The Ramsey Show - App - How Do I Get Out of My Debt? (Hour 3)

Episode Date: May 6, 2024

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Her best-selling book is Money's Not a Math Problem. Check it out at ramseysolutions.com. Brandon starts this hour in San Antonio. Hi, Brandon. How are you? I'm doing good, sir. I appreciate it.com. Brandon starts this hour in San Antonio. Hi, Brandon.

How are you? I'm doing good, sir. I appreciate it. Sure. What's up? Well, first off, I want to say thank you for everything that you and your team do. I listen to the podcast, and I love all the advice. Thank you.

How can we help? So I have a question about a couple of loans that I have. I have one loan that's an SBA loan. It's about $43,000. It's $908 a month, but I figure there's nothing I can do about it because it's already a veteran loan, and it's at 3.4%. You said it's an SBA loan? Yes, sir.

And it's a veteran SBA loan? Yes, sir. Okay. All right. Go ahead. Go ahead. And your question is what? And the other one is a stupid Citibank loan that I got that the APR jumped to 21%

and is now at a point where no matter how much we chunk at it, the interest just overrides it. How much is it? No, that's not true. I'm sorry? I said that's not true. If you chunk $20,000 out at it, the interest wouldn't override it. So how much do you owe?

So it's at $8,000 right now. Okay. All right. So if you pay minimum payments, you'll be in debt 43 1⁄2 years. Their calculation was 19 years, and we would pay $19,000. Oh, my gosh. You're not doing that. Joyful. So what's your household income?

I'm sorry. My question for the Citibank loan was, would it be wise to take out a personal loan at a 6%, 7% to pay it out and then just chunk that off. It's $8,000. I don't even think you need to go through all that. What's your income? $75 a year for me and my wife. Does your wife work? Or is that just you? That's combined. That's combined. Split it out for me. I want to know who's doing what and what are your careers?

It's about half and half. My wife does scheduling does a scheduling for pediatric dentists. She makes about 36 a year. Okay. And I have a job doing, um, telecommunications and correctional facilities for, um, per, per 45 a year. Okay. All right, cool. So you're both working 40 hours? Yes, sir. And what's your car's worth? So we have a 2016 Ford Escape. I don't know what the blue book on it is, but it's paid off. What about the other one? And I actually have a work vehicle. So my personal vehicle, I had a Kia Rio, and we just sold it off for the cash.

Where's the cash? We put it into a loan, into the Citibank loan. Oh, good. Okay. Do you have any money laying around of any kind? No, sir. The reason that I have the SBA loan is because I actually had my own store. I had a retail store for a couple years, and that just ate up all of our savings.

Okay. Well, the 900 is eating your savings, eating your lunch too. But we've got to get rid of the 21% first. So I'm with Jade. I mean, if you made an extra, let's see, $1,500 a month, you'd be out of debt in six months on the card. And that would mean working extra. Can you pick up OT, or what kind of great side job, great paying side job could you do?

Well, my job is salary. Both of us are salaried. Okay. The only thing extra is I could do some Uber on the weekend or go sell blood or something. 100%. I don't want you selling blood, but Uber's fine. And, I mean, I think you could do a lot of stuff out there. There's a lot of different things.

I mean, you obviously are good with your hands, right? I'm okay. Yeah. So, I mean, you probably could wire stuff for people, I suspect, couldn't you? I don't know. I've never looked into it. Yeah. Okay.

I mean, it's what you do all day, right? Yeah. Okay. Okay. Well, I mean, it's what you do all day, right? Yeah. Okay. Okay. All right. I don't know. Just whatever pays you the most for a short period of time to knock this $8,000 out. So here's the thing.

Okay. 21% on $8,000 for one year is $1,600. Okay. Mm-hmm. $1,600 is not your problem. Your problem is you need $8 so if you if you got a zero percent it doesn't solve your problem is my point if you rolled the card to a zero percent card and you still don't and you still don't address it you haven't solved the problem so sixteen hundred dollars is a year which is a little over a hundred bucks a month is not your problem on this it's

okay if you want to move it down to a lower interest rate if you have that ability but the problem with it is when you do that you're going to feel like you did something and you really didn't do anything you made a you made a 70 80 dollar a month move okay which is nice if you send it to me i'll take it okay but but but it's the 70 80 is not going to fix this situation you need to clear up the 8 000 as fast as possible so you can lean in and knock out the 43 000 right correct because if you don't have either one of these payments your life would be pretty sweet right now correct yeah so that's where we're headed to so i want to turn up the intensity let's get you into every dollar our every dollar app and help you start putting

together a budget on that and the uh jade and i will give you the premium version as our gift and you sit down with your wife and you all start laying out a budget where every one of your dollars goes every month and then let's figure out how we can add dollars to it both of you yeah if i were both of you i i would make it individual she has a goal to bring in an additional thousand dollars and you have a goal to bring in an additional thousand dollars and then in four months you'll be done if you just put two thousand a month on it you'll be done in four months with that eight thousand and without that hanging over your head then you can get aggressive on the 43 it'll take you longer on that one but the trick is the actual dollars saved by you moving down an interest rate

it's you know you can go out to eat on it that's about it it's not it's not really going to change this situation so it's okay to do it if you want to brandon as long as that's not all you do that's about five percent of the problem 95 percent of the problem is eight thousand dollars I need to go find me in my budget living on beans and rice not going out to eat working extra selling so much stuff the kids think they're next I need to go find me eight thousand dollars that's what changes the game you were exactly right Jade yeah 100 I'd be looking around the house to see what I can sell what's the game you were exactly right jade yeah 100 i'd be looking around the house to see what i can sell what's the weirdest thing you and sam sold it's so funny you asked me that i just wrote a article about this i had some bath mats that i have yeah like

you know like in the bathroom the mat that goes used bath mats used bath mats i bought them at ikea so they were already cheap as dirt. And I sold them for like $4 or $5 and somebody bought them. People will buy anything. Wow. Facebook Marketplace, you could find a chewed up piece of gum and somebody would buy it and want to chew it again. Nate Bargetz, he talks about his wife is inviting serial killers over to their house to sell something for $5. That's a great line he does.

Bath mats. Listen, where there's $5. That's a great line he does. Bathmats. Listen, where there's a will, there's a way. And that money adds up. Where there's a will, there's a bathmat. Some folks need to sell their TV so that they can go to work and quit watching Netflix. Oh, throw a brick through it. This productivity killer.

This is The ramsey show jade washaw ramsey personalities my co-host jade there's still time if somebody wants to join you and me and george camel and rachel cruz and dr john deloney and ken coleman this coming friday and saturday for our total Money Makeover weekend event. It's a Friday afternoon, all day Saturday in Nashville. If you want to come in a little early, you can watch the show. We do it here on the glass. And then, of course, we'll be doing all kinds of stuff at the Ramsey Event Center on the hill shortly after that. This is a weekend-long event.

It's the ultimate motivator not only to get out of debt, not only to get on a budget, not only to communicate better with your spouse about finances, but show you how to become wealthy and show you how to become outrageously generous. And there's going to be a live taping of the hit podcast, Smart Money Happy Hour. We're going to have a lot of interactive Q&A.

There are tickets still available. These events usually sell out. This one's not. So we'd love to have you. It's at ramseysolutions.com slash events. It's this coming Friday, May the 10th, Saturday, May the 11th, here in Nashville on the Ramsey campus, ramseysolutions.com. Come on out.

There's still time to get you here. John's with us. John's in Toronto. Hi, John. Welcome to the Ramsey ramsey show hi thanks for having me and uh i hope you guys are all doing well we are how are you i'm doing i'm doing okay i'm calling because i i guess i needed some advice uh just because everything's getting a little bit more difficult up here and, um, looking at solutions and I wanted your input on it. Tell us more. So, um, me and my wife currently work two jobs each.

So, um, I'm a part-time soldier. I work full time. Now I'm part-time and now I work in construction. I make about 80,000 a year. My wife, my, uh, sorry. My wife makes about 20,000. Um, we're on baby step one we're working toward baby step two uh which is our car and that's the only expense we have and it's uh 2022 toyota corolla and it's going to be paid off in october great but the issue is is that um the houses here, the housing situation in Toronto is absolutely insane. The 20% down that they need is, it feels like to me, unachievable. And we budget everything. We know exactly how much money we're about to spend. We know what we need to do. Um, and then when we have a little bit

of money saved up, it's like, Oh, $700 in groceries for two and a half weeks. John, I would guess that if you Googled the 10 most expensive cities in the world to live in, including real estate prices, Toronto is probably on the list. Tokyo, London, Manhattan, downtown New York, L.A., certainly San Jose, San Francisco market will be on that list. And I'm guessing that Toronto would probably be on that list. You live in one of the most expensive cities in the world. What's keeping you there? So the reason why we moved from New Brunswick when I was in the military up there was there was a lack of doctors. So my wife is uh disabled uh she still works but the average

wait time for a family doctor in new brunswick was seven years um yeah that's a free canadian health care yeah yeah so we had to move from new brunswick to toronto because she has a heart valve replacement so we had a specialist in new Brunswick that would deal with it. But there was another specialist she had to see in Toronto. So every six months she had to fly halfway across the country to go and see a doctor. That's cheaper than living there. Yeah. I wanted to really stay in New Brunswick.

It's a fantastic province. People are really friendly. And then we come back here and thank god i'm living with my grandmother uh we're living in her basement she's charging us a thousand dollars a month utilities included so she's really helping us out um so you think that better it's it's better you're saying you think it's better to live there full time as opposed to have her fly when she needs the care is that i just want to make sure i understand i'd rather her i'd rather have to live in new brunswick because it's cheaper just for her to fly because every six months it's like five hundred dollars uh for uh both a two-way ticket right yeah which you save more than that in a week in groceries so uh what what what keeps you from moving back then? It's because of my occupation in the military.

I'm a tanker, so I was a qualified tank driver, gunner, loader. There's no more tanks in New Brunswick, so they're all in Edmonton now. So if we have to move, we go to Edmonton. So that's another reason I was talking to my wife. We had basically three options. One, we stay in the situation and we just embrace the suck, which is not my favorite solution. Second option is move to Edmonton. I'd re-enlist and go full time again. Or three, we moved to the United States, which is very, very enticing to me.

We were thinking like Indiana or Wisconsin because my sister lives in Chicago and I would join the military in the state. So that way we cover the healthcare issue, right? That way we have coverage. Or you can change careers and move back to New Brunswick. That's another option. There's no real careers in New Brunswick unless you work for like oil and gas companies. And even then it's not really like. I was going to say, there's no real careers in New Brunswick unless you work for, like, oil and gas companies,

and even then it's not really, like, it doesn't pay as well. Okay, so here's, I don't care which one of these you do. It's up to you guys. If I were in your shoes, I would want a path that gave me hope. Right. Long-term sustainability and hope. Mathematically, you're probably not going to do that unless you have a giant change in your personal incomes staying in Toronto.

This is a very difficult city to live in unless you make a lot of money, mathematically, and I didn't invent that. That's just the way it works. I mean, it's tough to live in Manhattan if you make make 80 grand, you can do it, but it's tough. And your long-term prospects of prosperity, it's hard to buy real estate. It's more expensive to do everything. Same thing. If you move to London, same thing. So, um, and those aren't, they're not bad cities necessarily. Some of them are, but, but the, but the, but I'm just talking about the math of living in an expensive place.

You have to make a lot of money to have mathematical hope about the future if you're going to live in an expensive place. So that, that's what you're aiming at. So you need to figure that out and say, okay, my cost of living, including my real estate purchase that is a part of my good future that I want to have, best lines up with my career, my income, and her health care where? And that's where I want to lay it out and pick out which way that is. And I don't know enough about Edmonton to tell you anything intelligent about it. And I don't know enough about immigrating to the states legally if you're canadian i don't know how to do that or joining the military you obviously know more about it than i do based on how sure you were

when you said that but i guess that's a possibility i've got no issue with that at all But for sure, you want to be somewhere where the path that you're on is leading you to a hopeful place. And the math indicates that, not just a wing and a prayer, not just a wish. Yeah, absolutely. I should have asked him the thing in Edmonton where he becomes a full-time in the military. That might be better for him. He might earn more money and therefore them get to their goal quicker. They've got some options, though. They're not in a corner, which is good.

Yeah, but I think they figured out that if the income doesn't change, then their current situation is going to, you know, embracing the suck is not a life plan. That's a temporary thing you do to get to a life plan, you know, to get to a good long-term strategy. I mean, I can embrace the suck for a short period of time to get through something that's hard, but I'm getting through it. I'm not staying in it. And that's the trick so yeah that i think that's what you know and those of you that are living in expensive places you don't get a pass as john has discovered nor did he indicate he wasn't whining about no he wasn't but i mean you don't get a pass on math it just it costs more to

live there so you got to make more to have the same life there wherever there is that's expensive and you can fill in that blank and you know that's the same i've, wherever there is that's expensive. And you can fill in that blank. And, you know, that's the same. I've had people ask me that question for 35 years. How do you buy a house in Los Angeles? 35 years ago, people asked me that question. I don't know. I guess you make enough money to live in Los Angeles.

That's how that works. It's freaking expensive. So that's how it works, man. I mean, it's twice what it is a lot of other places it's not it's not evil it's just a reality this is the ramsey show jade washall ramsey personality is my co-host today thank you for joining us we invite you to stop by our studios here south of Nashville and Franklin, Tennessee anytime you'd like. We do this show live on the glass in our fabulous lobby with

free coffee, free homemade cookies. Smells like mama's kitchen in here. Come on in. Yeah, we'd love to have you come by and see us. And we do the show from one to four central time, Monday through Friday. So there's at least two of us ramsey personalities sitting here and um uh some of them are much more entertaining than me but um but i i serve a purpose still so we're still here we're glad you're here and speaking of what happens in the lobby one of the things that's there is the debt-free stage right here in the lobby of ramsey solutions and kirk and julie are on the stage. Hey, guys, how are you? Good. How are you? Good, Dave. Jade, how are you?

Good. Good to have you guys. Where do you live? We live in a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio. Oh, fun. Well, welcome to Nashville. Good to have you. And came here to do a debt-free scream. How much have you paid off? We've paid off $110,437. Love it. Nice.

How long did that take? Four and a half years. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? So we started at about $120,000 and then right in the midst of COVID, I lost my job of nine years and so we kind of had to regroup after that. But then I was very grateful to get a new job a few months later and now we're up at 148 000 you got a better job well that was more him than me but okay still it was good still worked out good very good good for you guys what kind of debt was the 110 000 dave jade you name it we had it all um 22 different credit cards uh it was probably the height of the insanity um just you name it and and we had it car leases uh we had it all okay house uh house is not paid off not not that's not

so this is debt free except the house good for you yes for you okay good very good congratulations you guys oh okay what happened four and a half years ago that's before covid yeah you started this process before the fauci pandemic and then you tore into this right that's right okay i think the thing that happened at that point dave was you talk a lot in your your videos and your books about being sick and tired of being sick and tired and i think the moment for us came when we were doing crazy things like I would tell Julie, you know, this credit card is not maxed out and that's what you can use to buy some presents. Or we would go to a department store and say, we had some

space available on a card. Let's use that to buy gift cards at a store like that for others. And you were normal. We were, we were, and it was about that time. Um, it was a God thing and it, it, it pointed me in the direction of total money makeover. Uh, it was, it was the book I found, uh, with a guy from Tennessee that I'd never heard of read the book, um, cover to cover. And, uh, right about time, I started talking nonstop to Julie about you and your book and your principles. And then right at that time, our church was offering a class. And so we took it and we got into it, and we knew we wanted our kids not to make the same mistakes we had. So while we were starting to pay off debt, it wasn't with the gazelle intensity that you talk about,

but then they asked us to teach the Generation Change course. So we taught that twice and all our kids took it and Rachel is married to John and they paid off their debt with you a few months ago. But then it wasn't until we did that

and then we started teaching the adult class. We've taught it five times that financial peace university yeah and that's what really made us get gazelle intensity you don't have a choice if you're teaching it we need to be the example and that's what's done it that got it going hard absolutely that was the accountability thing it was like you're teaching the class and you're making good friends in your church and you're leading by example it's no longer just uh you know we're going to try a little bit to this we're we're going full go and and this is a testament to those people that have been in the class that if you stay with it you stay with the program you do all aspects of it 100 you're going to get there yeah way to go gosh way to go i'm

proud of you how's it feel to be completely free? It's still new, but we're thrilled because we've worked really hard, and we're just glad we're finally there. It's a long four and a half years. Yeah, and we don't want to see our kids make the same mistakes. So, Julie, when Kurt came home and he said, hey, I heard of this guy, Dave Ramsey, what was your first thought? Were you 100% in on it, or did you have a moment where you're like, hold on a second?

I just didn't know. Sometimes he comes home with things, and I'm like, what is this? was this were you 100 in on it or did you have a moment where you're like hold on a second i i just didn't know sometimes he comes home with things and i'm like what is this and i just didn't know about him and then it was truly a god thing because it was right after that that our church said they were having the class and we took it and i was like this truly was what we were meant to do yeah so once you got in the class it was okay though oh gosh yes and then teaching it we've loved it we just taught our fifth one um this wrapped up a couple months ago and we hope to keep on teaching thank you thank you for doing that absolutely that's awesome so you said before you said you know your whatever available balance you know we'll use that did you

have one straw that kind of broke the camel's back? Usually people have that one moment that's like that. What happened that made you go, this has got to change? Well, we knew that our oldest was getting ready to go to college and we did not want to have credit card debt or student loan debt and we didn't want them to have that. And it was just, we realized when, you know, our kids needed things for school like clothes and we didn't have money to get them except it's like, oh, what's left on this store's

card and what's on this? You can't live like that. You make too much money to feel that broke. Absolutely. Yeah. And then we were trying to sell our home. This was like 11 years ago, but we were trying to sell our home and we put granite countertops on the credit card that then we never got to enjoy

those granite countertops because they went on the house that we sold. So those were the things I think that we were, that was really the tipping point for something like that, you know, with home improvements that you'd never enjoy. And we just said never for, um, for our kids and for their families,

it's, it's time to stop and get out of this and, uh, and, and go game on. Full go. Behavior change. For sure. Love it. Way to go, you guys.

All right, when you're teaching these classes, you paid off $110,000, and they say, how'd you do that? What do you tell them the key to getting out of debt and getting control of your money is? Go ahead. I think the thing with it is the principle, Dave, of giving first. You know, we talked about that with our fellow church members that we needed to set up our budget that way where giving was the first thing we did, you know, the tithe to the church.

And then we felt like with that, then you just think started to snowball after that. I mean, just like with the debt snowball where we could go and say, every month we're going to sit down, do our budget, you know, come up with our plan. And it's just, it's, it's being on the same page. It's, it's working together. It's having that intensity that, you know, like you've said in, in your books and your videos, you know, you, you need to sacrifice now and, and you're going to benefit in, in the long run. And we feel like that's where we've benefited now with, you know, we have our oldest daughter is married, and she's married to John, who works here at Ramsey.

And they did their debt-free screen back in October. And our middle daughter, she's engaged now. And when her boyfriend came to me and asked for permission to ask her to be married, I said, sure, you need to be the second person that takes FPU as well. So he was the second one that did that. And I feel like that's where we now have given that same kind of passion toward our kids and how they're going to live their own lives with money. Very cool. I like his dad style. I know, that's right. Good it on the line. Good stuff.

Good stuff. You know, I've never, I've been doing this 30 plus, 35 plus years now, and I've never met a person of faith who started tithing off the top before they did anything else that regretted it. I've never had one say, Dave, that's the stupidest idea. It doesn't work. Now, I've had people that don't do it say it's stupid, but I've never had somebody who actually is a giver as a part of their faith walk before they do anything that Say it's stupid. But I've never had somebody who actually is a giver as a part of their faith walk before

they do anything that says it's wrong. And oftentimes we hear someone standing here on the debt-free stage saying it was the key. It was the breakthrough for us to put generosity first, put God first, and trust him, and then move forward, how that opened up everything for them. So congratulations, you guys. We're proud of you. Thank you. Well done. Well done. You guys are heroes kirk and julie cleveland ohio area making 110 or i'm sorry paid off 110

in four and a half years making 120 to 148 count it down let's hear a debt-free scream three two one we're debt free! Yeah! Woo-hoo-hoo-hoo! Yeah! Absolutely. That's how it's done, ladies and gentlemen. That's how it's done. You change the family tree by making sure the new son-in-law goes.

I know, that's right. This is The Ramsey Show. Our scripture of the day, Proverbs 27, 17, is iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another. Bernard Meltzer says, A true friend is someone that thinks you are a good egg, even though he knows you are slightly cracked. I love it. Hey guys, the best way to make the most of your money is by creating and sticking

to a monthly game plan. It's called a budget where you tell your money what to do. If you don't like the budget, it's your fault because you're telling it what to do. We call it EveryDollar because you give every dollar a name. It is the world's best budgeting app, one of the most popular budgeting apps on the planet as well, and you can keep the pulse on your spending and make progress on your money goals with EveryDollar. Download EveryDollar for free in the App Store or Google Play, and you can do it online at everydollar.com as well.

Mark is in Buffalo. Hi, Mark. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave and Jade. Thank you so much for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So a little background. I'm 24 years old. I have a little over $39,000 in savings, about $23,000 to $24,000 in my 401k. I owe about owe about 123,000 on my house. That's worth roughly 170, I would say. Wow. Good for you. Um, thank you. I appreciate it. Um, so I've been with my girlfriend for a

little over three and a half years. Uh, and there's no question that, you know, she's the one for me. So I'm getting ready to, to ask the big question here soon. Um, so she's the one for me. So I'm getting ready to ask the big question here soon. Good for you. Fun. So she's finishing up her master's degree. I'm actually going to her graduation this Thursday. So we've talked many times about our future together and how once we're married, we become one. And that being said, I know she's bringing about 61,000 in student loans.

So my question is, is it better to just wait until after we're married and then I can use what I have in savings to go towards that student loan? Or should I currently take what's above my emergency fund and put that towards paying off the house like right now and then depending on the answer that question if I could ask a follow-up question that'd be great what's your follow-up question go ahead so if I do wait until we're married and I go to put a chunk towards the student loans, should I completely go down to the baby's have won $1,000 in the bank account and put it all towards that just so we can pay it off as soon as possible?

Yes. Yes, yes, and yes. Yes on all of the above. No, don't pay it down on your house. No, do not pay any of her debt until you are married. When do you think the wedding will be? Well, I'm getting ready to ask here soon, so I would say probably about a year and a half. I mean, both of her sisters and my sisters were about a year and a half from engagement to wedding planned and married. Well, there's also the price of the wedding to think about, too, to throw into the mix. It's not just her dead and her.

Who's paying for it? We haven't had those discussions yet. I know her family and mine have both said that they are going to help out. She knows she's dating a spreadsheet nerd, so she knows I'm not going into debt for a wedding. So what is the... What's her master's in?

She's going to be a school counselor. Interesting. So I'm making about $70,000 alone, and then once she's working, those starting positions are typically anywhere from like the mid to high 40s. Okay. All right.

So, well, I want her to save as much or pay down her debt as much as she can prior to the wedding, and then I'd love for you to have enough saved up to write a check after the honeymoon and pay it off. Yeah, me too. That's the goal. Down to $1,000. If you can't, still down to $1,000. And then the two of you with $110,000 income attack the student loan debt. Do you see anything else, Jade?

No, that was it. My only thought was just make sure you guys get clear really quickly on the budget for the wedding. Find out what families are contributing, if they are at all. And then you guys fill in reasonably with your budgets what you can what's next yeah what's left and you've been dating three and a half years a one and a half year planning for a wedding um it's pretty lengthy um it's not it's not necessary i mean we've had pretty big weddings at the ramsey place and they were all done in a year or less yeah and so it does not take that long and you don't have to stretch this stuff out there's no purpose in that um when it's time to get married let's get married you're not

you know it's not it's not it's not a royal wedding okay it's just not and so you just yeah the uh the sooner the better as far as i'm concerned yeah the longer that length is is the more time you have to add things to the wedding that are more expensive oh is that the problem i didn't think of that okay all right adrian is in chattanooga hi adrian welcome to the ramsey show hi everyone thank you for taking my call. Sure. So we ended up in a situation. We've never been in debt up to this point except for a car that we had to get. And then about six months ago, we had to move out of Seattle, Washington. We had about $40,000 saved, no debt at all.

We decided to buy a fixer-upper since I'm in construction. I was hoping to get it done for the cash we had and kind of move in right away. Didn't work as planned, so we ended up spending all the money and going $35,000 in debt and credit card debt. Well, you suck at estimating. Well, the house had way more issues than we thought, and since we were out of state, we pretty much bought the house side on scene, and the inspector didn't really do a good job. So you asked for it. Okay. You asked for this mess.

I guess so, yeah. And then my wife, the stay-at-home mom, we live in an RV at the moment, parked on the property, so she stays with her two little children, and I work full-time, and then I come home and work on the house. And I make about, well, I make $25 an hour before taxes. So when will the house be completed where you can live in it? Most of the stuff that we had to purchase is purchased, and it's all about just time-wise. I'm hoping to get it done sometime this summer.

You know, the hardest parts of it was done, and then, you know, it's just finishing stuff. But I can only manage, you know, I drive an hour to work and an hour from work. You may need to sell this mess and move on with your life. Well, there's one more thing I didn't mention. So we do own a piece of land here in Tennessee that we bought outright for cash. And we did put it on the market, but my wife really doesn't want to sell it. So we put a higher price than... This woman lives in an RV.

Why doesn't she want to sell it and get moved into your house? That's exactly my position, but she thinks it's going to keep going up in price. Well, all in goes up in price. That doesn't mean I'm going to live in an RV to own it. What will you make if you sell it? Well, we bought it for $20,000, and we posted it for $45,000, but it would probably sell for closer to $30,000. Okay, so you can make some money and you have

thirty thousand dollars to hire some labor and get this stupid house finished and move into it and then you've still got an hour commute which i do not understand in chattanooga tennessee why you did that but um if you want to do it that's okay so what how can we best help you today right quick well the the kind of the you know we're trying to figure out the best plan to kind of pay off the debt faster. We'll first sell the land. Okay, well, it's on the market, so I guess we'll lower the price. We'll put it for the right price so it sells. The fair price.

I'm not suggesting you undercut it, but sell it for a fair price. Okay, and then we were thinking about getting a credit card with zero percent interest no a year please stop borrowing money stop it well it wouldn't be it would be just transferring the balance so we don't pay the interest for a year and just focus on spending on paying it off you think interest is your problem your problem has been dumb but decisions piled on top of each other. Bad decision after bad decision after bad decision. Now you're getting ready to add another one to it.

Don't do that, Adrian. I mean, you bought a house that was a mess. You missed your estimate by double. Double. Double. You bought a piece of land with money you should have used to finish this house. And now you've got your family with two little kids living in an RV. And the way to be sure that that happens forever is keep borrowing money on credit cards,

0% or otherwise. Please stop. Stop. Sell the land. Probably sell the whole thing. And just get fresh start. Move over closer to where you're working so you don't spend your whole life on the road every day. That puts us out of the 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. Take care.