The Ramsey Show - App - Don’t Give All Your Money to Banks and Wonder Why You’re Broke

Episode Date: April 2, 2025

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 actual amazing relationships. Rachel Cruz, number one best-selling author, host of the Rachel Cruz show and Smart Money Happy, our co-host. My daughter is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Cody is in Boston. Hey Cody, what's up? Hi, Mr. Ramsey and Mrs. Cruz. Thanks for having me on. Sure. I hope the cruise went well. It did. It was fabulous. It was good. We missed you. Hopefully next year.

So I have a question. I'm planning on proposing to my girlfriend here coming up soon. But back in November, she told me that her father had transferred all of her parents investments to her so that her sister could get a larger financial aid package. I basically said to not tell me anything more because I think this might be fraud. She said her dad talked to someone and he said it was all fine. And then a month ago I went to ask for hand to her parents. They said yes, but her dad kind of led me into saying that I would be willing to sign a prenup and he doesn't know that I know about the asset transfer.

Then last weekend I brought up the situation saying that I know about the asset transfer. Then last weekend, I brought up the situation saying that I wasn't comfortable combining finances and signing marriage papers with these assets and putting my name under them. Again, she tells me their dad said it's above board, but I felt like it was maybe fraud. I told her that if she went to a lawyer and basically had him call me and said it was a call above board I'd be fine with it but I'm just kind of wanted to get your opinion on this is fraud or am I just kind of being paranoid about this I'm not sure if I can make the judgment on whether it's criminal fraud or not.

It's definitely morally wrong. Yeah. Okay. The Pell grants that they qualify for by posing to be poor people are for poor people. Right. And these people are not poor people. Correct. So I don't know if it's above board quote unquote or not but it's morally wrong. It's like saying I'm going to not act like I don't have a job. Well, now that would be fraud.

If I have a job and I collect welfare checks saying I don't have a job, that'd be fraud. But it'd be like I'm not going to, I have the ability to work and make a lot of money, but I refuse to because that way I qualify for free government whatever right same kind of thing and and and it's just it's morally wrong at a minimum it is approaching the criminal side and the bigger problem let's just change the word it's ethically horrendous correct yes it's ethically ridiculously bad. This guy has no ethics. Mm-hmm. Okay. He's willing to lie to the government to get poor people's legal student assistance. Right. Pell grants are income and asset based.

And that's the only thing that in a possible financial aid package that would come up is the Pell Grant. Unless the college had an income based scholarship program or something, but most of them don't. So, but yeah, it's ethically wrong. That's what you're saying. And that's why you got this, that's why you got slime on you and you want to take a shower after you met with him. Yes. Yeah. So, no. Full stop.

Yeah, have a transfer back. Full stop, yeah. I'm not going to participate in this. We are going to have a standalone life that does not involve something that I feel like is unethical. Yes, yeah, it's really been weighing on me. So I really appreciate that, that way. Pre-nup doesn't cover it. You can't pre-nup away a lack of ethics.

Yeah. And what's frustrating is she- Yeah, no, I appreciate that. Yeah, and what's frustrating, Cody, is she's, you know, in a sense, possibly the one that's going to be punished in the middle of all of this, because Cody, you're going to say, no, I can't. Like, I'm not signing a prenup. I'm not doing this. I can't combine finances right now. Like, this is a sticky situation. I don't feel comfortable attaching my name to all of this. And so she either has to choose to be- Between her dad and her fiance.

I mean, yeah, to be a grown up and to say, okay, I have to now think beyond what my dad says is okay and actually start, you know, having this like problem solving on my own with my future husband, with my future husband and deciding that, which is going to be a, you know, a break. That's going to be a hard thing for her to do, but if she does it, then that co-cudos to her, right? Of like, okay, this would be a means of it. You can be gentle gentle and you can be kind you don't have to accuse him of being a liar like I am

Or being unethical you can just say you can put it all back on you and just say look I don't feel right about this and I'm not and I can't go forward participating. I'm so sorry Don't don't don't call her dad names doesn't do any good it's not gonna change him okay he's never going to he's never going to say oh wow no my daughter's boyfriend told me I was wrong so now I think I'm wrong the chances of that are zero okay so I mean you know really it's it's it's your relationship with her that's on the line I mean, well, you guys have him you just say look, you know, you know, I'm making this up real time

I'm spitballing here. Okay, but you could just say something like You know, I got some counsel because I was confused about this and it bothered me okay, and so I take all of the weight of the problem on you and just say, I just can't go forward with this and the count, and here's what I would couch it in. All of my understanding of your daughter and I setting up a household is that we are to leave and cleave. We're to leave our parents, our mother and father, and establish our own standalone household. And this does not allow us to do that.

Yes sir. And I have to be able to do that to have a high quality relationship with your daughter. And so you guys have got to take these assets back. Well that and I would probably have. Preenup doesn't do, and I can't go forward if we can't have a standalone household. The intertwining of these two households is not healthy.

And I think even before that conversation though, he and her need to be on the same page to even go forward with it. Because if she's like, no, no, this is what we're gonna do. My dad says, you know, you sign a prenup, sorry, this is what we're gonna do. My dad says, you know, he would sign a prenup, sorry, this is it. And she doesn't budge. Well, and if she says,

then that's difficult. You're making a call here. But dude, I, you know, if you, let's say she says that and you go, okay, I'm gonna cave, I'll sign everything, we're gonna get married. What's the probability you're married 10 years later? Almost zero. Yeah. So, almost zero. Yeah.

So, I mean... From a single argument that then brings up everything... No, it's not a single argument. This is an argument over integrity. It's okay to lie to get a program that I don't qualify for. What else is she going to be lying about because she thinks it's okay to lie? Because her dad taught her this. So I mean, that's not cool. Yeah, she needs to realize what's going on.

And if she doesn't realize it, that's a hard conversation. And you can't just cave because that condones the whole stupid thing and makes it look like it's okay. And then extrapolates into other stuff. And 10 years later, you got an explosion on your hands. Yeah, it's more of a

That's so painful a revelation of character than anything else and so that's hard Yeah, I mean if your parents robbed banks for a living and you think it's okay Maybe we shouldn't get married now. It's kind of worth five. It's about where it lands. It's although that is a criminal act This is not a criminal act. I get it. I'm being melodramatic, but Still that's the deal. this is not a criminal act I get it I'm being melodramatic but still that's the deal this is the Ramsey show. Hey when you're gazelle intense you sell so much stuff the kids think they're next but when you've gotten rid of all you can save money by switching your cell phone plan to boost mobile it's just $25 a month for unlimited talk, text, and data

forever. Boost is a major nationwide network that offers reliable 5G service and here's my favorite part, transparent pricing. There's no hidden fees, no contracts, and there's a 30-day money-back guarantee which means no risk. Go to BoostMobile dot com slash Ramsey to switch today That's boost mobile dot com slash Ramsey The break I was talking to some people in the lobby from Phoenix Dr. John Delaney and I'll be in Phoenix on May the 5th doing the money and relationships tour

We're gonna be talking about raising great kids, handling money fights the right way, making real friends in the 21st century. We're going to six cities and it's a weird format. We've never done this before. We're going to put up about 20 different subjects in an app when you're sitting in the audience before the show starts. You're going to vote on some Dave subjects, subjects some John subjects and some Dave and John subjects and that's gonna form the format for the night we're gonna you're gonna build the talks you're gonna build the order of the talk or not the order but you're gonna select what you want us to talk about it's pretty cool so

pretty interactive that's a cool thing Louisville Kentucky is just a couple weeks away April 21st. Durham, North Carolina, that's on Monday. On Wednesday is April 23rd is Durham. Friday is Atlanta, April 25th. Couple weeks after that we'll be in Phoenix on May 5th. That's a Monday, Fort Worth. On Wednesday, May 7 in Kansas City on May 9. RamseySolutions.com slash tour. Or if you're on YouTube or podcast, click the link in the show notes and you'll get your tickets.

You don't want to miss this guys. It's gonna be a lot of fun. John and I will have a lot of fun. The only thing more fun than John and me is Rachel and John. But they did money and marriage stuff. Absolutely fun and hilarious and all that stuff. John speaking of John is in San Francisco. Hi John. How are you? Hey, I'm doing well. Thanks so much for taking my call sure. What's up? Yeah, and look I just been listening for the last few weeks Just a recent listener here, and I really appreciate all the advice you've been giving I'm trying to balance a couple things so I have sort of two questions one is related to

Really expensive mortgage I have sort of two questions. One is related to a really expensive mortgage I have. I bought a house a few years ago and I discovered soon enough that it was a bit of a lemon. Since then I've been sort of spending all of my time repairing this house and trying to get it up to market value in hopes to, oh, I don't know, rent it or sell it or do something with it that could be profitable. And the second thing is that, you know, a couple years ago, I also met a lovely lady and she's just about last year moved in with me and it's been a bit of a struggle trying to have enough time for the relationship,

manage the finances as I sort of continue to progress with this very expensive mortgage. How much is your mortgage payment? It's $5,300 a month. And what is your take-home, Pacer? My take-home is about $7,700 a month. Your mortgage payment is $5,000 and your take-home is $7,000. I don't know how you eat. How do you eat?

It's been tricky. Are you running up credit card debt? I don't have any consumer debt. Is there money somewhere else coming in or going out? Where, how in the world? That's an impossible budget. Uh, it's pretty tight. Yeah. Um, I've had to do right.

A lot of the house repairs myself. I keep things. You're, you're cutting in and out. Talk spot, talk directly into your phone What'd you say? Oh? I have to keep a pretty tight budget. That's right. No, you don't have a budget that this is impossible I've done budgets for 35 years your mortgage is 75% of your take-home pay. I don't this is I mean, that's not sustainable I'm shocked you've done that for more than 12 months and not caved in.

I agree with you. You need to sell this house yesterday. Do you have a lot of savings, John? Are you feeding your, are you pulling from savings at all? Yeah, yeah. So I have about 30 an emergency and about 80 in stocks. And how much are you burning through each month of your savings? I would say, you know, maybe a thousand, maybe 1500. Yeah, okay. Now we got it where you can eat. Now understand how, because I mean, what you were telling me just wasn't... So basically you're burning up your savings because you bought a house you can't afford sell it yep yep yeah okay yeah so that that's really it is

should I should I jump ship yes you're alive there's nothing in this homeownership package that is fun. Everything you've described to me screams anxiety. But John, you knew this, right? Like... It's in a high value neighborhood. It's near the high rental market here. High in demand, San Francisco.

Higher than your income. So it's hard not to see the stars and the grass is always greener on the other side, so to speak. But yeah. The grass is always greener over the septic tank. Yeah, exactly. Well, um... Sell it, John.

I think it's going to relieve a lot of stress. I think your relationship will thrive. Your finances will thrive. A lot will thrive when you're not stressed. I want you to... Stressed to the max about this. I mean, that's hard. Here's the thing, not only is the arithmetic absolutely ridiculous in this because you're burning savings. Thank you for saying arithmetic. You're saying

you're saying the mathematics of this. You're saying it's you know you're burning through your savings. So that's principle number one. But what I want you to breathe in also is what this is costing you, the stress level you're carrying around all the time. When you get rid of this house, you're going to feel like you set down 300 pounds that was on your back. And you've kind of gotten accustomed to carrying around 300 pounds, but when you set it down, you're going to go, I I can breathe again I didn't realize you could breathe like this my lungs haven't worked like this since I bought this house I mean you're physically going to feel the release when you get rid of this burden But you you've intellectually and willed your way through this you're like a

Bulldog that got a hold of something won't let go and But but once you let go you're like oh, I can let go and I'm free. And I can breathe again. No, dude, there's nothing in this equation that's worth it. It's affecting your health long term. It's going to destroy your finances. It's affecting your emotional well-being. And now you said it's affecting your relationships.

So this thing, this house owns you. And you're going to be singing like, thank God I'm free at last. When you get, and you don't even know you don't until you set yourself free, you don't even know how much, how awesome it's going to be. This is a horrible thing for you. It's not good for John. I want John to have a home. I just don't want the home to have John. And this one owns you, my son. It owns you. Let it go. You're going to sing a little Elsa for us? A little Frozen? You mean sing a little Elsa? A little let it go.

Who's Elsa? It's from Frozen. The granddaughters will teach you that. Soon enough, soon enough. Let it go, John. We need to cue the granddaughters to sing Let it Go. That's right, that's right. You know, it's so common to, for us,

I qualify for that. As Americans though, to be so wrapped up in our stuff, and I would put homes in this, cars in this, credit card debt, all of it. That for the sake of a thing, right? In a house in and of itself, it's a thing that we deteriorate so much of our peace and our mental margin and our stress.

And like, I mean, so much of it for a thing. And it's not worth it, even a house. And again, homeownership is something that like we are all about and we want you to get it and have that be part of your long-term financial plan but to the point that it's completely robbing you of a life and it's eating away at your relationships and your peace all of it, it's just it's just a thing. It's not worth it. It's not worth it. So as Dave and Elsa would say, let it go. The minimalist, Joe, we can just play their tune

right now. They would love this. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, so yes, we do want you to own a home. You said you're new to this stuff, but it's much, much less home than you own right now. And which is hard too, John, because you're in one of the most expensive real estate areas. Oh, San Francisco, yeah. Yeah, in the Bay Area Area. I mean you're in one of the highest priced Tokyo, New York and Silicon Valley. I mean London. These are some of the most expensive pieces of real estate in the world and that's where you're choosing to live making 75,000 dollars a year. Well that's after taxes. Yeah well so California he's probably making 140 and they're taking half. So California, he's probably making 140 and they're taking half. So.

Yeah, with their taxes, yeah. That's true. Sorry, John. Sell it. Wow. Please, no, I'm not sorry. I'm happy for you. Well, I am. I'm gonna set you free.

No, what you thought was a dream's a nightmare. I'm gonna set you free from your nightmare. This is the Ramsey Show. Hey guys, I'm Jade Warshaw and I wanna talk to you for a quick second about student loan refinancing. If your payment and your interest rate are burying you and you feel like you can't dig out, refinancing your student loan debt might make sense.

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Laurel Road is a brand of Key Bank National Association. All credit products are subject to credit approval. The Ramsey Show question of the day is brought to you by WhyRefi. You've got a defaulted private student loan and you can't sleep at night because of things riding you down. See, if you're in default on it, you're not making payments, right? And you're never going to get out and it's a problem. And this is private. They can go after you. This is not it's not a student loan with the feds. And so if you've got that, why refi can get you out?

They'll buy the loan and set up a set of payments that you can pay and show you how to get it paid off and get it out of debt. It's fabulous. Go to why refi dot com slash Ramsey. And you can like sleep at night and get rid of the stupid loan. The letter yrefy.com slash Ramsey might not be in all states. Today's question comes from Craig in Delaware. My wife and I are looking to buy a new home. We own our current home outright and are looking to continue that debt-free lifestyle. We've been paying ourselves a mortgage as a saving technique

and have saved a lot of money over the years. Our friends have been telling us not to put so much down, liquid cash down for a new home, but rather take out a mortgage and invest a big chunk of that money instead. We were thinking that living mortgage-free will give us freedom that we enjoy and allow us to invest with the money

that we make going forward? Are we making a mistake by doing this? Craig, no, you are not making a mistake. You are correct. And this has always been an argument of paying off the mortgage or not, because if you do have a great rate, which if you buy a new home,

you won't have a two or 3% rate like a lot of people do right now. But they say, we'll invest that and if you make 10% in the market, you'll make an eight, 7% spread and you'll make more money in the market than having a paid off home. And that's always kind of been the math

that we get cursed by people would say. But the truth is. They leave out risk. Yeah, the risk, the peace of mind and then also if you turn around and go back and invest the mortgage payment, like what he's doing, you know, and you don't have a paid off home over time, like you're still gonna build wealth.

So it's the piece that's not in the Excel sheet of which. Let's go to the proof of what really happens, okay? Number one, if your broke friends are making fun of your financial plan, you're on track. If your fat friends are making fun of your workout plan, you're on track. Okay. Think about it. These are broke people throwing around financial advice. It's hilarious. The second thing is this, Ramsey did, our Ramsey Research Team did the largest study of millionaires ever

done on the continent. We found a couple of things that are key to this. Number one, we found that 89% of America's millionaires are not millionaires because of inherited money. Nine out of ten. Okay, now once we establish that then we have to establish the question if you're doing good critical thought. Okay, what made them millionaires if it wasn't inherited money? What was their habits and their decisions around things like this discussion? So then we go to those millionaires and we say, okay,

how many of you became a millionaire by borrowing all you could on your house so that you could invest your cash. Out of 10,167 millionaires that we asked that question, did you become a millionaire using your broke friends plan in other words? How many of them said they used your broke friends plan and how many of them said they used your broke friends plan and how many of them said they used your plan? The number that used your broke friends plan of

millionaires that became millionaires on their own that borrowed all they could on their house to invest the money because the spread is there, the number out of 10,167 that did that is precisely zero. thousand one hundred sixty seven that did that is precisely zero. None of them. So what does that tell us? That your broke friends have a theory that is unproven by data. The data of actual millionaires, people that actually build wealth, not have a theory, not drink too many beers and have a discussion about this, but instead actually freaking do it. The data, the facts are they work your plan and they got out of debt and stayed out of debt and they use the increased

cash flow to build with no debt payments going to the stupid bank to increase and create wealth. Your most powerful wealth building tool is your income. Don't give it to freaking mortgage companies, Lexus, motor credit, Toyota motor credit, master card, student loans, and then wonder why you're broke. That's what it comes down to. So no, you are exactly right, Craig. Do your plan and just nod and wink and smile at your broke silly friends. You're probably not going to fix them. But don't take their advice for sure under any circumstances because

the data, the facts are that it's wrong. And you know, Rachel, when we first started doing this stuff, I started doing this before you were born. I mean it feels like you were baby when I started on the microphone. And I've been asked that question for 30 years. And based on, I would say well the borrower, slave to the lender, and biblically speaking, you know, and the stress and you know the freedom. And but now I'm starting to understand as I get further into this, and I actually have millions of millionaires that have been created by the Baby Steps out there. And the ones we studied were not just ones we created. We didn't create them, but not the ones,

they weren't Dave millionaires, they weren't Ramsey millionaires. But some of them were Baby Steps millionaires, some of them weren't. But, you know, my theory then was that what would happen is that you would have less physical stress, anxiety-based disease called blood pressure and heart attacks, right? Goes away when you're dead. I mean, it largely goes away. And Delony pulled this up the other day on some of the research that they've done in the mental health world that you can track the debt increase, the percentage of

our incomes going to debt and track it like a hockey stick on a graph over the years. And with it you can follow the increase in anxiety medications, the increase in suicides. Well technology is a big part. The increase in other stuff. Well technology is a big part. The increase in other stuff. But phones and. You can find, you can find. I mean all, it's just. As soon as the iPhone hit it spikes again.

Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's all through the books, yeah. The point was there's a real correlation between debt and your physical health. Yeah. That's the bottom line. And so, and no one considers that. No one talks about that. Oh, by the way, what's the number one cause of divorce in north america money

fights money problems guess who has money fights that doesn't have a mortgage not many not many more money fights usually come from like were broke and we can afford to buy something you know a mortgage you can just go get the stupid gun you go get the stupid purse and you have to fight about it matter of fact you get one of and you don't have to fight about it. Matter of fact, you can get one of each, you know, you don't have to fight about it, right?

And so it's, it's the, you know, relationally, physically. Well, and I would say, yes, that, and then just the autonomy of owning your life, like so much of the financial space, someone else has a say in your life. I mean, and that, and that's everything from, you know, if you have a boss, but especially if your actual income, that is yours, now has 15 other things that it has to go to because of debts. Like the autonomy of just being able

to make your own decisions. All the money comes in, all the money goes out, and only the names are changed to protect the innocent. Yeah, well, and that's the stuff that, yeah, is not an Excel sheet, right? Like that level of bandwidth emotionally as well. I mean, it's huge. It is. Yeah. Deloney would call it locus of control. Bloom was on here with his new book about wealth yesterday and he called it agency. You lose agency. You lose the power to make

your own decisions. I am trapped. I keep it. Oh, here's the other one your career when you don't have that You make more money. You know why because you might put up a crap You don't have to live in a toxic situation to make your bills But you look up and there's an ethics problem or you are not aligned with leadership because leadership's stupid You can go work somewhere else and people make, you know, when you are not trapped in a job by your debt, you can make moves in your career and people that don't have debt make more money. Oh, and guess what? People that don't have debt are more generous and guess who ends up with more money? Generous people because they're

highly attractive people. As a, you know, because they're highly attractive people. As a givers are more attractive than takers. Can we agree? Yeah. If you add value to people's lives, you just carry yourself different. The whole thing, it's a whole picture. It's not just I can invest the money and make a little more on a mutual fund. Oh, my God, Kermit the Frog, what is wrong with you? This is the Ramsey Show. I've been doing this show for over 30 years and some of the saddest calls I've 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 air 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 next week? Yeah. And 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. Xander is the place that Winston and I actually get all of our life insurance. And it doesn't cost much because Xander 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. We're gonna try something new that we've not done, well anytime in the recent memory. We may never have done it before it's possible. So you guys call. I don't know if you've done it. Well it's possible I've done a lot of things in 30 years. No, personalities have. You did it? This is your first. Yes, welcome. Oh, I've not done it. Welcome to the segment, Dave. Oh, okay. So this is something that's happened while I wasn't working. Okay. So anyway, we're pulling... It's fun though. People call and leave voicemails and so let's play one of them.

My name is Jared. I have been looking into the baby steps and I know one of the things is to sell everything quickly as you can get yourself out of debt, which I do totally understand. I have about 16,000 saved up and I also do have debt and I was wondering, like why does it feel better to have that safety net of the 16 then pay off the amount of debt, even though I totally understand numbers wise that the debt is costing me more than being savings is keeping me in savings. Thank you.

Appreciate that your time. Yeah, that's a good question. It does feel better to have the 16,000 and have the debt because you have the illusion of security. You have the illusion that you're safe and it's an illusion because over a 20-year period of time you're not safe because you're broke and in debt. But you've got this sense that in the moment, if something happened, and because it's true, if you had a $5,000 car engine blow up

and you've only got $1,000, you're not safe. But what you also don't realize is that because you're carrying all this debt, you're not safe. That's right, yeah. But your emotions because you're a saver, Jared, tell you that as a saver, I'm safer if I have savings, but if you were looking at it the other way and said, oh, the debt scares me more than the illusion

of the savings, then you're gonna pay it off. Until then, you're gonna sit there in that. So yeah, we always teach to just pay down to $1,000 and start your baby steps. Baby step one is $1,000. Anything above that that's not retirement goes at your debts and baby step two listing them smallest to largest and attacking them in that order. Yeah. And what's interesting is usually with especially savers, so I get this Jared on this end that again, you don't feel the risk of the debt, but if something were to happen,

there's other people coming to knock on your door and that doesn't feel safe either, right? So like if you're not able to pay these things, it's scarier to have your financial piece, if you will, in other people's hands and in other people's situations. And so being free from all of that by being out of debt and then building back the emergency fund actually gives you a level of deeper security.

But I don't think people think about that as much. You know the difference is you haven't experienced the risk. So like with me it's a no-brainer because I have been foreclosed on. I have been sued. I have had people take money out of my account that sued me and won before we went broke, before we filed bankruptcy. When in the process of two and a half years of fighting that we were foreclosed on multiple times. We were scared several times that they were gonna repo our car that night, walk out

in the driveway and it's anybody's guess if it's gonna be there. Then you start to go, oh wait a a minute, I don't feel safe forever. For the rest of my life, I don't feel safe with that. And so that's what I mean by it's an illusion. I've got the benefit of that experience because whatever sense I had that that was okay was completely stripped away by the extreme experience we went through. Okay, play the next one, James. We had a question about tithing. Is tithing specifically supposed to be used for the church? Or if we are in a church that is currently declining, is it okay for our tithe to be donated to Christian organizations such as a pro-life organization or something

of that sort. I just wanted to kind of find out what you believe is a biblically sound answer to that question. Thank you. Good question. Well, I studied the Bible through the lens of an evangelical Christian, which means someone who believes the Bible, on instructional things like this, literally. Evangelicals for the last 500 years have taught and backed it up biblically that the tithe goes to the local church. A tenth of your income. Tithe, the word in Hebrew means tenth. Doesn't mean five percent. If you want to get five percent, that's fine. The tithe is not a salvation issue. God doesn't love tithers more than non-tithers. Tithers don't automatically get into heaven.

That's not what this is. It's a baseline instruction from your Heavenly Father that teaches us to give to our faith community 10% of our income first. And the model is the Old Testament storehouse, and the Old Testament storehouse took care of the widows and the orphans and the Levites. The Levites were the pastors. And so the preachers get paid well, not overly paid. The minister of music, the children's minister gets paid well, but not overly paid. They never get overly paid, and you know the bills get paid and we keep the lights on in the house of

worship with the first tenth of our income. Anything other than that tenth is an offering and it can go anywhere. So it's tithes and offerings. Then I would just say that if you're uncomfortable giving your money to the church because it's in decline, I'm uncomfortable trusting the spiritual welfare of my family more. I'm more worried about that than I am the money. If you're more in my... Well yeah, but if it's just a sweet church that there's not a lot of givers and they're like, well, we're not going to be able to keep it open.

But they're great Bible teachers. Do you know what I mean? Like there is, I don't know, there's a part of me that I'm like, what if it is a great church But they're great Bible teachers. Do you know what I mean? Like there is, I don't know. There's a part of me that I'm like, what if it is a great church and they're just... It's not in decline. But what if all the people who know... And we don't know where Seth lives, right? I do not know the church. And they... So all that to say...

We've worked with 50,000 churches in America. We love churches, we love pastors. That's not the question. But usually if. A great church is a small church and there's no givers. If you say your church is too much in decline to give to, I worry that it's too much in decline to trust your spiritual health or your family too. That would bother me. That's the answer. I mean, if I can't trust them with my money, I don't need to trust them with my family. Yeah, no, it's not that they're doing anything immoral. I wasn't talking about immoral. But you say, I can't trust them with my money, I don't need to trust them with my family. Yeah, no, it's not that they're doing anything immoral. I wasn't talking about immoral.

But you say I can't trust them with my money. I'm just saying they're not doing well. Because maybe they don't have a lot of givers. I don't know. I always hate making that statement. I'll be honest. It makes me uncomfortable. Here's the thing.

Churches that do well don't have a shortage of givers. That's a strong statement. No, they don't. It's an accurate statement. I don't have a shortage of givers. That's a strong statement. No, they don't. It's an accurate statement. I don't know. I'm not, I'm not. Okay, we'll argue about it. That's fine.

I don't know. You'll be wrong. It's okay. I think you... And then I'll find the stat and bring it on next time I'm on the air. This is the fatherly... Good luck with that.

Good luck with that. Rick is in New Orleans. Hey Rick, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, how's it going? Better than I deserve. What's up? Yeah, I just had a question on how I should start preparing to possibly take over a business from my boss. He's gonna give it to you or sell it to you? Sell it. Okay, so how is that gonna happen? Currently with current discussions with them, we're looking at a possible owner finance. Okay

make it a percentage of net profit a Large percentage of net profit until he's paid out in about two or three years Don't take a set payment for 20 years. That'll get you in trouble. That's thing one thing two is Then if there's no profit he didn't get money until there's profit again and you don't go out of business and he can't sue you. That's my point. So thing two is then how long have you been working there?

Five years. Okay, and how many people work there? It's seasonal, so we have, yearly we have six people working there. Seasonally we have upwards of 28. Okay, are you the senior guy? Yes. For how long? Actually there's me and one other person in our maintenance department. Okay, well you need to be the senior guy immediately. The person that would also be me is not interested. No, that one want to set. They all need to be reporting to you as step one before the transaction occurs. He needs

to set you in the president's seat while he's the CEO and you walk in that and he shows you every detail of every part of the business that he's running for at least a year and then the transaction occurs. Not he tosses your keys and goes I hope you can figure this out. That's not a good plan. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions it's the Ramsey show where we plan. Rachel Cruz, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, host of the Rachel Cruz show and co-host of Smart Money Happy Hour on the Ramsey Network. My daughter is my co-host. Thank you for joining us. 828-825-5225. John is in Indianapolis. Hi John, welcome to the show. Hi Dave. Hi Rachel.

Hello, hello. How are you guys today? Better than you deserve, don't say it. Better than you deserve. You're right. You got it John. Yes. I am so glad it's both of you today. My father approached my wife and I about moving in with him. I'm one of eight siblings and it's a home that is now as its siblings are growing up

getting more quiet than he's used to. And I have four kids of my own and he's one of these really old guys who was born in 1960 and he said that he would love for us to inherit his house at some point and be able to fill it up with our kids and I don't know the best way of approaching that with my siblings who are many scattered throughout the country and want to make sure that we do right by everybody there. With the value of the home meaning if it goes to you guys? of many scattered throughout the country and want to make sure that we do right by everybody there.

With the value of the home meaning if it goes to you guys. Correct. Yeah. Yeah. How's his health? He is in good health. He just retired last month. He was a doctor his whole career and it has imparted really good financial wisdom on us

throughout our lives. So he's just lonely is what it sounds like. And he just wants you guys around. It's in your, in your town. Uh, yes, it is. Okay. That's good. Um, well, I mean, the obvious thing is it's, it's his house.

And if he wants to date it to you in return for you all living there to, uh, have him, uh, keep him company or whatever we want to call this, that's his choice. Okay. The right way to do that is to make sure that this is all talked about with the brothers and sisters. The wrong way to do it is to hide it from somebody and then they discover later that you own the house that they thought they owned an eighth of at his death and that would make everybody angry, right? So these things sprung on you later is how people get mad at the reading of the will when they discover that the house is no longer in the estate. The... Is there

any merit into if we were to sell our house and just using that equity as essentially a down payment into this house? I'm sorry I thought he was giving it to you. Well that's what I'm trying to figure out how we have how would I buy it from him or could I buy it from him or is he giving it to me? Or basically, eliminate the questions from the siblings is trying to buy it from him that way. Oh yeah, because if you... I mean, if you pay market value, if you don't pay market value, then...

Which I can't pay. I can't pay market value for that home. So I'm trying to make sure that... Okay, then the siblings are going to have an opinion. Okay. Agreed? which I can't pay. I can't pay market value for that home. So I'm trying to make sure that... Then the siblings are going to have an opinion. Okay. Agreed? Yes.

I mean, because... Unless they all just... I'm getting, you know, if I'm the sibling, I'm going to go, hey, more power to you. You're taking care of dad? Yes, that's what I was going to say. Have at it. Do you have good relationship with them? Because they may say, John, like, thank you, thank you, John, and wife and kids and taking care of dad.

Like, I mean, if Dave called us and was like, please come live with us, and Denise, Denise was like, I'll do it. We're like, great job, Denise. Good job, then Denise will be the one. Rachel's like, nah, no chance. I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I would take care of you. No, seriously, I think you gotta,

you have to clear it with the savings and everybody has to be okay with whatever the deal is. Okay, there's a couple of ways to structure the deal. One thing you could do is he just deeds you the house now and you leave him with no protection and you just own the house. Another thing you could do is he deeds you the house now and you could give him a life estate estate which means as long as he lives he's allowed to live in that

house and you can't sell it until he dies unless he signs off on that and releases that. Okay that's the second thing. The downside of him deeding it to you now, he's only 64, so I mean he could live 30 years. This is a long time for you to not ever sell this house or not ever move. That would be- Yes, and we're okay with that. I'm not okay with you being trapped. Okay. Okay.

Because things change and sometimes they change tragically, sometimes they change from prosperous. Okay. Let's pretend that something happened and you at work had a breakthrough and started a business and all of a sudden you had a complete change of net worth and you wanted to build a house twice this size because you had the money. 30 years? That could happen. That's prosperous, okay?

And you know, that's why I always laugh when someone says my forever home. Or your wife's family gets ill and you guys want to be close to them and you want to move out of state or something. You know what I mean? Like anything can happen in 30 years. Well, God forbid something happened to you or your wife Before he does and then you got a you know, and then you're deciding okay Here's a really weird one. What if you died in a car wreck and she stuck there? She said if I died in the car wreck she'd sell our house and move in before the funeral. My father and her get along so well.

Today. That's before you live together. But yeah, I'm serious. I don't want you to do something that doesn't have an exit path. If you need to get off the exit ramp you need a place to get off. I hope you don't. I hope it plays through the way you want it to play through you're not against the idea The idea is fine. Give yourself a release valve. That's right. That's right So if the pressure zone give yourself a release valve and let everyone know what the release valve is and give yourself a way out of this thing. Yeah dad's been in the nursing home with

early onset for eight years and one of your kids, all your kids move to another city and your grandkids are all now in another city. You can't sell the house, you're stuck with it. That's not okay. Yeah. You know, there's just, life is going to happen. That's all the people that call this show is life happened to them. Yeah.

Over and over and over and over. So no, you just don't want to get there. So what would you do then? You would deed it, not deed it to John right now. I'm trying to, what's confusing me, what I don't know, I don't know how to protect dad. And protect John. And give John a release valve. That's what's bothering me. I can't figure out how to do that. So you got to think through that though. If you can get that, if you can solve for that, you're okay. The last thing you got to solve for is if they

deed it to you now, your basis in this house becomes what he paid for it. Versus if you receive it at his death, your basis is market value. And if you sell it, you got no capital gain, or you know, you got no gain. If this house is worth 600,000 bucks, you're married filing jointly, and his basis is close to zero, and you're married filing jointly, can do a $500,000, you're married filing jointly and his basis is close to zero, and you're married filing jointly can do a $500,000 write-off, you now have capital gains on a house because it was deeded to you. Oh, and by the way, he needs to work on the unified estate tax credit, so you've got some estate tax planning to do if he's going to deed you the house now.

If he's not going to deed you the house now, that might be a way to do it. Maybe you don't own it. Maybe you just bank your equity and you live there. And if you needed the eggs that you still have no rent because you take care of him and then if you need to leave you can leave. That might be even cleaner. Mm-hmm. And if he dies it comes to you. You're deeded it out of your estate, your portion. Well or the whole thing and the siblings are okay with that. I might be okay with that one. That might be a way for you to get out if you get stuck. I just don't want you to get stuck.

They call here all the time stuck. This is a Ramsey Show. All right Dave, you have some strong opinions. Possibly, yeah. I think so. Okay, because you really prefer credit unions over big banks. So why is that? Well, credit unions, for one thing, are non-profit, which means that the members, the customers

own the credit union. So any profits that the credit union makes goes back into customer pricing. So you get better interest rate on savings, cheaper checking, and so on, that kind of thing. What's more important than that though is the fact that the customer is the owner changes the spirit on the credit union. So I find very few credit unions that aren't very customer-centric. Yes. Well, and I think we have found one that is incredible, and that's Fairwinds. They are an incredible credit union

that is really out with the heart to help the customer. You know, that's why we're partnering with them because they've got a scope to be able to handle the Ramsey audience and they're the right kind of people with the right kind of values. And they've done a really, really good job with customer service and the deals that they're offering,

the Ramsey Tribe is incredible. Yeah, absolutely. And you're right, their customer service is unbelievable. Winston and I just signed up and we got an account. And I'm not kidding, it took less than five minutes. It was so user friendly, like the step-by-step approach was unbelievable. And then the next day my phone rings

and it says fair wins on my phone. So I answered it and talked to someone there and they said yeah They give calls to every new customer and so again They just really care about your experience and I I so so appreciate that so again you guys I know it can be a pain to Switch banks or to open up new accounts, but fair wins again They make it so easy plus anything that you can do at a traditional branch, you can do with them at fairwinds.org or on their app. And you'll have free access to over 33,000 ATMs. Hey, you guys know how much I hate banks in general.

And so for me to do this is a big deal. Talk to our friends at Fairwinds and check out the combined checking and savings bundle that they created just for the Ramsey tribe. You guys, it's incredible. Yeah, you guys, it's so easy to join Fairwinds no matter where you live. So go to fairwinds.org slash Ramsey to learn more.

That's F-A-I-R-W-I-N-D-S dot org slash Ramsey. From the Ramsey network app, Isaiah steps in it. You keep saying to invest $100 a month beginning at age 30 and you'll be worth $5 million at 70 years old. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard because the life expectancy of a white male is 72 and for a black male it's 68. That means most people will never live to see $5 million. Help me make sense of this advice. Well you don't really want me to make sense of this advice because you think it's ridiculous. So let's start with your belligerency to start with. But the answer to your question is number one, you have all of your numbers wrong. So

it's hard to make a cogent argument when you have your numbers all wrong. We have never said a hundred dollars a month from thirty to seventy is five million dollars. It's not. It's one million one hundred seventy six thousand. And that would be true of twenty to sixty or twenty five to sixty five. Any forty year period of time you wanted to pick. And so you could align that with

okay start when you get out of high school saving $100 a month at 18 and at 58 you would have 1 million not 5 million I never said that 1 million 176 thousand also the average life expectancy of a white male is not 72 years old I don't know where you're getting your data, but the National Vital Statistics System at the National Center for Health Sciences says in 2023 the average male death age is 75.8 years, 76 years. Period. Average female is 81 years old when they die. Now that includes infant mortality and teenage death, which we can all agree that most teenagers are not saving and

most infants are not saving. So once you make it to age 65, my age, and you're healthy, well not even healthy, once you make it to age 65, on average you will live another 18 years. So the average 65 year old has a death, all males 76 years. Okay. At 18 to that, it's gonna be 86, 92 years old. So I'm sitting here at 64, the average is that I make it to 92. Once you make it to 65. Okay? So, so all your numbers are wrong to start with, Isaiah, but at the core of your belligerency and claiming our process is ridiculous is the idea that somehow you're supposed to get

rich in 10 minutes or that somehow you're entitled to something or that I'm angry because I don't feel like it's possible for me and you even throw the race card in there because color of skin hasn't got anything to do with your ability to build wealth. Skin pigmentation doesn't cause wealth building one way or another. It doesn't. And so, you know, you just got to you got to throw that in there though to go ahead and try to create some kind of social justice argument that's bull crap here. So the truth is that anyone who saves a hundred dollars, but by the way almost no one saves, like I would say really close to zero people save a hundred100 for 40 years a month.

Like I haven't saved $100, I've saved a lot more than that. Rachel hasn't saved $100, she wants to save a lot more than that. Right, so just the idea of the investment calculation saying it's an example. It's an example saying if you'll save money you can build wealth. You'll build wealth.

That's what the example says, but you're like Oh, no one can get there because they're all gonna be dead. It's like oh gee son Roll up your sleeves live on less than you make get out of debt deny yourself a little bit of pleasure because you're acting like a four-year-old here and Stay out a happy hour and go put some money in the bank Quit smoking so much pot, seriously. And so honestly, this is ridiculous, Isaiah. No, I mean the belligerence on this is victim based.

It's victim based. This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. It is not the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. What's ridiculous is your argument, because you don't know anything about the numbers that you presented, they were all wrong. That's what's ridiculous. So what's ridiculous is you've used some twisted version and inaccurate numbers to justify your victim existence that's

ridiculous so you're not a victim of anything but your bad thinking that's your only victimization so the truth is is that the yet you know 89 percent of america's millionaires are first generation rich. Go get you some boy. It's your turn. Roll up your sleeve. Quit your whining. Be a victor, not a victim. And quit trying to figure out some way that if the whole thing is stacked against me, the little man can't get ahead.

I grew up with people my whole life saying the little man can't get ahead. You're always going to have a car payment. We're stuck. These numbers only work for people that aren't like us. People that are different than me. People that are my race, my color, my neighborhood, my educational background, my history of my family. People like me can't... Oh shut up! Was Eeyore your spirit animal? Come on man! That's ridiculous! I'm the little man. I started with nothing and I was a millionaire twice. I'm so stupid I had to do it twice. I got a PhD in DUMB and I had to do it twice.

So this victimized and it's all just seeping in these words right here. It's just running off this page and I'm not gonna talk... It's hopelessness that you're spreading. You are a hope stealer when you tell people that they can't make it. And that pisses me off because I spend my life giving people hope. And you can do this in America right now. It is the best place, the best economy, the best situation in human history for the little man to get ahead.

If at any time you wanted to drop into any society in human history and you wanted to start from nothing and build wealth, this is the best place ever, anytime. It's better than 30 years ago, it's better than 60 years ago, it's better than the Roman Empire, it's better than anywhere you want to drop your little butt and think you can't get ahead. Let him in, can't get ahead. I promise you freaking Karl Marx isn't gonna help the little man get ahead. He helps the big man get ahead. That's who gets him ahead.

And so your broke college professor that's teaching you communist technique has got to stop it. This is crazy, y'all. So if you want to win, you can go win. We'll help you. We'll show you how. But we are not going to participate in this is most ridiculous. It means people will never see their money.

They're going to die before they get their money. Oh, you that's just dumb. It's just ignorant. So hope I wasn't unclear. Nope. That's why I wrote million, that's why we did. I was not going to do another book in this space. That's why I did Baby Steps Millionaire. What's the stat of people that come legally into America, they end up winning? Four times more likely. likely if you are a common they're like you know if you come here from another

country under the law legally not illegally you are four times more likely to become a millionaire then someone born in someone born here who believes crap like this like the dick stacked against the little man you just can't you just can't do it there you're gonna die you die before you get your money oh brother so now do the stuff man do the stuff live on lesson you make get out of debt get your butt on a budget and act like a grown-up and stop your whining and you can go do almost anything in this country it's gonna be hard but it's easier than being broke and mediocre. At the end of the story you get to win this way. The other way at the end of the story you just die broke and wondering what you...

I don't want to work in McDonald's at retirement unless it's the one I own in St. Thomas. You know, seriously. You can do this stuff. It is... and you don't have to be... I'm not extraordinary. I'm far from extraordinary. But I've had extraordinary results following God's ways of handling money, having hope in my life, having a sense of abundance instead of a sense of scarcity. And going and apply... If you plant corn, the most magical thing happens, corn grows. And if you plant more corn, more corn grows and if you plant more corn more corn grows so if you plant a hundred bucks you'll get this if you plant a thousand bucks you'll get ten times as much and and you know most of you are making so much money a hundred

bucks you waste driving past some fast food restaurant or Starbucks you just drive past they take a hundred bucks from you and you even got your food yet this is man this is so doable y'all it's so doable and I'm not going you get pissed at me if you wanna start another reddit page on Dave Ramsey have at it I don't give a crap just just stack it up there you know what cuz you're wrong the proof is in that social proof is out 10

million millions and millions and millions of people are doing this stuff. And it's not...so if you're not doing it, you're just wrong. It's not any hard...it's not any harder than that. You're just wrong. This is The Ramsey Show. Rachel, do you ever get these sketchy text messages that are like, Hey, you need to update your address and verify so we can get you the package you didn't order. Yes, I have. George is sketchy and never trust him. And that's why we recommend Delete Me. They help with that. Yeah, they do. Delete Me actually goes in and removes your information from data broker websites,

and it is an incredible service that everyone needs. And there's a lot of shady companies out there that solely exist to sell your personal data to bad guys. And that means your info, like your email address, your home address, your kids names, your name, everything is just out there for scammers and spammers to find. That's right and then once they remove your information then they're gonna send you a detailed report telling you where they found your information, when they removed it, how many hours they've saved you. I mean it is incredible, so detailed and it's beautiful. I love these reports. So far, get this hours they've saved you. I mean, it is incredible. So detailed and it's beautiful. I love these reports.

So far, get this, they've reviewed 27,000 listings on my behalf, removed me from 240 data broker sites and saved me 77 hours of time. It's incredible. Absolutely amazing. And Winston and I now get fewer texts, weird emails, spam calls, all of it. I love it.

So you gotta be sure to check them out. Ramsey fans get 20% off their annual plans. Just go to joindeleteme.com slash Ramsey. That comes out to less than nine bucks a month. Super affordable. It's amazing. So again, that's joindeleteme.com slash Ramsey. Make sure to check it out, you guys.

Robert's in Denver. Hi Robert, how are you? I'm good, how are you, Dave and Rachel? Better than we deserve. How can we help today? Thanks for taking my call. Um, I found you guys in 2020. Um, and after paying off all my debt, I'm now on baby step six. Um, I've been dating the same woman for four and a half years. Um, she's absolutely amazing. I love her to death. Um, the one thing we struggle with is money and we pretty much see it kind of opposite, um, we're getting to a point in our relationship where, you know, we're

heavily discussing marriage and what all that looks like, and we're, we're heavily discussing marriage and, and what all that looks like. And we're, we're kind of in a spot where, um, you know, I try to help her as much as possible and as much as she wants me to, I guess, to set up budgets and stuff like that. And it just never works out. Um, you know, she, she always goes way over budget or whatever. And, um, if we were to get married, like she, you know, she would sell her house and move in with me and, and, uh, profits from that would pay off all of her debts, he has about 65,000 in debts.

Um, so, so it's not really like a concern from that aspect. It's more just, um, I guess I'm scared to move forward with someone that I've never seen can stay within a budget. Um, you know, and I'm worried that it's the number one reason people get a divorce. I'm worried about becoming a statistic because we fight about money all the time. Can she not, can I ask this Robert, is she not being able to stay into the, and is she not able to stay on budget because the budget's not realistic for what she's set up

or is it that she truly spends more than she makes and she's just, says that's just how it is? Yeah, she just spends more than she makes. I mean, she brings in more money than I do, honestly. What does she spend it on? What's she doing? Shopping, vacations? Like what's-

Just like, yeah, yeah. So like in her every dollar, you know, she's got a food category that's supposed to be $600. Last month she spent $1,100. And then like her shopping, you know, it's supposed to be I think $400 and that includes even like unnecessary fund purchases that, you know, everyone has to have. But instead she's spent like $900. You know, she wants to, she's a mom of two. She wants to get a mommy makeover. Um, and so like in her head, she's justifying, well, if I can pay off these two debts,

that's payments equal what the mommy makeover payments will make that I can do it. But she's never once made like that extra debt payment to even pay those debts down. She just, she's more of like like that extra debt payment to even pay those debts down. She just, she's more of like, you know, you gotta spend the money that you make to have fun kind of thing than I am. Hmm.

It's interesting to me that you started doing this stuff in 2020 and you've been dating her four and a half years, so you started, you met her about the same time. So she's watched you adopt all of these things. The more you got engaged with the stuff that we teach, she's watched it. She a first a front row seat for the whole thing so I was I was debt free by the time I met her I started January 1st as a New Year's resolution and I met her December 4th so within that year I was out of that so she never really saw me aggressively attack debt but I still live the lifestyle like I still buy that month. I still, you know, so she's seen that lifestyle and where it's gotten me and she just,

she just, she doesn't have like the mental mind. Like I see things in numbers, in statistics, I'm a spreadsheet nerd. She's the complete opposite. Yeah, I don't ask her to be a nerd. I am asking her to quit being immature and just buying stuff she can't afford and I just deserve it I just want to get it and so I'm just gonna get it. I mean she doesn't tell herself no ever. The category breaches you talked about, the purchase breaches you talked about, those are all I just look at it and I'm gonna do do it anyway. Like there's a sense of entitlement or immaturity or something there that's bothering me in this. I can't tell what it is exactly. So what

would we do in this situation? You guys have got to resolve this before you go forward. Not necessarily she has to become the nerd that you are or she has to stay on a budget. But whatever the core issue is that she's struggling with here, immaturity, entitlement, because you can't just, she's not acting like an adult in the sense that you can't just spend 900 bucks when you say I'm gonna spend 400. Yeah, that's where I was trying to figure out with.

That's weird. Yeah, is she not budgeting correctly? Because there are some people that are like, oh, I'm gonna make., but then change the budget. That's what I'm saying. But this sounds like it's above that. It's like that she pro she could live within the numbers that she sets. Correct. Like she that or that she has to mathematically, she makes enough money to pay to do it right.

She just chooses not to have any boundaries for herself. Yeah. And that's what I'm hearing. So what would I do? I, if I were in your shoes, I would say, look, we have to resolve this and get aligned on it to go forward because it's not going to, we're, we're going to have, you're going to, you're going to have a long life because you're going to treat it. You're going to think I'm just picking on you all the time. And I don't want to be the bad guy in this all the time.

And it's a value standpoint. I'm not going to sign up for the bad guy role. Yeah. And it's a value sampling. And I'm not gonna sign up for the bad guy role. Yeah, and it's not, again, we've said it twice in the call, but I think this is important for couples to hear. You're not trying to form her into you, right? No. Because I'm the free spirit. As you're speaking, I'm like, oh my gosh,

that would so be me if I wasn't doing the Ramsey plan. I am, I'm just a spender, emotions, I'm like, yep, we're gonna have fun, we're gonna enjoy. But having to learn a value system of boundaries, a value system of living below your means, a value system that stuff is not gonna make me happy, there's a contentment issue there as well. Like all of these things are values,

where I still month to month spend more than Winston, my husband, because I am more of a spender than he is, but it's in the budget. So from again, you're not checking. That's easy, because Winston doesn't spend any money. Yeah, he doesn't spend a lot. But it's like the idea is, again, it's the values that we agree upon,

not the personality trait necessarily, but if we can't have boundaries and limits to our money and we keep going over and over and over and over and over, then there's an issue there. That's a problem. And even with debt, I would say debt's a value system. That if you are uncomfortable with living with debt, that it gives you stress, the risk of it, it's not worth it.

It is, I want the autonomy, and she's completely okay with debt, that it gives you stress, that like the risk of it, it's not worth it. It is, I want the autonomy and she's completely okay with it. And it's totally fine to live by my means and I'll live on credit cards and just try to pay, you know, the minimum balance every month or the minimum payment. Then again, there's a value system there that will be really excruciating to walk along life with. And this is your partner, right?

Like when you get into a marriage, like this is the person that you're gonna make all these decisions with, and that should be fun. And it should be enjoyable. This is someone that you don't want to constantly be picking apart and adding stress, right, to the relationship. And that's what these big issues, money is one of them,

but you could throw in in-laws, you could throw in parenting. I mean, right, there's all these other issues, but with money specifically, it's the value system. Yeah, like you would tell the kids no and she won't. It's the value system. You know, that's the out- Yeah, that causes, yeah, that ruffles feathers for sure. That's how that's gonna translate. So here's what I would do. I would schedule a pre-marriage

counseling session and I would sit down with a counselor and tell the counselor on the phone before you meet with them with her present that the pre-marriage counseling session will have failed if you can't help us get aligned on these subjects. Your job as a pre-marriage counseling is you have to give the counselor instructions, okay? I am not moving forward in this marriage unless we can get aligned on these things. And so your job is to guide us through that. If you think your job is to make me okay with her being off the rails one way and me being off the rails

the other way, I'm not going to be okay with that, that you failed as a counselor. Because sometimes counselors will do that. You get, it's all okay. Because they don't think they don't see it the way that we're seeing. So you need to give the counselor. Well, a good counselor will dig in and understand. A good one. Yeah, but to know the root of it, because so much of who we are in our existence,

the good, the bad, the ugly, comes out on how we handle money. Exactly. And so there's things in there, right? And I would say for extreme savers. Family of origin. Yeah, and extreme savers, right? There's a level of hoarding and control issues

that come from people that are, and people call this show, and they're so anal, and you're just like, oh? There's a level of hoarding and control issues that come from people that are some people call this show and they're so anal And you're just like oh my god chill. You're okay But they're they're so wound up on that side and that's unhealthy But then being on the other far side where she is that's unhealthy and so so tell me getting to that place You have the counselor some instructions and the instructions are you are to help us get aligned? If you can't help us get aligned then we're either gonna call it or you failed in your counseling. We are not leaving your office with you saying oh it's okay. That's not an okay thing for the

counselor to think because sometimes pre-marriage counseling is a bit of a rubber stamp and you don't want that's what I want you to I want them digging in on this. I want you to dig onto this and y'all find out what's what's driving these things and That way you don't turn Ramsey into a cuss word in your new household. This is the Ramsey show What does the future hold for business ask nine experts and you'll get ten different answers economic growth or a recession Business taxes will go up or down. AI will help us work or it will replace us all. But there's no such thing

as a crystal ball. That's why more than 40,000 businesses have future-proofed themselves with NetSuite by Oracle, the number one cloud enterprise resource planning system. Ramsey Solutions uses NetSuite and you should too. Whether your company's earning millions or even hundreds of millions, NetSuite helps you respond to immediate challenges and seize your biggest opportunities. With one unified business management suite,

there's only one source of truth for the visibility and control you need to make quick decisions. NetSuite's real-time insights and forecasting help you see into the future with actionable data. And when you're 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. If you're a business owner,

you know running a small business is hard. If you've ever become self-employed like I have, you figure out pretty quickly that your boss is tough your boss is a slave driver and yeah self-employed stuff it's hard running your own deals hard we've got a new book called build a business you love where we unpack the entree leadership system it doesn't make running a business easy but it makes it easier because it's a clear path to walk through the five stages of business. It's like the baby steps for small business.

Not money, but how to grow your business. How to deal with team members differently as you go through the five stages. How to deal with profit differently as you go through the five stages and so on. If you pre-order right now for $29.99 you can get over $350 in bonus items, instant access to the Entrez leadership hiring playbook, the eBook, and the enhanced audiobook. Pre-order today at ramsesolutions.com slash store or if you're on YouTube or podcast click the link in the description. Seth is in Virginia Beach. Hi Seth, how are you? Hey Dave and Richelaw, how are you? Hey Dave and Rachel, how are y'all? Better than we deserve. What's up? All right, so I'm 27

years old and I'm married with three kids and me and my wife have been on baby steps four, five, and six for the past few years and I'm currently in the military and we live in military housing so we're renting. We're trying to figure out the best way to kind of save for a down payment on a house. So since we move every three years, we're not trying to jump on buying a house right away, but if the opportunity presents itself, then we would like to maybe be in a place where we can do so. So over the past few years, we've saved about $25,000. Good for you.

For the down payment. Yeah, so also while saving for retirement in kids college. Which branch are you on the Navy? I'm in the Marine Corps. Marine Corps. Thank you for your service. All right, very cool. Yeah, thank you. Your question was what? So we're trying to figure out the best coach to saving up for down payment on a house. My wife's taking some time off work to stay home with the kids, with the both of our kids, but she's a nurse and she's going to be starting a job here in the fall as a school nurse. And we were thinking like potentially going back to baby set three B and just pausing retirement in kids college to just back up cash for a year. We were soon enough that would be maybe be the right move with, you know, still trying

to invest steadily for retirement. That's fine. The first thing popped into my head was I'm under the impression a school nurse does not make near what a nurse makes. Correct. So she used to work like in a hospital on the floor. Why would you take a job that pays less when you're trying to hit a financial goal? Why would you take a job that pays less when you're trying to hit a financial goal? So because of with our three kids, the schedule is a lot easier with kids are at school, 12 hour shift. Yes. And, um, and so, like I said, we're not trying to jump on like buying a house. Yeah. How old are your children? No. Uh, there are five, two, and then about to be one.

The school nurse doesn't have anything to do with a two or one year old. Correct. They would have to be in daycare. But our oldest is in kindergarten. OK, so the schedule thing is bogus. It's not true. Well, she'd have summers. I mean. It's not. Well, I she'd have summers. I mean.

It's not, well, I mean, you can take summers off whenever you want. I mean, you can go work three 12s and be done for the week and make three times more than she's going to make while the other two kids sit in daycare. So that's not logical. Anyway, I think that's a bad choice. Anyway, back to your question, you're not in a hurry, so you can do whatever you want to do. Right.

And you've done a great job so far with your money. But I'm a huge fan of nurses because it gives you the potential to earn a lot of money and work a very, very flexible schedule and do a lot of different kinds of things. I think you're not getting good use of that opportunity with what we're talking about, but okay, back to it. Now the, um, I wouldn't pause, maybe step forward. You can pause the kids college though. If you guys were putting in a certain amount of money every single year,

if you want to pause that to save up some extra money. Or just drop it down to 50 bucks or something. I wouldn't stop it, but I'd drop it way down. And you use that. I really wouldn't because you're not on a tight schedule to buy, you don't have an urgency to buy. And so I don't want to build up a down payment over here in a high yield savings account while I'm missing out on good mutual fund returns over in my retirement accounts.

Now, I'm going to leave that at 15. Now if you want to turn up the urgency and you say, okay, in 24 months we're going to buy a house. If you want to shut it down for that, that's okay. But just in general, I'm going to just want to build a slush fund so someday I can buy a house. No, I would not do that. And then I want to add one more thing before I let you go.

Like you said, you guys move every three years and it's going to be very unusual market that you can buy a house and sell it quickly and make money on it in three years. Okay? So, here's how I mean, I'll teach you how to do it. I talk to military guys and the engals all the time. I love what you guys do and thank you for protecting our country. The thing you do when you get ready at your next stop and you think okay we got the money let's buy a house. What you want to do is you want to look at two different statistics with the local real estate agent.

Just go get one of your Ramsey Trusted Real estate pros off the website at the ELP site, okay, on our website and ask them two things. Number one, in the area I'm looking in, within a five mile radius of the houses I'm looking in, in that area, what is the average DOM days on the market? And if it's average of 27 days, well you've got a hot market and you'll be able to sell the house if it's an average of 270 days that's nine months you're gonna be stuck with this thing when you move next time and it's gonna end up a rental property in another city bad idea okay so days on the market the second thing you look for is average

appreciation rates in that five mile radius for the the last five years, four years, what have the houses gone up in this area? If they've gone up 2% a year in three years, that's 6%, you're going to lose money when you sell this house with commissions and closing costs. Right. Okay? But if they go up 10% a year, let's go on up 30% you're gonna make money I will tell you that you will find these two numbers are

will Only appear together and give you the right answer in other words if you see high appreciation rates You're probably gonna see short days on the market And if you see long days on the market, you're probably gonna see low appreciation rates so a low appreciate and so what happens is if the town is a military only town and the military is the economy, you've got a bazillion houses on the market all the time because the people are moving in and out all the time. There's always a glut in the market. You don't see a lot of appreciation. It's very hard to sell. You're going to get burned. But if you're in a metro area like

you are right now, Virginia Beach is a vibrant economy separate and apart from the military, heavily influenced by the military, but separate and apart from the military. It's got its own economy. So you could, that could be one of the markets right there that you could make money on. San Diego would be a market you could make money on and get in and out if you're military. But if you're in the middle of whatever cornfield and it's all military, you're military. But if you're in the middle of whatever cornfield and it's all military, you're gonna get stuck with the house, dude.

So be careful with that. Because we do talk about renting a lot for families. Yeah, just rent, just rent. If you're going into the cornfield market, or if it's not a vibrant market for whatever reason, and you're gonna get stuck, you're much better off financially to rent for that three year period of time.

And your stress level's way down. Because if you're buying and you gotta move in, fix up, and you're selling, you gotta move out, fix up. And it's a lot more stress to be an owner than it is to be a renter on the short term basis. So that's what we're looking for. So good question, man, thank you. And again, thank you for serving your country.

Last thing I'll throw out because I got just a second is don't use the VA loan. The VA loans suck. The Veterans Administration was formed to be a blessing to veterans and to active duty, and they may be in some areas, but in the real estate world they're not. VA loan is more expensive than an FHA loan. The interest rates are higher and the fees are higher but veterans do it and active duty people do it because I can get nothing down. It's one of my benefits. Well nothing down is not actually a benefit. It's causing you to buy something you can't afford and so don't do the VA. Don't do it. Do it, you know, do a traditional conventional Fannie Mae mortgage. Don't do an FHA either. It's the cheapest. Fannie Mae is the cheapest. A standard conventional mortgage is much cheaper than either one of the two government programs. Well, there's a shock. And so, don't fall for that either, for those of you that are out there in the military.

So we've done a bazillion hours of work with the military folks and love them and try to help them any way we can. So thank you guys. 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 actual amazing relationships. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Rachel Cruz, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, my daughter is my co-host today. Mark is with us in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Hey Mark, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi Dave, hey, and Rachel, thank you for taking my call.

Sure, what's up? I went with my daughter and purchased a 2016 Chevy Silverado pickup truck and there was a lien on it, but the bank won't even talk to me anymore because my name is not on the original lien. Um, I can't part it out. I can't sell it. That's a felony. Um, the odometer, they rolled the electronic odometer back a hundred thousand miles.

Um, wondering what your advice would be. The police department won't help me. I'm wondering what your advice would be. The police department won't help me. I'm wondering what you would suggest. I'm confused why in the event of fraud, you're saying a forged title? Is that what you said? Forged title and on the title it says, Boy Def Altered. And... You know, is this a dealership or an individual? Forge title and on the title it says void if altered and You know, is this a dealership or an individual? Combination there's a dealership that signed off on the back and we purchased it from an individual

Okay. I you know, I the only thing I would tell you to do is just find an attorney and sue both of them. Okay. And you can go ahead and name the bank and the transaction. Go ahead and sue the bank too, just for the fun of it. Is there one that you have? An attorney? Lawyers? No, I mean, I'm going to talk to some friends and business acquaintances in the Grand Rapids area, if I'm you, and try to find out who has a general practice.

2016 Silverado, it's probably over $10,000, so it's probably not a small claims court. But yeah, I'm just going to sue everybody and wake them all up and drag them into court and make them stand before the judge and say that they committed fraud and then he'll quiet the title it's called. The judge can clean the title in any state and but it's going to require, it's going to cost you, you know it's going to cost you a lot of money but also losing the entire truck and just driving it in the river is going to cost you a lot of money. So.

I know is there a point that you end up losing money going through a legal system? You spend more on it than the trust. But what I'm saying is, I think if an attorney starts filing suits and they start seeing subpoenas show up on the doorstep, they're probably gonna solve this before it gets to court. They're probably gonna go, I don't really want to get in front of a judge when I've committed fraud. I probably don't want to be there.

It's not a good thing because then all of a sudden the police department would get involved if there's criminal activity here. So because the judge would call them up and go, hey guys, you need to pick this guy up. And so it's a little different thing than just trying to get the sheriff to go and knock on his door. But yeah, I would call each of the individuals one more time and just say, I'm willing to give you another five days to get this straightened out.

And if you don't, what I'm gonna do is sue all of you and take everything you have. I'm going to make a hobby out of you people and just lean into them because they're a bunch of crooks it sounds like. And this doesn't sound like it's a, uh, a clerical error with what you're describing. Well, no, they moved the mileage back. So I'm like, it's very intentional.

Exactly. So, you know, we've got proof of this fraud. We've got proof of that fraud. And so at a minimum, you got to get my title right and you got to get it clear of the lean. And, uh, and if you can't do that in the next five days, then I'm coming after you, and I'm going to mess with you to no end. Then that, usually the crooks find a way to get it all straightened out, usually. Or they'll just disappear, and you're completely screwed.

But really, that's what's going on. So I'm sorry you're facing this, but there's not a magic wand that makes justice appear And I'll be truthful with you. The court system does not make justice appear either But but the fear of the court system sometimes will cause justice to occur But the actual process of being in a lawsuit is very seldom as anything to do with justice It's got to do with who has the most money to last the longest So that's what it comes down to.

All right, Brooke is in Salt Lake City. Hey, Brooke, what's up? Hi, how's it going? Thanks for taking my call. Thank you. How can we help? So my husband and I are just in a disagreement about my work schedule and the opportunity to take a new job with less days of working.

Sounds great. What's the disagreement? Yeah, that's what I thought. So we're just in the process, obviously, of paying off debt. We paid $30,000 off last year, so we're doing great. All we have left is obviously our mortgage and then my student loans, which have about 25,000 left. Mm-hmm. So at your current rate, you'll be out of debt in a year. If you take the new job, do you make less or more? I would be making like basically the exact same. What's basically? Are you going to make the same or not? Why did you put basically in the sentence? Yeah, I would be making the same. Yes, there's just bonuses and does he not think that's a good idea? That's weird.

I know. He just wants to obviously, you know, pay it off as fast as possible and he said. If you're making the same money, it doesn't affect that. What did he say? He said why not work more, you know, so we can pay off the debt faster. So do you have more opportunity to do overtime with the current job you're in? So I'm working 30 hours a week, so four days a week in my industry is considered full-time. And so I would be working three days, 10 hour days. So not really much overtime. It's just, yeah, just different days and hours basically. I'm sorry, I don't understand why he thinks you're making the same money is going to cause

you to get out of debt slower. Yeah, I honestly, I don't know. So he's like, call Dave and, you know, get his opinion. So yeah, I would be making basically, you know, the exact same with potential for more with bonuses. Are you a nurse? Dental hygienist. Okay. You have children? No, no kids. Okay. So why not take the job making the same money three days a week and then take a part-time job and double your income in

the other two days a week. Yeah, I could also do that because with dental hygiene I mean you know I could tempt additional days and I did say that to him. And that would be a dramatic raise. Yeah. Is that what you... And... I don't think you guys know what you... And...

I don't think you guys know what you're arguing about. I know. The biggest thing is we bought our house two years ago before we started listening to you guys when we were out of debt. So we do have a higher mortgage payment right now because... That has nothing to do with this discussion. Nothing. you called up and because you were arguing with your husband about whether take a job making the same money working less which you then he says he doesn't believe that you're gonna make the same money that's what this is I

think so you guys need to do a little better job of talking this through because I don't think either one of you know what you're arguing about. Thanks for hanging out with us guys. We appreciate you being here. Our Every Dollar Team multiple free training, join our Every Dollar Team for multiple free trainings for you this month. You can join live to learn how to break the paycheck to paycheck cycle in just 90 days. We're going to get you a

step-by-step walkthrough of the EveryDollar budgeting app, the world's best budgeting app. Download it for free and the setup with the EveryDollarTeam with a free training is free, free, free. It's all things free. free plus you get your biggest budgeting questions answered during the live Q&A over a hundred and sixty thousand people have done this training Wow spots are limited but we do them all the time and you can sign up right now for free at every dollar dot com slash webinar Josh is in Jacksonville Florida hi Josh how are how are you? Hey, it's an honor. I'm doing well. Good. How can I help? I've been reading a book called the name and store. Uh,

there's a reference from another book I've been reading. You're doing a lot of that lately and in this book, it being Google with your money, which is also something that you preach, but, um, I got hung up on something in this book that was referring to investment and in the book, it says when you invest and to hold it from being taxed, you basically wait till you die and then you give it to people so that it's not taxed. Now I was wondering why should I invest in stocks and bonds if I'm never

going to be able to use this money and if I use it how can I bring it out without being heavily taxed. Okay well the book was written in 1992 it's a best-seller perennial best-seller it's a wonderful work he did the first study of millionaires I ever read the the authors Tom Stanley Tom was a friend of mine before he passed away his daughter Sarah still interacts with us They still do millionaire research all the time, and they're really really good people so but Tom studied 750 millionaires and it became kind of the bellwether the

Baseline for how millionaires behave. And that's what he's referencing in here. It's not necessarily an investment philosophy. He's saying that what millionaires end up doing is they save and invest, and they save and invest in good stocks, not bonds usually, but usually good stocks, and meaning mutual funds, growth stock type mutual

funds. And this is what we found in our millionaire study that came out, you know, 30 years later after Tom did that and it still found very similar things actually so I'm a fan of him I'm a fan of his work I'm a fan of Sarah's work and so on so anyway what he's saying is you end up building up enough wealth that you don't end up having to use it to live your best life. And so it is given then to your kids at death or your heirs at death. If you don't need it, like for instance in my case, the chances of me actually using my

Roth IRA in my lifetime is really close to zero because I have enough real estate and other things that will provide me income if I ever chose to not be on this microphone which provides me an income. Okay and so if in my later years I took an income from I would end up taking it from other stuff so probably Rachel and her brother and sister will get my mutual funds that are in Roth IRAs.

I'm probably investing for them. Very high likelihood. And that happens normally with wealthy people when you build some wealth. Now if you get there and you need the money because you don't have any other money and you haven't built very much wealth but you built a little bit and you need the money to pull out, yeah you're going to have taxation unless it's in a Roth IRA. If it's in a Roth IRA all the growth is tax-free. The whole thing is tax-free because the money you put in has already been taxed and all of the growth which is the majority of what's in the

account is tax-free. And so you don't have that problem if it's in a Roth. So oddly enough mine's in a Roth so I could take it out and not pay any taxes but I probably won't even do that. I'll probably just let it roll because it's making money, making money, making money, making money. Even if you did have to pay some taxes when you got it out it would be capital gains rate and unless you're making over $400,000 a year then that's only 15%. And so you took out, you made $10,000 and you're going to pay $1,500 of that over so you still got $8,500 left. The taxes are not crippling even if it's not in a retirement account and it grows. So I think probably what Tom was saying in that chapter,

it's been a long time since I read that book. I read it in 1992 the first time. So I would have to get it back out and try to kick. But I know the gist of his findings and the way he viewed things. I had him on this show when he was alive years ago. And so a couple times. So I kind of think that's what he was referring to him Josh so you're gonna be fine. Rachel it's um here's here's the thing that we do not

currently nor have we ever had in the United States to date a 100% income tax. So if you build wealth, some of it you're going to keep. We have fairly low rates today compared to other times. There was a time back in the 70s and 80s that the tax rate was 70%. The highest tax bracket was 70% tax bracket. So, you know, today it's 39 and 15 on capital gains, 20 on capital gains if you make over 400. So, you know, you're always, you never say I'm not going to build wealth because of taxes. Right, right. Because you're going to outperform it. Mathematically, mathematically it's incorrect. Right. Well, and it's still a great avenue, Josh, even though you are paying some of those capital gains to build wealth. Because I'm like, it's your money making money while you sleep.

So I would pay taxes to build wealth versus not putting money in investments and letting it just sit there and it actually goes down because of inflation. So it's still worth it, Josh. Mark's in Salt Lake City. Hey, Mark, what's up? Hey, Dave, how you doing? Better than I deserve. How can I help?

Hey, so our situation is I have one year self-employed. We're looking to buy a house in the next year. And coming up on the tax deadline, I've been trying to research this. Um, do I write off my business expenses and pay less taxes? Um, but that would hurt my chances of getting a traditional mortgage, a traditional mortgage. You do that requires two years of taxes of taxable income information.

Yeah. Well you don't make enough money to qualify for the mortgage if you're having to act like you don't have expenses. Okay. So no, you take all your expenses and run a proper P&L, pay taxes on a proper profit and loss, and whatever your income is is what your income is. Don't lie to yourself and go, oh I'm gonna pretend like these expenses aren't here so I can get a mortgage that I can't afford. No, you're setting yourself up for a fall, man. That makes more sense just to what can I actually afford versus rather than qualifying for a mortgage. Exactly, because those expenses are real money it's not it's not a ghost column right I

mean that's like you really had that expense so you really did not have as much profit because of that real expense that's a real thing and so the money that you actually have to pay the bill with is reduced by that expense in in actual fact if it was a depreciation schedule or something, you know, we can look at that and go, oh well, that's, but usually that's not the issue with what you're talking about. Usually it's just like, yeah, we're just getting started and we're not making a lot of money yet because we're trying to get this thing up and get it moving. We're trying to get it, kick it in the butt and

get it going. Right. What's your business? General Contracting and I finished carpentry. Oh great man you're gonna make so much money maybe not last year and you but you're gonna make a lot more this year and you're gonna make a lot more the next year you you are in a great field. Last year was pretty good yeah my first year I felt like. Yeah yeah get just have a little patience you're you're going you're in a great field. You're going to do great. You keep showing up on time doing the work right and they're going to give you money

like you've never seen. You're going to bail money before you're done on this. Hey, I'm going to send you a copy of my brand new book, Build a Business You Love, that walks you through the stages of business and you're at the beginning stage of the treadmill operator stage and I want to show you how to grow this thing. I'm excited for you man but give yourself one more year to buy that house you're fine you're fine you're just getting started on a brand new business it's okay give it you just give yourself

a little credit man you're killing it I'm proud of you this is the Ramsey show Rachel Cruz Ramsey personalities my co-host Trina is with us in New Orleans. Hi Trina, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, how are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up in your world? So, well my question is, I am a travel nurse and I've always had the ability to, my kids are grown, so I've always had the ability to, you know,

work hard, put in extra hours and, um, you know, make the money that I need if I wanted to splurge and do nice things. Well, I think I've taken that for granted because I really wasn't putting money aside saving money. And I had a health scare recently where I wound up in the hospital with a pulmonary embolism, bilateral, yes, had to have an embolectomy and they had found blood clots all throughout my body.

So a lot of changes have taken place since then. So sorry. So I decided I'm just grateful. I'm 50. Okay. Yeah, so standing on your feet all day nursing is not probably conducive to your healing, right? Right. Well the bigger thing too is I also have an autoimmune issue. So I said, you know what? I have been getting by with, um, minimal treatment, meaning like if I have a flare up, I would take the prednisone feel better. But now that I'm on blood thinners, the prednisone is actually contraindicated. So I'm like, you know what? I'm going to take some time off and I'm really going to focus on diet

exercise and just do whatever I can to optimize on my end. So in the meantime, I decided to rent out my house because my parents are retired and they preferred me to stay with them. Anyway, after that incident, you know, they get a little nervous about me being by myself. So that's not a problem. Um, my issue is that I had acquired, I have about 45,000 in credit card debt. Um, I paid for a wedding a year and a half ago and have, um,

this all happened about eight months ago and then I have my student loans and I have my car what do you all the car about 38,000 I had just bought it actually because you have a 38,000 on a car and you have forty five thousand dollars in debt and credit card what's your student loan credit card debt oh I'm sorry my student loan is another 45 oh my goodness okay yes and you don't have any money and you don't have any money no I have the income coming in from the rental house or my home that I'm renting out, which is 4,000 a month. Do you have a payment on it? Yes, it's 1,500 between the note and the insurance.

Okay, so you don't have 4,000 because you gotta pay 1,500, right? 2,500, yeah. Correct. Okay, so you got $2,500 there, all right, which won't pay these bills. But I do have about $300,000 in equity, and that's the part I'm struggling with, is that I plan to go back to work. I love my job.

I love to work. It's not a stressor to me, but I know I have to take that year off. What's the timeline? You're eight months into the year though aren't you? Well I just did take off in end of January. Oh okay. I went back to work I thought I could swing it. So we need to go into January to end of January is that right? Right. Okay all right. Probably gonna sell this car I Don't think the math I don't think the math works does it In what way well, I mean you can't pay these bills with 2,500 bucks

You're eating on sell the house or the car That's what I was trying to figure out I would say I the car, live with your mom and dad, and heal. And then with a plan to go back to work in January. How much do you make, Trina, when you're back to work full time? Like next year? So typically I will clear about $2,500 a week. Yeah, serious money. You can make $150,000 a year, especially if you go back to travel yeah but you don't need that car is a problem you put the student loan on hardship deferral call them and put it on hardship deferral for

12 months they'll do that with one phone call okay they love keeping you in debt believe me and so that's what that does the credit cards you can limp through those with the 2,500 if you didn't have the car payment you could make it around until next January. But that's the part that scares me is accruing all of the interest because it doesn't scare me because you can pay it all off now that you decide you're going to. You've just been screwing around and haven't done that and now you're like okay I'm going to have to grow up and take care of business here so when you go back to work I I'm guessing you're gonna clear this debt, right?

Yes, that's the goal. I live on beans and rice and 90 grand not counting the car. You're out of debt. I guess I was considering a quick fix with selling the home. The only reason I don't want to do that is the cost to build a home these days. I would never in a million years, I would wind up in a much smaller home owing much more than I do now. Yeah, I would not sell your home to take care of this consumer debt because you can do that with your income. It's gonna take you probably another two years after this year and next. Maybe two and a half, but I would be in that pain for two and a half years then to your point of having to

a half but I would be in that pain for two and a half years then to your point of having to re-up a home I'm like oh my gosh that's a lot unless you just hate unless you just hate the house I wouldn't sell it I think that's the last thing on the list I'm selling that car though probably tomorrow I mean really okay because how much is the payment on that dream it's not it's a car you know you can get another car The house with their car was seven. I think it's like seven hundred twenty four dollars, but I did get it interest-free so Hey, I still owe like three more years on it. Yeah And and I had just I'm not a person to splurge on those type of things, but yes you are Well prior to that I had a credit card debt too Well, yes

My daughter for her wedding and you only get to do it once. Yeah, there's a lot of rationalization in your life. Yeah You're awesome, I love you you're fun. I think you. You're fun. I think you're listen. I want you to heal. That's what I'm most concerned about you've not you've taken care of everyone else, but you and you haven't and you haven't addressed your health and you haven't addressed your finances and then God just gave you a full stop and Is making you address both of them? It's I absolutely said the same thing. This was a wake-up call to say, you know what, what are your priorities? And it will make you do that really quick when you're laying in the ICU.

Were you a single mom when the kids were little? No. I was married for 19 years. We had five children together. So needless to say, once my kids were grown and I got to have me time for the first time ever, I just started really enjoying the travel nursing and got to go places I had never been before.

Now you're not married, right? You're not married now. Okay. Cause all the words you were using told me that I didn't never ask you that, but that's what I thought you were saying. Okay. So, all right. Yeah. I think this is the year of Trina. I hope so. Trina gets her health back and Trina lays out a game plan that when she goes back to work she cleans up the financial mess and starts to build a financial future that looks like stability and peace and with some wealth for working so hard. You've been living in the moment for a long

time and that's cost you your money and your health. Yes, definitely. And so I think this is the year where you reset and God's given you this opportunity to get going again. I'm sure sorry it took a horrible medical thing to do that, but that is the net blessing of the thing, is that you now have a whole new viewpoint on things. I think you're gonna be amazing. I wanna help you any way we can.

Let's put you into Financial Peace University. I want you to study the principles that we teach. I'm gonna pay for it, it's free, because I'm giving it to you as a gift. And every dollar premium as well, the budgeting app. Set those things out and if you can make it and keep the car on $2,500, I don't think you can. Put the student loan on hardship deferral, live with mom, and then come out of this

swinging in January ready to go again, but this time with an eye on the future not just the moment, and you take care of your body and your finances going forward. I'm your biggest fan. I think you're cool. Our scripture of the day, Proverbs 14, 23, in all toil there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty. Sam Ewing says, hard work spotlights the character of people. Some turn up their sleeves, some turn up their noses. Some don't turn up at all. That's pretty good. I like that. All right. Bryce is with us in Austin, Texas. Hey Bryce, how are you?

Hey Dave, how's it going? Better than I deserve. What's up? Good. So I'm in a bit of an interesting situation. My car was recently totaled by a dealership. They're 100% at fault. And I just need some guidance on what to do if there's, if I need to do a lawsuit or insurance and mainly just buying a new car as well. Okay.

Good Lord. What happened? So I took it in for some routine maintenance, oil change, and unfortunately the lift failed, and the car fell. No one was injured, thank God, but the car is done for. Wow, and what year model is the car? So it was a 2016 GMC Terrain, fully paid off with about 70,000 miles on it. Oh. Alright, cool. So what do you think the car's worth?

KBB has it at about 8 to 9K. And another concern is that just buying back into the car market with tariffs and everything else. Tariffs don't affect used cars. Indirectly could they though no no no okay not a 2016 pickup truck it's not gonna affect at all I mean a ten thousand dollar pickup you're not gonna see a blip at all on that but so I assume the dealerships were ready to write you a check are they not they're

getting their insurance involved first. When did this happen? About two weeks ago they currently have me in one of their loaner vehicles. Okay I want a real tight deadline on this because let me tell you if you get hit by a consumer just a regular person and your car gets totaled you get a check in a week. Okay. It doesn't take two months. All right. And so these guys, uh, they don't need to drag their feet on this. They need to make you a priority. I want my dad gun money quick. Like next 10 days or so I want to see my money. Okay.

That's not an unreasonable request. This insurance, it's a no brainer. This insurance company is going to write the check. They destroyed your car. They have to pay for your car. It's a no-brainer. Write the check. It's only $10,000. Not $150. And the dealership can write the check and get reimbursed by the insurance company. It's not that big a deal. So we're not going to drag this out for two months and get a lawyer. You know, here's the value of the car. I need my money quick. And so I'm gonna not be a jerk about it, but I'm gonna be applying some real steady heavy pressure and go, okay guys, how fast do you think this is gonna happen? Because I'm of the opinion this ought to happen real fast. It's kind of a no-brainer. And if they're saying it's gonna take a month, no, that's they're saying it's gonna take a month no that's not okay I need my money this week it's ten thousand dollars you guys can handle it you tore up my truck pretty simple yeah and I'm not mad I'm not gonna be

nasty to you and I don't want to have to sue you or something like that but we're not we're not drag button around on this because you guys think insurance people are a good good idea so and then tell them jack their insurance people up and get the dead gum claim done it's not that it's really not hard so to get your money and go get you a truck it's a simple thing and this is not an excuse for you to upgrade nope do I need to be filing anything with my insurance in your opinion no think their insurance should handle everything I think their insurance not a handle it you're not it you don't have anything to do with your insurance in your opinion? Or do you think their insurance should handle everything? No, I think their insurance ought to handle it. You don't have anything to do with your insurance.

I mean, you weren't even on the premises. The car rolled off the lift. Yep. I mean, Darrell and his other brother, Darrell didn't put the thing on there right. I mean, it's like, you know, yeah. Wow, that's scary. I'm really glad no one was hurt.

That's what I was gonna say, that is. Yeah, you don't have a tariff problem And you don't have an insurance problem. You just got a communication with the dealership and guys I'm not being nasty, but this it is Unreasonable for this small amount of money to take very long y'all just need to knock this out real fast and if you can't then I'm gonna start to increase my Unreasonableness and that's all it is. And so just be nice, and man, if I'm running that dealership,

I'm writing you a check so fast in return for a release that I can get you off the property so you don't dream up something and add 25,000 bucks to this or something. Because I want rid of you as a potential problem if I'm them. So I'm gonna do everything I can be nice and be fair and be quick if I'm in that situation

because they are straight up at fault, straight up at fault. Now, and you signed the release because you're not trying to get money out of this, you're just trying to get compensated for your truck. And now they knew they need to give you full stinking value for the truck every dollar it's worth we're not wholesaling it we're not going with

trade-in value we're going with full value Hannah is in Seattle hey Hannah how are you good how are you better than I deserve how can I help so my husband and I have been working on baby steps. We're on number four. We are wondering, we're concerned about hyperinflation and possible market crashing downfall. We're wondering if we should build an addition or work off paint on our house. Work on paint off our house. Well, if you were concerned about those two things, I'm not, but if you're concerned about those two things, it would be yet an extra reason to pay off the house.

To create a sustainable, paid off home is a much more sustainable position than more debt or slow debt reduction for an addition in the event of hyperinflation or in the event of a market crash. Neither one are coming by the way. You don't think so? I'm positive. Okay, because we would be paying for the addition out of pocket. Yeah, but that would mean you don't get out of debt. Right. Okay, so how much does it take to do the addition? Probably 150. And what's it take to pay off the mortgage? 300. Okay and what's your household income? Probably 175. Okay so you pay off

the house without doing the addition, how fast? If jobs go as planned, we can probably do it within the next year or two. Okay. You got some cash you're throwing at this that we didn't talk about then. How much cash have you got piled up? Yeah. What do you have saved? 150 plus what? We have. Oh, you have 150 saved? 150 plus what? We have...

Oh, you have 150 saved? Well, she said she's going to pay for the addition out of pocket. Right. It would be on jobs that we've got lined up. You have any money saved, not counting retirement that we're going to throw into this formula? We have 110 in our emergency fund, and then another hundred and ten in our business and personal. Okay, so you could throw easily a hundred at the three hundred and yeah you could probably do this in a year to two years and then build the addition in another year, correct? So three years from today,

regardless of which order we do, you would have the addition and be debt-free and be down a hundred grand in your savings right okay so you the only question is do you put the hundred and fifty on the front end of three years or the back end of three years that's the only question and you guys can answer that I'm okay either way right but do it all in three years okay and get it done and then and and get off the internet Do it all in three years. Okay. And get it done.

And then, and get off the internet. Quit reading that crap. It's killing you, yeah. I mean, you're going down there with some kind of bad rabbit hole there and it's just scrolling some Instagram wormhole that you can't get out of. And otherwise you don't come to that.

It's everywhere. You don't come to that, it's not everywhere because I don't see it otherwise you don't come to that. It's everywhere. You don't come to that. It's not everywhere because I don't see it. I don't look at it. It's not on a billboard. It's just in the internet. So, yeah, it's.

The old billboards. It's not in the newspaper like I read that either. But yeah, so. All right. Those magazine clippings. That's it. The magazine clippings, that's it. Really got it. Oh, thank you for the boomer jokes.

Okay. Well, I think we've had fun today. I think it's been good. Now people are concerned though. It's always that rumbling of- They're always concerned. Of crashes and all the things. If you don't like who's in office,

you immediately predict the end of times. That's just the way it is. Right or left, that's the way it is. It's all coming to an end! Biden's gonna kill us all! Trump's gonna kill us all! It's all coming to an end! Oh, brother. That puts this hour of the Ramsey Show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember there's ultimately only one way to financial peace

and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.