The Ramsey Show - App - How Can I Get My Spouse on Board With a Move?

Episode Date: May 18, 2022

Dave Ramsey & Dr. John Delony discuss: Talking a spouse into downsizing housing, Does it ever make sense to take a financial hit for a career change? How to tackle debt as a single parent. Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3nInETX Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, number one best-selling author of the book Own Your Past, Change Your Future, is my co-host today as we answer questions for folks about building wealth, doing work that they love, and having actual amazing relationships.

Open phones here at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Ephraim is with us in Atlanta to start off this hour. Hey, Ephraim, what's up? Hey, Dave. First off, what you've done for me and my wife and our family has just been incredible. We've listened to you, we've read your books. And you've just been life-saving. So thank you for that.

Well, thank you. Actually, you did it. I just told you what to do. How can I help? Well, so I've been married for about 30 years to my incredible wife. We are living in the house that we've raised our girls in. So we're at the point now where we're empty nesters. And, of course, like a lot of people, have a house that we just, it's too big for our needs right now.

So with the housing market being what it is, I threw out the idea to my wife to consider selling it. And her point was, well, if we sell high, we've got to buy high. Well, I encountered that with going into living in an apartment in an area that we love. It's a multi-use development with retail, with restaurants. We're there probably three or four, if not five days a week, and we love it there. So I propose that we get an apartment there for a year or two, enjoy living there, and wait for the housing market to come down, and then be ready when that time comes to build a house or move into one or whatever options we want to move forward

with. We can, but she's, I think it's a lot of sentimental that she doesn't want to sell the house, but the rental is about 4,000 a month, which we could easily afford. And we would make probably close to half a million dollars on the house net. Okay. So her ultimatum was, well, call Dave Ramsey and see what he has to say on it. Oh, I'm the tiebreaker. Yes, you are.

I don't know if I can handle all this responsibility. A lot of pressure, Ethan. I got a lot of pressure i got a lot of pressure here all right so let's uh let's change a couple of um a couple of the variables in the conversation okay sure number one i'll give you a 99 chance that the housing market is not going down okay okay it has gone down two times in the last 100 years the 1930s and in 2008 it's the only time it's gone down okay and then it snapped right back almost instantaneously in the 2008 less than a year that was how even the areas like for instance las ve Vegas was the worst hit by the bubble burst. It was overbuilt.

It was the fastest growing city in America. And basically the bubble exploded there. And we saw values come down pretty substantially. And it was 18 months and they were all back. And then it's gone nowhere but north since then. So I don't predict housing is going to go down at all in this turn, in this round. I do think it's going to slow down its rate of increase, but that does defeat your premise, okay, as far as renting until then.

So is there a property in the area you're talking about buying, a condo, for instance, that you guys could just buy and move into well we could okay hypothetically there's there is actual properties around the area you're talking about where you're not a renter yes it's obviously very very difficult to find it you have to be ready to to almost make a cash offer because it's it doesn't it's not in the market long. Okay. Okay. So if you could pull that off, it changes the discussion. I'm not going to tell you to go rent.

You're going to lose that argument. So she wins, okay? Okay. Because I think you're going to end up going in the hole with a rental amount and values are going to increase, albeit not at the rate they're currently increasing. So you're going to lose money two different ways by going to be a renter. I'm not opposed to you moving to that area and moving into a less expensive property and selling your property and buying high and selling high, which is her point. But buying high and later buying higher after having rented. No, I'm not doing that one.

Usually, and Dave, you and sharon just did something similar so y'all have lived this um from normally i see couples have this conversation and it's all about the house and the math and this is a much bigger conversation which is this is we're we're sliding into phase three right we've had our time together we've raised kids and we're empty nesters and we built a tremendous home together and a tremendous life together the next phase is what do we want this next this next season to look like and that it will include discussions about home where we live and we want to go to coffee shops and concerts we want to be that couple when Do we want to move out to the country?

That's a broader conversation. As a part of that conversation will involve grieving the leaving the house that you raised your kids in. It's got a lot of cool memories there. What are your thoughts about renting the house? Renting it out to others? Why do you want out of it so bad?

I'm just ready for a it's a it's a 5 000 square foot home that just we we live in the keeping room kitchen and bedroom yeah okay so i think that's the part y'all need to start talking about before we try to do a real estate deal i'm with john so the two of you need to get aligned on what the future picture is of your life and what the future picture is. Okay, it's a smaller, more efficient use of the square footage for you. For her, what is the future picture? And then what is the thing that we can do that has all of the future pictures in common?

Yeah. Okay. And, you know, you're going to give up some, you know, like if you have five things I want, your bottom two you might not get in terms of forced ranking, and she has five things she might not get her bottom two. And that's kind of what Sharon and I just went through, honestly. We did a little bit of a similar discussion. We had this huge house and um

it was a good time to get out of a huge house and so it's kind of stage two empty nester for us um and um and it was a good opportunity to cash in and but we did immediately or simultaneously buy another uh property half the size that we moved into uh as a temporary measure until someday we build. But we had a lot of different goals with that that we both aligned on the future. Now, the deal is I think if you'll start, if the two of you will sit down, like John said, and start working on a future picture, let's paint the picture together what five years from now looks like. All right, now what has to be true for us to get to that picture? Then you're going to start making moves that are going to cause you to sell this house,

move downtown into a smaller condo as a temporary move, then later on build or something like that. You're going to develop a game plan to end up at the same place. And this could be a romantic, fun, exciting. Sharon and I, the word we kept using over and over is this is a pain in the butt, and it's an adventure. There you go. We're and it's an adventure. There you go. We're signing up for an adventure. And, you know, moving's a pain. Renovating a house when we moved in slightly was a pain.

With no workers available. Moving is a pain. Did I mention moving is a pain? It's the worst. Kind of like having a root canal. But it's an adventure. And those are the steps we took to get to where we wanted to be five years from today. I just saw a study that really made me sad.

It showed that families owning life insurance in the U.S. was at its lowest point since the 1970s. After what we've been through the past few years, I'm just lost on how people don't make this more of a priority. How are you going to make sure your family needs are met if something happens to you? This is why getting term life is an absolute necessity. Rates have never been cheaper and the whole process to apply is pretty simple with many companies not even requiring an exam anymore. This is why I send you to Zander Insurance and I have for almost 25 years. They'll make sure you get the right protection at the lowest cost possible and they're there for you and your

family every day. I challenge all of you to make sure your families are protected. It needs to be a top priority. Call Zander at 800-356-4282 or visit zander.com. That's 800-356-4282 or zander.com. Open phones this hour as we talk about building wealth, doing work that you love, and creating actual amazing relationships. Dr. John Deloney is my co-host today. He is the number one national bestseller of the new book, Own Your Past, Change Your Future, all about relationships and dealing with mental wellness. And so for regular people that are just trying to navigate this crazy world we live in right now,

open phones here at 888-825-5225. It is event week, guys. Orlando, we will be seeing you for a sold-out Building Wealth live event tomorrow night, May the 19th. We'll be at Calvary, Orlando. Completely sold out, over 3,300 tickets sold. Thank you, guys. We appreciate you. And I can't wait.

It's going to be an absolute blast. We're going to walk you through all the crazy stuff wait. It's going to be an absolute blast. We're going to walk you through all the crazy stuff that's going on out there in the financial world. Like if you noticed your 401k turned into a 201k or something like that, then we're going to talk about it. And the financial principles that we teach, we're going to talk about all the, you know, just address some of these issues head on and in a logical, wise way. So you can leave with a game plan where you'll know what to do. Rachel Cruz, George Campbell, and I will be doing that. Dr. John Deloney and Ken Coleman will join us.

They'll be hosting a free bonus session about work and relationships to kick us off. You don't want to miss that. Those of you that have tickets, be sure and plan on getting there early. Look at that bonus early session. It's completely free, and you do want to be there for that. It's pretty incredible. Work and relationships are a big deal, both right now. Things are just tenuous out there.

So this is us helping you guys on to the next level, right? Now, if Orlando completely sold out at 3,300 seats, and if Las Vegas almost did two weeks ago and was a complete rousing, rowdy, fun crowd, then you can know that Phoenix in September, Sacramento, Minneapolis, and San Antonio in November are going to be sold out because they're already over half sold out, all of them. Tickets are only $25, and you can get a four-pack of tickets beginning at $60. Bring your friends, in other words. It's going to be absolutely amazing.

John, I'm excited about this. I can't wait, man. It's fun. We're going to be on the. John, I'm excited about this. I can't wait, man. It's fun. We're going to be on the road for a week, and I can't wait to get out, man. The Vegas crowd was really cool. The Orlando crowd is going to be cool. It's going to be great. We're going to be staying over because we start the Entree Leadership Summit starting on Sunday,

and we'll have about 3,000 folks there as well, 2,750 or so business leaders from small business primarily all across America, and be doing about four days there with Jay Leno, Nick Saban, James Clear from Atomic Habits, our team, Dr. John and Ken Coleman and me will be speaking, and on and on. It just, a lot of the lineup is absolutely incredible. Wait a minute. Jocko, not James. Jocko is next year.

Jocko is this year. James Clear is coming 2023. Jocko is this year. That's right. I got it backwards. Yeah. And Henry Cloud will be there this year. And Pat Lencioni will be there this year.

It's a world-class leadership event. One of the biggest events we do of the year. And looking forward to that in orlando as well at the grand hyatt and that of course is sold out as well and it's usually sold out like six months in advance so uh tickets will go on sale for 2023 which will be in nashville for that event very soon so really feels good to be out there moving around seeing people again i loved it in vegas was such a a uh a great return because they they came ready to party man yeah and it was loud and they so many people showed up and um by the way this little bonus session the numbers they told us the other

day is they just finally quit counting they just like it's so full people so many people are coming which is just great that's good people are ready to come on out and have a good time yeah the bonus session may be bigger you never know yeah it's possible i love it so it's just good times uh folks you know those of you that have not um you know have not begun your walk into the emotional healing from everything that we've been through and you're still uh you're still living with a lot of fear and hopelessness right now. I encourage you to get connected with people again, whether it's at some kind of an event like that. I don't want to scare you, but the rest of us are out here, and we feel really good about hanging out with other human beings.

Yeah, it's important. We need to be around people right now. All right, Zach is going to be next up. He's in Philadelphia. Hey, Zach, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave, thanks for having me. Sure, what's up? So I'm looking at a career change, and I wanted to get your input on this,

but it's going to cost me. I work in law enforcement, and I'm in my eighth year as a police officer. Looking to change careers, but kind of don't want to lose that pension. Our department offers a military buyback program where the time served in the military, you have the option to buy that time back towards your retirement. So my question for you is, I'm at eight years. I can buy back four years to get the minimum pension, to secure the minimum pension, but it's going to cost me $85,000 to do this. Now, I have the $85,000 in my 457 plan, and I can roll this over to the buyback

tax-free, no hit on it at all. So I was wondering if you think that is a good idea to do. Almost all the buybacks that I've ever done the numbers on involve getting more money as a result of having bought more years. And are you saying if you don't do this, you get zero? No, what I'm saying is that for the career change, I'm looking at changing careers, you know. I got that part. And you leave and you said, I don't want to you said i don't want to lose my pension but the truth is you're not going to lose your pension you just want to enhance it with this 85 000 no i will lose it so if i don't hit that minimum threshold of 12 years you get a zero they will just cut me a check yeah they will cut you a check for my. Wait a minute. No, no, no, no. Stop, stop, stop. They will cut you a check?

For my pension contributions that I've made, correct. So you just get your money back, no match, no growth, or anything like that? Correct. Yeah. It's not nearly as much as the pension would be. The pension would be $33,000 for the rest of my life, or they'll cut me a check for like $25,000 one time for my contributions so i have the money in my in my 457 and i can roll it over tax-free um so once you don't get it at all just some i just want to make sure i'm crystal clear so once you hit 12 years

you get 33 you qualify for the minimum pension they pay you every year every year for the rest of your life starting now correct no starting when i um when i would have hit my 20th year so i'd still have to wait eight years to start collecting it oh dad gum is complicated okay yeah so it's a complicated financial formula to figure out if it's smart. Correct. Because basically you've got a $25,000 swing one way plus the $85,000. Correct. Minus the $85,000. Minus the $85,000.

And then you've got the eight-year wait, and you're not making – listen, the pension is usually a horrible rate of return, usually around 5% or 6%. Okay. What are you going to go do? Well, I just finished my four-year degree, so I was looking at either going federal, and I also obtained my CDL last year as well.

What are you going to go do? Drive truck, most likely. What about going with the Fed? Yeah, I mean, it's just a longer process. Until I would go drive truck until that process was complete. It can sometimes take

six, 12, 18 months. Do you need out of law enforcement that bad? Are you just cooked? Yeah, I mean, me and my family, we're just done with it. Got to be done.

We're ready to move on from it okay i'm sorry yeah it's been a hard few years man um all right i i can't do it in my head and i can't do it in two minutes on the air even with a good calculator probably okay so um because the three variables are the horrible rate of return the eight-year wait before you get anything, and then so what is $33,000 for the rest of your life worth beginning eight years from now? Four years old, yeah. But, I mean, what's that present value, the net present value of that versus $85,000 going in minus the fact you would have gotten 25,000 in your pocket. I think it's going to work out where you take the 25,000 and you go on with your life. It's probably going to work out better for you.

That's my guess. And you roll your 457 over into an IRA. You just forget about the pension. Yeah, and just forget about the pension. Because I think the pension is a trap. But I can't do the math in my head fast enough to guarantee you that. So jump on RamseySolutions.com. Click on SmartVestor Pro.

Find someone that helps you do investing in your area. They'll run the math out for you and say, this group of $33,000 is worth this in today's dollars because it doesn't start for eight years, and it's based on 6%, and then you can back into it and figure it out. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, author of the brand new number one bestseller, Own Your Past, Change Your Future. Own Your Past, Change Your Future is my co-host. In the lobby of ramsey solutions on the debt free stage they're here donnie and kiona are with us hey guys how are you

hey doing well how are you welcome where do you guys live uh moorhead minnesota awesome welcome to nashville how much debt did you guys pay off uh 1188,005. Way to go. How long did that take? 35 months. All right. And your range of income during that time? We started at about $74,000 and our highest year was $102,000. 102. Good for you. What do you guys do for a living? So I'm a certified athletic trainer. I'm a senior program coordinator for a non-profit. Oh, good. Cool. What kind of debt was your $119,000? Oh, we had a little bit of everything. We had a majority of it was our student loans, about $80,000. We had a car loan, credit card, a second mortgage. It's the normal. You're normal. Yeah. How long you been married? We're coming up on six years, seven years.

The confidence you have is astounding. And it wasn't even me that wasn't confident. Hey, I'm glad it wasn't you that slipped up. That's all I'm saying. All I know is, hey, how much debt? It's this much, this much, and five bucks. How long have you been married? Round it off.

Close enough. All right, so six years, give or take. And halfway through that six years, give or take, 35 months ago, you said something's got to change. Tell me your story. What happened? So we were two years into our marriage at that point. We just had our first.

She was about six months old, and we recognized that our current lifestyle and financial situation was not sustainable, and we added in child care finances. Ooh. Ouch. The bite. Yes. The opportunity was presented um to take fpu i presented it to my husband he said i don't think we really need that because we're doing so good yeah i thought we were we were doing everything's fine we can't pay the daycare bill but everything's fine exactly um so we took the course and from that point um well yeah when we took the course, and from that point, well, when we took the course, I was kind of nervous, but Donnie dove right into it.

Yeah, I dove right in. I think I bought four of your books right away. Oh, wow. I read them all in probably a span of two weeks. Oh, my gosh. We dove in. So, Keona, you're like, oh, my God, what have I created? I thought he was going to make me sell our brand new car that we just bought.

So I was a little nervous, but we didn't. You didn't? You just paid it off? Paid it off. All right. That'll work, too. Good, good. Yeah.

So when you went through the class, all you got was nerves? Yeah. And I was just ready. Game on. Game on. Okay. All right. And you're a certified trainer?

Yep. Athletic trainer, yep. So nothing is worse than you sitting down with an athlete and saying, here's what you need to do for the next three weeks. And they're like, sure, got it, coach. And they do none of it. Exactly. So you know the value of following a plan.

Yep, yep. And going all in. Good for you, man. Yeah, that makes it easy. The correlation between the behavior change is almost identical. I mean, it's pretty incredible. Well done, you guys. Thank you.

Very, very fun. All right, outside the two of you, who were your biggest cheerleaders? We were pretty low-key about telling a lot of people what we were doing. Obviously, our family knew what we were doing, and they supported us. Yep. Our financial peace class. One of Kiona's coworkers got us into that. I would say we had a lot more naysayers than true cheerleaders but um that just helped drive us even more so what are they saying now they're like oh don't worry

you'll go back into debt at some point oh yeah they're gonna go all the way i said no double down on stupid okay exactly oh my gosh what was the what was the the best marriage disagreement you had? The best marriage disagreement. That's oxymoronic. Very much so. What was the biggest freaking fight you had? That's a good question. I mean, once we got in, like, obviously our monthly budget meetings really impacted the way we communicated in our marriage. Once she knew you weren't eyeing her car.

Yep, yep, exactly. But no, I think, honestly, it wasn't any big disagreement. We just, our communication got so much better once we started that we were able to truly talk like adults to each other. What about personal sacrifice? What's the thing you were into? Are you into shoes or weight programs? What were the things you were into that you gave up for the last couple years?

I think it was just that instant gratification. I loved shopping at the time, and so not going out and shopping and buying whatever I wanted, that was a little bit difficult. It took a lot of behavioral changes that impacted our finances, but the communication within our monthly budget

and having to be able to say, yeah, I spent X amount of dollars at whatever store it was and being open about that. I didn't want to disappoint. Not that I would disappoint him, but I wanted to honor the sacrifices that we were making together and being respectful of that so that we could have those conversations. I think that that really.

Those are good words. It's incredible. It's good words. Honor, respect. Yeah, that's good words. Yeah, I would say my biggest one was I like to go out and have a good time with my friends and you know there's just a lot of times where i had to say no or we had to change our plans to just hang out at the house and grill or something like that so yeah um i think the biggest change actually was when the

pandemic started uh kiona started cutting my hair so um didn't have to spend $30 a month. I wasn't going to say anything, man, but it looks great. It looks good, right? Yep, yep. We weren't going to bring it up, but, you know. That's awesome. You guys are fun. Well done. You feel powerful?

Oh, yeah. Yep, that's for sure. I feel like you're in control now, huh? Yeah, absolutely. Are your naysayers right? Will you ever go back? Absolutely not. I think one of the biggest things, too, when we started our journey, we had a six-month-old,

and we had the goal to hit debt-free before she hit kindergarten, and she just turned four last month. You guys crushed it. Boom. Mic drop. I love it. Good for you guys. So very well done. So very well done.

See, they will not go back in debt because that would be disrespecting the sacrifice that they had made. That's right. And it would make their knuckleheaded friends right. You can't let that happen. Exactly. This is true. That's a big enough motivation right there just to not cave for you goobers. I love it.

Way to go, you guys. We got a copy of Baby Steps Millionaires for you. We're so proud of you. Way to go. And that's the next chapter in your story. It's the number one bestseller, How Ordinary People Built Extraordinary Wealth. How you will to in your case. A copy of Total

Money Makeover for you to give away to one of those knuckleheads. Maybe you can get them started. And you might even use this. We've got the one-year subscription to Financial Peace University, which, of course, was a big part of your story. And the every dollar premium version of the app is part of that. It's the Ramsey Plus one-year deal.

We're going to give you a gift card for a whole year for that. You can either give that away or you can go back through it, whatever you want to do. But that gives you a chance to pay it forward and tell your story and maybe inspire some other people to change their lives. So good for you guys. Very, very well done. All right, Donnie and Kiona, Fargo, North Dakota area. 100.

And that wasn't what you said. You didn't say Fargo, North Dakota, did you? No. They're connected. Moorhead, Minnesota and Fargo, North Dakota. They're connected by the river. Yep. Moorhead, Minnesota.

All right. I knew I didn't hear Dakota. All right. 118,000 paid off in 35 months, making $74,000 to $102,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free!

Yeah! Woo! This is how it's done. This is how we do it. how it's done you know these this is interesting these are interesting words in his world of uh personal training your world of therapy where someone is you know is called to engage a difficult truth and make a change about my physical uh habits my money habits, my emotional, mental health, spiritual habits. In every case, honoring the sacrifice that's made, respecting. Those are two great words.

And one that kind of almost goes with that, that I hear, I had to submit myself to the plan, meaning I thought I had it all figured out, but here I sat broke, so I must not. So I've got to submit myself to the plan, meaning I thought I had it all figured out, but here I sat broke, so I must not. So I've got to submit myself. I've got to actually agree to do it, which means I wasn't right. Yeah, that I asked somebody one time, how do we move forward? And that was the answer is you got to look back and acknowledge I hurt people when I said this or did this. I hurt myself.

I dishonored myself. I didn't. I didn't. I'm not as smart as I thought I was, or I didn't. All my schemes don't work. I got to submit to the plan that works. I got to submit to something different than me. Yes, and that's hard.

It's a little bit of a 12-step thing, admitting I'm powerless. That's exactly what that is. It's taking a knee and saying, what I'm doing now. It's that famous quote, is this making your life better? And you got to look in the mirror and go, it's not. Continuing to do the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. That's right. The definition of insanity.

That's right. Good for these guys. They're a sharp couple. Very sharp. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Michelle is with us in Atlanta. Hi, Michelle. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hello. How are you?

Better than I deserve. What's up? Welcome, Colin, to ask the question today. I want to know what is the best way to tackle a debt as a single mother of an 18-year-old starting college in the fall and an annual income of $24,000 to $26,000 and a total debt of $56,406? Wow. What's the $56,000 on? That student loan, car total, and a loan. How much is the car? The car is $15,000 now.

Okay. All right. Wow. Well, you've been fighting this battle a long time, hadn't you, kiddo? I have. Yeah. You raised that kid his whole life by yourself? I have.

You're a princess warrior. Yeah, you're a rock star. Thank you so much. So I'll give you some mathematical observations, and then we have to convert those to real life, okay? Okay. observations and then we have to convert those to real life okay okay mathematical observation number one is if i woke up in your shoes i would be looking for what my next new career is because your income sucks right that's not a shaming thing it's i think you're probably worth more than you're getting paid especially if you went and did something else that's a not a not nice way of saying you don't make much don't make enough money

okay hard to make it on 25 000 bucks yes out there in today's world okay what do you do i'm a dialysis technician okay so what could you do to gear up some further certifications maybe in the medical field that would increase your income almost immediately? Any ideas? Immediately? I mean, like if you took a six-month class at night, by Christmas you'd be making double or something? I mean, is there stuff like that out there?

I mean, various certifications in the healthcare field like um medical billing and coding now i'm into no i'm talking about like moving up in what you do is a hands-on you assist in a medical procedure today yes and if you were assisting in a different medical procedure or further in depth with that procedure and made more i'd be happy with that if you like doing what you're doing that is and i got a feeling you've been doing it a while uh two years and a lot of hospitals have uh you know go back and get your bachelor's and we'll pay for it but you owe us two years afterwards things like that

that you could possibly pursue here right right? Yeah. Okay, so thing number one, mathematically, agree with me, we're going to work on our income because that's part of your equation. There's two parts to the equation, the income and the outgo. So if we get the income up, some of this starts to solve itself, doesn't it? Mm-hmm. Like if you made $50,000 instead of $25,000, no kidding, right? You kind of already knew that before you called me but you know my point is i think you need to be actively saying hey 10 years from today i want to

be making 75 000 and here's the five steps i've got to do to get there and doing whatever that is i don't care and it's something you like. Don't do something you hate. But I'm saying go make some more money, number one. Number two, the longer you are in $25,000 income range, the more you have to look in the mirror and say, I can't afford a $15,000 car. I want to make $25,000 a year. When you have items that are going down in value that you pay payments on, cars, anything with a motor or wheels,

that are more than half your annual income, it makes it very difficult. In other words, your car is a big part of your problem as a percentage of your income. Yeah. So if you made $75,000, I wouldn't be worried about a $15,000 car debt. We'd just knock it out. But at $25,000, that's some pretty heavy lifting. I mean, you've got a medium-sized hole and a small shovel.

These are my math observations. So you can do the stuff we teach right where you are but it's just going to be very hard because you just making month to month has been hard for a long time that's why i called you a warrior princess you've been fighting it i know what your budget looks like there's no room in your budget yeah so we got to get your income up and your out go down. And the more we do of each of those, the more money we find to throw at getting rid of the debt and then throw at building wealth so that you retire with dignity. So can we go to part three now? Okay. You got a kid heading into college, right?

I do. And for 18 years, you've scratched and clawed and said, this generational stuff stops with me, and my kid's going to have something better. Is that right? Right. Do not go sign a bunch of Parent PLUS loans that you will never be able to pay back for some expensive school. Okay?

Okay. The conversation that you all need to have right now about going to school is, here is the financial reality of our world, and whatever state we happen to be in, here's what a community college looks like for two years. And hear me say, my mom went to community college, and then went on to work at one of the biggest companies on the planet, then got a PhD PhD and is now in her 70s still a professor. So anybody who bags on community college doesn't know what they're talking about. And you can do it for a fraction of the cost of a larger institution.

I know this game because I worked in it for a long time. And they look at moms and dads and say, they will mortgage their souls for this picture of what this kid's going to get. And I'm telling you, don't do that. We're breaking cycles here. You hear what I'm saying? Yes. I want your kid to go to school.

If college is in y'all's future, I want him to go. I think college is great. But I want you to go to a school that y'all can afford to. He can work his way through community college for the first two years if it's not free in your community or your state. So if I load you up with a bunch of materials, will you use them and learn about getting out of debt and getting him into school debt-free? I will use them. I will use them. I will use them.

Okay, because I'm going to load you up as my gift, because I think you're a pretty impressive lady. Amazing. So I want to sign you up for Financial Peace University for a year, and it includes every dollar of the World's Best Budgeting App to help you manage your money and learn about money like you've never done before. Okay? We're going to give you that. I'm going to send you a copy of Ken Coleman's book,

From Paycheck to Purpose, about how to get a better career going for you. You've got to read that. Okay, I'm also going to send you a copy of one of our small books called Debt-Free Degree on how you can go to college debt-free. And let me tell you, we've studied the student loan mess that's out there and we've studied it and studied it and we're really on top of it and let me tell you a disturbing thing that we discovered regardless of race regardless of income the number one person that does unbelievably stupid stuff when they go to college is if their parents didn't go to college to show and didn't know the way to show them where the landmines were and the parents instead go oh all college

is wonderful because i wish i had gone in college college college college college and they mortgage their soul and they sign them up at some expensive thing where they're paying 15 times what they should be paying for the same degree and they study the wrong stupid thing like get a degree in left-handed puppetry with a 250,000 dollars worth of student loan debt from some stupid butt school that they should never been in the first place the number one person that does that is someone who didn't have parents in college it's not a shame on the parents that didn't go to college they just don't know the ropes and they don't know where all the landmines are and the kid wanders through and just landmines are going off everywhere and they wake up at 30 years old two hundred thousand dollars in debt but by god they got

a college degree which is freaking worthless uh because you know getting a degree in left-handed puppetry and medieval art is ridiculous you know and you can't do squat with it you end up being a barista. So that's what you've got to avoid here. All right, hang on. We're going to send you all that stuff, Michelle, and you call us back while you're walking all this out. We'll help you with the career.

We'll help you with the money. We'll help you with the kid going to school. We'll help you with every bit of it. We actually know how to do all of those things. You're amazing. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, it's John Deloney, co-host of The Ramsey Show. Did you know over 18 million people listen to The Ramsey Show every week? A lot of those people listen on one of our 600-plus radio stations across the country. To find a station near you, go to RamseySolutions.com slash show.