The Ramsey Show - App - From Food Stamps to Freedom (Hour 1)

Episode Date: March 20, 2019

The show about you

Music Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I am Dave Ramsey, your host. This is your show. Thank you for being with us. It's your show because we talk to you. We actually take more calls than any other talk radio show in America because you're actually the subject here. So we're glad you're with us. Open phones at

888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Joseph starts this hour in Providence, Rhode Island. Hi, Joseph. How are you? Good, sir. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? I just wanted to call you today to get some advice from you.

I'm having some issues with my girlfriend. I'm trying to get her to do the debt snowball with me, and she's got like five credit cards and some student loans. Her cars are paid off. She's got her own house. She's got about $150,000 left on her mortgage, and I'm just really trying to talk with her and get her on the bandwagon with that. And she's got some problems with anxiety and depression and stuff.

And talking about that, according to her, supposedly triggers that. And it's just been very difficult. Is she in counseling for her anxiety and her depression? She was at a time, and she stopped for a few months. Okay. Well, if you have anxiety and depression to the point that you cannot live your life well, you need help with that. And you don't get to stop. You get help until you get healed.

And you need some healing. Because when you say you can't talk about money, what you're saying is I can't talk about life, because money flows to every part of your life. Right. And so it might be that that's a load of crap. It might be that she just doesn't want to talk about money because she doesn't want anybody telling her what to do. That might be what it is. I kind of got that vibe dave um her you know her parents have definitely spoiled her quite a bit of her life yeah you know so the word no is not a word she wants to hear nor is it a word she wants to tell her herself she don't tell herself no and

so it ain't gonna do with her anxiety or her depression it's gonna do with she being a spoiled brat it could be i don't know. I'm just guessing. It could be. It could be both. But anyway, so here's the deal. There are four things that marriage research tells us you must be in agreement on if you want a high probability of a successful marriage. The number one cause of divorce in North America today and trouble in marriage is money fights. Number one.

Okay? And so, you know, anytime you find the number one cause of something, you deal with that if you're going to be doing that something. So if this relationship is going to get serious and move towards marriage, this has to be dealt with is what I'm saying. You guys have to have some discussions you have to get on the same page you have to have an agreed value system to go forward because if you marry a princess you're going to have what's known as a long freaking life okay right so you don't want to do that and if she marries a jerk that doesn't want to work much and doesn't want to pay his bills she's going to to have a long life, right? And so you guys need to be in alignment about how you're going to handle money

and what our view of money, savings, and debt, and investing, and generosity is. And we need to have some alignment on those things. Now, she doesn't have to be exactly like you, but you need to have had these discussions and be in alignment on those. The other three things, by the way, in the statistical data on marriage are being in agreement on in-laws, kids, and religion. Right. Kids, if we're going to have them, how many and how they're going to be treated? Are the inmates going to run the asylum? How are we going to deal with boundary issues and extended family which is um crazy in-laws and so forth interfering people all

that kind of junk and then you know religion uh and christians call that unequally yoked so anyway if you're in agreement on those four things and you've had some good pre-marriage counseling and good healthy non-toxic discussions where we're aligned on those four things, statistically you have a very high probability of your marriage winning. So that's how I would talk to her about it. I'd just go, listen, this is a big deal because it's the ingredients. It's one of the big ingredients for success. And I want a relationship to be successful.

So for your relationship to take the next step and become more serious towards marriage this has to be dealt with and you can gently and kindly and but you need to figure it out ahead of time don't and don't think oh we get married we'll straighten it out then no okay this is something you deal with before the engagement ring goes on the finger. Yes, I'm going to put it in the butt as fast as I can. Well, I mean, it's a deal breaker. Right, right. And it's not because money is that big a deal. It's because your value system, how you spend money, says what's important to you, how you handle money.

And if you're going to put your hands over your ears and go la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la and act like we don't have to deal with this and somebody's going to swoop in, the fairy godmother's going to take care of us, the government's going to help us retire, which is well known for its ability to handle money, you're going to be broke your whole life. I mean, I can spend on these credit cards. There's no end in sight. You're not in Congress. You've got to have a plan. So that's the thing.

So you've got to practice denial because it causes us stress, denial is a river in Egypt. We can't do this. It doesn't work, man. So that's what you guys got to, and so you can have some kind, gentle discussions and probe, but only to the extent the relationship is moving forward and the relationship is stalled until you get past this hurdle uh at some point now again if you've been on three dates it's not something you talk about that much

that would be weird but um unless you met on the in the dave ramsey community or something on facebook but which we've now had three engagements on there but but if you're not if you didn't meet there then it's weird to talk about this on the first two or three dates it's you know a lot of stuff you don't it's a very intimate subject it's not something you do in casual conversation the first go-round or two so anyway that that's um it's a big deal though folks for you to be aligned and those of you out there that are married i mean get you and your spouse being on the same team is just it's just all the data points are there it's almost impossible to drag someone down the road to wealth

you kicking and screaming against their will it's almost impossible to do that it's almost impossible to out earn someone's spending addiction it's almost impossible to out earn someone's spending addiction it's almost impossible to out earn your stupidity and lack of organization i tried it i couldn't do it i'm pretty good at making money but i couldn't make enough money to get past my stupid because i do stupid big when i do it and so you cannot do this you've got to be aligned you've got to be on the same team. You have to make decisions together that are major decisions and be unified about it. And, you know, Sharon and I practice that to this day. It is the recipe to a great marriage. It increases communication, quality communication.

It increases intimacy. It increases the probability of you building wealth working together. You are not roommates once you put the finger in the ring and you say, I do wireless plan is blowing your budget each month. Pure Talk USA offers smarter wireless with unlimited plans starting as low as $20 per month. You never pay data overage fees, and we never turn off your data. No contracts, no hidden fees, and if you're thinking our low cost means less coverage, think again. Our voice and data service covers 99% of Americans, and our 4G LTE network provides the fastest internet speeds like more expensive carriers. We operate on the

largest GSM network in the U.S. to ensure you receive reliable coverage virtually anytime, anywhere. Plus, you can keep your same phone and number and add multiple lines to save more. We're so confident you'll love Pure Talk USA that we invite you to try our service risk-free. Visit puretalkusa.com or call 844-862-3677. Enter promo code SAVEDAVE and receive 50% off your first month. That's puretalkusa.com. Jody's in Dallas, Texas. Jody, welcome to The Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave.

Hey, what's up? Well, my husband and I are wondering about our kids' college savings. We are on the baby steps. We're going to pay off our mortgage this year. Yay! I know, we're excited. We're going to have some cash flow to be able to help with the kids' college. Our kids are 15, 13, and 10, so the first one will be going into college in three and a half years. But we were wondering, do you recommend the same aggressive allocation for the kids' 529 plans as you do for retirement plans or would you be

more conservative well i don't necessarily consider it the hyper aggressive it's just a a good allocation over a five-year period of time and in each of these cases a portion of the money is going to be left alone at least five years um because even a 15 year old uh you've got um three years to go to school plus four more seven year window before the last dollars are being pulled out and so yeah i personally that's what we did with our mutual funds for our kids we had them across those four types growth growth and income aggressive growth and international there's no harm uh in just putting it all in growth funds if you want to. I don't care.

It just needs to do something that's going to earn north of 10% because the tuition inflation rate is about 7.2%. So you've got to beat that on average going through. But you don't have a lot of time to where compound interest is necessarily going to be the bigger portion of this account. The bigger portion of this account is the money you've already gotten in there and the money that you're going to add, physically add to it. Because growth in three years or four years is not going to be that much on the account. You know, if you had $100,000 in there, you're're talking about 10 i mean you're talking about five ten thousand dollars a year growth

so it's not it's not that big a portion of the money at this stage of the game um so the you know it's not anything to wring your hands over in other words if you want to back off and not have that aggressive growth in there which is, which is hidden inside of your question, well, I don't care. That's fine. I'm comfortable with having it spread across those four personally. But if you want to back it off a little bit, that's fine. Because, again, mathematically, the bulk of the money is already there or going to be

added by you. It's not going to be the growth because it's so late in the game. Now, if we're dealing with a three-year-old, we might have a bigger argument about that. Jason is with us in Cleveland, Ohio. Hi, Jason. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. How are you doing? Thanks for your ministry and thanks for taking my call. Certainly. How can I help? I have a quick question for you. So, 14 months ago, my wife and I got in your plan, and we just finished Baby Steps 2 and 3. We're in 4, 5, 6 now.

The unique situation is, through the 16 years of my career, I'd always maxed out my TSP, and I have two rental houses that are owned free and clear. Wow. We owe about $175,000 on our current house that we live in, and it's worth about $400,000. Because of your teachings, I don't want to owe anybody any money at all. So I'm kind of torn. Do we sell one of the greenhouses and pay off the mortgage, or do we keep it and just keep cracking away to, I guess,

get rid of the mortgage in a couple years? I figure if we keep it going for a while, we could do it in a couple years and be done with it. But I just don't want the stress of any more payments. We've spent like Congress for years years and we're done with it. I appreciate your dramatic change and transformation in who you've become.

Congratulations. I think that's your secret sauce. The dramatic right turn that you all made. Your living life perpendicular to what you used to live it. And that's what matters here. And so it's not the end of the world if you want to sell a rental

and be debt-free today. What are you going to do then? You're going to start building up cash, and you're going to take cash and in two or three years buy a rental. Yeah, absolutely. Probably. Do you like rentals? Do you like real estate?

I do. The situation with my job, you can put 25 years in and retire. So since I started, I've always maxed out my TSD. I've always saved for the future, but our current finances were always a mess, full of payments and everything. And we had the moment of we've had enough screened that I know you're very familiar with, and we just went out of Rampage and paid off about $101,000. Way to go.

Way to go. And you're still mathematically on that Rampage, which means you had had enough. You really have changed. That's what I meant. Absolutely. But the point is, five years from today, you're going to be buying rentals with cash if you want more real estate in

either scenario, correct? Yes. Whether you sell a rental and pay off your house today or whether you pay off your house over the next two years. Correct. Yeah, just the thought of owing someone money now, we just don't want it. It would be nice just to... It'd be great.

...come with it for now and we still have the rental, yeah. It'd be great. I don't want it. And it would be nice just to. It'd be great. Come with it for now and we still have the rental, yeah. It'd be great. I don't mind. If there's a rental that you're not that fond of anyway, if you were going to buy a rental today, you might not buy that one. And it accomplishes this goal. You're getting rid of something you're not that thrilled about, you're not in love with, and you're getting rid of some debt.

You're in love with that. That makes sense. But if you've got two little golden rentals sitting there and you just love them, you just think, man, I'd buy ten of those if I could get them. I'm not sure I'm dumping that. I'm going to just scratch through in two years and be debt-free on the house. But, again, you can just kind of look at it that way. There's not a wrong answer here.

You're doing smart stuff either way. I mean, neither one of these options are under the dumb column. There's nothing where we look stupid up and see you in the dictionary. That's not what's going on here. You're on track. You're doing what you're supposed to be doing. You're being very wise, and you did. You had an I've had it moment, and you changed your life.

Congratulations, hero. Well done. All right, Kim is with us in Fort Myers, Florida. Hi, Kim. How are you? Good. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can I help? Great. Well, me and my husband, we have about $300,000 in our savings account, and we have recently purchased a multi-unit franchise. He is working, and I am not right now. I quit my job for this franchise and we were wondering if we should use the savings to pay for the business so it is debt-free for the first

several years till it starts making money or continues to stay debt-free or do we take out a business loan and let the business pay for itself and do something with the money. So you would borrow money to keep from using your savings to do the investment? Correct. Why would you do that? Well, I mean, I figured that was the answer, but because the business could pay for itself eventually. Hypothetically.

And maybe we could do more. Hypothetically, it will. Well, hypothetically. Eighty percent of small businesses fail in the first two years, including franchises. Multi-unit franchise. You mean you've got multiple locations of a particular type of store? Correct. Okay.

How many locations? Three. Okay. Why did you do multiples when you hadn't even run one? We live in an odd place where down here we're growing pretty pretty fast and our town is kind of split by a river so uh we we definitely needed two and to buy three was a big discount and we want to open more than that eventually if it's in the medical field okay all right um well pay cash for it that's what i would do pay cash for it always pay cash pay cash for it. That's what I would do. Pay cash for it. I always pay cash. Sounds good.

Pay cash for all your expansions and go build your business at the speed of cash. If that means you slow down a little bit, you're going to be glad when there's a downturn or when there's something happens with the franchise home office or when some negative thing comes your way because there's always a negative variable coming at you at some point. I'm not being negative. I'm just being realistic. And, you know, when that comes at you and you have no debt, it changes your world. I mean, when 2008 happened, we had no debt.

We had a pile of cash. We didn't lay anybody off. Some of the cash flow slowed down. We had some pinches around here. We had to watch what we're doing. But we actually were in a position, a lot of people did get laid off, and we were able to invest in humans and bring in some of the smartest, best people we've ever brought in

because companies that were broke were dumping them on the street. So you could take advantage of downturns in several different ways if you keep yourself in a strong cash position and no debt. And if that means your business grows slower, oh well. I'd rather see you on the cover of Slow Company magazine. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. Joe is with us from San Antonio, Texas, in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions. Hey, Joe, how are you? How's it going, Dave?

Better than I deserve. So, I understand your wife, Karina, wasn't able to make it. She wasn't. No, we had a family emergency, so she stayed home. We're sorry we missed her. Well, welcome, man. Good to have you. So, you're here to do a debt-free scream on her behalf.

Of course. I love it. And how much have you. So you're here to do a debt-free scream on her behalf. Of course. I love it. And how much have you paid off? We paid a whopping $182,500. Okay. Very good. And how long did this take you? It took us 9.3 months or 280 days.

Gotcha. Wow. And your range of income during that time? $200,000 to $240,000. Wow. Okay. What do you do for a living? I'm a real estate agent now. And what range of income during that time? $200,000 to $240,000. Wow. Okay. What do you do for a living? I'm a real estate agent now. And what does she do?

And Karina was a registered nurse, and now she's a real estate agent. Oh, that'll work. Okay. Very good. What kind of debt was the $193,000? It was our home. Way to go, man! Yes. Looking at weird people. Yep. I love it. Real estate agent with a paid-for house. Ding, ding. It's's a good deal so what's this house worth it is worth about 250 000 okay so you had to have some money

in savings that we did we put a little down on the home and we actually own two other homes i owned my home outright and karina owned her home outright and then we decided to buy our own home and those other homes were rentals. And I called into the show, as a matter of fact, and mentioned to you that we were going to try to save and pay cash for the home. And we got a little fever, a little home fever, and we went ahead and took a mortgage on a home. And I will tell you what, Dave, the first bill that we got, that mortgage payment gave me the worst kind of anxiety I've ever had in my life because I hadn't had a mortgage payment. We hadn't had a mortgage payment. And I sat down with Karina. I said, Karina, we make good money. We're just going to live on your income alone. She was a registered nurse at the time. And she said, let's do it. So we forked every bit of commissions

that I made, everything from my retirement. I'm military retired. Put my pensions into it, and we just went gazelle times 50. And it worked out really well for us. Because you're averaging $20,000 a month. That's pretty strong. We have a great real estate market

in San Antonio, just like here in Nashville. So you're making good money and just chunking it all on that. Yep, throwing it all on the mortgage. Well done, sir. Very, very well done. How does it feel to not have any payments again? It's surreal to be able to do what you want to do when you want to do it and how you want to do it. And, Dave, you speak a lot about giving.

Giving is one of those things that I never was able to do. I grew up on food stamps and welfare. And to be able to serve 20 years in the military and give us that structure to start following things. And the interesting enough, when Karina and I married, I took her to Europe. I wanted her to see Germany. I lived in Germany for two years and I bought your book at a consignment store for $3. And I opened the book up and I was waiting in Baltimore airport, BWI. And I opened up your book and I started to read it. And 12 hours later, because of the flight to Germany, I never put it down. I read your entire book in one sitting for about 14 hours. Wow.

And from that point on, I knew this is where we had to be. This is what we had to do. And Karina was on board, of course, and here we are able to do these things. And I think you speak to it very well when you say, you know, being debt-free is great, and that's awesome. But being able to give, I've received many things in my life from people that cared for me and supported us. I was never able to give as much as we've things in my life from people that cared for me and supported us. I was never able to give as much as we've given today. We love to go on trips and we talk to waiters and waitresses and we want to hear their story. And to be able to give $100 tips for a $12 meal is the most amazing thing. I went and participated in a Wounded Warrior Project a couple of months ago in New Hampshire and met some amazing men who struggle with PTSD

as I struggle with PTSD. And to be able to help one individual gentleman, he said, I want to write a book on PTSD. And I said, well, what do you need for that? How do you do that? And he's like, I'm going to sell T-shirts. I said, what do you need? He said, $100 is all I need.

I'm going to start with. And God spoke to me. And in that moment, I said, I'm going to give you $1,000. It was pretty great. That's fun. It's about as good as it gets. That's just fun stuff. Well done.

Yes. I don't think you'll get the fever bad enough to go back into debt. No, sir. Absolutely not. But I tell you, we got some great support at our church. And I'm just going to give a shout out to Crosspoint Fellowship Church, our church there. I'm actually helping the coordinator do FPU. We got some great folks there.

I'm also doing Joint Base San Antonio Randolph, the military FPU as well. And we have a class going in that. And I love to help in that as much as we can there. So it's just an amazing thing. But I wanted to give you one story. I flew into Nashville and I went to Hertz. You know, I scheduled this, this trip and Hertz, I went to Hertz and I show up there and I say, here's my reservation. And they gave, I give them my debit card and they said, we don't accept debit. I said, actually you do accept debit. And they said, no, we don't. And I said, well, it's on your website

that says you accept debit. And they said, well, we don't accept And I said, well, it's on your website that says you accept debit. And they said, well, we don't accept debit. And I said, I looked at him and I said, where's dollar? And I looked, there's dollar. I said, just wait right here. I walked over there to dollar car rental and they looked at me. I said, I'm actually here to do my debt-free scream. And they're like, well, Dave Ramsey, of course.

Not only did they take my debit card, but they gave me a cheaper rate. It was awesome. So a young man by the name of Adam was there working, and he helped me out. And it was just so awesome that he was working. You guys are working in partner. Yeah. And I wanted to be able to say that to him.

He was really, really good. That's cool. So, yeah, I appreciate everything you've done and the gospel of Dave Ramsey and the things that we've done and how we're able to help people is just an absolute blessing that we will never shy away from. Well done, sir. We're proud of you. Congratulations. Thank you.

How does it feel to have no payments? Like I said, it's just a surreal situation to be in, to not have to worry about. And on the real estate agent side of the house, you know, if you don't sell a home, you don't get paid. Well, I have a military pension. So if I don't sell a home, I still get paid. So the pressure is not on me to sell homes. In fact, I think I'm a better real estate agent because I tell people if it takes six months, a year before you decide on the right house, then I'll wait. I have no problem doing it. There's no pressure in it. And then I go on

and to speak about a little bit of some of the things they should do. I speak about you and your book. I've even gone and told a client, and who does this as a real estate agent? I've told a client after they told me about the finances that this is probably not the best time for you to choose a home. And although a lot of real estate agents might think that's crazy,

I think it's God being able to say, you know what, you made it this far. Like you say, your house should be a blessing and not a curse. And we want to do those things to make sure that you succeed. Cool. Well, we got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Everyday Millionaires. Your house should be a blessing and not a curse. And we want to do those things to make sure that you succeed. Cool.

Well, we've got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Everyday Millionaires. I have Everyday Millionaires. I read that quick. What else you got for me, Dave? Hey, man. You pick out something out of the bookstore. Yes, sir. We'll just do it that way. Absolutely.

Absolutely. Well, that's definitely the next chapter in your story for sure. Sure. Absolutely. To be Everyday Millionaires. Congratulations to you and Karina, Joe. And thank you for your service to the country. And thanks for leading our classes.

We're honored. Very cool stuff. Absolutely. All right, Joe and Karina, San Antonio, Texas, $183,000 paid off in 9.3 months, making $2,000 to $2,400. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free scream. Three, two, one.

We're debt-free! Woo-hoo! Yeah! That's how that's done. Open phones at 888-825-5225. You jump in. We'll talk about your life and your money. We're glad you're here.

Peter is on Facebook. How much life insurance should I have? And what if I feel like there isn't any room in my budget for it? Well, it's like everything else. You will find the time and you will find the money to do what's important. And you need to look at your budget and crunch it down. Life insurance is not that expensive if you're in reasonably good health. Go to ZanderInsurance.com, get you a quick, easy quote,

and you should have 10 to 12 times your income on you. So if you make $50,000 a year, then that means you would need $500,000 to $600,000, somewhere in there. 15- to 20-year level term insurance. And just jump on, again, Zander Insurance, Z-A-N-D-E-R, insurance.com, and you'll get a quick, easy quote there. You'll be amazed at how inexpensive it is. Dude, depending on your age, you probably spend more on pizza. Really. So take depending on your age, you probably spend more on pizza. Really.

So, take care of your family. This was the Dave Ramsey Show, Amelia. Hello, sir. Thank you for having me. Sure. What's up? So I have a question about we had to draw some boundaries with my parents with money who are helping us out a little bit as we've just had a baby. And things just tend to get a little hairy with them, and I'm really struggling with how to keep it fair to them

and also without messing up our progress. Okay. So what is it they're trying to give you money or they need money? What are you saying? So I'm sorry. So we are moving home to pay off our debt. So we're moving in with our parents. They are doing some renovations on their basement so that we can live there for a few months and save some money. And from there, kind of decide

where we're going to go. And we have we have an agreed upon rent rate and we have an agreed-upon rent rate, and we actually gave them rent in advance to help pay for some of those renovations because I knew they wouldn't have the money up front. And it's just kind of already started happening where they know I have some savings and they're starting to, you know, ask me for money to borrow. And while I do trust that they'll give it back, I just, I find, I'm just not sure how fair it is of me to say I'm not comfortable, you know, having this borrower-lender relationship when they're also helping me out. And I don't know what's fair to them and fair to me. Okay. So how much do you have in savings? Right now I have $1,100, and then I also have about $228 just for expenses for the baby if something comes up.

And how old are you? I'm 29. I'll be 30 in about a month. And how old are they? My mom is 60. She's 60 years old, and she needs $1,100? Oh, no, she doesn't need $1,100. That's how much I have in savings.

They want a few hundred. It's about $300. Why does she need a couple of hundred dollars when she's 60 years old? She's that broke? They're not good with money. They're not good with it. That's why I'm... So how are they doing the renovation of the basement then?

How much money did you give them for that? Oh, it was basically our rent for two months, so they have a very reasonable rent for us. It's $400 a month. We gave them $800. So $800 is what the renovations cost? Just for the flooring, yeah, just to kind of get it so we could live there because it's been finished previously, but we ripped up the carpet, and then it was just a cement floor.

So they just put in some vinyl flooring for us and some paint and stuff. Okay. My mom is also helping with child care one day a week. Okay. Well, Mom, we're too broke to loan money. What do I mean money? You're broke. You have $1,100. That's not – mean money? You're broke. You have $1,100.

That's not... I mean, you're broke. Yeah. And so we don't have any money to loan. I've got a baby and we're trying to get out of debt. That's why we're moving homes

because we're broke. Right? Right. And if she can't accept that, you don't need to be moving in there right yeah matter of fact you really don't need to be moving in there because if because this relationship has got it's got toxicity written all over it um i mean that i gotta tell you i'm 58 years. The chances of me asking my 29-year-old for $200 is zero.

I think it killed him. I think it really hurt him to have to ask me. Yeah. Well, I mean, I just wouldn't have. I'd have gone and eaten dirt in the backyard before I did. I mean, I'm not going to ask my kids who have brand-new babies and are broke for money. That's just pitiful excuse me and so yeah so i mean it's just i it so what that tells me is is that your mom and dad

a they're in a bad position and b this is not going to go away with one conversation i mean you really think this is going to go away when you just have a magic sentence or two to give her? Nope. Probably not. Nope. Not going to go away. You're going to have problems as long as you are receiving anything from her. She is going to expect you to reciprocate.

As long as you're receiving daycare from her and housing from her, she's going to expect money from you. Because she's not in a position to simply give. She feels like everything has to be received. And so you're paying her rent for two months. You've already paid her rent for two months. So I guess you're going to try to go through with this. But I've got to tell you, this is going to be very, very difficult to go through and come, but I've got to tell you, this is going to be very, very difficult to go through and come out the other side with a quality relationship intact. You're just going to have to be very kind and very gentle and very firm

and just go, Mom, we don't have any money, okay? Well, you've got $1,100. Yeah, I know, I've got $1,100, but that's not any money when you have a baby. And we're trying to get out of debt. That's why we're moving in here. If I had $11 million, I'd give you $200. But I don't have $11 million. I've got $1,100.

We're as broke as you are. And so we're not in a position to give you money. I'm sorry. And, you know, we just can't. I'm sorry. And she's going to pout and stomp her little foot and get red in the face because she feels entitled. Am I missing something? I mean, she's a little less bratty about it, but yeah, that's about it.

Yeah. Well, maybe it'll be passive-aggressive instead of just aggressive-aggressive. Yeah, maybe. Okay. But, I mean, she's – it's just the kind of a person that's 60 years old and asks a 29-year-old kid for $200 is not the kind of person that's going to take a no easily. So you need to expect some reaction when you give the no. Right. And, by the way, giving her $200 is not going to make her not have the reaction the next time she asks for it,

which will be in two weeks. Right. So it's just that's the problem. I mean, it's the same thing. A guy comes in here the other day, and he's like, Dave, God told me that you were going to give me a van. And I said, no, he didn't. No. And he said, well, what do you mean?

Aren't you a Christian? I said, yeah, I'm a Christian. I talk to God every morning. And if God told you that I was going to give you a van, there'd be one sitting out there with car keys in it ready for you. But he didn't tell me. And so since he didn't tell me, you're making this up because you just think, well, you're not a real Christian.

He gets mad and stomps out. Why? Because I gave him a boundary that a crazy butt couldn't accept. Right? Right. And so that's a dramatic example. You're not going to face something that crazy, obviously. But any time you tell people no that feel entitled, you generally get a negative reaction.

Generally anger. And so that's what you're facing, I'm afraid. I'm sorry. I wish i could give you better news but i don't think this is going to get better i wish i could give you a magic phrase but i just say mom as gently as i can i love you and i'd help you if i can but i can't i got a brand new baby we're living in your basement because we're broke did you notice that and we're trying to get out of debt we got eleven hundred dollars to our name i'm not i'm not going to deplete that with a baby sitting here.

My job as the mommy is to take care of this baby. You taught me that, sort of. And, you know, that's what we got to deal with here. So that's the only way you can talk to her about it. Good luck with it. But I have very few good results of drawing boundaries for boundaryless people. They generally don't react well to it. You can pretty much expect that.

Hold on. I'm going to send you a copy of the book, Boundaries, by the maestro himself, Dr. Henry Cloud. This book is an amazing book on this subject. It is the Bible on the subject of boundaries, anyway. It's the best of the best out there and i love it so uh it's helped me a lot over the years hold on i'll send you a copy of it open phones at 888-825-5225 i was reading henry cloud's tweets this morning

and he's about as smart aleck as i am not quite he's a little more gentle, but he said the difference between your opinion and pizza is I asked for pizza. Wow. Yeah, that's pretty brutal. Oh, wow. Well, there's that. Our question of the day comes from blinds.com. They have a 100% satisfaction guarantee. It means even if you mismeasure or you pick the wrong color, they'll remake your blinds for free.

Candace says, my husband and I are almost finished with Baby Step 3. We plan to start saving for retirement when we're finished. We don't have kids yet. The question is, should we put any leftover money towards our mortgage? Yep. Or a down payment on a future home? Nope. Pay off your mortgage first, fast as you can.

That's baby step six. And if you want to move before it's paid off, they'll give you a check when you sell it at the closing table. All that money's not going away. It's going to be right there waiting on you in the equity of your house. This is James Childs, producer of The Dave Ramsey Show. Did you know you can now listen to The Dave Ramsey Show on Pandora and Spotify? For all the ways to watch and listen, check out our show page at DaveRamsey.com slash show.