The Ramsey Show - App - Helping Your Parents Overcome Powdered-Butt Syndrome (Hour 3)

Episode Date: January 28, 2019

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, 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'm Dave Ramsey, your host. You jump in, we'll talk about your life and your money. It's a free call at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Corinne is with us in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Hi, Corinne. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show.
Starting point is 00:00:58 Dave, thanks for sharing all your expertise with us. Well, thank you. I have a question regarding where we are currently in our Baby Steps. We are in Baby Steps 3, and we will be fully funded with our six-month emergency fund by April. We're wondering if we should go back and fund our 2018 Roth IRA before the deadline, or should we just contribute to a Roth IRA moving forward? Okay, so you've got Baby Steps 3 done. We have four months saved out of six months.
Starting point is 00:01:29 So we want to have six months saved. And six is what you feel like you should have? Yes, we're a one-income family. Okay. And you can do your 18, Roth, up until you file your taxes. Yes. You haven't filed your taxes yet? Not yet.
Starting point is 00:01:44 Okay. have you you haven't filed your taxes yet not yet okay can you have the 18 funded and have your six months before you file your taxes if we delay filing until april yeah i mean there's no harm in that um yeah there's no reason to not do that if you want to and just you know we're going to call that 15 of your income going back into 18 and then from this point forward you'll be at baby step four start saving 15 of your income now uh and you've got that calculated how you're going to be doing that going forward i assume yes i'm going to partially fund the TSP so that I can get the match and then go back and fund both Roth. And then above that, I plan to go back to the TSP. You got it figured out.
Starting point is 00:02:33 And put the TSP Roth in there, okay? Yes. Make your TSP be a Roth, yeah. Excellent. Hey, you got this dialed in. You got this dialed in. If I take off next week, you just fill in for me, okay? I've been listening to you all night long at work.
Starting point is 00:02:48 So we actually just started budgeting in August, and we paid off over $75,000 in six months. Wow. And we're moving forward pretty quickly. Good for you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you for all your advice. Yeah, so let's recap.
Starting point is 00:03:04 Make sure I dialed this in. I think I did because I think you're pretty dialed in. Your emergency fund is finished. Then we're going to fund 18. And then going forward, you've got 15% of your income going after that into retirement, right? Correct. Hey, let's do it. I'm in.
Starting point is 00:03:22 Do it, do it, do it. Very good. Excellent job. Knock it out. excellent job knock it out this is how it's done way to go kiddo wow that's fun see that's the interesting thing about a um a written goal a detailed plan you know if you're on the path or not because there is a path. Sometimes when I'm in another city and I'm going to a place where I just got off the airplane or something and I'm going to a place I don't know, I'll pull up Google Maps or whatever the iPhone map thing is. Both those little icons are on my phone, and you can pop in the address.
Starting point is 00:04:03 You guys know how to do this. All you guys are laughing at me, but I'm old. I just learned how to do this about five years ago or whenever they started doing it, right? But it puts on there, you know, how far you've got to go, and it gives you the little blue line on turn right, turn left, right? This is a clear path. And it gives you alternative paths that aren't as short. You can take this way, but it's an extra three minutes, a scenic route, you know.
Starting point is 00:04:28 And there's traffic up here, and it'll calculate that nowadays if you turn the traffic button on, right? So the point is a clear path tells you how long it's going to be before you get there. If you have no destination, there is no clear path. If you aim at nothing, you will hit it every time you know this is what zig ziglar used to say and that's the beauty of where she is see she's got this so dialed in the baby steps she knows exactly what to do and there's just no way to avoid wealth doing that you're just gonna be wealthy jared's in new y City. Hi, Jared. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey there, Dave.
Starting point is 00:05:07 Thank you. Thank you. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can I help? So I, first and foremost, thank you for taking my call. I've been listening just for a short while on YouTube, kind of discovered you relatively recently,
Starting point is 00:05:21 and really need to help my mom. So we lost my father a few years ago. And thank you, thank you, appreciate that. And, you know, they come from a background where they had a lot of money, and then, you know, leading up to a few years before he passed away, times were tough, and they kind of always spent every dime they had. You know, the money was always coming in, so everything was gone.
Starting point is 00:05:50 They didn't have a lot of money. They just made a lot of money and spent it all. Exactly, exactly. That's what I mean. Okay. So, you know, she's now at a point, she had some life insurance from my father, and, you know, she kind of stabilized herself
Starting point is 00:06:04 to as much she could be my parents had declared bankruptcy a few years ago and and um now she's at a point where her bills are way too expensive every time you try and tell her hey you need to budget even you know buying my nieces and nephew uh presents and things like that it's you know they don't need the 500 thing you know the $5 thing might be okay. And every time you try and help her or try and give her advice or anything like that, it's almost taken as a defense, and I don't even know where to begin. How old are you?
Starting point is 00:06:37 I'm 27. Okay. And you're out on your own? Yes. Yeah. I actually just got married last year. Congratulations. Okay.
Starting point is 00:06:44 Thank you. thank you. Here's the thing. There's a couple things going on here. Number one, it's very difficult for parents to hear advice from their children. We call that the powdered butt syndrome. Once someone has powdered your butt, they don't want your advice on money and sex. And, you know, it's just very, very hard. I've got a 27 year old son who is
Starting point is 00:07:07 brilliant he's very wise beyond his years he works on our team here i respect him and even in that case it's hard for me to take his advice i mean he works in one of our digital areas and he's so smart in that area and i'm so dumb in that area so i can actually take his advice there uh but i have to work at it emotionally. You know what I'm saying? And so it's the same thing with your mom, and she's not even working at it. She's just like, you little turkey. You don't tell me what to do.
Starting point is 00:07:35 And that's what's running through her head. Plus, she's a little scared and probably a little ashamed. Okay? So there's a couple things we can do. Number one, if we were to do something like this, and you've got to phrase it real carefully, hey, mom, I've been listening to this guy, and he actually gave you his class if you would agree to go for free. Would you consider just going to this class? I'll go with you. Would you consider just making a trip and going to the Financial Peace University class?
Starting point is 00:08:10 It's free. And I want to sit there with you just because I want you to hear some of the stuff. It's stuff I'm doing and I'm really excited about. And I'll do that for her as a widow because as a Christian, we're supposed to help take care of widows. And I'll just give it to you to give to her for free. I did that for her as a widow, because as a Christian we're supposed to help take care of widows. And I'll just give it to you to give to her for free. But the only way we'll give it to you is if she agrees to go.
Starting point is 00:08:35 I'm not going to give it to you and it'll sit on her shelf. So you hold on and Kelly will pick up and she'll interface with you guys and make sure that we get this lined up properly. And you and I together, maybe we can help her. Because I'm old. I had a conversation with a friend recently, and he told me about a young man in his late 20s who died suddenly with no life insurance. Now, I don't want to sound unsympathetic, but this drives me crazy. What are people thinking?
Starting point is 00:09:08 I don't understand how taking care of your family isn't a top priority. Most of you probably just spent a bundle on Christmas on things you didn't really need, and now you're making New Year's resolutions that are focused on yourself. But if you've taken the time to do something really important like protect your family, if you want to use the new year as a reason for doing something right, then do it. Term life insurance is something every family needs, and that's why I talk about it every day.
Starting point is 00:09:36 It's not complicated, it's not expensive, and you need to do this right now. Zander Insurance is the only place I recommend. Visit Zander.com or call them at 800-356-4282. Please learn from other people's mistakes and get this taken care of. Zander.com. Are you house poor? Do you have more home than you need or more home than you can afford? Well, moving into a smaller home could help you save big time, not only on your mortgage but also the upkeep on a gigantic house
Starting point is 00:10:20 and the taxes and the insurance on a gigantic house. Our endorsed local providers are the real estate agents that we recommend, and they help you buy or sell for the right price. They have the heart of a teacher, and they go by what we teach here. You're going to get consistent advice, high-octane, high-protein, high-quality real estate people, not beginners. DaveRamsey.com slash agent, and you can hook up with an ELP near you or just on the front page of DaveRamsey.com and click on ELP for real estate.
Starting point is 00:10:52 Endorsed local provider, that's what ELP stands for. Jason is with us in Augusta, Georgia. Hi, Jason. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. Thanks for having me. Sure. What's up?
Starting point is 00:11:05 Hi. So my wife and I moved about seven years ago, changed states, and we had just bought a house right before we moved about a year and a half. And we couldn't sell it. So we're currently in financial peace, and we're on baby step number two. My question is, we have about $52,000 of debt outside of that other house, and I'm trying to figure out whether I'm getting a large sum of money coming up, if I should put that towards selling the house in another state that we don't want or go ahead and continue the payout debt.
Starting point is 00:11:37 Are you upside down on the house in the state still? Right now, if we sold it, we would likely lose, I'd estimate, about $5,000 or $10,000. Oh, okay. All right. Good. Okay. And how much have you got coming in your lump sum? You said you're coming into a sum of money and you're trying to decide what to do with it.
Starting point is 00:11:58 Yes, yes. It'll be about $13,000. Okay. So enough to get out of that house or pay the other debts. I see what you,000. Okay. So enough to get out of that house or pay the other debts. I see what you're doing. Okay. And you've had it rented, and I assume since you're upside down, you're losing money on the rental monthly, right?
Starting point is 00:12:12 Yes. How much are you losing a month? So it's rented now, prepaid for six months, but we've already had to do about $500 in repairs, and the rent is just enough to break even. So we've already lost about $500. Okay. So you're losing roughly, give or So we've already lost about $500. Okay. So you're losing roughly, give or take, $1,000 a year.
Starting point is 00:12:28 Okay. Cool. So what do you do if you want to sell it if you've prepaid the rent? What are you going to do with these rents? Well, it would be once the six-month lease is up, we'd go and immediately try and sell. Yeah. Which is when? That would be about July.
Starting point is 00:12:44 Okay. And what's your household income? My 2018 prior to tax was about $130,000. Okay, and how much debt do you have, not counting this house? You said $50,000? Yes, $45,000 in student loans and $7,500 in a 401k loan. Hmm. 401k loan okay because by july you could easily have 13 back um and then not only by july but by the time it actually sells which will probably take a month or two right right okay let's project into that rather than you have to have the $13,000 a day used for that.
Starting point is 00:13:27 So what I want you to do is get with one of our ELP real estate guys and have them go ahead and preview the house and get some pricing and some days on the market. Ask them how quickly houses are selling in the area. What's the average DOM, days on the market? That's a multiple listing statistic they can pull easily for you okay okay and then that will tell us when you need 10 grand or is it 10 grand you know is it really 14 because you got some selling expenses i don't know but let's just let's just back plan then to have 14 by then by stopping the debt snowball. But go ahead and use the 13 now on your 401k loan and stop that.
Starting point is 00:14:09 That's going to add, you know, and then let's tear in, let's go ahead and see how much of this mortgage. You might be able to do both by the time the house gets sold. You might be able to be debt-free and pay off the house deficit with your income and the 1313,000, right? Maybe. Yeah, I mean, it's close. It doesn't look feasible right now, but maybe.
Starting point is 00:14:31 It depends on when the house sells. But, I mean, if it's sold by September and we knock $13,000 off of this, that only leaves you $30,000 plus the $10,000. So you need $40,000 from now until September, and you make $130,000. That starts to be pretty close to doable. Not quite, maybe. You might have to pull up and stop and go, okay, I've got to save for three months and get ready for this house sale, and I'll come back and finish the student loan
Starting point is 00:14:53 a month later or two months later, right, if you don't make it. Right. But my point is, take the $13,000, pay off the $7,500, and pay down on the student loans and then back out from when the actual closing date is projected on the sale of this house and back out from there plus 30 days. So you give yourself a 30-day cushion and make sure you have the amount of money that the real estate agent says you're going to need to be able to get out of this by that date. Have you had one of them do a competitive market analysis on it, or where did you get your $10,000 in the hole?
Starting point is 00:15:30 I've looked at just competitive or just comparative houses that have sold recently, and I had an analysis done probably, gosh, five years ago. Okay. It's been a while. Yeah, let's just get fresh numbers and set a very detailed goal is all I'm saying. And then I'll use the 13 on your debt snowball now and then stop your debt snowball in time to save up the amount you need to be able to dump this thing when the lease runs out. Is that logical? Yes, thank you very much. Yeah, that's a good plan.
Starting point is 00:15:59 That'll work. Hey, thanks for the call. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Rachel's in Austin, Texas. Hi, Rachel. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. Thank you so much for taking my call.
Starting point is 00:16:11 How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So my husband and I are both dentists. We graduated about a year and a half ago, and we have quite a bit of student loan debt that we've been making some minimum payments on. I'm a new listener. I just read the total money makeover and I'm trying to get everything figured out.
Starting point is 00:16:32 Try not to fall prey to docitis, as I believe you've termed it so well. And my question is basically how long do you anticipate before we're able to pay everything off and then also do we absolutely need to wait until all debts are paid off before my husband either buys into his existing practice or purchase it or another one kind of knowing that that buy-in would you know significantly increase his income and how much student loan debt do the two of you have um we have about 295 000 total total between the two of you yes who went to school free uh so i had some help from my parents so um i'm kind of paying them partially back and my husband went through the government oh good okay wow all right good that's because i was holding my breath for seven eight hundred thousand My husband went through the government. Oh, good. Okay. Wow. All right.
Starting point is 00:17:25 Good. That's a positive. I was holding my breath for $700,000, $800,000. Okay. Okay. Wow. So $295,000. I mean, I feel light already.
Starting point is 00:17:34 And what's your household income now? It's about $280,000 per year. Way to go, kiddo. Phenomenal. Thank you. Okay. So if you live on nothing, how fast can you pay off $295? Right, that's what I'm kind of wondering because...
Starting point is 00:17:51 Well, I mean, what's nothing? $80? Right, okay. That's $200 minus taxes. You're debt-free in like two years. Okay. I mean, between two and three years, you should be debt-free. Right. Our goal, our goal last year was to, you know, try and live off of one salary and save the other. And we didn't,
Starting point is 00:18:14 we didn't do so well on that. So we're trying, trying to do better this year. I don't think we need a vague goal. I think we need a written game plan. Okay. It's like a practice management plan or like a treatment plan where there's a series of processes that create the outcome. And that's the detailed budget that both of you are looking at. Here's the bad news. You're in a deep hole. Here's the good news.
Starting point is 00:18:37 You've got a good shovel. Okay. It would be a shame for you guys to wander around in debt for five or ten years because you're sloppy. Right. Because you're not sloppy people. Both of you have accomplished a very difficult thing, which is a DDS. I mean, this is not for stupid people. And it's not for sloppy and disorganized people.
Starting point is 00:18:59 I mean, what you've accomplished is an amazing feat. If you'll take that level of ability to delay pleasure to win, and you'll take that level of focus and intellect and apply it to this problem, you should be debt-free in a little over two years. Maybe up close to three, but just don't do anything until then, and then start saving up and paying cash to buy a practice or buy into a practice. And then your income is going to just go up even more, as you said. Way to go. You've got a lot of hope in front of you.
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Starting point is 00:21:21 Let's take a minute to think about your 2019. What if you never had another car payment? What if you never had another credit card bill in your life? How much would those payments translate into wealth? This can happen. Financial Peace University is our proven class that teaches you everything you need to start your journey to winning with money. It's a nine-week class, and when you join Financial Peace University, you get the Financial Peace membership, which is the online version of everything, including the Legacy Journey, including Smart Money, Smart Kids, including EveryDollarPlus,
Starting point is 00:22:01 including Community, including all kinds of good stuff tied into that, free for a year. Financial Peace University, the nine-week class, and Financial Peace, the online experience, the membership, free for a year. You can learn all of this at DaveRamsey.com. Jonah is with us in Dallas, Texas. Hi, Jonah. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. Thank you so much for taking my call.
Starting point is 00:22:29 Sure. What's up? So I'm calling today to ask, should I let my car get repossessed, or should I just find a way to market it better, like try to sell it as quickly as possible? I called into your show September 19th of this past year, and I told you I'm in college and I'm trying to like make it work. Um, however, at the beginning of the year, I was started a new job, but it turned out, um, it was, uh, a really sketchy and, um, it was going door to door sales and quite frankly, I didn't feel safe doing so. Um, so it's just something that really new to me. But anyway, I haven't sold my car yet because the price I'm asking,
Starting point is 00:23:09 which was $18,000, it was too high. I looked on KBB and the value for private sale is between $16,100 to $17,800. The amount owed on my vehicle is $24,500. And if I just sell it like the low $16,100, I'm roughly in the hole between $8,300. You have a way to get the $8,300. From your advice on FPU and watching you online, you say go to like a credit union. I was going to do that. However, I don't know. I haven't done it yet. I just don't know if I'll even get approved. I don't know if they go through credit or something like that. I just don't know.
Starting point is 00:23:59 And what are you going to do for a new job? I'm currently working on campus at Dallas Baptist University in the police department. I work at least 23 hours a week. And per month, I'm making at least roughly, after taxes, $724.44. My car payment plus insurance total out to $583.91. So that's like over half of my income. Yeah. And, um,
Starting point is 00:24:28 I just asked cause quite frankly, sir, I have no idea. Um, I, uh, one of my mentors, he,
Starting point is 00:24:36 he mentioned doing a repo and I'm 20 years old now. Like I just turned 20 this past year or this past, uh, six of January. And, um, I have the next seven years of my life to look forward to when I graduate college, get married, and all that. I want to think long-term and set my family up for success instead of having that weight on my
Starting point is 00:24:58 shoulders and my future spouse's shoulders. We can get approved for a mortgage because I screwed up my credit thanks to doing a repossession on a vehicle. Yeah, and it's going to hurt you. It's going to hurt you for four years probably if that occurs. I'm not sure you can stop a repossession if you don't get the car sold. Right. And what hourly rate are you earning with the campus police? Campus police, I'm making $8.75 an hour.
Starting point is 00:25:29 I'm a dispatcher. I help. I answer calls and all that stuff. Okay. Here's the thing. You probably need to do something where you can make more money. You're not making any money, regardless of if you keep the car or not. How are you paying for school?
Starting point is 00:25:43 I have financial aid through the United States government. I also have a scholarship, the CLS scholarship, Christian leadership. And so far this semester, everything is taken care of except I need to come up with $325, which is like a huge blessing in disguise, which I'm really determined to do so. I've started FPU this past year. I'm really confident and I have hope now because I cut out my credit cards. Thanks to listening to you and Chris Hogan and Ken Coleman, everyone on your team. I have a lot of hope, and I have a plan to get my stuff in order and all that stuff.
Starting point is 00:26:22 Here's the thing. You're going to be okay either way. It's not a life-ending, life-altering decision permanently. But there's a smarter way and a dumber way to do this. What I'd like to see, you said you've got help from the government. Are you former military? No, sir. I just did the Pell Grant.
Starting point is 00:26:43 Yeah, a federal Pell Grant, some student loans as well. Okay. All right. All right. So what I would love to do is for you to make a little more money than you're making now and get the loan from the local credit union to sell the car. And here's why. Number one, that avoids the repossession,
Starting point is 00:27:05 which is harmful going forward into your future, as you said. But number two, you're $8,000 in the hole now. When they take the car and sell it on a repo lot, they're going to sell it for $10,000. It's going to leave you $12,000 in the hole, or $14,000 in the hole or $14,000 in the hole. Okay. And so you end up with a bigger problem down the road than you have now. You control the price of the sale today as long as you can keep the payment made before they repo it and borrow the difference.
Starting point is 00:27:38 You control all of that today. Once you turn it over to them, it's out of your control and they're going to sell it for whatever they want. Now, granted, you can come back and probably settle that deficit with them, and you'll have a settled deficit, meaning if they sold it for $10 and came after you for $14, you'd probably get them to accept $7, $8, or $9 for that and pay cash for that sometime in the future, clear that problem off your credit, but the repossession will still be there and would keep you from buying a home for, you know,
Starting point is 00:28:08 four or five years, something like that in the process. So if we can avoid that by getting an $8,000 loan, by getting a better job, I would rather avoid that. It avoids the repossession and the bigger hole that the repossession will put you in, and that's what I'm trying to do. So good luck with that. And I hope you can turn it around.
Starting point is 00:28:30 You're thinking it through well, especially considering all the stress you've got facing you and everything else. And so, yeah, good question. And you call me back if I can help you further at any point. See, it's stuff like that that makes me want to go to the car dealer that sold a young guy, 18 years old, who has no money, a car payment of $500 a month on $25,000. And see, that's just morally wrong. Well, he has the right to buy it. He's an adult.
Starting point is 00:29:13 Yeah, he has the right to buy it. He's an adult. But at what point doing business do you not know you're just screwing people? I mean, that car dealer ought to be tarred and feathered for doing that loan. And that substandard subprime lender. He took an 18, 19-year-old young guy, has absolutely no money. He's on Pell Grant. He's got no money. You sell him a $20-something car on a $500-something car payment.
Starting point is 00:29:44 Yes, the young man, he's culpable. He has responsibility for his actions. He is technically an adult legally. I got all that. But just because somebody's an adult doesn't give you the right to screw them. That's just wrong. That's just wrong. It's out of control.
Starting point is 00:30:05 And he's stuck. He's in a mess. I wish we could just wave a wand and make that go away for him. But I've done dumber stuff and I survived. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Our scripture of the day, 1 John 3.18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and in truth. Dolly Parton said, if your actions create a legacy that inspires others to
Starting point is 00:31:12 dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, then you are an excellent leader. As is Dolly. Alright, John is with us in San Diego. Hey John, welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. How can I help? My question is about, well, me and my wife, we're currently on baby step two. We should be done paying off our debt. Our goal is by the end of this year, we should be debt-free. But my actual question is from my $1,000 emergency
Starting point is 00:31:46 fund because um I know that $1,000 will uh you know cover my any small emergency stuff like that but at the same time I always get nervous and what if something happens and something a major emergency that's going to cost more than $1,000, you know, that will require that amount. And so my question is, would you recommend or would you recommend me to at least beef up my $1,000 to like $1,500 or $2,000 or stick to the $1,000? And how much did you have in savings before you started all this? I'm sorry, say it again, I'm sorry.
Starting point is 00:32:28 How much did you have in savings before you started all this? I think it was, well, we started, I totally forgot, but I know I saved up close to $1,000. So you've never had more than $1,000? I've never had. Well, actually, I think I had one, but I purchased it to the, I remember I had almost $2,000 for when we purchased our water heater, and it broke. And so I used that amount, and so we're down to $1,000. Okay, so you've never had more than $3,000 in your life?
Starting point is 00:33:08 Never, never. Okay, all right. And what's your household income, sir? Between me and my wife, I'd say close to probably like $55,000 a year. Good, good for year. Good. Good for you. Okay. Cool.
Starting point is 00:33:27 Cool. All right. And you said you would be debt-free, not counting your house by the end of the year? Not counting the house, yes. I think our total debt right now is close to a little over $6,000. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Okay.
Starting point is 00:33:43 You should be debt-free before then, then. Okay. Right. You need to tighten this budget up and get out. Here's the thing. Here's the thing, okay? The difference in $1,000 and $1,500 with all the different things that can happen to us really isn't spit. And so if you cheat on the baby steps and make it $1,500, does it end the world?
Starting point is 00:34:05 No. But it really doesn't help you that much. I mean, because the chances of you having a $3,000 event is still just as high. And $1,500 doesn't help with that. And so what I would do if I were in your shoes is I would stick with the $1,000 with the idea that it's very temporary. We're only $6,000 away from starting to raise this account. And I would use a little bit of the fear that you have as my motivator for cutting really, really deep
Starting point is 00:34:32 and for being on a budget, a written plan on my EveryDollar app with my wife. And we're going to be very, very, very detailed here. Because here's the thing. If you can find $1, dollars a month out of your 55 000 you'll have that other debt paid off in six months and a month later you'd have 2 000 in your savings and a month later you'd have 3 000 in your savings and a month later you'd have 4 000 in your savings and by the end of the year you could have 6 000 seven thousand dollars saved and be debt free if you did this at a at a rate for starting today of a thousand dollars a month and a thousand dollars
Starting point is 00:35:12 a month is doable on 55 and a part-time job in a garage sale and selling some stuff looking around there what else we can do might make all this happen even faster and so the good news is you don't have a lot of debt so there's not a lot standing between you and actually starting to build a real emergency fund. Because $1,000, I agree with you, it's not enough. It's not enough. It's almost as much as you've ever had, though. And so I want to get you in a position that for the first time in your life,
Starting point is 00:35:40 you're sitting on $10,000 as your emergency fund and no payments in the world but your house payment. That's where I want you to go. And I really think you're not that far from that. So let's lean in. Let's do that. Now, I'm going to be in San Diego the end of March, March the 25th. And I'd love for you to come as my guest.
Starting point is 00:36:01 Hold on, and I'll have Kelly pick up, and we'll give you a couple tickets to the Smart Money event that I'll be doing there in San Diego March 25. Jeremy is with us in Fargo, North Dakota. Hi, Jeremy. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hello. Thanks for taking the call. Sure. How can I help? So my former residence lease required me to give a 60-day notice to vacate. However, the owner of the management company verbally stated to me that my lease would have a non-renewal. I was trying to move. I was trying to get out as quickly as possible. So I contacted the property manager and asked for that in writing. She said she didn't know what I was talking about, but that I was required to give a 30-day notice. She stated that via text. So I found a place, I moved out, I gave a written and emailed notice, and it was minimum 30, I think it was about a 40-day notice.
Starting point is 00:36:53 But now they've sent me to collections for a last month's rent of $520, which is slightly less, and they kept my entire security deposit. I assume you've contacted them and told them that you have a text that says otherwise. I did, and I attempted to channel some of the things. They were taking off my lease for fees, but they've ignored me, and they're stating that the manager does not have the authority to authorize me to only give a 30-day notice. My lease was two months.
Starting point is 00:37:25 I'm forced to pay the remaining amount. And now it's going to go on to my credit report next month. So basically the question is, should I suck it up and pay it or try to fight it? It obviously seems very wrong to me, but that's the position I'm in. I'm not an attorney. And I think if I were in your shoes, you've analyzed this and fretted over it, and you're really angry about it, and I don't blame you. And if I were in your shoes, I probably would want to know what the actual law says on this.
Starting point is 00:37:58 I'll give you a guess, but it's a guess. I'm not an attorney. I've just got a bunch of rental property. I'm afraid they have you. Yeah, and that's what I've seen as well. I'm afraid that your lease is going to stand as the document. That's the contract you signed, and if you don't have a written alteration of that lease
Starting point is 00:38:19 other than a text from a manager that they've got you, obviously these people are crooks. Yes, they have a bad Better Business Bureau rating and like 50 negative one-star reviews here in Fargo. Okay, and so what I would tell them is this. If I'm going to pay you $500, I'm going to give you guys $500 worth of hell because I'm going to wear social media out with every detail of this. I'm going to post everywhere around there.
Starting point is 00:38:55 I'm going to let everyone I know, any way I know can. I'm going to let any member of the public I know that you guys are crooks. And to some degree, I've already done that i have a very limited social media presence uh but then i basically get very angry and very bitter when i talk about this um so that's the other side of it is part of me just i desperately just want to forget this and move on and hope that the lord will take care of them. Well, there's a value to that, for sure. But, yeah, I think you've already taken your run at it. I think a lawyer, if you could get someone to just talk to you for a few minutes and tell you without charging you $300 for their fee, you know, which would be counterproductive,
Starting point is 00:39:40 obviously, but I think they're going to tell you that that lease is going to be what the judge is going to go with, not the text. Yeah. I don't think a text is going to offset a written document, and you've got three different people telling you different things. So, yeah, if I'm in your shoes, I'm probably just paying this and chalking it up to having dealt with crooks and learned my lesson that I have to get a detailed written document that adjusts the lease terms if I'm going to accept a 30-day because you're not always dealing with people who aren't crooked. And this is obviously people that are crooked. I'm sorry.
Starting point is 00:40:22 That puts this hour of the Dave Ramsey Show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus. Hey, it's Blake Thompson, Senior Executive Producer for the show. You know, you can listen or watch anywhere with the Dave Ramsey Show app on your smartphone. Catch the full show or watch the highlights and check out Dave's upcoming guests. Head to the App Store and download it today.

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