The Ramsey Show - App - Don't Play the Credit Card Game! (Hour 3)

Episode Date: July 29, 2020

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studio, this is the Dave Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life and your money. My name is Anthony O'Neill, Ramsey personality, and sitting in with me, co-hosting with me today, is number one national best-selling author, also a Ramsey personality, and also one of the best speakers out there when it comes to women and helping ladies really get control of their life, Christy Wright. Hey, this is fun. This is a marathon of me and you today.

We started out with a shoot for the Christy Wright Show. We've been on the show today. This is fun. Yes, yes, and your show was fun. I can't wait for that one to come out. America's going to love this one. I keep saying America. I mean, I know James, our producer over there, said, Anthony, we're reaching people in Africa and London.

Stop saying America. Well, everyone who's listening right now. There you go. There you go. You got it. This is going to be a great show that Christy is doing on her YouTube show. So I want y'all to definitely go out there. And we have an hour.

We have an hour to talk to you about your life, your money, um, taking your questions, taking your questions. Give us a call. 888-255-225-888-255-225. And I don't care where you are in life. You can ask us any question. Uh, give us a call. Kelly Stamps. Uh, she's on the phone lines right now. I got in trouble last week for saying anyone can call. I'm just saying if you have a question, try and give us a call. And Kelly will let me know if we can take your phone call. Well, 888-825-5225. And we're going to go out to Washington, D.C., and have a conversation with Henry.

And, Henry, how can Chrissy and I help? Hi, how are you? Great. What's going on? So I'm a rising sophomore in college, and I'm at the point in my life where everyone is telling me, get a credit card and build your credit score. Crazy people. Sure they are, Henry. I know.

I don't intend to do that. But my question is, how can I put myself in a position right now where once I graduate from college, I'll be able to get a house or rent an apartment and get a car without a credit score? That's a good question. And let's live right there. I'm going to try and keep my cool down because people are giving you some stupid advice. But I'm going to give you the wise wisdom here. That's a great question. And I love the fact that you're thinking about what can I do to build to myself so where I can get to a house. I think the number one thing you need to be worried about right now, Henry is graduating college, 100% debt free. So where are you with that?

Are you taking out student loans for school right now? Or is college paid for with zero debt? No, I'm on the path to get through debt, debt free. There we go. There we go. There we go. What's your degree going to be in?

It's going to be in computer science. Computer science. What's your career going to be? I'm not sure yet. I'm thinking about going into medical school afterwards, but I could always go into a computer science field into software engineering. Okay, cool.

Here's the thing, because when i was your age this i fell for this trap get a credit score guy gave me two free large pieces one free t-shirt and i'm thinking it was just an emergency credit card and it turned into an emergency fund card okay when i met everything was an emergency yes everything was emergency when i met a young lady that's an emergency i gotta take to take her to Red Lobster. I got to impress her. You know? The next day after I took her on a date, and I'm being honest with you, Henry, it was an emergency.

I got to send her flowers so she can like me more. That was an emergency. You know? Then she's like, oh, thank you for the flowers. She's so nice. I said, okay, cool. I got another emergency, and I bought her a purse. And before I knew it, I was in fifteen thousand dollars of emergency credit card stuff.

And here's the truth, Henry. And here's what I want everyone to hear me saying right now. The credit score you hear Dave said is all the time. You said this, too, as well. Chris is I love debt score. And I say this. This is a I really love debt score because your credit score teaches you and it shows nothing how is it that you can have zero dollars in your bank account but you have all this debt and you have an 800 credit score and that doesn't mean you're financially successful right so henry here's how you win here's how you set yourself up to win i'm going all over the place right now because i'm so passionate about this message with young people okay um do this graduate college debt free okay put some money in your savings account right

now all right when you're ready to purchase a house you what you're going to do is you're going to look for a bank we endorse church here mortgage here what they do is they do manual underwriting i have a loan uh when it comes to my mortgage. I put down a lot of money, you know, and I finance it for a short period of time and I'm going to pay it off. But they manually underwrite loans for mortgages. And did I have to go through maybe an extra few steps? Absolutely. I did because I had to show them that I'm good with my money. And so that's how you win. But you can survive. You can rent a house without a credit score. You can rent an apartment without a credit

score. Would you have to put down maybe an extra deposit? Yes, you do. But you will be successful. Will not having a credit score adversely affect the interest rate? I mean, am I going to put myself in a position where the interest rate's way higher because I won't have a credit score? I'm not going to lie to you. Yeah, it's not going to be that much. You know, is my credit score? It was not my credit score. Is my interest rate on my home mortgage probably a little bit more? Absolutely. But it's not about what you're paying a month. It's what are you paying long term? So when I pay off my house, I'm saving so much money compared to someone who has an 800 credit score with a 30 year fixed rate mortgage. Okay. Because I'm paying my loan off

within a matter of seven years, seven to 15 years, what we recommend here, I'm going to save so much money on that end. And so I don't want you to worry about the interest rate. What I want you to do is worry about, okay, how do I do this? I'm going to get a fixed rate. I'm going to finance it for 15 years. I'm going to live below my means. My mortgage payment is not going to be above 25% of my take-home pay. That's going to set you up for success. Now, will your not having a credit score prevent you from getting an apartment? No. Will they make you required to put down an extra deposit on your apartment? Yes. But that's why we teach half three to six months of expenses and emergency funds so that way you can have that money to put towards it so what we're saying is we want to help you long term okay that's the goal and that's the thing right there

but man thanks so much for calling in henry that was a great question and you got me fired up man this man got me fired up i got young people looking at me right now smiling like get them and i'm not going after him i'm going after them i know i know can we talk about this because this is one of the things that i hear all the time you know many people don't know this ao but even before the ramsay personalities were a thing there was a speakers group here i was one of the speakers we were all speaking on money i travel all over talk about this and people would say to me you know i get a question like so you don't have a credit card? I'm like, no. They're like, you literally don't have. I'm like, literally, how do you breathe?

How do you live? How do you travel? I'm like, I've got a debit card. It does the same thing. So here's the thing. With this whole credit score, let's just camp here. And I want to hear your thoughts because I haven't heard you teach on this directly recently, Ayo. But what most people don't realize is the credit score is made up of length of debt, type of debt, how often you pay off your debt.

It's all things debt. Now, here's what's interesting that I want people to understand. This is a psychological problem. So when credit card companies that are in big buildings, in big cities, they create a game called points and rewards. They're not doing it out of the goodness of their sweet little hearts because they want to help you out because they love you. They're doing it because they win the game every time. So all of you college students that think I'm going to win this game, you're not. Avoid the game.

Take the game off the table. Credit cards, credit score off the table. Save and pay cash, and you will control your future instead of them. I have nothing else to say. Well, we have time, so it's good. But Chrissy Wright said, don't play the game. So let's just listen to what Chrissy's saying. Don't play the game and build wealth.

I like it. We'll be right back. you know what disappoints and angers me to no end as folks are going through some pretty hard times identity thieves are using every opportunity to prey on us. With everything that's going on, thieves are setting up fake websites posing as government officials to get your personal info and claim your benefits and services. They're also sending phishing emails to download malware so they can steal your banking details, your money, or your personal info. The scams are endless. ID thieves are unrelenting and you need to be prepared. Zander's ID theft protection is the only plan I have ever recommended, and I've looked at them all.

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and casey van from youtube is asking me a good question and i told casey i will answer the question and this question is i am taking on graduate school it is going to cost me thirteen thousand eight hundred and eighty dollars i am serving the church okay i'm also working and taking one class at a time while learning to adapt to a new city and state in three days. That's a lot. What can I do to get my master's degree paid for without having to feel burned out and tired and emotional and scared all at the same time like I am right now? And I'm going to address this, but Christy, you don't really believe in the word balance. You believe in priorities.

Yeah, it's a different definition of balance, I would say. It's creating your own version of balance where you're not doing everything, but you're doing the right things. And then what's cool about that is when you align your time with the right things, your priorities in that season of life, then you can be crazy busy, but you feel that sense of balance. Because the opposite is also true. You can be doing just a handful of things, but if they're the wrong things, AO, you feel stressed and out of balance. So it's not so much about managing or doing everything for an equal amount of time. It's about doing the right things at the right time. But that's a great point. So I think that's interesting because what I think of a lot of people specific to even paying for graduate school,

people don't realize there's a lot of creative options. There is. I remember when I was at, I went to UT Knoxville, and in that graduate program there, they had like a graduate assistant program where you could work for the graduate school, and it offset, it wasn't just like an hourly thing, it actually offset your tuition by a

lot. Like, you got a discount on your tuition, getting paid for the work that you're doing, you know, helping with grading papers or projects or whatever. So I would just encourage her to find, you know, some, some other options in addition to what she might be doing. Absolutely. And Casey, this is what I recommend. And again, thanks for watching this on YouTube. Chrissy and I appreciate you. I will identify your priorities. You know, you do have a lot going on right now. You just moved to a brand new city. You know, you're serving in a church, you know, and I love the fact that you're serving. You also are getting adjusted to, you know, your new job here in that brand new city.

I'm asking myself, do I need a master's degree right now? You know, and if I do not need it, if it's something that I really want, then I'm going to actually just pause the master's degree. I'm going to sit here pause the master's degree. I'm going to sit here and just get adjusted to my new world, get adjusted to my new life. And then from there, then I'll do what Chrissy was saying, like, hey, find some creative ways to take care of this $13,880. Maybe your job will help out. Maybe you can find some scholarships and grants out there that will help out in this situation. But I would try and figure out what are the priorities. Stick to those priorities.

And right now, moving to a new city, my number one priority is getting adjusted to that move. That's good. And it goes back to what you said about this idea of priority. So if you were to, and this is a good exercise for anyone watching or listening right now, sit down and write down your top five priorities in this season. This doesn't have to be true in five years. It doesn't have to be true in five years.

It doesn't have to be true five years ago. What is true right now? I'll give you an example, Ayo, and this is me being super transparent on air. Some people may not agree with this. I don't volunteer in my local church right now. I have three children under the age of six. So I support our church through tithing.

I support our church through other creative ways, like connecting with some of the staff and leadership on like one-off events. Yes. But I'm not there every Sunday working parking or in the kitchen. I'm trying to wrangle my own kids. So you could look at that and be like, oh, well, that's selfish or volunteering is not a priority. No, volunteering is not a priority for me in this season.

Yeah. Now, when my kids are older and I have even just one or two children that can give themselves a bath that'd be a nice success milestone then I can start to work in some other things that are important to me in my life that reflect my heart but you you can do anything but you can't do everything and you certainly can't do everything at the same time so I just encourage people to identify your priorities in this season and then let your time reflect that and And it can change in the next season. So maybe right now, uh, it's the masters is not the priority,

but in a year it is. And we're going to go all in on that. So you have permission to focus. You also have permission to shift your priorities as your season of life changes. I think that would help take the overwhelm out of it. Love it. Love it.

Well, Hey, you can check us out on YouTube. If you want there, we're there every day, Monday through Friday live. Uh, but let's get back to the phone lines. Let's go out here to it. Well, hey, you can check us out on YouTube if you want. We're there every day, Monday through Friday, live. But let's get back to the phone lines. Let's go out here to Pennsylvania. Yeah, Pittsburgh, not Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh and have a conversation with Cheryl.

How can Christy and I help? Hi, Anthony and Christy. I'm 35. I'm single. I work in higher education. I make about $50,000 a year. I'm technically on baby step two, and I need some help with trying to figure out how to allocate some funds so that I can continue my degree and be able to cash flow it. Okay. How much debt are you in? I have $2,200 that I owe to Bank of America. I have a $100,000 mortgage. I do have about $10,000 in savings. I have a savings bond that I got when I graduated high school,

and that's about $780 that I could cash out. I also have a whole life insurance policy whose cash value is about $8,700. And I don't want to take any money out of my 403B, but I do have some money there too. Yeah, we're not going to touch none of that. So you only have $2,000 in consumer debt right now? Yes. Aside from your house? Okay.

Yeah. And you're making $50,000 a year. What do you do? I work in higher ed. I advise students. Okay. Okay, that's cool. And where do you want to get your master's degree in?

Like, is it something that you absolutely need right now? Actually, it's my doctorate degree. I have about five semesters left. Through my college, they're very generous, and I do have an ed benefit. And I calculated out what I thought the projection would be for, you know, kind of what tuition would be in the next five semesters, and I calculated that to be about $12,615. Okay, $12,000 will be your cost of school. What will your pay go up to?

So if you get this degree, you'll go from 50 to? It probably wouldn't change. Whoa. Why? Yeah. I really like where I work now. And unless I leave that position, I mean, there really aren't a lot of opportunities for me to advance. So then why do we want to spend another $12,000 if it's not even going to move the needle for me career-wise and money-wise? Yeah, that's the kind of things I'm struggling with. I really want to finish the degree, but I'm not sure if I should. Yeah.

Here's the thing, Cheryl. You know, sometimes we want to do things that they don't have a direct ROI. You know, it's like, well, this is just a hobby or this would just make me feel good, and that's okay. But I think you go into it knowing that, saying, I just want to do this because I just want to do it because I want to finish it because I want the title. I want the letters. I want to, you know, and maybe one day that does open up doors, but I think it just gives you permission to treat it. And we were just talking about priorities, treat it that way versus feeling like, oh, well,

this is something I have to do because it's going to, uh, you know, lead to a different pay or different position. But the good news is Cheryl, you can pay off your debt right now. I think you said you have $10,000 in saving. You can pay off that too right now with your income and the ed benefit. You can cash flow this. It's just a matter of managing your time if you want to. So you're actually in a really great position to do it if you want to. But like you said, Anthony, you don't have to. You need to keep it in check in terms of what it's going to do for you expectations-wise if you want to stay in this position. Cheryl, this is what you're going to do.

You're going to hang up the phone from Christy and I. You're going to take $2,200 away from that $10,000 right now. You're going to pay off that debt. And then what you're going to do is go ahead and map out and budget out on the EveryDollar app what just three to six months of expenses look like for you. You're going to put that into your savings account. From there, Cheryl, go get the degree if that's what you want.

That's right. Just walk into it knowing it's not going to benefit you. It's not going to make you any better. That's like me going to buy a luxury car. I'm going to drop the money. It's not going to make me any more money. It's going to drive just like any other car to get you there. So pay off the debt.

Go ahead. Get the three to six months of expenses set aside. And then go do what you want to do. And cash flow it. $12,000 is not a lot of money. Thank you so much for calling in. We'll see you next time. find out for yourself why blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window covering. You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos they run every month. You'll save even more. I want you to use the promo code Ramsey to get the best deal.

Rules and restrictions do apply, though. Christy, today's question comes from Nathan in Alabama. He visits DaveRamsey.com to ask you a question. Yeah, he says, I recently graduated college. During that time, I bought and resold cars and just cashed out at $15,000. My current student loan debt is roughly $15,000 as well.

However, I found a business that I can run absentee for sale for $50,000. The $15,000 that I have saved up is enough for the down payment and all the expenses I would incur to take the business over. The business has a net cash flow of 85,000 a year. Should I buy the business or pay off the student loan? Here's what's interesting. So often we get caught up and confused. It's like we're just talking about with priorities because we see the next shiny

thing, but here's the deal. The baby steps are in that order for a reason. So you're not in a position, Nathan, to buy a business because you have debt. So let's take care of the debt. Now, here's the good news. When you take care of the debt, it doesn't mean you're never going to buy a business. It doesn't even mean you can't buy this business at some point. It just means you're not going to buy this business today. But I would encourage you, one of the things that you can do, Nathan, in addition to paying off your debt, is you can talk with that business owner about maybe even restructuring the terms. One of the things that Dave Ramsey recommends often is if you're going to buy a business, you can pay the owner, the current owner, out of the profits. And then there's no risk.

You keep the business profitable, the profit goes back to that owner until the business is paid for. But you're not having this risk. You're not taking out loans. You know, so often, Anthony, people think that business debt is different than personal debt. I'm like, there's someone responsible for that debt, and that someone is you. So we don't recommend any type of debt. But what I would do, Nathan, is pay off the debt. And then if you want to talk to the owner of that business about possibly restructuring it where you pay out of the profits,

that's something you can explore if not save and pay for it in the future when you can cash flow it i love it i echo everything you just said christy going out to new york we'll have a conversation with dotty dotty good afternoon how can christy and i help dotty you there yeah oh yeah i. Hi. How can we help? How can we help? Sorry, y'all got out for a second. I'm sorry about that. I am calling because we are finishing up Baby Step 3 this week and looking at Baby Step 3B or Baby Step 4 and trying to determine if we should save up for two years to buy a good enough house that doesn't really fit

our family, but we could crunch into it and probably make it work or save up for four years for building or buying a house that better fits our family size. It's probably important to note we have six children, five of whom are under 10. Dottie, that is important to know. Yes, that's very important. So we don't fit in simple little three-bedroom houses too easily. We need a little bit more space than that. Dottie, you know what I hear? You know what I hear from you?

I hear that you've already answered your own question. Pretty much. You've got six kids. Moving is expensive. Kids are expensive. Moving with kids is a headache and expensive I don't think you want to do that two times in four years do you Donnie um not really I mean you do you do what you want you can make an argument either way but the practical side is

numbers aside your family dynamic I hear in your voice well we wouldn't really fit we have six kids moving you're telling me all the reasons you shouldn't move. It just sounds like you just kind of could move, but it sounds like it would be a better fit, more exciting, better for your family, less stress for your family. If you saved up for the house that you really need for a little bit longer and who knows, Dottie, who knows what could happen with your income in four years. A lot can change in four years. The kids are older, hopefully a little easier in four years. And you may be able to even hit that goal a little sooner. Maybe it's three years. Maybe your income improves or you get really gazelle intense. So I don't think it has to be four years. But I think you might be

disappointed if you move into a house you don't really want and put your kids and your family through that stress. And it's expensive, too, just the moving, the practical side of moving. But that's just what I hear in you. What do you hear, Ayo? Dodd, let me ask you this question. What's your household income right now? About $65,000.

Okay, $65,000. And how much of a house, if you waited for four years, do you think you would want to buy? How much would a house, if you waited for four years, do you think you would want to buy? How much would it cost? Probably about $320,000. Well, $320,000 to $350,000 probably in this area. $350,000. And we recommend putting down anywhere between 10% to 20%. So you're looking at anywhere between about $ to $70,000. Do you think with your income right there of $65,000,

if you all actually got some more income saved up because three B is pretty much set aside 10 to 20% to put down. If you all got an extra job, maybe some extra income coming in. Do you think you can actually get there within three years? If you all really went gazelle intense, like Christie said, could you can actually get there within three years? If you all really went gazelle intense like Christy said, could you all really get there within three years? I

am not confident in that. Okay. I am confident in four years. Okay. All right. All right. I think just the kids need a break probably. Okay. At this point just the kids need a break probably. Okay. At this point, it took us a long time to get to where we are and a lot of no's and a lot of missed opportunities and it's better for them.

But I think that we need a break. Then there you go. Not a big break. Nothing crazy. Not a vacation or anything crazy. But just to be able to say yes occasionally would be amazing. Totally. Let me ask you this, Dottie, one more question. I should have asked this when you very first started talking. If you moved into this good enough house that you could move

into in two years, is that somewhere where you would want to stay maybe five or six years, or would you still be on the ideal house in four years plan? I should have clarified that with you. I'm sorry. We'd probably still be on the ideal house in four years plan. Okay. I'm just thinking of... Also playing into that is changing schools for the kids again. Right. Yeah. Closing costs and movers and everything to get a house set up. I mean, you have to calculate that into the math of all of it. If she was going to stay maybe five years in the good enough house, you might make an argument for going ahead and moving. But I think if you're still – you're moving in four years anyway,

so just save yourself the cost of moving halfway there. Absolutely. Stay right there. You'll be all right. Going out to Chicago, we're going to have a conversation with my favorite name, Anthony. Anthony, welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. How can Christy and Anthony help you out? Guys, so grateful you could take my call today. So I am confused if I should be on baby step three or four right now. The situation is I got

a severance check from this job I'm transitioning out of. Because of that, I got to pay off all my debt, and I currently have four months of expenses saved up. The issue is I'm yet to get the job that I'm moving towards, and so I don't know if I should keep it at three, work with that extra month I have, or as soon as I get a job, focus on getting my retirement set up. So I was curious what you guys thought. So right now you're saying you don't have a job, but you have some extra money, and you're trying to figure out if you should invest this money or should you sit on this money until you get an actual job with some income coming in, correct? Yeah, correct. I've been living off my severance as of recent just because the job hunt is really weird right now.

Yeah. But I want to make sure that I'm setting myself up for success during my unemployment. Yeah. So right now, we want you to do that. We don't want you to go out there and invest, make any large purchases. We want you to cover your four walls and live. And the four walls is your rent. That's going to be your utilities. That's going to be your transportation.

That's going to be your food. We want you to be your transportation. That's going to be your food. All right? We want you to cover those. So don't worry about investing right now. Okay? What I want you to do is go out there and actively find another job, get you some income coming in on a consistent basis. Once that is there, you have four months. You know, you sound young, Anthony.

You sound like a young, sharp young man. I don't have a problem with you going ahead and just sticking with that four months and honestly honestly, then start investing, moving on to baby steps four, five, six and seven. Because, again, we do all those at the same time, especially four, five and six. All right. So you're in a good place, man. I mean, you're in a safe place. You have that cushion. Go ahead and live with that cushion. Be a good steward with the money, though. Do not just waste the money. I want you to be wise with that money and you'll be all right. And congratulations on being debt free. That's awesome. I mean, I love how he did money, and you'll be all right. And congratulations on being debt-free. That's awesome.

I mean, I love how he did that. He got his severance package and paid off all of his debt. He's like, I'm out of here. That's a wise man. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. 888-825-5225 888-825-5225 I'll have enough time for about one or two more questions. Give us a call if you have questions.

But we're going to go to our scripture and quote of the day and then back to the poems. Yes. This is from Isaiah 35.4. Our scripture of the day is, Say to those who have an anxious heart, be strong. Fear not. Behold, your God will come with vengeance. With the recompense of God, he will come and save you.

Les Brown says, Too many of us are not living in our dreams because we're living in our fears. Oh, man. Love it. Let's go out to Ohio and have a conversation with Sherry. Sherry, good afternoon. How can Christy and I help?

I was just wondering, my husband, he's controlling, I think. He takes all the money except for $100 he gives me. He takes my paycheck, takes his paycheck. He takes all the extra money that comes in the house. He takes all of it. He wants to retire, so he thinks he can do this. He wants to pay off our house, which we're really close to paying off our house. I was just wondering, am I thinking wrong that I don't think I should bow over and give him my whole paycheck and live on $100 for two weeks? I mean, my husband, I think it's to the point where

he doesn't even care if I eat at work, just as long as he gets what he gets, like my paycheck and all the extra money that's coming in. And I'm kind of sick of it. Sherry, are you okay? Yeah. I mean, like as you're saying this to me, does that sound normal to you? It does not sound normal to me. Let me ask you this. I just want to dig into this with you.

How did we get here? How did we get here? Was it like an overnight thing or was it like gradually, incrementally, he started to take more control? Was this agreed on? Like I feel like there might be a a backstory here that I might need to understand because I will tell you this is not normal. But I want to know how we got to this place. Well, when I was a child, I grew up in an abusive situation.

And my dad gave me whatever I wanted whenever I wanted it. So I felt like when I want something, I want it. I went to work full time because I wanted extra money so I could buy things that I wanted. I didn't have to listen to him. Tell me you're spending my money. You're spending my, my paycheck. I didn't want that. So I went to work so I could pay for the stuff that I wanted. And then he came up with this theory that he should take my paycheck and give

me a hundred dollars. It's just, it's not working that way. It's not working for me that way. Yeah. Yeah. This is, there's some deep stuff going on here, Sherry. I want to, I want to call it, there's, there's, this is so much more than about money. Okay. The money you're seeing evidence in the, in the, in the problem of money. And I want to affirm that the, the situation, the arrangement that you guys are in right now is not normal. I would say it is not healthy. Okay. How you got here, I'm sure is by degrees, by years, a major lack of trust. Now here,

I want to call this out. Now this is, you didn't trust him because you don't want to be told what to do. So you got your job. You had your money. You wanted to spend things. That created an unhealthy cycle where he doesn't trust you, and now he's taking your money. We've gotten to a very unhealthy place where you all are not a team, and there's no trust. And so I'm going to recommend a couple things, Sherry. I'm definitely going to recommend counseling. So out of that budget that he apparently feels

the need to 100% control himself, I would like to recommend that you insert a line for counseling for both of you. Because I guarantee you that you're seeing this be a problem in your finances, but it's a problem in a lot of other places in your marriage. And you shouldn't be in this position where you're worried you're not going to eat and you're given an allowance of $100. And so we need to dig into the layers of what got you here as a couple and get to a healthy place where you're a team, where both of you, you and your husband, are speaking into the budget. You have a say in the budget.

Your values are represented in the budget. Your money is managed with both people speaking into it. No one should control the other person. That is not a healthy marriage. It's not a healthy way to manage finances. So I want to recommend that you guys get in counseling number one first and foremost and budget for that and second of all I want to recommend that immediately you all change the agreement that you all have and your husband's gonna have to be okay

with this he may not like my advice and I he may not like it but you both need to be a team so you you sit down, you manage the bank account together, you have access together, you set a budget together, you honor the budget, the bank account, and each other through your spending, through your activity. And you honor him, Sherry, and he honors you. And that's going to take some trust, which is going to be hard when you guys have been operating this way. But I would say a very practical thing is to begin to change this arrangement where you are not a child. This is not a dictatorship.

That's not a marriage. That's not what this looks like on a very practical sense. But you need to get in counseling to figure out why and how you got here and how to fix this at a much deeper level than the budget. But I don't want you to wait until counseling does its work to where you're no longer living on an allowance. I want that to fix today. I want you, I want you both to have access to the money that you both earn as a team today and the budget you create together today.

He can have goals that are represented in the budget, but you have goals that are represented in the budget. And that is what being a team means. And you both agree on it and you both honor it and you both live within it while getting counseling to help with the deeper issues, because there's a lot of deeper issues that are going to continue to be a problem in your finances and in other aspects of your life. If we don't fix this at the root level, the budget will not fix the root level. That's my quick answer for you to stop having an allowance today. But, but getting in counseling will fix it at the root level. And I, I hate that you got here, Sherry, because it shouldn't be like this. Managing your money, being married, that doesn't sound fun at all. And I'm sorry for whatever happened on his part, your part, your past, his past that got you to this point.

It shouldn't be this way, and it doesn't have to continue to be this way. And I just want you to know that you can change it. He has to be on board. He has to participate. He has to cooperate. He has to listen. And if he really loves you, he will. He will listen. He will honor you because that's what you do in marriage. I don't know. I mean, I definitely want to be sensitive to what, what I'm going to say, because I don't want to be disrespectful, but I agree with you.

It's hard to hear, isn't it? Yeah, it really is. And it's for me, I love the counseling part, but as a man, I feel as if he needs one-on-one counseling as well. Okay. Yeah, that's probably true for both of them, honestly. For both of them, yeah. Because just coming from a spiritual perspective, you know, it's our responsibility as a man is to love our wife, the way Christ loved the church and Christ loved us so much from my faith, uh,

that he died for us. And I'm like, there are certain things inside of the man, our personalities, our minds that we have to die to for our spouses. And I just feel as if maybe Sherry, he can just, if he's willing to,

which I would encourage him to, um, to just maybe Sherry, he can just, if he's willing to, which I would encourage him to, to just maybe just step back and just say, you know what you said this earlier today, like I have some blind spots. Let me work on some things that I need to get better at so we can have a healthier relationship, a healthier marriage and a healthier family. Yeah. It, it, it create, if we're not careful in any marriage you can get in these unhealthy cycles where i don't trust you so i act this way that makes you distrust me so you act that way that reinforces my lack of trust it becomes this unhealthy downward spiral i do want to um acknowledge that i'm really happy to hear that um sherry is safe yes she is okay kelly confirmed

that this is she is okay yeah but this is a problem, and they need to fix it. It's a huge problem. And we'll be praying for them because that's a big deal. Huge, huge, huge, huge. Well, I want to thank our producer, James Childs, and associate producer, Kelly Daniels. She didn't get upset at me today, so I did a good job. Remember, the caliber of our financial future will be determined by the choices we make today. This is The Dave Ramsey Show.

This is James Childs, producer of The Dave Ramsey Show. Once again, you made The Dave Ramsey Show one of the top four most popular podcasts last year. To get your daily dose of motivation and inspiration from the Ramsey Network, subscribe or follow today wherever you listen to podcasts.