The Ramsey Show - App - How Do I Transition From College Student to Full-Time Worker? (Hour 1)

Episode Date: January 5, 2021

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I am Dave Ramsey, your host, Rachel Cruz, Ramsey personality. Number one best-selling author is my co-host today here on the air. We're taking your calls about your life and your money. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Well, over a year ago, we start work on a project, Rachel writing her latest book and a year plus later all of that work comes to fruition and

today is launch day on know yourself know your money. It's here it's out oh I was telling my husband Winston last night we were going to bed I was like I feel like my child is being delivered in homes like all across America because the books some of them got delivered early so people yesterday were on social holding them up and and posting it and i was like oh it feels like my child is out there in people's homes right now and yeah i which winston would not allow by the way but yeah you can do that with a book not a real child not my real child but uh it feels like a child so it is it is a it is a long. It's a labor of love in so many ways. Because I actually ended up writing it almost two years ago because I did it before I had my third baby. Because I wanted to spend maternity leave not writing the manuscript.

So I wrote it before that, had maternity leave, and then came back and started doing edits. So it's been a long cycle. But it's fantastic that it's out, and people are already loving it. So I'm so thankful. The response has been right out of the gate really strong. And, of course, you're working what Book Launch Week means is you're working 16-hour days doing, what, a couple hundred media hits in about a three-day period of time here. Yes, yeah, here at the office about 6 a.m. Including in the morning.

Yesterday, Rachel Ray, and tomorrow morning, Good Morning America. Yes. Wednesday morning, for those of you listening on different times. But Wednesday morning, Good Morning America. Be watching. Current hit time is around 8.23, if I remember right. Yes. So be watching for that.

But also in your local television stations, you're hitting every major market. We can do all of that from our studios here with Fiber these days. And it sure does make it easier than being on a bus. It does. I mean, I miss book tour when you're usually when we launch books, we're out for about two and a half weeks traveling and going to each city and doing book signings at night, media during the day. And I love that. I think it's so fun. So the fact that it got canceled because of COVID-19, I was like, oh, man, it's like one of those things that was canceled that you just, I mean, everyone has that in their personal life. You're like, oh, I just hate that I don't get to do that.

Well, you don't get to see the people. And you enjoy the people. Yeah, and I enjoy going out to eat at all the different restaurants in every city. Oh, there it is. No, and. There it is. Now we got to the bottom. I enjoy all of that.

I really do. And, I mean, obviously, yes, meeting the people and being in the studios and doing it all. But this is fantastic. Yes. With three little kids at home, it's worked out. I really do. And I mean, obviously, yes, meeting the people and being in the studios and doing it all. But this is fantastic. Yes. With three little kids at home, it's worked out. It's great. So I'm able to be home in my bed at night. But here in the day, yeah, helping promote it because it's been interesting.

Even this morning, I did about 10 different cities in a row and almost half of them were like, yeah, well, our entire crew's been talking about it because, you know, I talk about the seven tendencies in the book and the money fears and your money personality and how you grew up. And they all are connecting it to themselves. So it's fun that it already has connected even just in a brief discussion about it. Well, and since we can't do like real launch parties and real book signings, we are going to do a virtual launch party tomorrow night, January the 6th, Wednesday night, and another one on Thursday night at 6 p.m. Is that right?

Both of them? Yes, correct. 7 p.m. Okay. I've got six on my notes, so I don't know what's right. But do we know what's right? Is it seven or six? Okay.

I'm almost positive it's seven. Okay. I'm not great at details. I'm a free spirit. So I might be late to my own launch party. Well, this other note says seven. I'm pretty sure it's seven. I've got one of each. But did you find it. So I might be late to my own launch party. Well, this other note says 7. I'm pretty sure it's 7. I've got one of each.

But did you find it out? It's on RachelCruz.com. Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's 7 p.m. So virtual launch party, RachelCruz.com. You can ask her your money questions. Join the virtual launch party. It's at 7. 7 p.m. Central Time.

Yes, both nights. Okay, now we have clarification on that. So I will fix that. I was right. You were right. Which is kind of surprising, obviously. This, both nights. Okay, now we have clarification on that. So I will fix that. I was right. You were right. This paper was right, this one was wrong. Which is kind of surprising. That's it. Well, no, it's not. You've got a couple things up in the air and you're memorizing all of it. It's perfect. So there you go.

7 p.m. Wednesday night and Thursday night, January 6th and 7th, the virtual launch party. You can go to RachelCruz.com to ask her your money questions. Okay, so know yourself, know your money. The thing that is resonating is the way you grew up with money and the money tendencies, the seven money tendencies. Are you scarcity or are you abundance? Right, right. Yeah, so the whole book really was this deep dive into understanding why. So we talk about the how to,

we've been doing that for decades now, right? How to get out of debt, how to budget, how to invest, how to give. And so I started really this process, this was a few years ago, where I'm diving into like the Enneagram and learning about myself. I was in some counseling. I read the book, The Birth Order, because I'm a middle child, like seeing just how all of how you were raised in your current environment affects how you see the world and your personality. And I thought, man, how does that relate to our money? And it felt like this black hole of content because I was like, there is so much here of why we view money the way we view it, why we handle it, why it's our habits and our

personality, like all of that. And when you can start to get a grasp on that, then you can start making effective change. You can actually start to say, okay, I can change my money habits because I know when I'm being unhealthy in a certain place or where that's a great habit and I can magnify that. So in turn, it helps you win with money so much faster and gives you lasting financial peace. As an example, if you understand that you are scarcity versus abundance, what does that do for you? So the seven money tendencies, neither one's right or wrong uh on the on the extremes of these that can be unhealthy so for if you're an abundance mindset person you see the

glass half full there's always more opportunity always more money to be made uh but the the bad side the unhealthy of that is you can be unwise you can make unwise decisions because you think you can out earn your stupidity yes a hundred percent you think oh it'll be fine i'll figure it out yeah me as you raise your hand i've always been able to make more money. Yeah. So that's an abundance mindset. So a more scarcity mindset, you see the glass half empty. And again, if that's your natural bent, that's not a bad thing. You're a little bit more cautious, a little bit more aware. But the unhealthy side of that, when you go to the extreme, you end up making decisions out of fear. You hold your money tightly because you feel like it's finite. You don't want to let go. So you're not extremely generous.

You don't spend it in joy. So that's unhealthy. So these tendencies to be able to pinpoint and say, okay, I can know when I'm going to those unhealthy extremes. So another tendency is status versus security. And this is why you want money. Some people want money for security. They want to feel like they are taken care of, that they're safe.

I feel good. Now, again, the unhealthy side of that is they end up just stalking away and money ultimately is not your security. Like there's a level of faith in our life and all of that. So that can be an unhealthy side. Status, not bad.

And I'm more of this. I want money so that I can enjoy it, so that I can buy things, I can experience things. I will budget so that I can spend. That's where I get my motivation. Now, the unhealthy side of that is that your identity ends up being the things that you buy, materialistic or your accomplishments, that becomes who you are, and that's not healthy. So that's an interesting one to figure out why do people want to win with money. And we started this years ago. I identified people doing budgets, and you included that in the seven tendencies of being a nerd or a free spirit. And you guys have been through Financial Peace University 20 years ago, heard all that.

And the nerd, again, the same thing. The nerd can be too uptight, too detailed, clamp down the free spirit. The free spirit's there for you to have fun. And free spirits have to be mature enough to live on a plan so that they get to do more free spiriting, that kind of stuff. Know yourself. Know your money. You can get it at DaveRamsey.com, RachelCruz.com. Discover why you handle money the way you do and what to do about it.

It is on sale officially. Today, it's book launch day. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. In an uncertain world, being a good steward of your money is more important than ever. While some circumstances can't be controlled, there are items within your budget you can take charge of, such as your health care costs. For nearly 40 years, Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM, has provided a budget-friendly means of sharing for medical bills when our members need it.

Learn more by visiting chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries.org. Rachel Cruz Ramsey personality is my co-host today. We're answering your questions about life and money on the book launch day for Know Yourself, Know Your Money by Rachel, soon to be her latest number one. Danielle is with us in Richmond, Virginia. Hi, Danielle. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show.

Hi, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So my daughter is three, and she was diagnosed with leukemia at the beginning of april so we paused our vet snowball and my question is at what point do you start it up again she still has about two years left of treatment and i we we just weren't sure when to start it up again. Yeah. Takes my breath away. How's she doing?

She's doing very well. Treatment's moving right along. We're where we need to be. Kids are resilient. That's what I have to say. The kids are amazing when they fight this. It's the rest of us that fall apart. Oh, my gosh.

Well, you got a long slog here, and job one is beat cancer, right? Yes. We don't have any other jobs to do. That's our only job. Yes. Anything else is like a side gig. Agreed? Yes. Anything else is like a side gig. Agreed? Yes.

Including restarting your debt snowball, including all that kind of stuff. So let's just say that, number one, it doesn't matter when you restart it. What does matter is that you do everything you can with money, time, effort, spirit, prayer, everything, and you pour everything into this job one, okay? And it's all-consuming, and it should be. And it's what you do. So let's do that. Now, you are kind of past the fog of some of that, and you're kind of in the rhythm of the treatments,

given that it's coming up on the first year, right? Yes. And so if things are in a wacky world that you're in, somewhat normalized, the rhythm is somewhat predictable, and you have extra cash beyond what you need to fight cancer, and you want to start back a little bit that's okay i would not expect quote unquote gazelle intensity because i would not expect that of myself were i facing this

but by the way it's perfectly okay with me from from from using the principles that we teach, to do absolutely nothing towards your money except pile up cash, any extra cash you have. You need to not go crazy and go into a bunch of debt with, quote, grief spending or something like that or justification or rationalization. Well, we can do anything we want to do because we've got this problem. No, because you've got to go back and clean up the mess you make. And so don't make a mess right but but pile up cash that would have gone towards debt and if you want to just wait until the three years is gone and then restart that's okay with me too rachel what are your thoughts well danielle's curious how much how much debt you guys have all i we've paid off the cars we never got credit cards so the only thing we have are

my student loans which is 42 000 yeah your household income is what 65 i believe yeah yeah i mean i've been active duty military so it's been a blessing having a steady paycheck during this for sure yeah i mean i'm i mean i have a three-year-old danielle so i can't even imagine like it kind of makes me tear up talking to you because i'm like i can't even go there emotionally because it's so terrible so i mean if that was me i think everything else in my life just pauses um and i and i focus on on my on my child so i'm yeah i'm with i'm with dave right there where if you choose to do nothing for two years until treatment's over, 100% okay. Because, yeah, that is your number one thing.

But if you had $42,000 in savings when that happened, you know, at the end of three years, that would be the way to do it. Okay. In other words, you're not going to, again, slide over and misbehave, but you're just not going to pay down on the debt and have not enough money in savings to deal with something because you might need to jump on an airplane and do something, right? Yeah. And to get a treatment. It's almost like, Daniel, when someone's pregnant, we always say just pause for nine months, wait until the baby's here, wait until everyone's good and healthy, and then whatever money you've saved, then you can put towards the debt. You can almost think of it like that, like a two two-year pause we're going to just pile up cash okay when everything's good and the treatment and everything is done and she's healthy on the other side

whatever you've piled up that of savings then you can just throw at the debt yeah but don't go buy a new car no right and say that that's okay because of the mess you're in you made a bigger mess and people do that sometimes they they um well money is a coping mechanism yeah you push you push your spending over like food's a coping mechanism you push your spending over to deal with the stress of this and the grief of having to fight this and all of that so yeah that that's what just guard against that and it's what a lot of people dealt with not this specifically but in 2020 the 43 percent of americans spent because of stress and anxiety during the pandemic so you see the rise of spending to feel good is

what is what you're talking about and 44 can't fit in anything but their sweatpants i just make that up but yeah i mean there's that too so i mean yeah food and money are coping mechanisms yes if you and alcohol i mean there's a lot there's a lot of coping mechanisms alcohol sales are through the roof they're almost as good as plexiglass sales i know okay so anyway so so danielle the banner statement is making sure your spending is not just to cope but just for for you guys to say, pause, take care of that baby. Owen is with us in Newark, New Jersey. Hey, Owen, your question for Rachel and me. Well, congratulations, Rachel, on your book.

Thank you, Owen. I'm graduating in May. You're awesome. I'm graduating in May, and I have a very generous job lined up. And I was wondering how you would advise a 22-year-old who's transitioning from being a college student to making a full-time income. Of course, I'm going to get my emergency fund set up and using my full 401k match but uh there's going to be leftover income and i don't want to waste it

oh and do you have any debt currently when you graduate you have student loans or credit card debt no i was fortunate enough to get a nice scholarship oh awesome amazing uh i mean yeah i mean i would say oh number one, the fact you're asking the question is encouraging because you're gonna be starting this process at 22, which is incredible. So yeah, I mean, it's exactly what you just said, just making having some cash on the side for an emergency fund, three to six months of expenses, and then looking into retirement and funding that 15% from there. And then and even in the process, if I wouldn't buy a house right out of college, but having some savings savings if you want to save up for a down payment on a home because you

know that may be coming later in life uh doing that too how much are you going to be making at your new job uh 157 plus a little stock good night owen what are you doing do what software software development yeah yeah software engineering okay wow Do what? Software. Software development? Yes, yes, software engineering. Okay, wow. Nice, Owen. That's a great first job. That's very impressive, young man. That's a very good first job out of college.

To give you an idea, I made exactly 10% when I came out of college of what you're going to be making when you come out of college. I made 34%. So, yeah, I think you have a bright future, sir. You're going to be okay. Don't screw it up. Wow. Got a free ride somehow and comes out. Well, because you're smart.

I'm sure. I got a feeling you're a smart guy. An academic scholarship. Yeah, we didn't have any of those either in the Ramsey household. Hey, hey, hey, hey. No, I'm talking about me too. Owen, that's awesome. Way to go, Owen.

Way to go. Yeah, just save up some money. Pile up some money and get ready for your home purchase above your emergency fund, above 15% of your income. I think you already

knew the answer to this. Congratulations. You are a stud. Well done. Okay, so how do you feel sitting in your chair doing this show? How long have you been

doing this show? 30. 30 years. You're getting more young people calling you than ever before, would you say? I think it's a YouTube thing. Okay.

The demographic on YouTube is... Do you feel like a grandfather of America where you're like these young... I used to be your peer when you called, and I have evolved into... Then I went to Uncle Dave, and now I'm just straight up Papa Dave. Yeah. There's no question about it. I mean, the guys calling are younger than my kids. No.

But that didn't happen 30 years. No, it didn't happen. It was like guys in their 60s calling you back in the day, right? Well, I mean, it still is. I'll just say, great America. There's a hope for the future. There's a lot of young people like Owens. It's awesome.

Well, and I'll bet you dollars to donuts that he was a YouTube listener. Probably not an AM talk radio listener. He probably created something for YouTube. I don't know. He could be. You never know. But there's how it works. Wow.

That's awesome, Owen. So proud of you, sir. Very well done. Salute you and your parents. Well done. This is the Dave Ramsey Personality bestselling author Rachel Cruz is my co-host today. Always joining me, but today is a special day. It's launch day for her new book know yourself know your money the

team around here in high gear uh with marketing and appearances rachel is doing and including good morning america in the morning be sure you jump on around 8 28 15 you'll see her showing up around then know yourself know your money discover why you handle the money handle money the way you do and what to do about it. A little inside baseball for those of you who don't know how things work behind the scenes. You would not believe that putting a title on a book and a subtitle on a book is many times more difficult than writing the book. Yes. The crap we go through around here to figure out how to name something

to where when you read it, you go, okay, that's what the book's about, meaning the title is prescriptive, and the title doesn't need a subtitle to explain it, but it helps explain it, and not having a subtitle that is in itself a book. I mean, there are so many things violated by authors and publishers every day, and we spend an inordinate amount of time, emotional energy, and money and creativity studying these things and testing these things before they come out. We probably looked at 40 different titles for this, didn't we?

Yeah, it was a lot. Because it was hard, because I'm like, it's not the psychology of money, it's not your money personality. I mean, like, how do you put it in four words? Yeah. Five words, six words? I mean, it was a feast. It is one of the more difficult things.

It's a surprising thing. And, you know, one of the reasons it's so surprising was I accidentally was brilliant with my first book. I had no idea. No, I really was. coincidentally, was brilliant with my first book. I had no idea. No, I really was. I mean, Financial Peace is a genius title. That is a world-class title of a book. But it's just like, who thought?

I just dreamed it up. And thank you, God, for giving me that idea because I had no marketing team. I had nobody to test the title. I just said, you know what? That's what it's about. It's about having peace in your finances, and everybody will understand that. And it worked so well. And every book after then has been a labor to try to put a, my worst title is more than enough.

That sucks. I really, you know, and it's the worst selling book I've ever done, too. You think it the title yeah well no the book is awesome no there's multiple reasons i won't get into all of them but some of my fault some of them might be the publisher but the uh but the book itself is awesome once you get into it but very few people have read it there you go so it's just there you go it's it's a process you guys mor Morgan is with us in Jacksonville, Florida. Hi, Morgan. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave and Rachel.

So I just had a question. Me and my husband, we bought a house eight months ago out in the country. It's a really beautiful house. It's on a small river, a third acre. Or a third, yeah, a third of an acre. But we thought it was a manufactured home, and it's actually a small river, a third acre or a third, yeah, a third of an acre. But we thought it was a manufactured home and it's actually a modular home. But you really can't tell because it has like a big porch and like a detached garage and things. And so we've been like putting a lot into it because we like kind of want it to be like our family home.

But we recently have just discovered that it has like two very, very large problems and one of them one of them it's not hitting a problem yet but it will be a problem um in the next few years and so we were we were trying to see if we should stay in this house or if it would be wise to like stay in this house for as long as we wanted we were hoping we were wanting to like stay for like seven to nine years until we like outgrow the house but um we were just wondering it's like seven to nine years until we outgrow the house. But we were just wondering, it's like, I don't know if we could get the money back if we did fix the larger issue. And so I was just wondering if you guys would advise that we should leave the house. What are the two things?

What are the two things? What do they cost and what do you pay for the house? So we paid $156 for the house. And one of the problems, we recently discovered that there was water damage in the mudroom. And so that's like the urgent problem that we currently are having to go back in our baby steps into our emergency fund to fix because there's like mold and rotting wood in the floor. What's that going to cost? What's that going to cost? I'm hoping under $10,000.

Okay. So what's the other problem? It's a foundation problem. We've recently had a lot of cracking in the house. There was already a lot of cracking, but the cracks have gotten wider just in the eight months that we've been here. And so the guy that we had come out today, he said that with doing it at the very cheapest, it was probably going to be $15,000, but he couldn't even do it. And so the people that could do it are a much more expensive company.

So they would probably be more around $20,000. He said that. The foundation problem. He said that. He did say that, yeah. Okay, so you don't have enough information yet. Your feelings are hurt that your new house is broken. Okay, yeah. You don't have a financial catastrophe.

Okay. Fix the mudroom, get five bids, and spend six months studying the foundation before you make a decision on it. Foundation repair is full of the people that do it are, there are groups of people that do it that are wonderful people, and there's a bunch of jacklegs that just make up crap as they're going. And I think that's who you met today. Well, he was going to give us a really good deal. Yeah, I know. He was nice. But he also didn't know how to fix it, and he also gave you an estimate about what another

person's company would charge you, which is making up crap. He pulled that out of his ear. Well, he had us call the other company. We called the other company, and we called the manufacturer of the house, and they were saying that we would only, because it has like this protection underneath, this insulated protection in the crawl space, he said that we would have to get a specific kind of foundation specialist, which it's like a really small town we live in, and so the closest one.

You've had three conversations, and you're ready to move okay don't do it no fix the mud room and spend six months studying the foundation getting more bids talking to more people finding more ways to fix it there's a lot of things you can do to foundations there's more than just one possible fix and there's certainly more than just one possible company even if you're quote unquote out in the country you can pay people five thousand dollars and they will come out in the country and fix this for seven i don't know i'm making this up but you don't know this yet and so you've got to gather more information when's the point that you would say no yeah you need to move that the it's not worth fixing because in order to sell it you gotta fix it you have to disclose yeah

you have to fix it or you have to disclose it right one of the two i mean if it was an eighty thousand dollar repair on this i'd have a lawsuit against the seller for not disclosing. You know, at that point, the people that sold it to them and the real estate agents that are involved and the home inspector that missed the inspection, which, by the way, never buy a home without an inspection. And these are the reasons right here. So you don't get your heart broken on the thing that you thought you were going to be in love with for nine years. And now you find out you got mudroom with mold and a cracked foundation. So foundations in different states and in different regions are sitting on different kinds of soil,

and there's all kinds of different situations. With you being in Florida, you're probably sitting on some version of sand, and so it's probably some version of slab, and I don't know. You're just going to have to look at it and get in there and figure out what they do. In Tennessee, the fix would be different than it is in Florida. But I have owned over 2,000 pieces of real estate. I did rehabs for a living for a decade, and one thing I know is that guys working on houses are kind of like doctors

they are practicing that's why they call it a medical practice they're making crap up as they go and they proved that during covid they didn't know what they were doing and so they just did stuff and so they're practicing medicine and some of them are better at practicing than others and none of them apparently are good at math but the same thing's true of foundational people they're practicing they're trying to figure it out and they're looking at three little cracks and trying to figure out how to fix your house you need more information before you shut the economy down that's what you're going to do. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. This coming Tuesday night, we want to do something to help you guys kick off your new year right with money.

After last year, a lot of people will raise their hand and say, I need to reset. I need to restart. I need to get a do-over. I need a whiteboard. I need to start fresh, and I'm ready, set, go. So we are doing a reset live stream live from LifeChurch.tv in Oklahoma City this coming Tuesday night at 7 p.m. Central Time. That's January the 12th at 7 p.m. Central Time. It is free. It will be me, Rachel Cruz, Chris Hogan, and Pastor Craig Groeschel. And Rachel will be covering some of the material from Know Yourself, Know Your Money. I will, of course, be talking with Chris Hogan,

and I'll be talking about how to walk you through the baby steps and how to do your reset. And Pastor Craig has an incredible, he's a world-class communicator, talk on a discipline that I have loved, and I asked him to do it. It's really good. And so I'm looking forward to this. It's going to be an absolutely incredible night. It is completely free. How do I watch your say, Dave?

Well, here's the deal. You text the word RESET to 33789. Text RESET to 33789, and it is a free, did I mention it's free, live stream this Tuesday night. That's going to be fun. Oh, it's going to be great. I think that the content is really spot on for where we are,

right? Early 2021, we did Message of Hope, we did a couple of things in 2020 to kind of set the course, and I think that this event, it is going to launch people into a new year to gain a new control over specifically their money, but also their life. Like you said, the discipline talk from Craig

can be applied in every aspect of your life. But really getting your money under control this year, I think it's something that so many people feel. I wonder, and I'm sure stats will come out later in the year, resolutions, money's always in the top three but i wonder if it even rises to the top of the top because of 2020 i'm sure i mean after that dumpster fire who everybody's got to relook this right and go thank god that's in my rearview mirror now i got to fix the mess that i made or maybe that was just my wake-up call, or maybe I was doing pretty good, but I want to do even better because I never want to be vulnerable

again. I don't want my family to be vulnerable financially because we're living deeply in debt and no money, and we don't have any wealth. And wealth is not valuable except what it does. That's the only thing it does. It gives you margin. It gives you a pad between the crazy things in life. You can't protect everything.

You're still going to die. You know, there's lots of things. People still get sick. You can't control any of that. That's not the point. But wealth doesn't buy any of that anyway. All it does is give you the ability to manage the process, you know, as you're going through. And it gives you lots of options to do things.

And if you need to buy an airline ticket to go visit a sick relative, you don't have to think about it because you've got the money. But when you need to buy an airline ticket to visit a sick relative and you're broke, now you have two crises, a financial crisis and a sick relative. And so you've got all of these things going on. And this is your chance to reset and not leave yourself vulnerable again. Text the word RESET to 33789. It's this coming Tuesday night. We want you there. There's already over 65,000 people registered to watch this.

It is going to be the largest live stream we've ever done. It's going to be probably 150,000 people by the time the numbers are in next Tuesday. So we're really, really excited about this. All right, Jake is with us. Jake's in Portland, Oregon. Hi, Jake. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave and Rachel.

Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up? I have a question. So this year I became debt-free. I followed the baby steps, and I'm debt-free, and I've got approximately $70,000 in the bank, that's including my emergency fund.

Nice. My issue is that my mother and my older brother with mental disabilities live in a dilapidated house that's owned by my grandpa. She's been living in it for 17 years without paying any kind of rent, and he refuses to maintain it at all. So it hasn't had anything done to it in 17 years. It's currently falling apart. It has mold in it. It has holes in the wall. I mean, it's pretty bad. I've been running the numbers and I think it's going to be about a $100,000 remodel. So my question is, should I buy this house from my grandpa and then put the money in out of my savings into doing the remodel, even though I

may not have enough right now? Or do I say, you know, forget this house and then move them out into a different house because this is an unhealthy situation and I'm not sure how to fix this situation at the moment. What do you make a year? I make about $110,000. How old are you? 32. You're an extraordinary young man. Thank you.

Willing and able to do this for your mom and your brother with disabilities. Well done. So what I always think of is what is the most efficient way, financially and time-wise, to accomplish the goal? And the goal is for your mother and brother to have a place to live that's not mold-infested and falling down. Yes, sir. Okay.

So, you know, there's two things you can do. What would I do if I were in your shoes? Is your home paid for? I actually sold my home at the beginning of the pandemic, and now I'm renting really cheap. So I lowered my living expenses by 75% by renting. So at some point again, you will buy and move on with your life in that part of your world. Are you single? Yes, sir. Okay.

All right. I would do a two-step procedure if I were in your shoes. One is I would move them out into an inexpensive rental immediately and just pay for it. You make a ton of money, and you have a ton of money in comparison to them. And by the way, a few months of rent is a lot less than buying a house for $100,000 or remodeling a house for $100,000. You can rent a long, long time for $100,000, right? Yes, sir.

Okay. So we don't want to do this forever, but my point is use of your cash and burning of your cash, if you rented them a property for two years, what could you rent it for? Yeah, approximately right around there, it would be about $1,300 a month, I believe. Okay. All right. And so, you know, I'm probably going to cheat on that and say, let's try to, they're living in a dump now.

Let's try to make it $1,000. That's $12,000. If you did it for two years, that'd be $24,000, right? Yes, sir. Okay. And that's a sizable it $1,000. That's $12,000. If you did it for two years, that would be $24,000, right? Yes, sir. Okay. And that's a sizable upgrade from where they are. During that two years, save money and buy an inexpensive property that is way nicer than they're living in now and pay cash for it and just let them live there.

Okay. And I think you could probably pull that off in two years, couldn't you? Yes, sir, I think so. And then you would move on with you buying a house for you later. Do not move in with them. No. And do not combine your households in order to make this financial goal happen. Okay.

That is not what I'm suggesting. Okay. But where do they live? They live down in Arkansas. Where in Arkansas? Northwest Arkansas around Fayetteville. Yeah. Okay.

Okay. So you can buy, you can 4X their living situation for 75 grand to 100 grand, can't you yes sir okay yeah i mean that's a palace compared to where they're living definitely yeah and just pay cash for it and then all you got to do is make sure that the taxes are paid the insurance is kept up and um that your mom keeps the utilities paid which she's probably doing now right um barely she's got a business that wasn't doing very well before the pandemic and now it's just stuck a knife in it so it's going to go out of business so she has zero income at this point yeah how old is she uh in her early 50s time for her to have another income yes sir and that's uh something we talked about but about, but she fights against it.

Yeah, well, sitting on your butt is not going to work. This is an option. So you can be generous to a point, but we're not going to be an enabler either. So you're a fine young man. That's how I would do it. I would rent something for probably less than $1,000 now that I've learned a little more. And then a good area, but it's an inexpensive area. And good people.

But I would rent something inexpensively for a couple years, pile up some cash, pay cash for it, and then move on with your financial goals. But also a part of that is that she needs to be able to maintain it, and she needs to be able to get her career moving again. She is in her early 50s and this is a requirement of the future of her life. She has a 90-year life expectancy. That's a long time from 52. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. If you would like to do your debt-free scream live on the show, make sure you visit DaveRamsey.com slash show and register. We would love for you to come to Nashville and tell Dave your story.