, Danielle, truthfully, I'd probably pay off the mortgage and then feel really good about getting a, whatever the heck kind of car I wanted. And you guys could do that in a few years. It wouldn't be a long time. So we're talking three years and we attack this mortgage. And you guys just came out of a hard year, Danielle, with a cancer scare and everything that you guys have walked through. So there's a level of emotion for you that is understandable,

but it's also you feel this like, oh, my gosh, I just want to have fun. Like, can I just please just have fun? And you're looking for an outlet to do that. And I'm wondering if you can kind of scratch that itch elsewhere while still being wise with this money that you guys have because I think this money could go further than just throwing it at a new car. I think you're right.

But I do wonder. But I'm like, you know, for this man, I'm like, I don't know. Again, you're not but I do wonder but I'm like you know for this man I'm like I don't know is there again you're not violating any principles here so we're not gonna yell at you if you do it

you'll be okay but I think because of your own fear that you haven't done a good enough job with the retirement I don't think you would enjoy the new car

at this point you're gonna have some guilt yeah because it feels like more an emotional purchase than like a rational one you know yeah I think you're all that's very

much right that's exactly what i wanted to do i wanted to feel really great after getting through it yep and and that's totally understandable but see if you can celebrate go and spend 400 at an amazing dinner in la that's true and go, go big, like go do something that you're just like, oh, I want to like kind of scratch that spending itch because I get that. I feel that. I love to spend. Rachel's not scared to spend. I have a little more of the guilt. So this was a very balanced call here. But Danielle, thanks for letting us talk it through with you. We're honored to take the call. So glad to hear that this cancer is behind you, and we hope it stays that way. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, you guys. Health insurance costs are only moving one way, and that way isn't down. And if higher costs aren't enough, the wait times to see your doctor are longer, and it's harder than ever

to get anything approved through the bureaucracy. 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 at chministries.org slash budget. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Campbell, joined by Rachel Cruz. We've got a lot of fun things happening at RamseySolutions.com. And if you head to the store, there's a lot more fun happening because we've got the Christmas Cash Giveaway right now. We're giving away $500 a week, $5,000 grand prize. You can enter every day for more chances to win.

We also have the $12 sale, which is a killer deal to get some of our bestselling books like the Total Money Makeover, Baby Steps Millionaires, Own Your Past, Change Your Future, some of the questions for humans decks. And while you're at the store, you'll see some new and exciting products. And I'm biased, Rachel, but my new book, Breaking Free from Broke is there on pre-sale, as well as your brand new kids book. I'm glad for what I have, just released yesterday. There's also the 2024 Ramsey Gold Planner. We've got the Rachel Cruz wallet in Navy. I'm glad for what I have. Just released yesterday. There's also the 2024 Ramsey Gold Planner. We've got the Rachel Cruz wallet in navy. I mean, we have it in camel, but why not have it in navy? We do have it in camel. You're welcome, George. It's not with a K. I was a little

upset about that. Missed opportunity. I know. You have to go with the color palette, but we're going navy this season. Very excited about it. Very classic. Love a good navy. Very classy. So you can check that all out. It's a one-stop shop for all of your Christmas shopping. Just go to ramseysolutions.com slash store to check it all out. Let's get to the phones. Sean joins us in Irvine, California. Sean, how can we help you today? Hi guys. How are you doing? Doing well. Doing great. Good, good, good. So I just had a quick question. So I currently, you know, I'm not in debt really that much, really just from school and a surgery that I had, but that doesn't even amount to like 20 grand,

which is totally manageable. But on the other hand, I don't, I have about seven credit cards with very little balance. If anything, they're just my remedial. They're paying for Netflix, stuff like that, on payment plans every month for that kind of stuff. However, it does amount to over $100,000 of open credit. Now, with that much open credit... Are you trying to impress us, Sean? Because it's not working so far.

No, no, no. It's scary. Okay. Because I need to get... I'm going to buy a house soon. Why? And... What was that?

Why? Because our rent is just going out of control that i'm paying right now and it's almost amounting to a new house payment um a mortgage if i just paid like a thousand dollars more i'd be in a mortgage how much do you make so i make about ninety thousand dollars a year okay and married no no who's you kept saying our our rent our rent oh sorry you kept saying our rent is going up who's the hour is there someone else in the picture oh our roommate roommates got it how old are you so i'm 31 oh i thought you were younger the way you were talking okay you're just too you're just too no i meant it i meant it in a good way i meant it in

a good way sean um you have a very young energetic voice so you're 31 you want to buy a house for sean yeah okay which will somehow save you money well yeah because i have like $170,000 saved up for this. Why are you hanging on to debt when you have $170,000 sitting there? No, I don't. So the hospital bill is interest-free. So if I'm not paying interest on it, I figured not to. So what do you owe in medical bills? Well, I want to know from Sean, what are you calling us for what's your what's your number one question should you buy

a house is that the number one thing that you want to know what what's lenders like seeing how much credit cards i've had i have is there a problem with um that i see me having so many credit cards do i need to close some i don't want to close any because it hurts you know i know it hurts your credit score um okay but i'm okay so sean you called a kind of a different show just so our advice is going to be probably opposite of what you usually hear because we are not fans of credit cards we're not even fans of a credit score we're not fans of keeping around debt we want debt in that entire game that everyone plays out of your life 100% forever, ever. Amen. And that's Sean's $90,000 that he makes is all his. There's no game to play. He has cash in the bank that's saved in a high yield savings account for an emergency fund. He has a

good down payment. He's funding retirement and he's doing things that are good for Sean. This whole game that you're playing is normal. That's what most people do. But here at Ramsey, it is a completely different mindset to the point that we would say close all of your credit cards, pay everything off, get a debit card, pay for Netflix with a debit card and your credit score will lower because it is all mathematically calculated by debt. There's about seven layers of your credit score, and it all has to do with debt. So when you stop going into debt, when you start paying off debt and eliminating debt, that score

inevitably will go down to the point in about 12 months after paying off all your debt, it will be undetermined. It goes to a place that they can't determine your credit score because you haven't had debt in over a year. So then you'll do a process called manual underwriting, where they will actually underwrite you a mortgage, but that's after you're debt free with a fully funded emergency fund and at least 5% down for that mortgage. Because for so many people, the thought is, well, if I just had a house, because yes, like you said, in some people, their rent is even more expensive than what a mortgage would be, right? I mean, it is insane what people are paying for rent. So I totally hear you. But when you own a home, it's very expensive.

When things go out, there's not a landlord to be there. There's not roommates there to split up the rent, right? I mean, it becomes a very expensive process. And it's a great thing. Homeownership should be part of your financial picture. That's a part of building wealth. But we want you to do it in the right way. So, okay.

So we're so opposite of everything. So against credit cards. Yeah. Right. Yep. So if, let's just say, I mean, I have a business of my own and I wanted to expand and use credit for myself. How do you, without credit cards, how do you get expansion and trust from lenders? Why do you want more credit and more lenders? You just told me you were frightened by a $100,000 line of credit. Well, no, no, no. But like, let's just say, okay, so let's say I need to get something for my business, right? Some huge purchase that's going to help me make money in the long run. Okay.

Save up and pay cash. Move at the speed of cash. If I pay that cash, though, am I essentially draining my savings and all my... No, what's draining your savings is making payments to 14 different lenders. You're going to spend the money anyways. We're just telling you to do it up front when you have the money so you don't make stupid decisions that Sean regrets. And there's no risk. And that's the other thing is you add on so much risk especially in a business we actually have a

business conference going on right now with small business owners from all over the country and it's amazing especially in small business that people out leverage themselves and when something doesn't work the amount of stress that is caused on that it never ends up good and so we teach them to run their business completely debt-free and so even for this company, Sean, we have a thousand team members and we only have business debit cards. We don't have a single dime of debt on this place. It's a $300 million paid for building. And we moved at the speed of cash.

Dave's been doing this for 30 years. This building just opened four years ago. And so it's a slower pace. You're wanting to move very quickly. And there's a lot of podcasts and shows wanting to move very quickly. And there's a lot of podcasts and shows that will help you do that by leveraging debt. We just happen to swim upstream and go countercultural. Yeah. And to Sean, part of this, you have to understand is that debt, there's a weight that you carry with debt and everyone does. And now in our culture

today, it's so normal that people get used to what they carry around. But there is a freedom that is caused when you don't owe anyone anything. And that autonomy is what's missing in our culture today. And that autonomy of being able to make your own choices, being able to have options because no bank is in your life. There's nobody that you are financially attached to. You have complete autonomy. And there's power in that to be able to use your income to build wealth on the mathematical financial side. But there's an emotional, spiritual side of money, too, that a lot of people don't talk about. And there's a freedom that comes when there is no payments. You're not owed by anyone. You make different decisions in life when you don't have that risk. I never really thought about it like that.

I want you to hold on the line, Sean, because Emily's going to pick up. I would love to give you Total Money Makeover. It's the best selling book that we have here at Ramsey written by Dave. It'll walk you through the seven baby steps. It's a quick read. Very easy. It'll give you an overall picture of it.

I hope you're enlightened by it, Sean. I love that you called because... Yeah, call us back after you read it. I want to hear your paradigm shift. Because we've helped millions of people build wealth and get control of their money. It's just a totally different way than the world does it. So I'm glad you found this though.

I've personally done manual underwriting, Sean, without a credit score after I cut up my cards. And between Rachel and I, we have zero credit cards. That's what it amounts to. And our wallets are lighter and our souls are lighter for it. This is The Ramsey Show. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Campbell, joined by Rachel Cruz. This is your show, America. You can give us a call at 888-825-5225. We're doing something fun this Friday, November the 10th, 1230 Eastern Time, 1130 Central Time. I'll be doing a free every dollar training showing you

how to break the paycheck to paycheck cycle in just 90 days. Now, this isn't just for people who are broke. You might be doing the baby steps. You're out of debt. You still don't have the margin to invest that 15%, to throw at the house, to save up for that vacation. I'm going to show you step-by-step how to create margin in your budget by spending less, by making more, and by using our EveryDollar budgeting tool. So join me. It's totally free to sign up, but you got to sign up to get the link. EveryDollar.com slash budgeting is the place to go. EveryDollar.com slash budgeting. And if to go. Everydollar.com slash budgeting. And if you can't make that exact time, don't worry about it.

We'll send you a link. You can watch the replay. But I hope to see many of you there virtually. We'll be answering your questions, and it will be a good time. All right, Esther is in Logan, Utah. Esther, how can we help today? Hey, thanks for having me on. So I kind of have a loaded question. I'll just give you a little

background info real quick. So my husband and I finished baby step three and we want to buy a home so we don't throw away our money on rent essentially. But we plan to move within the next four years after my husband graduates college and commissions as an officer in the Air Force. It's also important to note that we do not qualify to buy a home for the next 18 months because we are self-employed. So basically, we'd only be in the womb for two years. So our question is, do we save money for a down payment or spend our money elsewhere? That was a loaded question, Esther.

A lot to unpack there. So how old are you two? So I'm 22 and my husband is 23. Okay. And you're in baby step three. Yep. When will you be done with that? Oh, you're done. Sorry, we just finished. Okay. So now we're on to what we call baby step three B. You want to save up a home down payment

and you're going to do that how quickly? Do you have a goal? Our goal is within a year. How much can you save in a year? We could probably save a little over $20,000. So if we're looking to buy like a $400,000 home, it'd be about 3%, or sorry, 5%. And what's your household income? Right now, we're both working part-time and we make about 80k per year but that is projected to increase okay so esther i when it comes to buying a home timeline wise i wouldn't buy one that i'm not there at least five years so if you guys won't even qualify for something and you're only going to be there too i would i would probably rent um until he's out of the air force and you're only going to be there too, I would probably rent until he's out of the

Air Force and you guys know. Would you guys be stationed and move around, do you think, for a good season? Yeah. Yeah, we would be. Yeah. So do you guys recommend, like, do you guys not recommend buying a home and then renting it out? No, because you're going to move and now you're going to be a long-distance landlord and because you're going to move and now you're going to be a long distance landlord. And then you're going to want to buy something else. And then you're not going to have the money to do it because it's all tied up in this mortgage that you still have. And so you can see how it creates this weird cycle of risk and stress. Yeah. So I'm going to pause on this dream. I want you to be homeowners, but Rachel's right. I want you to think long-term and not just what's going to help us in the next two years. And you said these words at the beginning

that I want to call out, because I've heard this from many, many people. You said, we're throwing away money on rent. Can I free all the renters out there? You're not throwing away money on rent. Renting is not a sin. Renting is buying patience and it's very wise and I know it hurts. But you know what else hurts? Becoming a homeowner before you're ready and you become broke because you didn't realize how expensive home ownership can really be. And you buy at the top of the market and then, you know, who knows? And then you guys go to sell it in two years and you don't know where it's going to be. So there's just not enough time for it to fluctuate up and down to have some kind of sustainability to ride out any weird ups and downs. So yeah, I would still be having the dream though, Esther, and if you guys, how long will you guys be moving? Because I know with military families,

you know, you move every what, 18 months, two years? Do you know what the future will look like? How long he'll be doing that for? Yeah, I mean, I'm assuming it'll be at least 10 years. Okay. So it'll be a while. Yeah. But with that money, would it be silly to upgrade our cars? What money do you have? What do you have in savings?

Or you're just talking about future savings? Yeah, future savings. Yeah, I think upgrading your cars, I think, is great. And again, in 10 years you guys will be in your mid-30s and if that's the first time that you're putting a great down payment for a house i think i mean if anything it just kind of buys you time to say hey we have a decade to save a great down payment maybe even 50 of it 70 of it right that i mean you have you have a while because especially with military families going from city to city short term, I wouldn't recommend buying a house.

So, yeah, you guys have time on your side and it's just going to be hard, Esther. I think you're probably going to look around and see your friends on, I don't know, Instagram, TikTok. Holding the keys and smiling. Yeah. And that's just not going to be your story. It's just not smart financially for you guys. And that's okay. And you have plenty of time to be homeowners.

You have plenty of time to do all of this. And you're going to do it the right way in a really wise way. And I think that patience is going to be key. But it's going to be a level of contentment, Esther, that you're going to have to find. But thank you guys for your service. I know there's so much sacrifice in that for you all. So tell your husband, thank you. Thanks for the call, Esther. Tion joins us up next in Washington, D.C. Tion,

what's going on? Hey, how you guys doing? I'm excited to be on. So I have a question. I recently acquired or inherited some rental property or property. I also have my own rental property, but I do also have some debt. So I'm trying to figure out, you know, what's going to be the best approach for me for paying down the debt and then also investing for my future. Cool. How old are you? So I just turned 38. All right. And what's your household income? So I make about 160. Great. And how's your household income? So I make about $160,000. Great. And how much debt do you have? Okay. So the debt. So I have $53,000 spread out between three credit cards.

Ooh. What's on the credit cards? Just lifestyle or? A little bit of lifestyle. A little bit of lifestyle? That's $53,000 worth of lifestyle. Well, no, what else? Is there other stuff? Or is it just lifestyle? So I also recently lost a parent.

So I had to put a lot of funeral expenses on credit cards as well. I'm sorry about that. That was a big question of it. Is that where the inherited property comes into play? It is. Okay. Okay. Oh, okay.

So $53,000 in credit card debt. What else? What do you owe on your car? Yep. So I don't have any car payment. So I pay for a car in cash. Okay. So no car payment. So I paid for a car in cash. So no car payment. Awesome. I do have a personal

loan for $1,800. Okay. Any student loans? I do. I have about $83,000 in student loans. Okay. And then this property that you inherited, what's it worth and what's owed on it? So it's worth probably around like $300,000. Okay. And about $70,000 left on it. Okay. And then you have another... Oh, go ahead.

Sorry. Oh, yes. So I do have another rental property. I paid $110,000 for it, and I currently owe about $80,000 on the property. And what's it worth? You think it's worth $110,000? It's worth about $200,000, I would say. Awesome. Okay. And then what's your primary residence? So right now I'm living with my girlfriend. We rent.

So no mortgage on that. Okay. Yeah, no mortgage. Yep. Okay. Awesome. All right. I have a plan.

I don't know if you're going to like it. Oh, man. I'm ready to hear. Man, if I'm in your shoes, like you could slog and try to knock out all this debt aggressively, but I think selling your rental property would clear a huge chunk of this, and then you could clear the rest with your future income and hang on to that family inherited property. It would clear it all,

because if you could sell it for $300 and no $70... Well, the family one's $300, right? Yeah. Yours is $200 and you owe $80? Yeah. So you have $120 owe $80? Yeah. So you have $120 in that one. Yeah. So if you wanted to keep the more expensive one, you could do that.

But one of these has to go. Either way, you could knock almost all of it out. But hey, Tian, when you clear out your debt like that, you can't go back into credit card debt for lifestyle. So this is going to be a sweep that's going to help you. But Tian needs to change Tian or it's not going to work. You're going to be back in the same position if you're not careful. Yeah, you're too successful and too smart. I'm excited for you though, Tion. You got some good stuff ahead. Future's bright, my man. This is The Ramsey Show.