The Ramsey Show - App - Everyone Makes Financial Mistakes – Don’t Let Yours Define You

Episode Date: May 21, 2025

📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Are you on track with the Baby Steps? Get a Free Personalized Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Jade Warshaw and George Kamel answer your questions and discuss: "How do we move forward with a bridge loan and a house that isn't sold?" "My wife wants a divorce. How do I handle my finances while going through this?" Jade and George discuss their biggest financial mistakes, "My husband and I don't agree on where to live in retirement. How do we come to an agreement?" "Should I sign up for a debt relief program?" "My realtor doesn't want me to sell my rental. Is she right?" "How do I cut up my credit cards when I love the reward points?" "My car was repossessed and sold. How do I pay off the balance now?" "Is it wrong to sell my wife’s engagement ring and band ? " Next Steps: ✅ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Help us make the show better by taking this short survey!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📞 Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 weekdays from 2–5 p.m. ET or ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠send us an email.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏠 ⁠Get organized and prepared to buy or sell a home.⁠ 💰⁠Hurry—Your chance to win $5k is almost over! Enter the Ramsey Cash Giveaway today!⁠ 💵 ⁠⁠Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app!⁠⁠ Connect with our Sponsors: 🛒 Stop paying more and start shopping smarter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Aldi⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🌱 Get 10% off your first month of⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ BetterHelp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📱Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Boost Mobile⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to switch today! 🏥 Learn more about⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Christian Healthcare Ministries⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏡 Get started today with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Churchill Mortgage⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🔒 Get 20% off when you join ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠DeleteMe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏦 Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ FAIRWINDS Credit Union⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for an exclusive account bundle! 🥗 Save 15% on your first ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Field of Greens⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ order with code RAMSEY ⛨ Find top Health Insurance Plans at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Health Trust Financial⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💸 To find out more about student loan refinancing, check out⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Laurel Road⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💻 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ NetSuite⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ today to learn more 🗂️ Use promo code RAMSEY for 18% off at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Nokbox⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵 Learn more about ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Timothy Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏛 Get started with ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YRefy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or call 844-2-RAMSEY 🔐 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Zander Insurance⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for your free instant quote today! Explore more from Ramsey Network: 💸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Ramsey Show Highlights⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🧠 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Dr. John Delony Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🍸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Smart Money Happy Hour⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💡 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Rachel Cruze Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💰 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Kamel⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🪑 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠EntreLeadership⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

from the Ramsey Network it's the Ramsey show the only live show where we talk about your life and your money with actual callers calling in George I am your host Jade Warshot next to me as I just said George as in George camel I am your host Jade Warshot next to me, as I just said, George, as in George camel. The no last name. I'm like, share George, the George taking calls about your life and money. Like I said, you can call in at any point,

the number triple eight, eight, two, five, five, two, two, five. If you call in and you have to leave a message, that's a good thing. It means we'll try to get you on the show at a later date. We're going to go straight to the phone lines where we have Brenda in Dallas, Texas. Brenda, how can we help today? Hi, I'm calling because in October of last year, my husband and I made the dumb, dumb, dumb decision of taking out a bridge loan to purchase a property. And it was with the idea that we would sell

our previous property and pay off the loan, restructure the loan, and everything would be great. But we haven't been able to sell our old property and the loan is due on June 1st. Interest has accrued like nobody's business. And- What was the interest rate and then what was the amount? So the total, they combined both properties,

came out to 1.4 through seven at 10.99. So we're looking at- 10.99? Yeah, so apparently bridge loans, they explained to us are always high interest like this. They're anywhere between eight and 12. Man. They even explained it to you and you guys said,

sign us up, let's do it. Well, that's how confident we were that we could sell our old house. Why isn't it selling? That's the million dollar question. We've knocked the price down a couple of times now. We are technically under contract, but our buyers cannot seem to lock in a buyer themselves.

And when they keep telling us that the market is just so weird, it's just such a bad time right now, it's a buyer's market, not a seller's. Yes. So, but shoot straight with like level with this. If you had to say, here's what I really think the problem is because I have a feeling that, you can usually look at a situation and go,

even though I don't like this, this is probably what's going on. What do you think is probably going on? Whether you like it or not? I mean, I think we listed too high. But then again, we were going off of the comparables, the appraisal report. And I don't know. off of the comparables, you know, the appraisal report.

And, you know, I don't know. I think the market over here, the people that can afford that price tag, they're looking for way more square footage. So while that house is very nice, because it's remodeled, we poured a lot of money and swam peers into it. It's a two acre property. It's got, you know, that country feel with Starbucks five minutes away all the amenities

But I think people are looking for more palatial homes in that area because we're surrounded by those types of homes got it God, this is an original. There's a lot of new development out here a lot of incentive So what are you hoping it sells for at this point? We have it at 995 and like I said, we've been with this under contract with a contingency offer for 40 days already. I mean, because they're in the same situation, they're making sure their deal goes through, right?

So that has the potential to have a major domino effect. And I would not say in George, you know, chime in just that the fact that it's taking 40 days, I wouldn't necessarily say that, oh my gosh, this thing's not going to happen because the truth is, yeah, your buyers are now waiting for their contingent. You know what I'm saying? Somebody might have made a contingent offer on their home. So this, this does have some issues. Now, what you could ask is if your realtor can say, Hey, if we go under contract with someone, is there a way to say we're also open to other offers

until there's, and then like put a stop loss on it? You see what I'm saying? And say, Hey, we can, but most of the time people, we have had open houses still, but because a lot of people on many of the apps, like Redfin and Zillow and whatnot, it is showing us under contract. It's showing us pending. Right, but you can make a deal.

You can still mark it as accepting offers too. Exactly, you can make a deal to where it's not like that, to where it still looks like it's open for anybody to make an offer. And then ask your realtor to say, okay, now we need to put a stop loss on this. Like you have 60, if it's a contingency, you have 60 days or you have 90 days.

And then after 90 days, we get to go to the next offer. That way you're always making sure you have people, priming the pump here and you can make this go faster. The other thing is, have you had the same realtor the whole time? Because I might be thinking about kicking that one to the curb and getting the Ramsey Trusted realtor. Well, I actually did contact Ramsey realtor not so long ago and he said at this point because of your situation you're better off sticking with the same person. Because there would be a delay if I switch to a new agent.

What kind of delay? What's that mean? Tell me more. Well, he is at pictures and the listing itself would take a few weeks for it to get going again. Yeah, you'd have to do new pictures. You can't take the old guy's work. But if you really feel like, I mean, you're the one calling us, right?

Saying something's not right. And they are the professional, not you. So they should be getting to the bottom of this a lot faster. Not us, not you having to call into a radio show for us to tell you what a realtor should have been telling you, basically is what I'm saying. Yeah. And my guess is, let's say you guys walk away from this

with, I don't know, $900,000 net. Yeah. Or is there still a900,000 net? Yeah. Or is there still a loan to pay off? Yeah, we have to come out of pocket for any different semi. So you're telling me on June 1st, the entirety of that loan is due? They gave us till June 4th,

because that was when escrow was supposed to close. Okay. But they haven't been able to secure buyers. But how are you gonna come up with that amount of money, even if you sold this house? We have a savings. Obviously we would have rather not. A hundred.

Okay. Can you negotiate an extension with the lender? That would be your best bet right now. Yeah. To attempt that. I mean, I've already asked and nobody seems to get back to me on that. Well, otherwise it's gonna go through foreclosure. Yeah, I'm just saying.

Because your house is the collateral here. Mm-hmm. So that's even scarier. So I'm wondering if they would work with you and say, hey, we can give you this much right now, would you be willing to file an extension buying us another month so that we can close and explain the situation?

Especially knowing that you're under contract, I would think. Yeah. And then put pressure on the buyer to say, hey, we us another month so that we can close and explain the situation. Especially knowing that you're under contract, I would think. And then put pressure on the buyer to say, hey, we need to close by this date in the contract, no matter what. Well, my question is also, is it better to just terminate this contract

and go back on the market and heck even- Why would you take the only fish on the line, off the line? What I'm telling you to do is you can open it up and say, still accepting offers. So it would say like contingent, still accepting offers. You can still get more offers. And if a buyer can close fast,

that's your ticket out of this thing. But nobody is offering anything. 40 days. Well, they won't offer anything if it says it's under contract. Yeah. And you do have a good offer. if it says it's under contract. Yeah. And you do have an offer. I know.

The description says active kickout is what the description on all of those says. The agent added that little piece. Right. But they need to change it to where it shows as totally open. And that is 100%. My husband and I have done that. It's possible to do that. And I also want to encourage you that 40 days for the contingent offer, if it's taken them 40 days, let's pretend that your contingent offer saw your house, loved

it, made an offer, and then the next day put their house on the market, right? It's not uncommon. Exactly. And what I want to give you hope for is that the average time for a house to be on a market before it sells is 50 days. Okay. So you're at 40, you've got a fish on the line. Don't throw it back because it's squir sells is 50 days. Okay, so you're at 40, you've got a fish on the line, don't throw it back because it's squirming a little bit, just keep reeling it in and while you reel it in, make sure that your house is showing as available on all the different apps out there so that people know.

Your realtor should know to do this. And if not, you need to be getting all up in their grill about this, George. You gotta fight. Fight and claw your way out of this thing. Don't go through foreclosure. No more hard money loans. Straight to the phone lines we go.

We got Randy in St. Louis, Missouri. Randy, how can we help you out? Kind of going through a really bad time right now. I'm at the beginning stages of a divorce, found out about an affair and I need to know what to be doing financially right now. Everything's been split up without me knowing. But another curve ball is about three weeks ago,

I was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Oh my goodness. So right now I just don't know what to be doing right now. Um, you know, I'm at peace. I know where I'm going to go if this happens, but I'm just kind of everything is just last couple of months has just been completely just flipped upside down and I need to know what to be. Thankfully, my job is pretty flexible. I can work, make my own schedule. I'm trying to work as much as I can, but some days I just don't feel well enough. We had gotten about $35,000, $40,000 of debt paid down, but I still have

a little bit and I still have about $10,000 in medical debt. So I just need to know what to be doing right now during this time. Okay. This is a lot. You just found out about this diagnosis. How long ago? About three weeks ago. Okay. Have you started treatment or not yet? Or how? I just, it's, it's terminal and I'm about to lose the insurance. So, um, uh, that's another

curveball. So when you say through my spout, there's, they're not even attempting to treat this. Is that what you're saying? Um, I won't have insurance and out of pocket, it's, uh, I can't afford it. And they tried to get me, uh, in the programs. I made too much to get any kind of assistance. So even with treatment, the survival time's about nine months. Oh my gosh. So there it's... Are you still on your wife's insurance?

Where you're saying that will end when the divorce goes through? Yeah, once the divorce goes through, which she's really pushing for, I will no longer be on the insurance. Okay, do you have kids? No. Okay, I think that my debt and my bills is the last thing I'm thinking about. If, if I found myself in your shoes.

I know this is a money show, but I think what I'm thinking is if, if I do pass and we are, I don't want my family, like my parents, to have to worry about that debt. I think that's what I'm thinking of right now. I don't want to worry about it. They won't. If their name's not on it, they're not gonna be liable for your debts. Your estate will pay the debts.

So whatever you have that's of value will be sold to pay your debts, and whatever doesn't get paid is just a washout. Because we don't, since we've done it, we don't have a lot saved up. I have a small life insurance policy, but obviously right now my wife's the benefactor and I've been told I can't switch it as long as we're legally married. I don't, that's just what the lawyer told me.

Yeah. I don't know. When you say small, how much is it? It's 250,000. Oh, 250. Okay. It's 250. And upon divorce, you can't switch the beneficiary?

I can upon divorce, but I don't. It's just yeah, I'm, I'm, I was kind of wanting to switch it beforehand just in case and have my parents be the benefactor just to make sure that, you know, all that's taken care of and that they're taken care of. But, you know, all that's taken care of and that they're taken care of. But, um, I've spoken to two different lawyers. I've, I've seen that you'd be getting like different answers. So I'm just really kind of confused right now. At the very least, I'd want to speak to somebody about designating some of it just for your last, um, you know, for burial and funeral and all of that. If you can specify maybe even in your will that of that 250 X amount is even for her to know

that way the executor of the will will make sure that she carries that out possibly. That might be a loophole. I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know. But that could be a way that you could at least make sure those costs are not put upon your parents in that you're taking care of that through that money? Yeah, because they're gonna be going through enough.

I don't wanna burden them with anything else. That's right. Is there a way to- Thankfully they took, thankfully they, I was actually, when this happened, I pretty much was kicked out and I was gonna live in my car, but thankfully they said no way.

So I've actually been able to live with them to keep costs down. But, you know, so they've been really my parents have been great through this. But, you know, it's not something that they have to share. They should have to be doing with this. But I'm just kind of, you know, just really overwhelmed by everything that's gone on and just, you know, a little bit just frustrated that I don't know what to do. Of course. Of course you would feel that way. Like, I mean, 100% this is a lot. This is a curve. This is a huge curve ball and it's, it's, yeah, I don't have to tell you. Um,

but yeah, it's rough on the coming because I'm only, I'm only 37 years old. So it's like, you know, I'm not, I'm not an old man. So it's like, uh, I'm trying to think through some creative things you can do here. Could you do a legal separation and that way you could stay on the insurance for the time being?

She doesn't wanna do that. She wants the divorce. She doesn't wanna do legal separation, anything like that. She wants a divorce. Does she know about your health? Yes. And she just about your health? Yes. And she just doesn't care? Pretty much.

Okay. How long have you guys been married? I don't know, we've been married half there, 16 years. Okay, so my guess is in your state, I don't know the laws, you'll need to look into that, but there's probably gonna be an equitable distribution of the assets and the liabilities. So likely you guys would just split the debts.

And so if that's the case, what is the total debt you guys will have? Pretty much she's debt free. Like I said, I've got about 1,500 on the credit card and about 9,700 in medical, because I've had a lot of medical issues last year so it's that so pretty much outside of that like I don't have a car payment what about a mortgage so no we didn't have a mortgage yeah we were renting okay so there's

nothing to split nothing to sell you've already moved out no yeah I'm at my parents house and she's already gotten her own place. Okay. Yeah, Randy, if I'm you then. If she's wanting. If I'm you, I'm. If she's wanting to. Go ahead.

I'm sorry, but I think she's wanting to split this so she can pursue with the other person that she's been with. So that's why she's wanting to get this done so she can marry this other guy. So- Yeah. I'm guessing it's gonna be impossible

for you to find health insurance with this condition now. Yeah, it's pretty good thing I've looked and the only place that would cover me, the premium was like $1,800 a month and I just can't afford that. And that's the only place they even would take a chance on me but I mean unfortunately what I have is I have a glioblastoma which is pretty much that's not the worst you can get as far as

brain cancer and even even if they could do surgery it's it's pretty much it's pretty much a terminal diagnosis. And they say without treatment, maybe four to six months. But even with treatment, it's not a lot of people even last a year. So unfortunately, as this progresses, I won't even be able to work anymore because, you know, it's going to affect my motor skills and everything. So it's, yeah. Man. Dude, I am, I'm praying for you now and I'm going to keep praying for you. I don't think the Lord is going to let you out of my spirit anytime soon. So just know, man, our thoughts

and prayers are with you. This is a tough, tough thing to go through. I admire you for trying to get the financial things in order so that your family is not feeling the burden of it. And you know, but I would say at this point, man, go, go enjoy life, go live to the fullest, make sure that you're around your loved ones and don't spend your days fighting this. Don't spend your like fight the cancer, but don't fight people. You know what I'm saying? Like this is not the time you want to spend

tangled up in a divorce war over assets and all these things. Let her go on and be with old boy and you just enjoy your time on this earth. Yeah. And if you do rack up any more debt, what's going to happen is your parents would get a bunch of death certificates

and they would give it to all of your creditors and lenders and they would just wipe the debts. And so I'm not as concerned with you like racking up a bunch of medical debt and your parents having to cover it. They're gonna give them the certificate and they eat the cost of that and write it off. And so again, I'm with Jade on this one.

You can do all the things you can to protect your finances, but right now, man, I mean, you've got a timeline and you gotta live. And so I wouldn't go into crippling debt for fun, but I also wouldn't try to like just grind my way out of this $1,500 in credit card debt in the meantime. You got a lot going on. I would just take care of Randy right now.

Heavier things, yeah. So sorry. You're listening to the Ramsey Show. So sorry. custom plan to help you dig out. Visit wirefy.com slash Ramsey today. That's Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. It may not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Lucas in Missouri. What is one of the biggest financial mistakes you've made? How did you feel in the moment and how did you work through it to recover? Dang, Lucas turned it on us.

It's getting, it's getting more povich up in here. A dark curiosity from Lucas. Yeah, we, you know, people see us at this desk, Jade, in the studio and they go, wow, these people have never made a mistake in their life. But we have made mistakes with zeros on the end, as Dave would say. I know that's right. I, I, I feel when the callers call in, usually I'm like, yep, done that. Like it's... Been there, paid the stupid tax. So now, biggest financial mistake I've made, I'll go first.

I was underinsured, I was on my dad's insurance when I first started here at Ramsey for car insurance. And I got into a little wreck right outside the office. And the lady was fine, let me make that very clear. But you had the cops rolling up, the fire trucks, the ambulance, and now every employee at Ramsey's looking out the window, seeing me sitting on a curb like, oh my gosh.

Walk of shame, curb of shame. I thought that was the end of it. I thought, all right, this is why you have car insurance. They're gonna fix her door. A few months later, I got served a lawsuit at my doorstep of my house. Oh, thank God it was at home and not at work. Yeah, that would have been way more awkward. a lawsuit at my doorstep of my house. Oh, thank God it was at home and not at work.

Yeah, that would have been way more awkward. And this lady was suing me and my dad for $375,000. Holy moly! Which, you know, 23-year-old George didn't have close to that. He had like $3. Yeah, yeah. And so, turns out we were underinsured.

She was suing our insurance company, her insurance company, and long story short, she was an ambulance chaser and ended up walking away with 50 grand from the insurance companies. You didn't pay. It hit our limit. But they didn't go above that. But if they had gone above the limit,

I would have been on the hook. My dad would have been on the hook. For however much she could have gotten from this lawsuit. I mean, you're, okay, so you're the- And it took years, by by the way to settle this. So that's looming in my life, living rent free in my head. And I was so stressed out about this that it was going to decimate not only my life,

but my father's. Yes. Cause I was on his insurance. And so that very next day we upped the insurance. Is this why you have a heart for insurance to this day? Yes, this is why I'm such an insurance nerd because not having it can wreck all the wealth you're trying to build.

100, 100%. Oh man. That's the big one on top of, you know, This is why I'm such an insurance nerd because not having it can wreck all the wealth you're trying to build 100% oh Man, that's the big one on top of you know going into student loan debt and credit card sure all the normal fun stuff You do listen George those are the stories that the people are here for I'm never heard that before I get heart palpitations Just really well, I bet okay speaking of heart palpitations I'll tell you mine, so I I thought about this and you guys already know, like if you've been listening, you know, I had full scholarships and I still took out student loans just to live on that.

That's probably my dumbest like financial mistake as far as like debt products and things like that. But really I was thinking about this because I saw the question of the day during the break. And this is probably the dumbest thing I've ever done financially, like long term. Well, you know, George, Sam and I used to work on cruise ships. And we every week, we'd fly somewhere different abroad, not

throughout the United States, like abroad, like you go to China, and then you go to Japan, and then you go to Sri Lanka, and then you go to Alaska, right? You're always going, but we were broke. And I'm talking about broke broke, you guys know we had the debt and we would go, we would go fly literally with like dollars, like $10 in our account, like dollars. And like we'd be in the airport like splitting a pretzel,

like broke broke. But we were out making money so we could pay off this debt. And we just got, I think you can get used to anything. So I just think we were used to not having. Living on the edge. Yes, living on the edge. And living on a prayer, it sounds like. Basically, and so one time we'd gone to Argentina

and it was our first time and we didn't know. So certain countries, when you come in and then exit, you have to pay a fee that's called a reciprocity fee. And- That feels like a scam. Every country's different. And the fee was $25 per person. When I tell you we didn't have it,

I'm telling you we didn't have it. And we were like standing there looking at each other, like, do you have it? Cause I don't have it. Like we were about to spend a night in Argentina. Luckily, ah, man, this is so desperate. I'm just mad that I'm telling you.

Are you panhandling for 50 bucks to get through? No. It was one of those points where it's like, okay, I've got like $18 on this card. You can try to run it and I hope it'll go through. I'm okay if it ends up on an overdraft. Just try it. Get me out of this country. Do you know what went through?

And I, I shat, like I praised the Lord so hard because man, it was just one one of the and yeah, we got hit with the overdraw all that stuff But um, that was one of those aha moments that I was like Oh god, like we're broke and we almost ended up like locked up abroad. That would have been a much more wild story Well, let me tell you about being an Argentinian citizen. Let me tell you about being an inst inst Istanbul gosh, I can't talk Istanbul at gunpoint. I'll tell you that being an Istanbul, gosh I can't talk, Istanbul at gunpoint. I'll tell you that story one time. That has nothing to do with money. Wow. That's, I think we need an after show, Ramsey After Dark for that. You got kids listening. I know man. That's scary. So we've all done dumb stuff whether it's like a one moment kind of thing or like an insurance

thing or just long term just living on the edge like we talked about so you're not alone. Just don't make the same mistake twice. And if you can, avoid it. That's right. Because now when I go to Argentina, I got deeper pockets. Yeah. You come back a different woman. You're getting the Argentinian steak now.

OK. All you can eat. I know. That's right. Give me the plant-based variety. Let's go to the phone lines. We got Annie, who's in Mobile, Alabama. Annie, how can we help today?

Hi. Hi. Thank you so much for taking my Mobile, Alabama. Annie, how can we help today? Hi. Hi. Hi, thank you so much for taking my call, guys. You bet. So my husband and I have 40 years of life invested with one another, but our interests are starting to diverge

on how we imagine our retirement. We live in the South, as you said, Mobile, and summers are cruel and they're brutal. My view is that I'd like to relocate to a more moderate climate where there's more senior activities, but this requires us to sell our home and more than likely move to a much higher cost of living. The problem, which is not really a problem, is that we have eight in our family. We have four dogs and three cats and a husband. So I can't move. Which one do you like the most out of those? I just pick one and move. Oh, I'd

like to do that but I'll tell you what, that's my husband's favorite too. So, so you guys have to take the petting zoo with you wherever you go? We do. And so a townhome and a condo is out of the question. My dear husband, now he wants to stay, he wants to age in place. We have a nice home and he wants to travel maybe the three months out of the year, go and find a nice Airbnb. Airbnb. My concern is how viable each of these will be with our finances. What's your pardon me our nest egg is so we have about 800,000 in investments. We have a military pension of 6300 per month. We have a VA amount that comes into 2400 a month. We have a

government pension that comes in at 700 a month. Wow. And without taking our social security, if we wait until we're 67, 70, we'll have about four to 5,000 per month adding on top of that. That's great. So right now you almost have 10 grand coming in? Guaranteed income?

Yeah, a little bit like 11 or 12, yeah. Wonderful. And so you don't need to touch the investments. No, but we're not yet retired. So my husband is still working. And so he's bringing money in that we're setting aside 3k every month on top of that. How old are you?

And I'm 61. How old, how long does he plan to work until you guys choose one of these retirement paths? Work is fulfilling for him. So we're thinking 67. Oh wow and do you think that okay regardless of which way you go are you okay with waiting till 67 to start living that life or do you guys want to start living that life simultaneously? What does that mean? What it means for me is that he's more of a

homebody and I'm okay if I can take off maybe a month of the summer and maybe go do a little traveling on your own until worse yes on my own I'm used to that he's not he was a flyboy at one time and he's traveled all over the place and so he's not necessarily interested in doing too much traveling I think he wants to find a place and just chill out yeah absolutely I think we do have a little bit of a debt. I have zero debt in the sense, oh, the only debt I have is mortgage. Okay. And our mortgage is about 200 and well, I owe about 225,000. Okay. For the clock, Annie, let me get you at this.

So the most important thing that I'd be looking at is getting that house paid off before you guys retire. That's gonna give you the freedom to choose one of these paths. The idea of moving somewhere more expensive where you might have to take on a bigger mortgage, I don't like that idea. I want you to be mortgage free.

So whatever you do, make sure it's debt free. free. Graduation doesn't come with a GPS. I wish it did, but a lot of students are walking into the real world with no clue on what direction they should actually go. So the GetClear Career Assessment is part of the Find the Work You're Wired to Do Student Edition. And it's here. it's here for you. It will help your student get clarity

and build a real plan that they can be confident in, whether it's choosing a major, choosing a trade or getting their first job. The good news is it's only 34.99. And this assessment will help them identify their strengths while the book part of it will help them understand the results and figure it out what's next. So again, the get clear assessment, the career part of it will help them understand the results and figure out what's next. So again, the get clear assessment,

the career part is the career assessment and then find the work you're wired to do is the book part, okay? And this is really, really, really great. You can get a copy today at ramsysolutions.com slash store or if you're watching on YouTube or podcast, you could click the link in the description to help you so that you can get started.

George, I wish I had that when I was a young guy. I wouldn't have floundered as much, just sort of soul searching and wasting years at college hoping I'd figure it out once you graduate. Yeah. And that could have saved me some heartache because I took the Get Clear Career Assessment and it's spot on.

It's like everything I'm doing now, but it took me a decade to figure out. So I could have fast tracked that. Who knows where I'd be now, Jade. I knew people who went to school just to buy themselves time. To go on their Eat, Play, Love journey at the tune of $200,000.

Man, oh man, they sure did. For an art history degree. Oh, all right, hopefully Seth didn't do that. Seth from Coeur d'Alene, is that right? Idaho? That sounds right. All right, let's go with Coeur d'Alene. Did I say it right, Seth? Yeah, Coeur d'Alene, is that right? Idaho? That sounds right. All right, let's go with Coeur d'Alene. Did I say it right, Seth?

Yeah, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. All right, yes. All right, social studies for the win. How can we help today? So I am about to get married and I'm trying to get my financials in situ before going in there. I have about $31,000 in debt, she knows about that. It's from trying

to start a business, didn't quite work out. But anyways, I've done the financial piece course and I'm on step two trying to get the debt paid off. And I was looking at some debt consolidation programs where you stop paying your credit cards and you start paying into this program and then they negotiate for you. And it sounds really good because they you know they're saying less interest and less like total dollar amount but I'm just I'm trying to wrap my head around it. It sounds too good to be true? Fishing. Yeah.

Yeah, no, you are spot on, my man. Did you, were you just Googling? Like how did you even find this? Or did they find you with a targeted ad? I think it was a combination of Google and, you know, Facebook popping up some message or something, but yeah. Okay, yeah, you're spot on. So what they do is they don't eliminate your debt,

they just delay it, they restructure it. There's upfront fees, there's ongoing monthly fees, a percentage of the debt reduced, and then exactly what they'll tell you, hey, stop paying your payments, let it go into default, let your creditors come after you, and then later on down the road, hopefully maybe we can settle for less

and get you out of this mess. And we'll do it for you. Hey, relax, relief is on the way. The relief is in the name. It sounds amazing, right? Yeah. But here's the problem. Creditors might refuse to negotiate.

It tanks your financial world. So if you go to rent a place or do anything financially, your credit score is shot. Your debt settlement offers might get rejected. They could come after you and sue you. So this is not a fun ride. And you can do all of this yourself by just paying off your debts and negotiating the debts

if they are in collections on your own. I got you. Okay. So you don't need someone else then. You don't need to pay them to do it. You need the debt snowball method that's gonna walk you through how to do all of this. So hang on the line.

I'm gonna send you Financial Peace University, watch all nine lessons along with your lady and get this stuff dialed in and say, hey, I know I've screwed up, I made some mistakes, I wanna clean it up, would you go on this journey with me? And I think it's gonna help both of you get set up for success. 100%, hey, thanks for the call.

We've got Alicia, she's in Augusta, Georgia. Alicia, how can we help today? Hey, George, hey Jade, so excited to be talking with you guys both. Yeah, glad you're here. So my question is, if I should continue renting out one of my homes in San Antonio, Texas for another year per my realtors advice, or if I should sell it.

I have three homes currently that I have no business owning. I found the Bramsey show, unfortunately, a little bit too late. So I'm active duty military and I bought my first home in 2020 in San Antonio when I was stationed there. in 2020 in San Antonio when I was stationed there. And I currently have renters in that house and they pay about seven or sorry, $2,050 a month. And, uh, my mortgage is 1700 on that.

And then I have the second home that I bought, um, cause my husband and I were expanding our family and we decided to get a second home. And I oh, we purchased it for 375,000 in 2023. And we owe 348,000 on that one. Where is our mortgage? It's also in San Antonio. Okay. Our mortgage is 3250. We got a very high interest rate, um, in the rent. Um, we tried to sell it last year because we got notified, um, of a PCS. Unfortunately, I was three months postpartum and the military, um, ended up moving me unexpectedly to, um, Georgia. So we tried to sell it and we weren't able to get any buyers.

And so, um, our realtor said, let's just go ahead and put it up for rent. The highest we were able to get was 2600. So although we're making about $350 off of the first house, we're losing about $600 on the other house. And her advice is that we continue renting it for another year because Of course, it's her advice, it's not her money. We're only able to get, right. Listen, it doesn't matter what she said. She's not the one who has to sleep in your bed at night, right? It's really easy for other people to tell you to keep burdens that are not their own, right? I mean, that's the decision. The problem is, What's the problem?

Her market analysis is she says that we're only going to be able to sell it currently for about $330,000, even though we purchased it for $375,000. So my husband and I decided we wanted to try and sell it. And we are aware that we would probably have to come to the table with $40,000 out of pocket. But she seems to think if we hold on to it for another year, let the market go up. That is speculation. I love that. I love just the optimism.

Let the market go up until Trump burps and decides to do a tariff and then undo a tariff and then the housing markets back down, the Fed's not moving rates. I mean, we all thought that a year ago. Yeah. I mean, what will you make if the first property that's plus 350, what's that one worth if you were to sell it today? What would you pocket? So we have about $71,000 in equity in that.

We do plan on selling it next year. We removed the lease with the current tenant. Okay, and that's for one year. Okay. So for that reason alone, that's the only reason that you might push this a year is because you don't want to break the lease. But the, the math there is pretty simple. You sell that when you take the money. And if the other one is still upside down, you clear the balance with that, the money from the previous sale. And then whatever is left, you, you put it on to whatever baby step you're on, right?

Right, that's exactly what we were wanting to do. But I just wanted to hear it from you guys, I guess. So do you think it's a good idea to go ahead and move forward with the sale of the home that we're upside down on and just come to the table? But do you have 40,000? We do. How much do you have total that's liquid?

So we have about 50,000 in a high yield savings and about 24,000 in our checking account at any given time, because we have three mortgages that get old every month. So we try to keep a decent amount in there. Is any of that your three to six, like what, what of that is what tagged as an emergency fund? Um, the high yield savings is where we would, um, deem our emergency fund. Okay. Yeah. I'd 100% liquidate that because you're at, I would 100% that do that because

in many ways you're in baby step two, right? We're clearing out this debt. And my guess is you probably have other debt laying around as well. We don't. So I paid off my car. Once I started listening to the show, I immediately paid off my car. My husband is retired from the military and his truck,

his $60,000 truck was just sitting in our driveway. So we sold that. Good. And bought a little $8,000 car for him to cruise around town in. So we have no credit card debt and no other consumer debt. Listen, you're on the right track.

I think what George uncovered is great. You've got the money sitting there. Sell that second house today. And as soon as you can, sell the other San Antonio house so that you're not long distance landlords. Simplify your life. That's the key. Thanks for hanging out with us here on the Ramsey show

on the Ramsey network. This is a live show about your life and your money. You get to call in, you get to be the subject of discussion. We won't make fun of you. You might feel a little bad sometimes afterwards, but I promise you, you'll leave with the next step. We just want to tell you the truth and sometimes the truth... It hurts.

It hurts before it will set you free. A little sting there. But if you want to get involved, you can call in. The number is 888-825-5225 and we will get you on the line. If you didn't know, I'm Jade Warshaw. Next to me is George Camel. Let's get it started. Jeff in Columbia, South Carolina is on the line. Hey, Jeff. Oh, hey, I have a problem. I can't get rid of my Fidelity Rewards credit card. And basically what it does is it takes 2% of all my purchases and put it puts in my brokerage account. purchases and put it puts in my brokerage account. Okay. And I cannot cut that thing up with all the reward points I get. How much did you get? 400,000? Where are you at? Well, actually, well, well, I run it through all my business expenses. So I have two, I basically have one for my personal business. But I mean, I did. I mean, I have about, on

average, a little bit more, a little bit less than million charges a year. But I mean, I did, I mean, I have about on average, a little bit more, a little bit less than million in charges a year. So I get about 20, 22,000 a year free. Okay. Uh, 2% back. And then that goes into the brokerage account and, um, you know, I bought index funds, um, you know, ETFs, uh, and I mean, and I've been doing it for 20 years. Uh, the, uh, the first one I got that card is 1%. Now they jumped up 2%. Uh, and it's just, why do you want to cut it up?

Well, I don't, I mean, I follow everything that, that, you know, Dave Ramsey steps, you know, has about no debt. I don't have any debt. Good. And I just can't. So I know you guys don't typically recommend having credit cards, but I can't give that one up. This would be the only call you ever call that will say he got the best of the credit card companies. Is there a debit card that could do the same thing? Have you looked into it? I have, but I've just gotten fell in love with that one Fidel Rewards card. And it goes straight to the brokerage account.

I don't want airlines. I don't want cash back. I want it to grow. And what do you make a year? Well, after I pay the Alamarian child support, depends on year to year, about $150 to $160. Okay. And what's your net worth? Probably 3.2, 3.1 million. Way to go. Yeah. And no debt to speak of, no mortgage or anything.

No, I just try to pay everything in cash. I mean, but- And you said you run a million dollars worth of expenses through your business? Through my company, yes. Wow, what kind of business are you running? It's, I design and sell drive-on dots for jet skis and boats. And I have been noticing the last few years,

I get a lot of pushback from my vendors about the credit card. But, you know, I'll say, hey, hit me up with the, I try to negotiate. Um, a lot of times they'll give me 2% back if I pay in 10 35 or 3% credit card. If they charge me 3%, if I pay in 10 with the credit card, they're giving me 2%, you know, back for basically I'm paying 1%. But the best thing about those reward cards is they're not really taxed.

I mean the money you get from them, Not now. So it's tax free. But I mean again, the net worth I have, I'm pretty, I'm more of a saver than Spender. So it's more habit than anything else. You know if I go on cruise, of course I'm gonna get the cheapest room or I never fly first class. I mean I'm still driving a 10 year old SUV. And these are my kids, they're old enough. You need to get a new car.

I was like, no, why? It still runs. Well, that's how you build your wealth. And that's what I wanna encourage you with is you have been able to do this not with the help of the credit card companies. You have done it with your own sheer discipline and willpower and the rewards are nice,

but they have not made or destroyed your wealth. And I don't think the way you're living, it's probably not gonna hurt you that much in the future. So there's a lot of angles with the credit card argument. And the latest one that is very compelling for people like you is to understand Where these rewards are actually coming from? Have you looked into that?

Well where they're coming from to my basically from honestly all for my business person No, I'm saying there were $20,000 the credit card company is you what is funding that and there was a recent Fed study That found there's an annual redistribution of $15 billion from less to more educated, poorer to richer, from high to low minority areas. And all of that is due to the fact that essentially broke people are subsidizing your rewards. And this is not a moral high horse.

Like I don't think you're a bad person if you get rewards, but I'm saying if you're looking for a reason to cut them up beyond, well, I think I'm winning, why shouldn't I keep doing this? It's just a predatory gross system and industry, and it's not one that I personally want to take advantage of, even if I wanted to and could. I understand. I completely understand. But are you going to be the target problem calling in saying, hey, I'm at $40,000 in credit card debt and I'm excited about my rewards. I just think you could be more successful

and at least as successful without the credit card. So here's a good test, don't use the cards for 30 days and see if it changes your personal spending. See if it changes the way you run your business. And if it doesn't change anything, you do you. That's how I feel personally, but you know. Yeah, I mean, the thought is, I know there are debit cards that'll give you cash back.

He'd have to be, instead of floating that cash flow, he'd have to pay the cash flow upfront, but and then he, I don't know if they link directly to his investments, he might have to then take the money and invest it, but. Which it sounds like he's doing anyways. Yeah. But I mean, this is the money and invest it, but. It just sounds like he's doing anyways. Yeah. But I mean, this is the outlier where it's like,

okay, he's running a business, running a million dollars of expenses. It's a different situation. There's a lot more cash to be had, I suppose. But even then, there's not a single credit card that is being used to run this company. And so Ramsey is running a whole lot more than a million dollars of expenses.

And we are not tempted by the allure of a 2% rewards card. I don't own a credit card. I cut mine up back in 2013. And I'm telling you, something mentally switched in me to where I was excited about my Discover cash back and my American Express, you know, Delta Sky Miles. It changed the way I was thinking

and it changed where I was headed. And so my goals were no longer, let me see how much rewards I can get. It was, what am I doing to take control of my money, to build my own wealth, to create my own rewards through budgeting and spending more wisely. And because of that, my investing rate and savings rate increased.

My spending decreased. And so people don't think about how much more they could make than that 2% just by getting on a budget. And could you cut 2% of your spending this month if you realize I'm only using my own money? Absolutely. Because we found that when you use a credit card, you're gonna spend upwards of 12% more, 20% more,

100% more than the person next to you using cash or a debit card. That's right. Especially depending on the purchase. Things like, I've seen the studies where going through the drive-through, like the percentage more that you spend or buying concert tickets or, you know,

and those are the things that we tend to put on credit cards, right? It's like, oh, you know, Taylor's, Beyonce's in town, you know, she's only gonna do, you know, Cowboy Carter one time, so I'm just gonna, you know, go ham, and then you end up spending way more. You get tickets that otherwise you would never have considered getting, but because it's on the plastic,

you're like, hey, let me on, let me on, on the floor seats. Here's the TLDR, when it hurts less, it costs more. That's psychology, that's human nature, you can thank the fall of man for that, but that's how it goes. And so the more friction you add to your spending, the better off you're going to be. The more frictionless it is, you use other people's money and you pay it back later, you're going to make very different decisions. I'm going to need you to break down TLDR.

Too long didn't read. That's my version of Spark Notes. Okay! I can't believe I taught Jade Warshaw something. That's pretty cool. All right, George, it's time to chop it up a little bit. Let's do this. People want to know, they want to know the raw and the real. Am I doing all right? Where do, where should I be for my age is what people want to know. Like, am I doing okay financially? They need kind of a measuring stick. Yeah. How are other people my age doing? Where do I know. Like, am I doing okay financially? They need to have a measuring stick. Yeah, how are other people my age doing? Where do I fall in line? And I make these videos for my YouTube channel, the George Camel YouTube channel,

and they're the top videos. People want to know what is the average net worth by age. That's a big one. So I thought we can cover the high level here so that people listening can just figure out where they stand. We wanna compare ourselves. Yes, and let's make it clear, your net worth is not your self worth. If you are below this, you're above this, you're not worse or better than anyone, okay? You're still a fallen human being and we still love you.

But it's good to just go, where is it, how we doing America? That's what we're gonna call this segment. How we doing America? How you doing? And it's gonna get dark real quick, as you'll see. Oh boy. So net worth by age, we're gonna start for segment. How we doing America? How you doing? And it's gonna get dark real quick as you'll see. Oh boy. So net worth by age,

we're gonna start for the folks in their 20s. Okay. The average net worth, $113,000, which is impressive. Well, can wait, can I roll it back? Before we do this, let me roll it back. Can you explain net worth? Explain net worth first. So these folks know what we're.

Your net worth is your assets minus your liability. So everything you own minus everything you owe. And that's cars, homes, all of it. So for someone in their twenties, to have an average net worth of 113 grand is impressive. Yeah, it is. Cause we're talking, and that means you have probably paid off your debt.

You've got equity in a home. Now we got to talk about average versus median. This is where it's important. Average is skewed because you have the crazy high highs and crazy low lows. So this average number is skewed by people who are crazy high, maybe some trust fund babies. Now we're gonna move to the median.

So we go from 113 grand to the median net worth for folks in their 20s, $7,600. That's more like it. That's more accurate. That feels right. Cause this is like, I maybe avoided debt or I had time to pay whatever debt I had off. And now I just have my old car

and I just started contributing to a 401k. So median is a more accurate measure because it's simply the number in the middle of the list from the smallest to the biggest number. So that's the number two. If you're going to try to use the measuring stick, that's sort of the suck bar. Yeah, median.

I would say the average net worth, that's more like, okay, that's a healthier number to look at. But the median net worth just go from above that, I'm doing okay. So a goal to aim for. You said the suck bar. The suck bar, that's what we call it.

Let's be honest, 7,600 bucks? I'm with you, I'm with you. I mean, we can do better than that as you exit your 20s. I thought there would be some negatives on here. I'm surprised I didn't see any like minus signs. Well, that's the truth. When you think about the median being 7,600, it's not that far from being in the negative.

Yeah. So a goal to aim for in your 20s, I'm just gonna throw out kind of a BHAG, a big hairy audacious goal. 200 to 250 is like you get an A plus from George for long-term wealth. That is an A plus. So good goals in your 20s, get out of that consumer debt.

And if you can get into a home, great, but usually that's gonna happen for people as they enter their 30s in today's world with how expensive homes are. George, I'm concerned with where this is going. I'm afraid people are going to be in a deep dark pit. I know. I know.

I'm here to just, I'm just spitting facts. I didn't come up with this research. This is just reality. Just smile when you say it. Yeah. In your 30s, average net worth, 317 grand, median net worth, 35 grand. Got you. Okay.

So that's 30 to 39. I think that's good. You know, life's picking up speed. You probably have maybe some, you're married, kids, a mortgage by this point in 30 to 39, but your income is usually higher. And so your saving and investing should become priorities. And if you still have lingering debt,

you gotta get serious. Because you still have compound growth on your side when you're this young. That's true. You got another 30 plus years of working career to invest. And that's the hope. Take advantage of that. So an A plus goal from my book, four to 500 grand by the time you exit your 30s.

That's a pretty decent net worth. Think about that. You know, you've been investing in your 401k for a period of time. You've got some home equity now. You paid off the debt. This is if you're following the baby steps to a T. And you're 39, not 30.

Exactly, there you go. Now in your 40s, average net worth 791 grand. Okay, okay, okay. Media net worth 125 grand. Got you. So this is an interesting one. That's a big gap. We found in our millionaire study,

where we study 10,000 millionaires, the average age was 49 years old. So this isn't far off. The average net worth is 791 in your 40s. So to have a million dollar net worth by age 50, I think personally that's a good goal to reach for. Because that tells me you're right there in that millionaire study data.

Now in your 50s, it climbs up to average net worth of 1.4 million and a median net worth of 288. So 288,000 is the median there. Which again, that scares me because if you're heading into retirement and your net worth entirety, home equity, investments, everything is a quarter million. We got some catching up to do.

You gotta catch up, yes. This tells me- You can, but you won't have as much money as you. You can, but you just don't have, you won't have as much money as you would have had, but you could still have enough. You can still retire with dignity, but you're gonna have to work longer than you want to. Yes, that's right.

You're not living a super comfy retirement life. You're correct. So target net worth, in my book, By Your 50s, if you had a million by 40s, I would say let's start climbing up closer to two. So 1.75 to two million total net worth, not just investments, but everything, home equity, investments, cars, all that,

by the time you're 59, I would say, you're gonna do just fine. And then finally we get to the 60s, average net worth 1.7 million, median net worth 439,000. And this is where people are hoping to retire, to be able to. Now they might work because they want to, but I don't want you to have to work because you have to. That's

a very different place to be. And so median net worth of 400 grand scares me in your 60s. 100%. Yeah. In today's world, yes. That tells me you have put everything else in your life first and you've not put on your own mask. Or you thought social security was going to get you. That's a scary one. Or you've been signing up your own mask. Or you thought social security was gonna get you. That's a scary one. Or you've been signing up for Parent PLUS loans and trying to pay off your kids' debts, your own debts, keeping up a lifestyle you couldn't afford,

not investing into those retirement accounts. And so a good action step in your 60s as you head into retirement, get the house paid off, make sure that your investments are strong enough to last you another 20, 30 plus years. And so how do you improve your net worth at any age? It's simple. If your net worth is assets minus liabilities,

let's get rid of the liabilities column. Get rid of your consumer debt, which will increase your net worth. Next, get into a home when you can financially afford it. When in the right time. Forced savings, yes. That's a forced savings plan. The home will appreciate in value over time.

And we found that 68% of millionaires have a paid for house and that's a wealth building machine. That's part of your net worth. It really is. And then your primary home doesn't produce income. And so you need income outside of that. And that's where the investments come into play. So aim to invest 15% of your monthly income.

And if the earlier you start, the more compound interest has time to build. And here's what we found in the retirement accounts, 80 to 90% is all growth. Yeah, that's right. Only 10 to 20% is what you put in. That's right. So when we say, well, Jade, you could have a million dollars.

We're not telling you to try to save a million dollars. We're telling you, if you save 200,000 over the next 30 years, it will grow to a million. People don't understand the power of compound growth. Yeah. Which is why you really did say it. Like in your thirties, there's, if you're in your thirties now, there's so much time to take advantage of this. Like now is not the time to like kick the can down the road, really get serious because that time is really going to be your best friend when it comes to compound growth. And let me just,

let me talk to the people, because some people heard this. They're deflated. Yeah, man. I pop their balloon. They're a sad sack right now. And because it does, you're like, man, why? Why did you have to compare me to these other folks who are doing so much? But a word, George, on comparison, because I do think that there's like comparison in a bad way. And I think there's comparison in a good way.

And the way that I like to think of it George is Be curious not critical right like this is not a time for you to be like so critical on yourself that you feel bad But be very curious about how these people that George is talking about have achieved this and so it really is about instead of being Like well must be nice. You know that I mean that is all say it. That explains most of the comments section on the internet. Yeah, let's be curious, let's be inquisitive, and let's ask the right questions. Because the truth is, if they did it, you can do it. It's just how did they do it?

We're probably going about it the wrong way. So for me, when I saw like I'm in my 20s and 30s with a negative net worth, because at least none of these are negative, I'm like, okay, let me look at someone who's doing this and ask the right questions. Enter Ramsey Solutions. How do I pay off my debt? How do I get in a position where I can build a thousand dollars of savings? How do I become a person who makes good habits and follows their budgets? How did you build that business? How did you, you know what I'm saying? So

start looking at the people in your life who might be hitting the arrows on some of these medians and average net worths and start asking them the right questions and listening to the show and folks like George Campbell is a great place to start. Yeah, I went from negative net worth to millionaire in 10 years. So don't underestimate how much you can accomplish over a long period of time. If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck and wondering where the heck's your money's going, your first step is to get on a budget fam. Our team is hosting a free budgeting training this month. You'll learn step by step how to make and stick to a budget using my favorite budget

of all time, the only budget I ever use, EveryDollar. Plus you can get the biggest budgeting questions answered. It's in a live Q&A format, so it's you asking the question and hearing back in real time. The spots are limited though, so if you wanna sign up, you can do that for free at EveryDollar.com slash webinar.

Get involved. Let's go to Cassie in San Diego, California. Hi Cassie. Hi, my question, thank you for taking my call, my question is how do I settle a repo? Okay, tell us tell us the backstory. So my car in reality it got me and I'll be honest it got me into this position because I had a gambling addiction. I'm in baby step one, which I've saved $1,000. But now with my car getting repo, how do I settle it? So I just want, I mean, that's the only thing I have on my credit.

What was the connection? What was the connective tissue from the gambling to the car getting repo'd? So, I was, instead of making my payments, I was thinking I can go to the casino and double it to make payments and things like that. Oh my goodness. Yeah. Have you gotten control of the gambling addiction? What are you doing to resolve that? So keep myself occupied, disconnected completely, everything with the, everything with any advertisements that used to go to my

email, block that. Have you gone to Gambler's Anonymous? I have not. Okay, I just want to make sure that we've resolved the root problem here before we just fix the repo, which we can help you with that. Are you driving another vehicle now? No, I'm not. Are you working full-time? I am. Okay.

Is that remote or how are you getting transportation? The bus. Okay. Because I don't have a problem. Luckily, I'm fortunate that I'm able to get transportation that leaves me close to work. Good. And what is your total debt, including the repo deficiency balance? The total debt on the vehicles based on the information is 19,203.

That's what you still owe? That's what's owed. And I got, when they got repoed two weeks later, not only I got that letter, but I also got some letters from like if they were, when it was sold, they were going through the, through this place where they have to pay and they weren't paying. So I was, I got that notice and I started opening all my letters and I saw that the car was sold for 3,000. Uh, and so they hadn't changed, I guess, any information for the new owner and so getting built as well

for the toll road. Um, so I did reach out to toll road. Um, they did get confirmation, you know, that, um, the car was sold, uh, with my information, the letter that I got but the vehicle to the 19,203 I Got that letter. I didn't get a letter saying it was already it was gonna be sold with dates or any information It was just sold two weeks after that for three thousand five hundred around there and So now now they're charging me. they're asking for that 19,000. So because you owed like 24,000 or whatever it was,

22,000 on it. Correct. Originally, they sold it for three, you owe the rest. Oh gosh. Have you reached out to the company? I have not because I wanna make sure if getting that information over the phone, what are my options? Like, what do I, I mean, sure if getting that information over the phone, what are my options?

Like, what do I, I mean, is it something that- I mean, you're gonna have to, you can attempt a lump sum settlement and see if they would take less. Okay. You know, let's say you come up with, I don't know, $7,000. They might be willing to take that

as a lump sum settlement as paid in full. And the key is you wanna get any of all of this in writing. The full settlement terms, the exact amount due, a statement that the payment will satisfy the debt in full. And that will allow you to make sure that you don't get screwed on this. I mean, they're gonna take you for a ride. You're gonna have to beat them over the head over and over.

And at the end of the day, it's like, listen guy, I don't have any money. My car got repoed. What you're getting are my last dollars. And this is it, there's no more where that came from. Right? That's the attitude you've got to have. And when they do this, they kind of know

there's very little likelihood they're getting their money back. Exactly. And so, but you can at least clear this and move on with your financial life if you can come up with a settlement amount to make this go away. And that's gonna take a little bit of time. What are you making right now full time? Sixty-seven.

Good. And what are your other debts? Um, so that's all I have for now. I do rent, um, 1300 on my rent. That includes electricity and water and everything. So transportation right now I'm getting just the cost so it's like $75 a month so you know with food and everything I think I can definitely come up with that. Is it just you or is there kids or? No, no just Okay. That's why I have reached out because I figured I can do it since I'm now alone to where I don't feel too obligated or my responsibilities with my children.

My children are adults now. So. Got it. Okay, got it. So you clear this repo debt and you're completely debt-free. Correct. That's amazing. How quickly could you stack up half of this?

Half of the 19,000? Yeah, 7,000 or 8,000. How quickly could you do that? Oh, 7,000? I can probably do that in the two months because it's take home, I'm looking about almost 4K a month. Okay, good. Good.

So you're saying you could put away, I mean you said your bills are likely what, 1,500 to 2,000 a month. Okay, good. Good. So you're saying you could put away, I mean, you said your bills are likely what? 1,500 to 2,000 a month total? So you could save up about 2,500 a month. Let's say you did that for three or four months. That's eight or 10 grand. And then call them up and say, hey, listen, this is everything I have. Would you be willing to settle in full for this amount?

And then don't give them access to your checking account, get it all in writing, and instead do like a cashier's check or a money order to solve this and then move on. And make sure you've dealt with that underlying gambling problem so this doesn't come back to haunt you in another form of debt. But I hope we're moving forward to the future. I know that's right.

That's tough. Repo? I've seen those videos of cars getting repoed like at a gas station. They just roll up real quick and just drag that car away. I mean, it's heartbreaking to watch. Yeah, I feel like the emotional toll on that is just as painful as the financial toll, right?

Yeah. Oh my goodness. All right, let's take another question. This one's gonna come straight from the interwebs, as Dr. John Delaney would say. Let's go with Morgan from Instagram. She says, when entering baby step five, George, which is saving for kids college,

how much do you save for each kid? Oh, one of my favorite questions. And I truly wish there was like a magic, well, I know exactly what college is gonna cost, especially for the college your child will get accepted to and go to or want to go to. Cause here's what I found. People say, well, Jade, I don't want to save for college

because what if they don't go? And I go, what if they do go, and now they go 150,000 into student loan debt, when you could have saved and had the power of compound growth, the power of this tax-free growth in this 529 plan or whatever college savings plan you choose. And so how much to save?

We're gonna ballpark it based on the state school costs in your area plus inflation. And there's calculators, we have one on our website that can help you figure this out. But again, it depends on where your kid goes. They could go to the community college and pay five grand a year, or they might go to the out of state private college

and pay 75 grand a year. That's true. But the weird thing, and it's not weird, but the difference between baby step five versus some of our other steps is we tell you baby step one, it's a thousand dollars baby step four. We tell you it's 15 percent, right? We're giving you all these percentages and this is the one outlier where we're kind of saying, hey, she's your adventure. Pick it for yourself, whatever you have left over. And I will add this caveat, George, you know, some folks, they're like, I don't really wanna cover the bill.

Like I'm more focused on retirement right now, or I'm more focused on, you know what I mean? And you don't have as much margin as you thought that you would have to spend on that. And I would say that that's also okay too. You know, it's not required that you pay for your kid's college. I would say the only requirement there

is to make sure that you have a discussion. Have a conversation, yep. Yes, and set very, very clear expectations for both of you. And it's out in the open. the only requirement there is to make sure that you have a discussion. Have a conversation. Yep. Yes. And set very, very clear expectations for both of you. And it's out in the open so they know, hey, there's no fund here. You got to get a scholarship or you've got to work. I would rather have too much versus not enough because now with the new Secure 2.0 Act, you

can roll 35 grand over to a Roth IRA and you can also change the beneficiary. So you can bless another kid. Maybe you or your spouse want to go back to school. Maybe it's a niece or nephew. The range of who you can make the beneficiary is pretty amazing. And so I want to have six figures personally for each kid. And honestly, if you did overfund it and you were like, there's too much and I want this money, the fee isn't that bad. Yeah, you pay a 10% penalty. We're so glad you're here listening to the show

and enjoying the show. And I hope if that's true, you're also sharing the show. You're telling some folks in your life about, you know, the things we talk about here on the show and how they've affected your life. That's really the best thing that you could do for us. If you are considering yourself a fan of the Ramsey Network, tell somebody about it. You could drop a link in a text message and send it to somebody or email them or really just word of mouth, George, that's also- Sharing is caring.

Sharing is caring. You know when you love something, you can't help but tell people about it. Yeah, what do you love right now? What are you listening to, watching? Oh gosh. I'm putting books on the spot. There's a new show called Number One Happy Family USA.

That is about a Middle Eastern family, post 9-11. It's an animated series. It's hilarious. It's true to me, you know, my family growing up. Okay, love that. So it feels very relatable to me. How about you? I've been watching the NBA finals and I'm enjoying that

or you know, playoffs I should say, but yeah, it's good. It's not a podcast, but I would suggest it and I'm sharing it or you know, playoffs I should say, but yeah, it's good. It's not a podcast, but I would suggest it and I'm sharing it with you, my friend. Can I share my honest feedback about the NBA? I don't like the squeaks. I have sensory issues and I don't wanna hear the squeaks. The shoes on the payment? Too many squeaks.

Okay, okay. You know, so that's my, that's my, if they can make shoes that are squeakless, I'll watch. I don't know that there's anything they can do about that Come on guys get on it Nike. I'm sorry. Oh boy. Let's go to Randy. He's in Greensboro, North Carolina Come on and raise up. What's up, Randy? Yes, I just want to know y'all's opinion is it morally wrong for for me to sell my wife's Wedding set she's been past three and a half years morally wrong for me to sell my wife's wedding set.

She's been passed three and a half years. And I was counting, started cleaning up the house for the first time. Oh, wow. So sorry, Randy, three years ago she passed? Yeah, yes. How old was she? 59.

So sorry. And so are you needing to sell these rings for financial reasons or is this just like you want to kind of grieve in your own way and peel and move on through this? Well, no, it's not really that. It's just kind of the house is not paid for and I thought I had a ring appraised at 6200 and I thought that would go araised a ring appraised at 6200 and I thought that would go a good ways towards paying off the house and there's we didn't have any children together and and the and she's not really close you know no close to any girls in my family and so it's not like this ring would get

passed as an heirloom of with a lot of sentiment to you know a daughter or something right Wow I don't think there's anything morally wrong about that. No I mean at the end of the day stuff is stuff and if it's if you know the sentiment can be different for everyone. It might not be in the wedding band, it might be in the memories, it might be in a photo, it might be in a thousand other things and so if that's something that you feel like will help you get the house paid off and that's your own way of leaving a legacy from the life that you guys built together,

I see nothing wrong with that. Okay, I appreciate y'all taking my call. If you, I would say this, Randy, before you do it, just take a moment as much as you can and imagine how you'll feel if today you let go of that ring and it was gone, how would you feel? That would be my only thought is,

does that feel better for you or does that feel like, ugh, because if it feels a little bit like, ugh, like I don't think I'd do it just for that reason, not because of anything moral. Okay, well, it kind of does make me feel bad to think about it being gone. How much further do you have on the house? I'm just wondering, you know,

I know this will help you make some progress, but is this like, I'm not gonna be able to retire because of this? How much further do you have to go? I got laid off about two years ago, so I'm not working on that. And I haven't taken my social security yet because I was letting it build up as much as it could

because then it goes up to 8% a year. How are you living? That I'm, well, I get a survivor's benefit from my watch passing. And that's enough to cover all your bills? No, I take $1,700 out of my first year, out of my retirement fund. Okay. What's your total nest egg and what's left on the mortgage? There's $65,000 left on the mortgage and I have about 200, I mean 300 in total $50,000

everything, every penny I have in upwards. 350 grand to your name. Does that include the equity in the home or is that just your nest egg investments? Just the investments. What's the house worth? Around 280. Okay, so your total net worth is about a half a million, give or take?

Yeah, yes. Okay, and you are not going to be working? Are you done? No, I'm done. I worked, well, that's another story. I worked a 60, 70 hour week job my whole life. Okay, I'm just wondering, are you going to have to work? Is this gonna be enough to cover your bills

with Social Security, the survivor's benefit? Does that run out at a certain point? Or is that forever? It runs out when I take mine. I haven't taken mine my Social Security yet Okay, and what's the difference between the amounts? Well, will yours be more or will it be less than hers? It'll be more. Okay January 1st mine should be four thousand dollars a month and will that be enough to cover your lifestyle? Yes, yes.

Okay. Yeah, with this ring, I don't think there's anything on fire. My guess is you could look around, if you really needed the $6,000, you might could look around the house and find other things worth value that you could, you know what I'm saying?

That you could sell to accumulate that money that's not as dear to your heart as those rings. I mean, at the end of the day, you can do what you feel is best. But yeah, if it was still like heart wrenching for me to part with it, I don't know that I would. It wouldn't be the first thing I did. No.

And so, I can't even imagine though, walking through that scenario. No, I'd be, listen, if Sam Warshaw tried to sell my ring, I would haunt him from beyond the grave. I'd be like, not you, Sam. Get that ring back from that pawn shop. Give me the ring. Yeah, for sure. Oh my goodness.

But here's the other thing. It's not gonna make a huge debt in the mortgage. You know, 65 left. Yeah. It'll get rid of like 9% of what's left. And so there's still a lot left with no current income happening. And so I would want to go into retirement with no mortgage.

That would be my goal for our friend, Randy. I don't know currently how he's going to do that without decimating the nest egg. Yeah, yeah, that's true. And so that's another problem to solve. Yeah, he might have to pick up some more work here or there, which I feel like he could do. He still seemed like a young guy.

All right, let's talk to, you know what, let's go back to these social questions because I really liked these, George. Okay. So let's take it to you decide Facebook or Instagram. Oh gosh. I think Facebook. I like what the boomers are doing. That tells me a lot about you. That tells me a lot about you at a core level. All right. Shannon from Facebook asks, I told my teenage daughters they need to get jobs for their spending money this summer. One daughter refuses to work. I was thinking about giving her just $20 a week.

Would that be okay or should I just stick to my guns about the whole job thing? Oh, see, this is why I chose Facebook. The juiciest stuff is happening on Facebook. It is. Wow, okay, teenage daughters, you gotta get a job. She says, I refuse to work. And now she's going, well Teenage daughters, you gotta get a job. She says, I refuse to work.

And now she's going, well, if I give her 20 bucks a week, does it feel like I'm giving in? Yes. And saying, well, you can have free money anyways for spending. Well, there is a big difference between 13 versus 17, I do think, but either way, I still think I'm making it work.

Yeah, I don't know with the ages here, it feels like a lot to make a judgment call, but we're talking about 80 bucks a month for what? Two months now with summer? Yeah. It's not that long. So it's 160 bucks total. I would say here's what I'm willing to do.

You can have 20 bucks a week or eight, I'll give you 80 bucks a month for these two months, but nothing above that. You're gonna have to work if you wanna spend anything above that. Oh. That's a fair compromise. Ooh, I disagree.

I think I would say, if you work, I will supplement your pay with the $20 a week. How about this? I'll match anything you make. You make... Now wait a minute. Now we're talking. That feels like a lot.

Well, I imagine they also wanna like save for a car. Like they probably have some bigger goals. That's true. I like- Maybe I'll match it into a car fund. Here's what I don't like. That could be fun. Here's what I don't like about it.

The daughter, she used some pretty strong language when she said, my daughter refuses to work. That's where the hardheaded part of me would come out and be like, oh, you refuse. Okay, I refuse. Like I feel like I would get very. Yeah, and I'm trying to also put myself in the teenager shoes.

I don't think I was working every single summer. As soon as school got out, I was working a full-time job all summer. See, I was, I worked, I did work my summers. Was that a forced thing? Was this forced child labor at this point? No, I, well, my parents just didn't hand out money. My parents have never just handed us money.

And so I was like, I gotta get a job at Kroger. They would hire me and so I went there. And then the next summer, I did that two summers and I worked at the YMCA once. Like we just... You were hustling. We were hustling, man. I was out there skateboarding, you know,

but I was a simple man. A 7-Eleven Slurpee could tie me over for hours. That's all you needed. Just a Nature Valley Brunel bar. Yeah, $1.25, I can get by for the day. Thanks for hours. That's all you needed just a nature valley rental bar. Yeah $1.25 I can get by for the day. Thanks for listening. On and on we go taking calls from you America and abroad. Live calls so if you want to get in it's triple 8 825 5 2 2 5 you can leave a message if you can't get on today. We'll get you on another day. I'm hosting today with my friend, George Camel. I'm Jade Warshaw. Like I said, talking about your

life and your money as, as Dave would say right in front of you, which I think is pretty funny. Not behind your back. Not behind your back. We'll talk about you in front of your face. A good friend does that. Let's go to Leona. She's in Jacksonville, Florida. How can we help Leona? Hey guys, thanks for taking my call. So I'm drowning and I can't swim to the surface. My money situation is just crazy and I was wondering, would you recommend like, I own my own home. I've got two mortgages and a truck payment and, um, $70,000 in credit card debt. And, uh, I was wondering if you would think that like a chapter 13 would help, um, get me out of this situation. Um, I do have my house

for sale and I know if I sold it, I'd, I'd make, I'd walk away with like about 90 grand. Okay. Good. I could easily pay off the credit card debt, which is obviously what I want to do. But how much is the second? Um, the second one is about 105. The first one I owe about 75. And so the 90,000 is after it's all cleared. Yeah.

Okay. Like I did a whole bunch of renovations to the house and I'm selling it for 289 five. Okay, and how much is the truck? What do you owe on it? And what's it worth? I? Leased it at the three-year lease. Okay, when's the lease up? In two years, what is it gonna cost you if you turned it in early? Um, I don't know. Okay, so that's the first bit of information we want to know is, hey, if I turn this in today, what do I owe? I just, I can't pay the payment.

I got to walk away from this car. What do I owe you? That's what I'd find out today as soon as you get off this call. Let's talk about your income. What are you bringing in? Um, right now, I don't, I'm a crane operator by trade. So I'm between jobs right now. I don't start my next job till the third, but I kind of need a truck, a vehicle to get

back and forth. I used to have great credit. But you didn't answer the question. Wait, wait, Leona, you didn't answer the question. What do you make every year when you're working? Oh, last year was a really bad year. That's what got me into this predicament. But on a good year, like between 70 and 100.

And what's a bad year? Last year was 50. Okay. What causes that? It was 50. Okay. What causes that? It was an election year. What? I don't know. What does that have to do with cranes?

Because people aren't building. Okay. People don't, I didn't know that. You know, like these big companies, they're not going to invest in building like warehouses or the last big job I was on was the Mayo Clinic so you're telling me one out of every four years your income gets cut in half for every crane operator in the United States it depends like if you get in with a certain company and they've got work for you, then yeah, that's fine. But like, I mean, it's not a salary. No, it's just per day per day

on the job. How long have you been doing this? How long have you been working as a crane operator, Leona? Eight years. And I was an iron worker for 25 years. Okay. Is there a way that you can jump back and forth between those trades since you know how to do both to kind of fill the gaps? What I'm getting at. I'm too old. How old are you? I'm too old for the ironworker. Sorry. 55. Okay. What I'm getting at. Which isn't. I'll go ahead. I was going to say what I'm getting at is, you know, eight years of that fluctuation,

like George was saying, one of two things happens. You either go, this is not for me, and I move on to something else, or you learn how to do your money to go with the ebbs and the flows of the way your work, the way your work is right. Yeah, it's never happened before. Well, here's the thing. Let me just say this $50,000 is not a terrible income. It's not like it went from 70 to 20. It went down 20,000 before taxes. So I think what we're really talking about

is a symptom of a bigger problem, which is the debt. I don't think your job necessarily is the issue. The fact that it could fluctuate $20,000 in a year, I don't think is that much of an issue because it's not like this is happening every year, right? I think the issue is living and spending more than what we're making, because I think that accounts for the 70,000,

because it takes a while to accumulate 70,000 bucks, right? Correct. Right. Correct. Okay. Like last year, like I said, I was traveling like to go find work, being promised jobs, and then they fell through or got pushed back. So I was living on my credit cards because I wasn't working. I was looking for work. Correct. So and then it just like, I don't know. I was looking for work, correct?

So, and then it just like, I don't know, it happened like three or four times while I'm driving across the states to try to find work. And my credit cards just kept creeping up, creeping up, and I'm not working, so then I'm not paying. What's that process? What's that process? When you say you're driving to find work,

what does that mean? Versus let's say I was promised a digital means So I packed up and Brought my travel trailer went to Tennessee waited for about a week and a half and then he's like, oh man He goes like the job fell through it got pushed back till December There's no contracts ahead of time? Like this is not something that's a signed document? I think-

It just feels crazy to travel across the country to hope that you can make a buck. I would rather you throwing boxes at Walmart that's at least stable in Jacksonville than hoping. Probably what I should have been doing, yeah. I don't think that's probably it. I traveled to Wisconsin and worked a week, but then they weren't paying per diem,

which is like a living out allowance. And so I was like, well, I can't afford that. I got two mortgages. I gotta pay, I can't pay a mortgage or rent. Leona, I think the issue is a couple of things. A, the work that you are doing, I don't think that you're protecting yourself going in. I don't know any job that you don't know ahead of time,

what you're gonna make, if there's a per diem, what the per diem is, that there's not some sort of, if it's legit, that there's some sort of contract involved in that. And that's thing one. That's all part of being a union. And thing number two is you gotta, what I want is to improve your fast Twitch response, right?

Okay, I want you to go, this has happened once, it's happened twice, and now I'm doing something different. Right? Like right now I feel like I'm just letting it happen to me. I don't know what's going on. I just looked up one day and I just want you to respond faster and go, this is not serving me. I'm moving on. I'm, I'm Leona. Like I'm smart. I have many skills that I can do and no one's going to jerk me around.

I can walk into any of these big box warehouses and I can do a job for them and I can make more than 50 K. Like I want you to stand up straight. Cause you're, you're doing some big boss work. You operate a crane for crying out loud. Absolutely. You are a steel worker. You know what I'm saying? Like you can do some really tough jobs and I think it's time for you to go, hey, you're not jerking me around.

I'm going to go get some real jobs and I'm going to pay off this debt. I would never recommend bankruptcy because all that's going to do is put you on a payment plan. You can put yourself on a payment plan. You can put yourself on a payment plan. Alrighty to the phone lines. We continue to go. We've got Brittany in Salt Lake City, Utah. What's up, Brittany? Hi, how are you guys? Doing great. How are you?

Good. I hope this is a fun question. I'm trying to figure out if I should get my master's degree. So I'm 25 and married with no kids. My husband and I are in baby step six. I'm currently working as a hospital administrator making 50 grand a year. I'm gonna be graduating from my bachelor's with business management this year and my pay is is gonna increase to 100 grand. I'm kind of debating back and forth. I should be going and doing my masters or just keep working my job and moving up. So let me clarify, because I was a little confused.

If you get the masters, it goes up to 100K? No, I will go up to 100K this year once I finish my bachelor's. Oh, oh. And if I finish my master's, I have the potential to move up and go up to like 200. I don't know if I want to- Who told you that?

Is that like a guarantee? So I was looking into like higher level positions at my work. I work for a big healthcare and that's just their pay range. If I continue working up it's gonna be a couple years but would they keep going would they pay for you to get your MBA yeah so they're gonna pay about six grand into the program and the program I'm looking at it would be 16 grand total okay I have to pay 10,000 out

of pocket then I'll still work work full time and could do that. What about your husband? Will he contribute to this in any way? What's his part in this? Yeah, he works full time as an equipment operator and he makes like 80 grand a year. So right now we're at 120. Once I finish my bachelor, it'll be at like 170. Can you cash flow? You guys are in baby step six.

How quickly can you save up the 10,000? Probably three to four months. We have a lot of extra margin in our budget. Love it. Love it. This is a no brainer, girlfriend. Why are you, I mean, even calling us about this. I'm just curious, Brittany, can we get her back and see?

I just, what's your dilemma? Don't know if I want to go be a corporate girl and move up the ladder. I'd rather stay at home and be a mom in a couple of years. Okay, because on my screen it says, is it selfish to get an MBA? That wasn't fighting words. Yeah, well it's like, because we'd have to put in

all this time and effort into it, and then if I just left in a year to go have a kid and not work for a couple of years, like I'd feel like that'd be like a waste of an investment. Well, I decided like, I didn't want to keep moving up the ladder. Could you, could you, let's talk about the real timeline on it. Cause I think if we talk about all these things and there's no real time around it, it makes it tougher. Are you talking about having a kid in five years or like in a couple months? A year or two.

Okay, so. And you know that you would want to stay home. You don't know. I don't know. That's the thing. Okay. I'm trying to like balance it where it's like I enjoy my job. I enjoy working, but I have this dream of staying home, but it's also like, what if I stay home and hate it? Well, the MBA will always be there, won't it?

You can always go back. There's no take backs. You have the education, the skillset, the experience. And so if you wanna go back to work at some point and use those skills and experiences, you can. Or even, I think I was kind of thinking of it the opposite of, could you go, if you wanted to go later and get your MBA, you could.

Yeah, because I'll always be there. So I could just hang out for a minute, figure out the kid thing and then go get my MBA later. It sounds like you're not sure about the end goal of being high up in admin and healthcare, if that's gonna be stressful, if it's gonna be rewarding. Is that really the struggle here? Yeah, because it's not the $10,000. Yeah, I think that's gonna be stressful, if it's gonna be rewarding, is that really the struggle here? Yeah, cause it's not the $10,000.

Yeah. I think that's the struggle. I just don't know if I want to work in high level admin cause I know it's stressful, especially in healthcare. Why'd you get into it? I just like helping people and I like problem solving. And I do a lot of that at my job now. And I know moving out, that's what my job will be.

And are you wanting to get into more higher level leadership where you have more say in strategy and you know leading people? Yeah. I do want to do that but I'm also nervous that I'll hate it once I get there. So I think, so we're talking about two investments. We're talking about the time of getting the MBA. How long does it take? 12 months.

12 months. And then we're talking about the 10K that'll take just a couple of months to save. I spent 10,000 on stupider things. Yeah, I agree. I 100, he couldn't have said it better. I think the 10K is not a stretch for you guys to save up. So money-wise I'm like, I totally think where you're at,

you can do this. And if you decide later that you don't wanna do it, I think you're just smarter at that point. I think the bigger question is the time. Cause a year is a decent amount of time. I mean, it can go like that, but I- If you don't have kids, you know, you're fairly newly married. I think, you know,

this is the time to do it if ever. Yes, I am inclined to say that. And I'm saying this as a guy who is not a fan of MBAs in general, but the way you're talking, you're telling me that it could double your salary versus you just getting an MBA because you're searching for something

and you don't wanna go to work. You're working full-time and pursuing this and you're clearly very sharp. And so I would do it and get rid of this cost fallacy of what if I waste all my time doing this over here? I think you're gonna be a well-rounded person with more education, more skills, more experience, more hireable, and if you hate it all at the end, you can always stay home if that's the dream

and dreams change. Yeah, and I think- And that's okay. No one's gonna fault you for that. And you're going in your jump your eyes are wide open on this. It's not like you're going and later on having this great grand discovery. Oh my gosh I hate higher up leadership or whatever. But I think if you and your husband both sit down and you're like we know know that in one world, this could become a complete loss. And we're fine with that.

As long as you're both fine with it, then I mean, yeah, because George, how many think about it, people are wasting so much more money on degrees they don't even use. But how many times does life go exactly the way we planned it? Zero percent of the time, you know, so it's like that's just the fact that you're already looking ahead and going, something could happen to where I do want to stay at home or that I don't want to do this job. Well then there's the identity crisis. I was high level at this admin position and now I'm letting go of all this to stay home and it's a different identity.

And my wife struggled with this. She was at Ramsey for nine years. She was an executive assistant to one of our board members and it was a hard thing to let go of all that thing was at Ramsey for nine years. She was an executive assistant to one of our board members. And it was a hard thing to let go of all that thing that you worked toward for nine years. And you have to reset your whole identity and go, who am I aside from all of this? And it's a beautiful journey, but it's a hard one, especially for women out there.

I feel for those that are going, I wanna have a kid. I don't know what this means for my career that I've worked really hard on. And that's not an easy decision to make. We can't make that for you, but I can worked really hard on and that's not an easy decision to make we can't Make that for you, but I can tell you that your life is gonna be okay either way Yeah, you can make me with either decision. You're gonna be okay. All right, George. This is kind of like what we do We're going back into the social world time for Instagram. Yeah, let's do Instagram. Okay. I like this Janelle from

Okay, that was Facebook. I'll do Instagram My husband and I are in our early 40s and recently adopted two young children. Do we need to do baby step five if we will be of age to pull out of retirement when the two small children go to college? So basically we can use our retirement instead of doing a 529.

Well, they're two young children. I still like the idea of leaving the nest egg as the nest egg for the intended purpose of retirement. And if you have the funds and means to do it, I would still save in a 529 plan and have those tax advantages there. Because I don't know the deal with their retirement, traditional versus Roth.

And so for that reason. And that's a lot of money to pull out aside from your additional cost of living. Yeah, and to rob 100 grand that was growing for me at that point of the game, I would rather have money set aside instead of feeling like, oh, I'm robbing the nest egg. I just wanna know, I've earmarked this for college

for a specific goal, and I'm not gonna feel bad using it. And again, worst case, they can roll that over to a Roth IRA, you know, 35 grand. And so I'd feel good about putting money away in Baby Step Five. Yeah, I mean, if they were young, if they were like 16, that would be a whole different discussion here.

But they're saying two young children. And that means there could be another 16 years before they go off to college, who knows? True, true. A lot of 529 questions. That's the second one we got today. I mean, it's an interesting one because it's squishy. We just don't know the future. We don't know what the kids are going to do with their life,

where they're going to go to school, what school will cost, how much will have saved, what scholarships will be there, will they work part-time? So many unknowns. That whole thing could implode because it's a racket right now. I'll tell you that right now. It's just- The reckoning is coming. I feel like I'm paying you

and yet you are interviewing me to go to school there. Are you good enough for our school? Like it's opposite. Like if I'm paying you, I should be interviewing you. And you should be writing me essays so that I can decide if I want to go there. You're going somewhere now. The truth is buying and selling your home is a very, very big deal guys.

And between clickbait headlines and all the confusing data out there, it really is tough to know what's actually going on in this housing market. And we're here to make sure that you are up to date on the latest trends and that you understand exactly what's going on in the housing market. Uh, we want you to know, Hey, medium home prices did go up slightly last month to about $430,000. We want you to know there are actually more homes on the market. There's nearly 1 million homes on the market. There's nearly 1 million

homes on the market, which is actually the highest since 2019. But in many areas, the truth is it's still not enough to meet buyer demand. We want you to know that the average 15-year fixed rate home mortgage rose to 5.9% last month, but it's still under 6%. So that's good. And the truth is if you are financially ready, a small rate increase should not be the thing that's going to hold you back from buying the home that you love. So if this what your whistle or if this was kind of up your alley of where you are right now, if you want to learn more about the housing market trends and get free tools to help you buy or sell your house with confidence, go to ramsysolutions.com slash market or click the link in the show notes. If you're listening on podcast or YouTube,

Ray is in Tampa, Florida. What's going on, Ray? Hi, I'm trying to decide if I should take my parents up on their offer to live in their house for free, but it would mean moving states so we can save money to actually buy a house. Interesting. So they have a rental and they're saying you can live here, you don't have to pay rent, but it requires you to move states. What does that mean for your jobs? Well, that's the thing. My husband lost his job in February and to make up for his income, we've been living off of, we've been using our tax refund to help supplement. So we've burned through all of that. And then I am

a teacher at a private school and this year I've been let go because the enrollment was low. So I need to get a new job anyways. Wow. And we're renting, but our lease will be up this summer. Oh. And this is a really, it's a really, really expensive state to live in, especially in our income bracket. Where's the rental? We're in Tampa area. No, where would your parents, they're saying you didn't move states.

Oh yeah. It's in Texas, like an hour outside of Corpus Christi. So it's far out, nothing. It is a nothing. Can you get jobs in your fields out there? Have you looked at the job market? See, this is where it's probably already decided. It's just, I'm struggling emotionally with the decision because I've already got a job lined up, so I'm okay. Okay. In Corpus Christi. Like 10 minutes from the house. Wow.

And is it the pay, the pay is the same or better? It'll actually be almost 10,000 more than what I make now with the option of a potential bonus at the end of the school year. Great. So where's the problem? The problem is my husband at the 11th hour found a job here in Tampa. Okay. And even though he says he wants to go, he says we're going,

there's a lot of anger and hostility that I'm kind of forcing us to go. Is it, is his job offer like a really great offer? Tell us about his job offer. So his, he was a truck driver, but he got into a little accident and lost his job. Now his job is as a, in a different company, as a like driver manager.

And he can do it remotely but it's it's a little less than what he was making before. How much less? Before. Depending on if he was willing to actually like bust himself in work he would make anywhere from fifty five to seventy something and this job is just 55, but last year he only made 51 because he was lazy. Well, and the good part is it's remote.

So he could do it in Corpus Christi. Where is it that he just loves Florida and doesn't want to leave the state? I get that. It's not fully remote. Like he is supposed to go in. He's hoping that if he works for a while, it could be somewhat because he works from, I don't know, he just started it like a week ago, but he's also

had a few jobs in this time and none of them last more than two weeks. So I don't feel like I can depend on it. Why is that? Why is that? Don't go over that. I feel your resentment towards him. Yeah. Of he's lazy, he can't keep a job, I'd rather do this thing and be stable and Corpus Christi.

And so I feel like there's more, it's a relational marriage problem more than it is a financial one at this point. Yeah, right, why can't you keep a job? I don't really know. He's just, he got into this accident. Like I said, as a driver, it's bad. So then he gets into an accident and then he's having trouble finding work.

He found one job right away as a truck driver and lost it after day one because he lied about the accident. Oh, so he's just making bad choices. And then he's trying to find a new field and he keeps finding these jobs that are just not working out or they're not paying him

or none of them are paying enough. And then he finally lands this at the 11th hour and then I lose my job and we can't pay our bills. We have three small kids. And I'm just terrified we're gonna be homeless if we stay. Yeah, man. You've had it up to here, I get it.

Have you shared all this with him, with this level of emotion and how scared you are? Does he understand that? Yes, but we came here in 2020 after we had our first because his parents live here and they helped us so much with our first couple of kids and they did help us. My parents were living on a boat in California. They couldn't have helped us. Now they've changed their lives significantly and they have this empty house on their property and they said we can live there And they have this empty house on their property and they said we can live there and we have so much debt now because of having our kids.

I, to be honest, I don't know the exact number because three of the credit cards are in his name and I know that they're maxed out. I think we're around 20 K on his credit cards plus another I think 10k for myself and then also my student loans. How much are those? 120, 125. Anything else? That's it. This is the aside from my student loans this is all that that we accrued from a combination of I after the third I had three kids three years in a row so after the third one I on what I make I couldn't have afforded to work it wouldn't have made sense and so I took a year off and When he wherever his paycheck didn't make it we put it on credit

And now and then when I started working we've just been struggling to And now, and then when I started working, we've just been struggling to make payments because we pay what we can onto the card, but then we need that to, you know, feed the kids. What I hear, what I hear Ray is a woman who's tired of being in survival mode. That's what I hear. Everything is in you should be, you should be. And it's hard to leave. We have a community here, but they're not paying our bills.

But the biggest issue is the resentment that I'm getting from him about going, but it's not working here. No, it's not. And I don't know that you guys, you guys moving, like you go with you. You know what, you understand, like your life's problems won't be solved

by going to Corpus Christi either. It could be a fresh start, but the same behaviors, the same patterns, the same credit card bills will follow you wherever you go. So I want you guys to deal with the root issue here. Which is a couple who's not on the same page, who's going into crippling debt because they can't keep their lifestyle in check.

And we need to find a sustainable solution. And part of that might mean we got to go to Corpus Christi and have a reset. Yeah, I'm with George. I think that that is the caveat, right? I think that this opportunity fell in your lap with your parents. They were very generous to do this. I think it's wonderful that you landed a gig that is paying you more.

I think it's a wonderful thing that he's found a role that doesn't require him to drive. I think he can find another in Corpus Christi or one that is fully remote, right? It's like there's more than one option out there. He's just excited that he landed one. And honestly, I'm just saying this on the side, but I don't think he gets to be the sole captain of this ship anymore because he's like, he's crashed the ship. And so now it's like, hey, we're both making decisions and I have to feel just as good about the decision.

I do not feel good about staying here. And I'd put a couple of foot, I put my foot down and be like, I'm not staying here. This has not been good. But also knowing when we go to Corpus Christi, we've got a lot that we have to deal with. And it's probably you guys getting into counseling because I don't like the fact that you're feeling resentful.

I know why it is. But we got to we got to get a handle on that. I would have him working remotely in Corpus Christi while he finds another gig or something more stable or different field altogether. Mm-hmm. Your Ramsey Show scripture and quote of the day, Proverbs 28 19. Whoever works his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows worthless pursuits will have plenty of poverty. But he who follows worthless pursuits will have plenty of poverty." And then Jordan Peterson said, Work as hard as you possibly can on at least one thing and see what happens.

Love that. This whole multitasking thing. This whole multitasking business is, I mean, if you can just focus on one thing. That's why the baby steps work. Focus intensity. Yes, over time. Don't try to do 17 things at once and make progress. Facts. All right, Jason in Fort Worth, Texas is on the line.

Hey, Jason. Hey there. I'm 53, self-employed, and I'm way behind on retirement savings. I'm trying to catch up, so I'm thinking of opening a solo 401k. And I wanted to understand the match on that. I know you're supposed to match than Roth than traditional. So since I would be providing the match, I didn't know if that

still applied to that or if there was a better option for me like S&P or what. Okay, so you're the only person who works in your business? Yes. Okay. Is this an S Corp? How is it set up or is it just sole proprietor? Okay, so you're the only person who works in your business? Yes. Okay. Is this an S-corp? How is it set up? Or is it just sole proprietor?

It is set up as an S-corp. Okay. Sweet. Yeah, I mean, my husband and I have that set up and we contribute the, you know, you wanna, if you can contribute as much as you can out of your paycheck. And so that's your contribution. And then on the employer side, you can out of your paycheck, and so that's your contribution. And then on the employer side,

you can match that up to 20, 25%. But what's wonderful about this is I don't know what your business brings in, but because you have both sides of that equation, you can contribute up to like $69,000. Well, you're over, let's see, you're over 50, so you can go to like 76,000. 76,500. Yeah.

That's amazing. That's a lot. So how's the business doing? I mean, how much can you put in this thing a year? It's doing good. The company makes about 200,000 a year, but I only pay myself 70,000, but I could change that obviously, whatever would.

Is that really conservative? Could you give yourself a raise and still have enough retained earnings and reinvest in the business and do all the things you need to do? For sure, yes. I'd do that 100%. Is there any other debt you have

or anything that would stand in the way of this plan? Well, no, I'm kind of out of order on the baby steps, but I'm about to get a lump sum and I'm going to basically be caught up to maybe step seven, but with almost no savings. I've got about a hundred thousand and a couple of things saved, but I'll be up to baby step seven and be able to just power down on it. When's this lump sum coming? In about a month.

Okay. Yeah. I mean, if I would push pause on this until that actually comes through because you don't want to spend money before you get it. But if that money comes, you pay off whatever debt you have. Is that including your mortgage? Yeah, mortgage is paid off. And there's just a couple of other things that I'll pay off. And then I'll probably have about 140 to invest. And I think that's above anything I could do for the solo 401k. So after that, I'd also be interested in hearing what you would recommend until I could get it into that. And obviously I think a Roth version of the 401k.

Yeah, I'll tell you what, you know, when Sam and I did this thing, it is a little bit confusing and you know, how you're tracking all of this. And I did have to sit down with somebody to help me understand. I sat down with the person who does our taxes and does all of our books. And I also sat down with at that time, our SmartVestor, just to make sure, okay, how do we need to do this so that we're doing it the right way and it looks right through our books and all of that stuff. So I did do that, I'd recommend that because I don't know if you have someone that does that for you or if you just handle everything,

but if you don't feel confident, I would sit down with someone because you wanna make sure this is done in the proper way in your books as well so it doesn't look like, I don't know, you contributed all this money out of your personal pay. But yeah, that's what I would do 100% of. As an example, let's say you gave yourself a raise to $100,000, okay?

Now on the employee side, you can do 23,000 into that solo 401k. But on the employer side, now you can do that 25% of your W-2 salary. So 100,000, 25% is another 25 grand. So how much you pay yourself really does matter on this. If you wanna hit that. Because that increases the amount

you can contribute up to the limit. And then I can still do the catch up on top of that, right? That's right. So the max amount for you since you're over 50. 30,500. That's right. On the employee side. Plus that 25% of your W-2 income. So that's gonna be a nice hefty bump

to your retirement account to help you catch up. And then outside of that, again, like you mentioned, you could just invest outside of retirement if you would like, and that's not gonna have tax advantages, but it's gonna give you some flexibility and give you some liquid cash, other than some capital gains on that. Okay and then I'll be able to slow down my investments if my business slows down as I get older.

That's right. And it'll be fine okay. Good questions that's a really really really good question. There's a lot of hope here that even though you know he feels like he's getting a late start there's a lot of upside especially because he runs his own business. And the solo 401k is that we don't talk about it enough. We don't get a ton of situations where it makes sense because you've got to be self-employed just you or you and a spouse in the business.

But it's a great option for those that are self-employed. You don't get a pass on investing just because you're self-employed. Well, I think that's the thing. When you're in a company, they're telling you, here here's this option for you here's a 401k. They make it easy. They make it easy and when you're out there working for yourself especially I find George a lot of times when people are in like creative fields or it kind of just gets pushed by the wayside I'll think about it another day

another day and it's like hey this really does matter and it's really not difficult to set up you know you just sit down one time and get it set up and once it's set up, then it's just set it and forget it like everybody else. Just like your employer situation. So it's so, so important. All right. One last call. Can we do it? Can we burn it out? Brittany in Atlanta, Georgia. We're against the clock, but we can help you out. Hey, how are you guys?

We're great. you out. Hey, how are you guys? We're great. So my question is, my husband and I currently are sitting on right at 200,000 in debt outside of our home. And that broken down, it's about 100 in student loans, a credit card, one credit card left that has 35,000 on it. Our car has 57 and then we have our daughter's braces that are at about 3,000. But my question is specifically on the car. We've looked at trying to sell it private party, but we're upside down about 17 to 19,000 based off of KBB. And then, you know, we've talked to, you know, different dealerships about selling it, paying the difference or like private partying it. And we're not really

sure what to do. I'm kind of at the point where as bad as this sounds, I think crashing it sounds best. No, no. But I know that's not, you know, the right thing to do. I think that's insurance fraud. I mean, ask yourself the question. Would you rather be $18,000? Let me, let me include the correct, the cost of a beater. Would you rather be $25,000 in question, would you rather be $18,000? Let me include the cost of a beater. Would you rather be $25,000 in debt

or would you rather be $57,000 in debt? Right. Door number one. Well, my thing is, I don't know what to do as far as like, we don't wanna repossess it. We won't wanna have it repossessed, but like we can't. Definitely not. We're not getting anywhere on the car to get it.

What's your household income? We make about 170. And do you have anything in savings, anything liquid? No, we have the thousand dollars and that's what we've, so we've paid off about 6,000 in credit card debt in the last two months. We've really kind of been hitting it hard and like trying to figure this out.

Me and my husband together have four jobs. Have you attempted, have you attempted to get a loan for the balance, for the difference, in what they tell you? Yeah, they told us no, that we don't qualify. We tried refinancing it. We don't qualify. Was this like a credit union?

Where'd you go to try to get this loan? We looked at a credit union. Yeah, we banked with a credit union, so we talked to a credit union. We couldn't geted with a credit union, so we thought no credit union. We couldn't get anywhere. They could not cover it because of how far upside down we are. They would not help us. OK.

They said we qualified for about like $7,000 in a loan, which obviously doesn't help us any. Well, I'm thinking, what if you went and you saved up $10,000 real quick, took the $7,000 loan, and that gets you out of it? Now, you need a little more to get a beater car to get around if you guys need to be a two-car family. But that might mean you save up 15 grand plus the 7,000 loan from the credit union. That could get you out. Now you'll need to get really aggressive with your savings,

which means putting away way more towards savings to get out of this faster. But that's your only solution at this point. If you can't get any more than that in the loan, I would not do a repo. No, don't do a repo. I mean, this is you kind of pushing pause on paying extra, you pay minimums on everything until you can't stack that up.

And work like crazy. Look around the house and sell everything you can get your hands on. Because if you can get that other $10,000, you're free and clear of $57,000 of debt.