The Ramsey Show - App - Don't Give Anyone Permission to Hurt You or Your Family (Hour 1)

Episode Date: December 21, 2020

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. Dr. John Deloney, author of the best-selling book, Redefining Anxiety, is my co-host today as we answer your questions about your life and your money. Open phones about 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Now, if Dr. John's in the house, that means you can ask questions about your crazy family that you get to see this Christmas. Oh, man. Unless you're my crazy family calling in.

Were you in? Well, they're not allowed. We screen them. Good. Be on today, Kelly. For your protection. Be on today. So were you there at staff meeting this morning?

No, sir. So why not? What were you doing? I was serving the, I'm just kidding, I wasn't. You were serving the homeless? That's right. No, I was coming in late today. Uh-oh.

See, I don't know. I should check on these things before I go on the air and do this with 17 million people. So, yeah, I was talking about one of my buddies says when he goes to his mother-in-law's house, who's crazy, he said he just does bobblehead. Oh, yeah. I like that. There's no sense engaging because it's not going to change anything. Right. So he long ago gave up trying to fix her crazy butt, and he just says, I got three days of

bobblehead, and then I get to come back home. That's a wise, wise friend of yours. That's kind of like, I thought that was pretty good. I can't do it. You have to paint on the smile. See, I don't. You can't use the, bobblehead does not have a working mouth. See, I can bobblehead.

You have to keep this in mind. I love it. A bobblehead gets you through a lot of things in life sometimes, but you can't, though. You can't spiritually and psychologically. Bless your heart. I can at least say that. Bless your heart, which can mean a lot of things. That's right.

If you're from the South, we should do a book on just the various possible meanings and intonations and pauses in the phrase, bless your heart. You can say it. One way means bless your heart. One way means you're an idiot. One way means I'm getting ready to punch your lights out. I mean, you can say a lot of different things with that one phrase. And it's been going on a lot this year. So anyway, if you've got mental health questions, the doctor's in the house,

and we're not talking about me. Open phones at 888-825-5225. You jump in. We're going to start with Matt. He's in Colorado Springs. Hey, Matt, how are you? Hey, good, Dave. Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas to you, sir. Hey, I'm a retiring military member coming up on just about 26 years of service, getting ready to retire. And one of the benefits that we earn is the ability, it's called the Survivor's Benefit Plan. It allows for the withhold 6.5% of my retirement pay in order to secure half of that pay for my spouse up until her death should I pass away before her. You pay into it for 30 years and then you stop having to pay into it, but you are kind of locked into it. So it's not really a whole, it's not a term.

I'm familiar. It's just a survivor benefit on your retirement for your military. It's a very simple calculation. That's correct. And I think I haven't seen you talk about it. I've listened for a while, haven't heard you, just wonder what your thoughts were on it. Thank you for your service. How old are you? I'm about 43.

How's your health? It's pretty good. I do have solid term life insurance that will take me through the next 25 years, so I feel pretty comfortable in that part. It's sort of after that point that I'm kind of having a hard time making that decision. Okay, here's the formula. If you take the difference in the two plans, like say you took the without survivor, which is the big payout, right, and you took the difference in those two plans and you invest it

at seven percent it will break even at 10 or 12 percent you will at based on your normal death age which is 74 okay and um i suspect that's what they're running it on but they run their numbers out at seven percent and so the answer to the equation is this. The longer you live, the dumber the idea is that you took the survivor benefit. Right. Because you get less money for a longer period of time and didn't need the benefit. See, or worse yet, you outlive her. Right. Which means you get Zippo for this and you paid

all this money in for it and so if you're young and healthy like you are and you've got term insurance to cover her should something happen to you and this benefit die with you i would take the gamble and i would continue to invest and again were you to invest that difference you can sit down with a smart investor pro and they can tell you at what point you'd have enough lump sum to pay out what you would have paid out okay so what is the six and a half percent what's the difference right now in dollars uh in dollars uh so the retirement's going to be about sixty thousand dollars so i don't have to calculate with me but It's 6.5% of that? About $350 a month, yeah.

About what? So about $3,600? Let's call it $4,000. Yeah. A year or a month? Yes. Yes, a year. A year.

Okay, what does it take to create $4,000 a year in investments? Well, at 10%, that'd be $40,000. So at the point you take $400 a month and invest it, and it grows to $40,000, now the $40,000 will pay off the $400 if you die or if you don't die. You see, that's your break-even point. If you die before the $400 grows to $40,000, then you lost money on my idea. Right. But if you live long, and you will, you're going to live well past this.

When you run the numbers out, it's going to be a no-brainer. Right. Because it's going to be, I can't do it in my head. I don't have my calculator laying here but but bottom line is you're going to probably about the 20 year mark about the time you're in your 60s is when uh you're going to have the 400 would have technically grown to enough to create 400 a month a year difference or a month difference four thousand dollars a year so um uh so that's what you're looking at and um if in the meantime you keep term insurance so she's taken care of if you die and you don't she doesn't have this pension then you're going to come out better off so from a math

standpoint now if you told me you were ill or you had right i had a a debilitating disability that could indicate earlier death or something like that, then we might rethink this. But the longer you're going to live, the dumber it is to have taken, mathematically, the dumber it is to have taken the survivor benefit. So I'd buy a 20-year level term, and I think by then you'll break even, sit down with SmartVista Pro and run it out. Both of you fund your Roth IRAs. Both of you continue to build other wealth, and she's going to be just fine without this when you die.

And she probably will outlive you. Seventy-five percent of the ladies do outlive their husbands. Very interesting. When you look at their lifestyle, usually that makes sense. So people make a lot of dumb math decisions based on a lack of appetite for risk yeah yeah and then somebody's always there with a package to buy the risk from you right exactly that doesn't make sense long term exactly and that's the survivor benefit is truly about we'll make sure my wife's taken care of yeah which is a great noble sure thing is there a better way to do it and statistically what

comes out the better way to do it is buy some term life insurance to take care of if something happens to you and throw extra money into investments so that it offsets the fact that she's not going to get that. I have been so guilty of that

and just sitting here at this desk for the last year. Well, it's like an extended warranty. It's the same thing. That's exactly right, but just sitting at the desk

this year. The math doesn't work. I've never done the math on it. The math doesn't work. That thing on your car never breaks. It's always the other thing. It's the other thing, right? You know, that's the way those extended warranty works.

They weren't dumb when they drew those things up. They're not a present for me, right? Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, my co-host today. We're answering your questions about life and money. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. With more frequency than you know, I get calls and emails from people dealing with the recent loss of a spouse or a parent.

You can hear the struggle and the heartache that they've been experiencing. And at a time they should be grieving, what breaks my heart the most is the strain and tension that they're going through because of money, especially when it's a situation that could have been avoided. If you have a family, it is your responsibility to have term life insurance. It's one of the things you do to say I love you. And yes, this is an ad for Zander Insurance. But since this is one of the most effective ways I have to get my point across, so be it. For over 20 years, I've been telling you about the importance of term life insurance and protecting your family.

Listen, you need to check out Zander.com or call 800-356-4282. I can't say it enough. Protect your family. It's what you're supposed to do. Go to Zander.com or call 800-356-4282. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Open phones at 888-825-5225.

As we talk about your life and your money, our question of the day comes from Blinds.com. Find out for yourself why Blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window coverings. You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos they run all the time, you'll save even more. Always use the magic word. The promo code is RAMSEY. Save you some money. All right, today's question comes from Tyler in North Dakota. Tyler says, I've been dating this girl for three years and she was never taught about money growing up,

so I've tried to teach her over the last few years. She just had her come to Jesus moment and wants to change, but she recently lost her job and now she can't afford rent for this next month. I make decent money and I'm pretty far ahead. Should I lend her $350 so she can try and come out on her feet, or should I watch and let her learn from her mistakes? Whew.

No, you don't lend money. Okay. If you... Good answer. Been dating for three years. So this is a tricky one, Dave, because they've been together for three years. If he wants to give her some money, three years is a long time. That's an invested relationship.

I don't personally like that either. When you start bailing out your boyfriend or girlfriend, that can get messy, short-term and long-term. But three years, if he said we were engaged, we were going to get married, that's one thing. But, man, this feels like a slippery slope and a messy mess if you ask me what do you think dave uh well i i agree with you uh so explain what you mean like this is going to change the it's going to change the tone of their relationship yeah i mean just reading through this question um his job isn't to try and teach the person that he loves unless she's asking for it and she's interested in some of these moments.

And I've been guilty of trying to, quote, unquote, try and teach my wife some things over the years that after 15, 20 years together, I realized, oh, she was way ahead of me on those things, right? She was bobbleheading you. Right. And obviously you never lend somebody that you care about money. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You just don't lend people money period

when you're dating somebody and you give them money you get he gives her 350 bucks he gives her 500 bucks the power dynamic of this relationship shifts and suddenly she's beholden to him even though he's going to give it to her and let's just say that he is a perfectly noble guy and has zero negative power feelings, toxic power feelings about giving her the money. He just gave it to her, and he's a great guy, and it's no big deal. The water off a duck's back. But the way she feels, she could change. She's going to take that with shame. That's exactly right.

She feels beholden. And I'll tell you right now, he's not, Dave. He's somebody that's going to use this opportunity to teach her and to give her some lessons and to give her some information. And, man, you're setting up your relationship for a mess. Yeah. And so the only way you're going to pull it off is you're going to have to say all these things out loud. That's exactly right. And you're going to have to go, the problem with me doing this is it could end up with this and this and this and this and this

and we can't have that so i'm giving you this money there is no strings i'm not going to teach you or talk to you or whatever and you can't act like you can't act like weird after this that's right you can't you can't change you know you've got to just be normal we got to just pretend like the transaction didn't happen and uh you don't owe me anything nope you don't owe me anything. Nope. You don't owe me a bowed head. You don't owe me honor. You don't owe me the money back. You don't owe me sexual favors. You don't owe me anything.

And you just got to really say all of this out loud because when you say it out loud, it leaves the room. It loses its power on you, right? When you shine the light on the room the roaches run out that's exactly right and i might sit her down and say would you be interested in in this because if i sometimes my gift to you can be a burden for somebody else right if you're having this kind of conversation you need to put i love that put it all on table and then ask would you be willing to accept this gift and before you put it on the table just go

this is awkward as crap super weird if you say something's awkward before it's awkward, it's less awkward. Every time. That's exactly right. Yes. So, yeah, this is going to be weird. We do that with difficult conversations inside this building all the time. We go, look, this is going to be a difficult conversation. As soon as you say that, it changes the room.

And, Dave. And it's less difficult. I've had several people have to tell me that since i've worked here deloney this is going to be weird it's going to be one of those weird conversations that involves you it's not true but it's a good joke it's super true i love it open phones at 888-825-5225 we're talking're talking about you, your life, and your money. John is in Jacksonville, Florida. Hey, John, welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show.

Hey, how are you doing? Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. How can we help? So, first of all, thank you for the program. My wife and I are on baby steps four, five, and six. Great. And we're able to pay off quite a bit of debt in the last couple of years.

Great. We now have a three-year-old and another child on the way in February that we are super excited about. And we have started looking into schools and started thinking about school. We love the area we're in and the house we own, but it's not in a great school district. So in trying to be intentional with our money, we are looking at the future and either to move into a better school district would cost us probably about $150,000 more than our current house is worth. And the private school in our district is roughly $14,000 a year. And we're trying to figure out if it would be more beneficial to move, and then at least we have the equity in the house,

or if we like the house, stay and do private school. I did listen to the podcast from Anthony O'Neill. I know there was no major difference between private universities and public universities, but I'm not sure that applies to grade schools. What's wrong with your school, John? What do you not like about it? So the school, it doesn't perform particularly well. Unfortunately, the area that we're in, a lot of people send their kids to private schools, so the school actually draws kids from all different areas.

And it doesn't just perform into the academics. Sometimes those global scores can represent a number of different metrics throughout a school. I'm more interested in your kids' experience with their teachers, with the administration. They're not there yet. They're three. Oh, they're three. Okay, you're right. They're not there yet.

I missed that. So here's what I would do. Dave's got 30 years of wisdom on this, but I've lived in and out of the schools. My wife has studied schools and been out of schools. I would sit down with the principal i would sit down with the school counselor and have some detailed conversations with them about your concerns asks for some details about their their metrics and those metrics just don't tell you a whole lot sometimes and they don't tell you how great the teachers are how good the administrators are some of the

things they're doing that are going to be different two and three and four years from now we just went through this in my house, and I'm so glad we did because the public school that my son ended up at has been magic. It's been wonderful for him, for our family, for everybody. But my wife went and had some hard conversations with them, and they were excellent. Yeah, and walk the halls with her permission. You'll get a vibe. You'll get a feel on what's happening in there.

Is it clean? Are people happy happy or is it a prison and um i mean i've spoken in high schools got razor wire around them you know and so um you know some of these areas are tough and uh right you know if you if you walk in there you get that prison vibe thing you you move on, right? So the second thing is this. Generally, when two options are negative, an expensive private school that I may or may not be getting value from, $150,000 upgrade in-house in order to get to a better thing, if I only have two options and both of them suck, that means I don't have enough options. And so I'm challenging the $150,000 move up in order to get your kid in an acceptable school. That may or may not be true, but you may or may not be moving up in-house as well.

I mean, like you went from that 2,500 to that 3,500-square-foot house. Oh, I caught you! Okay. And so that's what it was. It could be that. It could be area. It could be those things. But there may be another way, another neighborhood, another nuance of a neighborhood.

If school system's the only thing, do you move down a little bit in home and up a little bit in location? And then the numbers aren't different. So sometimes we get this stuck in our head, and it's like, oh, it's going to be $200,000. I want to live over there. And you get over and look around. You start thinking, yeah, we can buy that one, fix it up. Foreclosure. There's other ways to skin this cat.

Let's keep working the problem here. So work both parts of the problem and you'll get a better answer. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. We'll see you next time. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today here on the air. Open phones at 888-825-5225. If you feel like you should have made more progress paying off your debt by now, I understand. When it comes to paying off debt, sometimes it feels like all grind and no reward. Here's the thing. When you try to do it by yourself on your own, you're more likely to fall back into old habits.

You're more likely to cheat around the edges. And that's when you stop making the progress. And that's why you need to be on the plan, Ramsey Plus. Ramsey Plus is our step-by-step money plan that will give you the accountability and practical tips you need to pay off your debt faster than you can on your own. When you have someone in your corner cheering you on, you make the tough choices that get you where you want to be. Ramsey Plus helps you go from sort of to all in,

and you can finally keep more of your money. You can start a free trial right now. Ramsey Plus, text the word TRIAL to 33789. That's TRIAL to 33789. Michael's in Sacramento. Hey, Michael, welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, thanks for taking my call. Sure, what's up?

Hey, so quick little back story. I took FPU about a little over a year ago. I'm on baby step two. I was about $23,000 in debt. Right now I should actually be out of debt here in about the next month or two. Excellent. What my question is, is that I bought a house about three years ago on a 30-year fix at 4.375%. I'm kind of looking at the refinancing right now. It's looking, from what I'm seeing, a 30 years about in the high 2% or a 15 year in the mid to low 2s.

My take-home pay is about $56,000 a year. My current mortgage is about $1,282 with property tax and insurance and everything. What I'm wondering is, is this something I should be looking into refinancing or staying where I'm at? Are you going to stay in the home? Yes. Yeah, you need to refinance. So your balance is what? The current balance on the house?

Mm-hmm. It's $182,000. Okay. So every 1% you save is $1,800 a year. Regardless of what the payment is, the interest being charged to you as a part of that payment is $1,800 less per year for every 1% you save. Okay? Mm-hmm. Now, so if it costs you $3,600 to refinance, which is probably pretty close, if you save $1,800 a year and it costs you $3,600, how long does it take you to break even?

Answer, two years. Okay. And everything after you pay back the $3,600 with the $1,800 savings is gravy on the biscuit, $1,800 a year. Now, you're going to not have that happen in cash flow because your payment is going to go up because you're going to go to a 15-year. But while your payment went up, your interest went down,

and so your overall cost on the mortgage is going to go down substantially for two reasons. One is you're only going to have it 15 years, and two is you're going to pay eighteen hundred dollars less per year in actual interest cost so this is a no-brainer you refinance this okay even so if i do that 15 year and the payment's going up because it seems like that would put me over you know your suggestion of you know not spending more than 25 of your take-home pay yeah you've already spent that though yeah we're just structuring and admitting it now so what will that what will

the payment be did they quote it to you um no no i haven't gotten an actual quote on that yet and what do you do for a living uh i'm in retail what's that mean what do you do so well i'm a i'm a manager for a retail store in the outdoor industry how long have you been doing that uh let's see 15 years now okay so uh five years from now what will your income be what's your trajectory on your income is it not going up uh yeah it not going up? Yeah, it's going up. Now that you made store manager, you're going to see this 56 turn into 76 fairly soon, aren't you? Yeah, that's what I'm hoping for.

Yeah, and so the 15% or the 15-year being 25% of your take-home pay is going to solve itself with your income going up. If you were working for the government and you were going to get a 3% of your raise, I'd be more concerned, but your trajectory on your income is going to solve the math problem for us, not this year, but within three years. So you're going to be just fine there. And I love it. You just called that, Dave. You've already, you know, you've got someone here trying to do the math and saying it's pushed from your 25%.

We're already over that. We're just being honest about it now, right? That 25% take-home pay. math and say this puts you more 25 we're already over that we're just being honest about it now right that 25 the 25 don't buy a house on a 15 year fixed where the payment is more than a fourth of your take-home that's right but when you already own the house it's like someone says oh when i sell my car i'm gonna lose six thousand dollars on it because i owe six thousand more than it's worth right no honey you've already lost it that's right when you sell the car you just admitted it that's right but it's already gone and that's the case here there you know it's the same thing you're already there by just restructuring it now we're saying ouch this

house was a pinch um even with a better interest rate it was a pinch but it's not going to remain that way because the trajectory of your income so i'm doing it anyway i love it game on instagram from jacklyn here's a good one riddle me this how do i make sure that my dad with severe depression feels loved even when he treats me badly purposefully and purposefully says hurtful things to me you got to draw hard boundaries there people need to feel love but they don't have permission to hurt you in route to that love right and so you may write him a letter you may hold firm boundaries but you number one don't let anybody hurt you with or without your permission so you don't solve his depression by getting abused absolutely not becoming a punching bag as a matter of fact that will

probably harm his depression it will make it worse because he makes him feel like the schlep that he is. So what somebody like that needs is really firm boundaries from someone that cares about them, and they will lean up against those boundaries and see if they're real and if they hold and if they're firm. And then if you write them a letter, they can hold something, right? It's tangible. They can see it and then go back to it and then go back to it. And as they get well, as he puts in the work that only he can put in then he can he can reinterpret that letter over time but yeah so what's the letter sound like dear dad things are dark and i want you to know that i love you i have and things have been hard

and you haven't treated me fairly over the years you haven't treated or maybe not fairly you've hurt me over the years and i want you to know i forgive you and i love you and it's short and it's sweet and it's direct you may not even have to to include the abuse part in there but just let somebody know that they're loved that they can circle back to it and circle back to it okay so that's the encouragement correct without the uh physical presence to allow the abuse absolutely not okay and so you're standing there later in the kitchen because it's Christmas, and he says something nasty. Then we will already have, me and my family, already have had that discussion,

and we will pack up our things and we'll walk out the door. And I will not go on a vacation where I don't have enough money to go to a hotel with an abusive family member that um i can't leave right i won't have already had that conversation with my wife right um and it'll be no fanfare there'll be no drama i'm the one that went into that knowing this could happen we're going to pack my things up i'm not going to hold it too tightly and then we're going to go nobody has permission to hurt me or my family and that starts with my boundary so it's up front um you know we don't we, you know, we're not going to do this.

Correct. So if you're going to do this, that's going to mean we can't be here. Correct. So I don't have anybody abusive in my family, but I've got a whole herd of people coming to my house. And I sent an email saying, here's where everyone's sleeping arrangements are going to be. Here's what they're going to look like, who's going to share a bathroom and who's not. Here's what we will not talk about while we're here. And here's what we are going to do while we're here, which is going to be low-key and peaceful and chill.

And we're going to be respectful. We're going to spend a lot of time outdoors. And I want to give everybody notice up front. You are free to not come, and we're going to love you. And if that's not where you're at this year, great. But I don't want people to come and be surprised and then there to be tension. I'm just going to call it what it is before everybody gets there. And that's me trying to have boundaries and be mature

and know what I'm getting with my lovely family who's coming in. The number of times grown kids go back to their old home and who sleeps where is a problem. There's probably a book in that. Of course there is. Wow. And it's strange, too. Right. This's probably a book in that. Of course there is. Wow. And it's strange, too. Right.

This is the Dave Ramsey Personality, best-selling author of the book, Redefining Anxiety, What It Is, What It's Not, and How to Get Your Life Back. Tyler is with us. Tyler is in California. Hi, Tyler. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. Dr. John Deloney. So nice to talk to you guys. You too, sir. You too. What's up? Just want to first say my wife and I are so thankful for everything you guys do at Ramsey Solutions and just really appreciate it. Well, thank you.

So my question today, yeah, my question today is I inherited a trust that was set up from my grandfather who passed away when I was a baby. And my wife and I just aren't quite sure what we want to do with it. So I thought we'd call you and see if you have any advice. I would use it for where you are on the baby steps. Okay. Where are you? you are on the baby steps. Okay. Where are you? So we're on baby step seven. Oh, well, then you're down to investing, right?

So how much is in the trust? There's a little, it's right around $219,000. And what's it invested in? So it's broken into 33 of its cash, 15 is in a CD, and 170 is in bonds. Okay. So we know it's not invested in what you teach and what we have our other retirement stuff invested in. Yeah. So I would sit down with a SmartVestor Pro, and I would make a plan for investing it.

I only invest in two things, growth stock mutual funds and real estate that i pay cash for those are the only two things i invest in i don't i don't play any other stuff i'm not a big player i'm kind of boring and because i discovered most people that are wealthy are boring with their money they're not flash and dash and they don't have all these plans and all the stuff they talk about the golf course stuff they talk about at the golf course. People talk about stuff at the golf course are like people that say they caught a big fish. They're full of crap.

And, um, they just, they're mouthing off and they, they're act like they got something they don't have. The guy that says he hadn't got any money, grab your wallet. Cause he's probably got some,

uh, so, you know, that's, that's the kind of stuff we look at there. So just, I'm boring and I give you permission to be boring. And then there's only three things you can do with money.

Invest it, give it, and live it. And you ought to do all three all the time with all your money. You need to enjoy some of it. You need to be generous with some of it. And you need to be investing it at all times. You could do that off of the proceeds that this creates in terms of the income that this $200,000 invested creates. Maybe it creates a couple thousand dollars a month that you fund money. We're going to do something lifestyle with it.

We're going to be outlandishly generous. We're just going to walk up and pay for people's gasoline at the gas station. Just blow about 10 people's mind an hour just for the fun of it. I mean, you just go do fun stuff. I mean, just blow, you know, have some crazy, outrageously generous moments. And, by the way, you should budget for that. It's not necessarily random or impulsive. When it happens might be, but you ought to just be walking around with a couple grand in your pocket at all times going,

hmm, what you up to today, God? And you can do that stuff when you're on baby step seven and you got $200,000 from your grandpa. Well done, sir. That's cool. Yeah, it sets you up in a different thing. You'll start seeing stuff when you budget for it. Because you have to intentionally look for it and where you're looking for positive things,

negative things, people that you can help, people that are out to get you. when you're looking for it, that's what you're going to find, right? That's what you're going to see. Yeah, it's the old thing, the reticular activator thing. You know, I start looking at buying a green car, and all of a sudden I see green cars everywhere. Everywhere, that's right. It's the same thing. And so, same thing here. looking for the opportunity to be randomly generous, you start hearing three aisles over in the grocery store, a kid crying, and you look over and mom is crying,

and the card was denied three times, and you go, that bucket or basket of groceries is on me. I got that one. And you get to have these moments when you've got the money walking around, and you're maybe step seven, you've got no payments. House is paid for. That's what that means. Way to go, man. Way to go. You're killing iticole is with us in new york city hi nicole how are you

hi dave thank you for taking the call sure how can i help so um i recently received inheritance from my mother um she passed away earlier this year from COVID. And so my husband and I, every once in a while, we sit down and look at our bills. For me, I don't have any credit cards. I just have my student loans and the house. And what I discovered, my husband wasn't able to give me any money because at one point he had gotten into so much debt, he got a consolidation loan, and plus he had his alimony and child support, which are now done. So, you know, I do the bills, and I sit down with the bills every month, and every once in a while he wasn't doing it with me, so I finally just said outright, like, what is your debt? Because there's no money coming in from your side.

And now he's back in debt again. So with the inheritance, I'm trying to decide whether I should pay off my student loan. I mean, the payment's like $800 a month or really aggressively attack the mortgage because I'm a little concerned about the future. We're both 50. Yeah. How much student loan debt do you have? $118,000. And what is your income? I make $150,000. What's your husband make?

About $150,000. So $230,000 household income. Yes. And your inheritance is how much? $75,000. And how much debt does he have? He has right now, what he told me recently, is about $82,000 in credit cards. Okay.

All right. You can't make enough or strategize enough to come out of this disaster with your skin intact unless he stops being stupid. Right. You cannot. There's not a strategy that will offset him overspending and mismanaging at the level that he is. It's kind of like saying he's got cancer and it doesn't affect me. Yeah, it does. When somebody's got cancer, everybody in the house is affected. They don't all have cancer, but they all are impacted by the fact that there's cancer in the house.

And, Nicole, your question about paying off your house sounds like it's a question rooted in safety. Defensive mechanism, because you think he's going to continue to screw up, or he's going to bail on you. Well, earlier in our marriage, we've been married eight years. He did have an affair, and he left the house. So we reconciled in 2018, but I told him, there's a reason why you have a patent every two years, just getting in crazy debt with credit cards, and so we're back at that same point.

Okay, have you guys seen a marriage counselor? I was suggesting one. He hasn't. Okay. There's two things. Here's the answer to your question then, okay? You do not need to pay off your mortgage, and you do not need to pay off your student loans. You need to park the inheritance in a separate account with your name on it only,

and you need to demand marriage counseling, and the two of you need to get on the same page, and you need to see a bright, hopeful future together. And then when you do that, then the two of you need to combine your incomes and combine your goals and combine your problems. Your student loan problem, his former credit card debt problem, because he no longer is going to have one after you go through Ramsey Plus and Financial Peace University together, and both of you are on the same team.

If your husband is unwilling to do all of these things, see, nothing can remain at status quo. It can't remain where it is. So your marriage is either going to get worse or it's going to get better. I'm telling you to take some steps to make it better and get the two of you on the same page with a joint set of goals, financially, emotionally, maritally, everything else. You do not have those now.

You got one foot out the door in divorce because the way you're preparing all of your money stuff is as if this is ending. When you got back in touch, when you got back together with him in 2018, it sounds like you hedged that relationship. Yep. That you were going to split money, you were going to keep doing your thing, but you would take this guy back because either you were lonely or you missed him. Is that fair? Well, actually, when he came back, I was like, okay,

we'll put the accounts back together again because he had separated them, and then he just chose not to put the accounts back together again. So that's since 2018. Yeah. There are fractures in your relationship that are causing you to play defense, and I'm telling you, you can't play defense enough to solve those. You've got to solve those one way to other. You're all going to fall in those cracks.

Yeah. You're going to end this thing because it won't work, or you're going to bring it together and heal it and figure out with some help how to do that, and then you can have some joined goals. In the meantime, I'm parking this money over the side because I don't know what you're going to be facing. Next 12 months is going to be rowdy.

I know that. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Have a friend or family member that needs a daily dose of Ramsey advice in their life? Let them know about the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast. It's a quick hit of advice about life and money in under 10 minutes. Check out the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.