The Ramsey Show - App - How Do We Combine Our Money After Our Wedding? (Hour 2)

Episode Date: January 1, 2021

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Hey guys, this is James Childs, producer of the Dave Ramsey Show. Dave and the team are out spending time with their families for New Year's, but we'll be back soon to help you take control of your life and your money in 2021. In the meantime, we put together some of the best clips from the show for you to enjoy. This is the best of the Dave Ramsey Show. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar for you to enjoy. This is the best of the Dave Ramsey Show. 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'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Thanks for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225. My co-host today here on the air, Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality. We're here to answer

your questions about your life and your money. 888-825-5225. Michelle is in Memphis. Hi, Michelle. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. How can we help? Hi, John. Hi, the Dave Ramsey Show. How can we help? Hi, John. Hi, Uncle Dave. What's up? I'm calling. I want to let you know, first off, I love you. I love your show.

I paid off my car, my credit card, medical debt because of you. Way to go. Yeah, so the question I have today is that my fiance and I are getting married. We're getting married tomorrow. Tomorrow? Yeah, congratulations. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.

I mean, after this year, you know, we both had COVID-19. We recovered from it. We did premarital counseling, and we decided we're just going to go ahead and get married this year. We're going to do something big next year with everybody else. And so, because we all want to get started with our marriage and getting our finances together, we have some questions as far as how to pay off the debt

or how to combine households. So the situation is this. For him, he has a $6,500 work truck, $5,000 personal truck, $3,500 credit card, $3,000 in a HELOC, $1,000 in medical, and then he owes $12,000 on his house, and that's a personal loan with his dad at 0%. For me, I have $130,000 in student loans, and I have a house that I just got two years ago that I owe $205,000 on and if I were to sell it I think it would sell for like $230,000 or $240,000 and my question is that you're thinking that what I'm going to do is probably move where he is. It's like you say, the hour out, and then just commute back and forth.

Currently, my sisters live with me, so I charge them rent, but maybe have them take over the mortgage. But I don't know ultimately should I sell the house, should I continue renting to them, but I'm not sure for how long. Should I rent it to somebody else? Good Lord. Okay, let's stop. There's a lot going on here. There's a lot going on here. Okay, to start with, let's just you change your pronouns when you get married. It's no longer his house, your house, it's our house. It's no longer my

debt, his debt, it's our debt. It's no longer his house, your house, it's our house. It's no longer my debt, his debt, it's our debt. It's no longer his income, my income, it's our income. So you become French, oui, oui, oui. Okay? So what are we going to do with the house I used to live in that my sisters are still in? What are we going to do with this big butt student loan? What are we going to do with this big butt student loan? What are we going to do with this truck? And so on. And so once you start kind of looking at it that way,

then it's going to help you. In other words, you don't have two lists of things after you're married. You have one list of things. And so where are you're planning to live in the home that he owes his dad $12,000 on. Does he have a first mortgage in addition to that? No, no, that is the first mortgage. So when it pays off $12,000, that house is paid for? Except for a $3,000 HELOC. Oh, okay, $15,000.

All right. So I think your sisters need to look for a place to live, and you need to sell both of your properties. Not like next week, but within, I mean, they need to be gone, and you need to have the house on the market by spring. Okay. Okay. You can be gentle with them, but you're not in a position to be a landlord. You're too broke. $135,000 for a student loan debt

that's broke okay so um and then you guys look at the car situation and you look at your debts and we list all of our debts after the two houses are sold except the home smallest to largest pay minimum payments on everything but the little one and attack them and work them together in that order. What will your household income be after tomorrow? Our income. What will our income be tomorrow? I think $130,000. Oh, great.

Great. Well, you'll be able to plow right through this once you get organized and focused on it together. This is going to be really exciting for you. You're going to make a lot of progress really fast, but you're going to start amputating some crap out of your life. I also have, I was wondering, my mom gifted us $10,000 for the wedding, and I also have like $17,000 in a Roth IRA towards contributions.

I didn't know if it would be best to withdraw that and throw that at the debt or just leave that there. I would leave retirement alone, and any monies that you have other than retirement, you use to work your baby steps. Hold on. I'm going to give you a wedding present. We're going to sign you up for Ramsey Plus for a year, and that includes going through Financial Peace University.

It includes the EveryDollar app, and it'll give you and your new husband the tools to work together. This idea of combining things changes relational dynamics, doesn't it? Yeah, because it takes the power dynamic out of it. We're in this together. There's not yours and mine. There's not I've got some more than you've got or I've got less than you've got. This is ours.

We've got to learn to renegotiate who we are as one person instead of mine and yours. And there's a shame dynamic, too. Well, of course. People bring, if they bring a negative financial end of the thing, they feel ashamed. Right. Like, I should have to clean this up. It's a mess I made. And the other side of it is,

there's a power in feeling superior. Well, I didn't bring any debt into this, so that's your stuff. Man, when you sign up, you sign up. Same team, same team. That's right. Richer for poor, in sickness and in health,

unto thee all my worldly goods I pledge. You almost never hear that part anymore but that's book of common prayer marriage vows the old-fashioned marriage vows if you had heard them heard a marriage ceremony in the 50s or 40s or 30s in this country you always heard that and it got truncated and now people just write their own vows it It's like, you know, I love daisies and Skittles and whatever, right? But this verse. I love you and butterflies and gummy candy. Yes, and unicorns.

But, yeah, but the, but I mean, there's a commitment, there's a pledge here. In sickness and in health, for richer, for poorer. Unto thee all my worldly goods I pledge. And there's a combination there. There's a combining there. And it does away with the shame. It inserts grace. It does away with the power dynamic, to use your phrase.

That's a great phrase. And it sets you up in a completely different way. And I stumbled into this. I didn't know it. I was just making people get on a budget together because it was practical. It was impractical to run two checking accounts. Right. It was impractical to try to run two different lives inside one house.

And I'm an efficiency guy. Right. So when I first started doing Financial Peace University, it was all about efficiency. And people kept going, you saved our marriage. And I'm like, you went the wrong class. Sex class is down the hall, dude. I mean, and it's like, but then I started figuring out this stuff is so intermingled relationally that you really cannot separate. 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 visiting chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries.org slash budget. You're listening to the best of the Dave Ramsey show. We'll be back soon with more live content. Thanks for joining us, America.

Rachel Cruz, Ramsey personality, my co-host on the air today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Brock is with us in Nebraska. Hey, Brock, how are you? Hi, Dave and Rachel. It's an honor to be speaking with you both. You too. What's up?

Hey, so I'm 18 years old. I make about $30,000 a year. I save about 50% of my paycheck into a regular savings account, and then I have a little bit I'm investing, about $200 a month. And I'm interested in investing in real estate. So I'm not sure when is a good time to start that process. The other thing I want to add is I'm also interested in becoming a professional pilot. So I'm cash flowing my pilot's licenses right now. And then I'm also working on a fallback career, which would be a volunteer firefighter getting my 1 and 2 license and then also EMT training. So I'm kind of just trying to navigate this next season and how to get started in real estate. I love real estate, but I want you to finish your career goals first. The money you're spending on the pilot training or on the EMT training is going to give you

more money back than real estate will give you. Okay. Real estate's a wonderful investment, but education is a better investment. Okay, awesome. And then my other question is, for buying a house, when would be a good time to do that at my stage? Or would you recommend renting? What's the timeframe there? And Brock, if I were you at 18 years old, I would rent just for a couple of years before you really, you know, put roots in the ground, if you will.

Because you are still so young, there's so much opportunity that for you to be moving, you know, life change when you're be moving you know life change when you're in a really crazy life change period of your life right now uh did you just graduate high school in may uh or this past year yeah yeah so there's gonna be a lot so if i were you for sure i would be renting and i would yes do exactly what he said making sure all of your career stuff is taken care of and as you get that going and building, investing in retirement, then looking for a house, and then beyond that, looking into real estate as an investment. But you're rocking it at 18, so I think you're going to be just fine.

That's fabulous. All right. Open phones at 888-825-5225. William is in Colorado. Hi, William. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. How are you doing?

Better than I deserve. What's up? Can't believe I'm actually talking to you. What's new? What's new? But my question is, I'm an active duty soldier out here in Colorado. And the question I have, we have a baby coming in October. That's a big blessing.

And we've saved, we did a baby coming in October. That's a big blessing. And we've saved, we did a baby fund up to $10,000. The question I have, we're in baby step two, but moving into this new FY October 1, and I know there's bills that pass. There's sometimes bills that don't get passed that may hurt funding to where we won't get paid. Thankfully, I have yet to experience that, but I don't believe I'm impervious to that happening. Would it be wise, even though we're in Baby Steps 2, keep that fund there, the baby fund, and add to it a little bit? It's in the event that they don't pass the bill and some federal employees, government employees don't get paid for a month or two months.

So I have that ability. Would that be a wise decision? Because I know we're in Baby Steps 2, we're cranking away. We're putting it on hold because of the pregnancy. But moving into October, is it wise to have that and that's still there if it's an event to cover expenses and so. William, is there an active, is this like an active bill going on? No, no, you're fine. The percentage chance of that happening is so low, I'm not worried about it. It happens once or twice every 10 years

and uh it's just not that you know i i'm not going to worry about that if i'm you you get you need to plow on through and if you get furloughed you just pick up some side gigs while you're furloughed for a little bit if there's a funding issue but you know you're gonna i mean there's no way we know anything for certain anywhere but i personally if i were in your shoes would be comfortable enough as a federal employee with the steadiness of my paycheck to not worry about it regardless of congress losing their minds i mean you can't ever tell what the island of misfit toys is going to do but i really don't you know i really don't think that's going to happen so um and when does, it's usually very short term,

and it's political more than financial or more than economic. So, yeah, it's worrying about something that has a low enough probability that it's actually going to occur that causes you to take action, and so it's out of balance. You need to have a higher chance that something's going to happen for you. Adjust your plan. For sure. I mean, that general concern is out there,

but if there was some situation that a specific bill with his specific employment and all of that really was going through active and there was a chance, then that's kind of a different story. But that's different than a vague concern. Well, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, this more general concern, not stopping the plan for that. Ben is with us. Ben is in Kentucky.

Hi, Ben. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. How's it going? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, so my situation is basically I've got my debt is I've got a mortgage and I've got an HVAC system that I just put in the house.

And the deal with the HVAC system is it's a zero percent APR, meaning that I don't pay any interest on it right now. And so I was wondering, first off, if you think I should just go ahead, because I know I've read a lot of your stuff and you talk about the snowball effect and paying off the small stuff first. So I was wondering, even though it's a 0% APR, if you recommend paying that off first before going more in on the mortgage, because right now I'm just basically attacking the mortgage and just paying month to month with the 0% APR, just the minimum that I have to on the HVAC. And Ben, you don't have any other debt, correct? No, I have the mortgage and just the debt for the HVAC. Yeah, no credit cards, no car loans, anything like that.

Well, then, yeah, I would stay current with the mortgage, but I wouldn't pay extra on it, and I would get this thing paid off. Because even though the zero interest is there, mathematically, I understand your thought process, but it's the emotional side of still owing that, right? Like there's still money to be owed. And so getting that out of your life completely, building up that emergency fund and then walking through the baby steps is what I would do. We try to just rationalize so much of our money, mistakes or decisions based on math. And at the end of the day, it is so much more than math.

It is so much more than math. And that's what you have to take into account. But yeah, mathematically, I understand what you're saying. But there's an emotional, spiritual side to money that when you don't owe anyone anything, things start to change. Yeah, you just need to be free. When you play games with, you're not going to get wealthy with borrowed money on a vacuum.

It's just, I got 0% on my vacuum. A heating and air. Well, I mean, HVAC or your heating and air system. It's just, you know, said no millionaire ever. The 0% on my HVAC caused me to become wealthy. It just doesn't come up. Being and staying debt-free and not having cash flow and not having stuff around my neck when weird crap happens is by far superior to that. So, yeah, write a check, pay that off as soon as you possibly can,

and don't pay extra on your mortgage until you have that done and have a fully funded emergency fund. That simple. Don't do it. Speaking of becoming millionaires, SmartVestor Pros are the people that we recommend for you to do investing with, and they'll help you. The only time you should even think about an early withdrawal, when things are going crazy out there, is to avoid a bankruptcy or a foreclosure. And the bigger your emergency fund, the less you've even got to think about taking out

your retirement. So you get into your retirement and you leave it alone and you keep doing it. If you're ready to start retirement, roll over retirement, start a kid's college fund, do some investing, and you don't have someone in your corner with the heart of a teacher, go to DaveRamsey.com slash SmartVestor. DaveRamsey.com slash SmartVestor. And that will hook you up with a drop-down list of the SmartVestor pros in your area, and you will choose the one that you want to work with.

This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. You're listening to the best of the Dave Ramsey Show. We'll be back soon with more live content. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage, Lance and Kayla are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? We're good. How are you? Welcome, welcome. Where do you guys live?

Currently, we're in Raleigh, North Carolina, but we're originally from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Okay. Well, welcome to Nashville and all the way over here to do a debt-free screen. Yes, sir. How much did you pay off? Just over $27,000. Very good. How long did this take?

19 months. Good. And your range of income during that time? So we started technically around $36,000 and went up to about $80,000, but we have a little bit more to say about that in our story so okay all right what kind of debt was the 27 um our honeymoon a car a heloc uh student loans yeah how long y'all been married uh five years five years so what happened 19 months ago what's the story on this so um lance was working in pitt in Pittsburgh and I was back in grad school and

he was working for a university, which got me the opportunity to go to school kind of debt free. But along with that, we had to pay taxes on the tuition, which cut his paycheck in half. And we didn't know about that whenever it happened. So it was instead of $36,000, it was about $18,000 that he was really bringing home. And so I got a job nannying. And while I would walk her around, I was listening to The Minimalists with Joshua Fields Milburn and Ryan Nicodemus. And they kept talking about Dave Ramsey and how they were out of debt. And we were living really frugally at that point, but we still had some debt.

And I wanted to get rid of it. And so he... And I just said, that's just another podcast you're listening to. He wasn't on board yet. It's just another podcast. Here we go. It's another one.

Yep. She's crazy. She won't stop talking about it. Baby's napping. You're just listening to a podcast now. But he got a job offer in raleigh um in november of 2017 and they wanted him to start in january of 2018 and i still had to do my student teaching and so i stayed in pennsylvania he moved to north carolina we paid for that entire move in cash wow um. We took FPU in October of 2017 to kind of start that ball. And got down here.

We were managing a mortgage and an apartment. And we finally sold the house. I was still in Pittsburgh. He was up here, or in Raleigh. Right. You lived with your parents. I lived with my parents. That was a peer or in uh raleigh right you lived with your parents i lived with my parents that was a fun five months and i can see the fun written all over your face it just looks like

it was fun for me i mean i was hours away so yeah so um i had to pay for my last semester of grad school but then when i moved down to raleigh in May of 2018, we found out we were expecting. So we had to go into stork mode. And so we paused until January of 2019 when Morgan was born. And we paid for all of his bills in cash and for the hospital and everything. And then we got gazelle intents right after that. And we were debt free by the end of 2019. Wow.

So it all kind of had to get lined up first. Oh, yes. It was a long process. The careers lined up and the housing lined up, and then go. Yep. And 19 months, boom. Yep, yep. And it was all a God thing.

I mean, every step of the way, God was with us. So are you teaching now? Yes. Okay. And Ryan, what do you do? Or Lance, what do you do? I'm sorry. I'm an IT specialist. Okay. And Ryan, what do you do? Or Lance, what do you do? I'm sorry. I'm an IT specialist.

Okay. All right. Very cool. And doing better than 36 now. Yes. Good, good. Excellent. Good.

Minus taxes. Sure. I don't hurt. Yeah, that free degree wasn't so free, was it? No. It sounded like a good idea at the time, but it got me to my job now because my undergrad was in a different field entirely. So now I'm teaching elementary, and I was able to coordinate FPU while I was in Pittsburgh and he was in Raleigh.

Wow. And now your parents are on the road to debt-free. And now my parents are debt-free. Right. Very good. I got them involved. Everybody's in. Yep.

So what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? You did it. Lots of communication. FPU was huge going throughan. Yep. So what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? You did it. Lots of communication. FPU was huge. Yeah. Going through that. Yep. Especially for me because I was so, I mean, just another podcast.

Once a week or two into FPU, I was like, this is for real. This is definitely a big thing. Yeah. And so we actually just took it again this past January before the quarantine hit. And at that point, we were debt-free. And so it was really helpful. We just wanted to see it from the other side. Right.

And we were able to motivate the people who were still in debt. But there weren't that many people in debt. We were all in like baby step three, three Bs. What do you tell knuckle-headed, brick-headed men who have brilliant wives who stumble on a podcast, how to soften and change their hearts? Me or her? I'm talking well played, dude. Directly at you.

I mean, listen to your wife. I mean. Ta-da. It's not that hard. I mean, just give it a shot. There's nothing wrong with it. Go for it. It's nothing.

It's not going to hurt you. It doesn't make you any less. Yeah, you're not going to go any further. I never had anybody pissed off at me because I got them out of debt. They get pissed off at me about everything else, but not that. That doesn't, that one doesn't get, that doesn't usually get people mad. So, well, way to go, you guys. Very proud of you.

Who were your biggest cheerleaders? I think our parents. Your parents have always been debt-free. I was the one who brought him into debt. I needed a credit card to get my credit score up. I never had a credit card until I met her. Ah, okay.

But yeah, our parents were huge motivators. Very good. Very good. Well, congratulations, you guys. We are very, very proud of you. Thanks for leading the class, too. Sure. Changes everything. Very well done.

So did you bring Morgan? Is he going to get in the shot? Hopefully. Yeah, all right. How old is Morgan? Morgan is a year and a half. Oh, he's beautiful. Thank you.

Say hi. Yeah, very good. Life is good. We got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Everyday Millionaires. That's the next chapter in your story for sure. Lance and Kayla and Morgan, Raleigh, North Carolina, $27,000 paid off in 19 months, 36 to 80 income. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream.

Three, two, one. We're debt-free. We're debt free! Yeah! This is how it's done right here. Wow. So, how often in higher ed do you see people taking a job? He was underpaid, making 36, because his wife could get free tuition and then he found out the free tuition was so expensive that the taxes on it alone were more expensive

than tuition in other places yeah my my experience is um i won't say all my colleagues some of my colleagues are so we're so smart that we figure out some really remarkable ways to get things done in alternative ways that ended up costing us about as much as if we had just gone straight through it. We do a lot of... It's an old Deion Sanders punt return, right? Where he would run 150 yards laterally and make 32 yards downfield, right?

It's a lot of energy just to get right over there so yeah um but yeah that happens it sneaks up on you yeah that's um well it's just not a calculation that most people know to do right and you get that first check-in and you're like what it just goes back to there's so few ways around just slogging through it doing the hard everyday work and in their case it worked out at the end but it just it didn't it cost more than they thought that's what it came down to and so they had to push their way through it but they managed to get through done beautiful baby life set two great careers here we go game on game on game on very well done you guys the baby will never know and this guy knows to listen to his wife now.

And that's two big, big wins, man. Well, most of those podcasts. Most of the... Some of those podcasts, maybe not. That's right. That's right. How many households across the country the dinner starts with? Honey, I was listening to a podcast.

I know when I say that, my wife, her head just goes, Oh, gosh. She just looks at the table and says, Not again. Here we go. Not again. I thought I told you to stop that. That's exactly right.

I thought I told you to quit. That's right. I thought you said you were going to. Every once in a while, a podcast will change a family tree. So well done. Yeah. Well, if you change your family tree, we just show you how to do good stuff. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. you're listening to the best of the dave ram Show. We'll be back soon with more live content.

Ramsey Personality, Chris Hogan, my co-host today on the Dave Ramsey Show. Jennifer is in Alabama. Hi, Jennifer. How can we help? Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my call. We have a little bit of a unique situation. We're in Baby Step 2 right now.

My husband's in the military, and we just recently got a bonus for him being in the military. About 10 years ago, we had a house at another base that we were at, and now it's our rental house. Because I know we're supposed to go down to the $1,000 and keep that as our emergency fund, I'm pretty much losing my job because we're supposed to go down to the $1,000 and keep that as our emergency fund. I'm about, I'm pretty much losing my job because we're moving. And we're worried that if something happens with the rental house, that we won't have the money to cover that mortgage. Now, because of like security clearances and whatnot, we have, he has to make, to pay his bills, of course. Should I put money away in a different account just in case that happens for that rental house before taking that bonus and putting it all towards a bunch of debt that we have? Or should I just kind of wing it?

I don't know what to do now. You can set a little extra aside over in the rental house account. That's a separate business, and you're holding retained earnings in it. That's separate from your personal stuff, although technically you're on it it but i would just do that while you're getting it sold you need to sell that house we are we are going to sell it probably um next year we're going to sell it um why um well because we're pcsing right now and the amount of money to get it up to selling um to sell it that we would need i'm going to go out next year and do everything myself so that um we're not paying out i mean just to i guess they were saying to paint it to get it

ready it's going to cost six thousand dollars and yeah that's what i was like who is they yeah um well the lady who takes care of our house, our rental manager, she got a bunch of quotes together. Well, listen here, Jennifer. Listen. How much do you owe on this home? We owe $123,000 on the home. Okay, and what do you think it's worth? Probably we could get around to $152,000 for it. Okay, all right.

And so the payment on this mortgage is how much, this rental property? $872,000. Okay. And what other debt do you all have outside of this rental? Oh boy, here we go. Uh-oh. We have about $180,000. Break that down. What is it? Let me see. I have about $ 000 student loans okay um we have let me see a bunch of

credit cards and uh we have a car loan okay how much is the car loan uh 13 000 okay what's your degree in accounting okay and you're not and you're not working. Why? Well, with the COVID thing and everything, I was a school bus driver. Why? If you have a degree in accounting, are you a school bus driver? I don't have it yet. I'm like, I'm seven classes away from getting my degree. So I stopped taking student loans out, and I'm actually using my husband's GI Bill to stop the whole student loan thing.

So I'm just, I'm getting there next to finish my accounting degree. Okay, that's good. That's very smart. And, yeah, I think the house needs to go sooner than later. Okay. I don't want to delay it. Every day it sits there, it's a problem, looking for a place to happen. Yeah.

And every day it sits there, that's, I don't know what the net of this is going to be, $20,000, $30,000 worth of equity that you could use towards the debt. Right. This is not something we need to wait a year on. No. Okay. All right. Somehow we need to make this a priority.

And so if you guys are moving now, when are you moving, actually? Well, here's the situation with that my husband isn't allowed to move but we did buy a house before we started this whole university thing and found out we shouldn't have um we just bought a house and so now um he's not allowed to move but we found out that i can go ahead of time and move and then he's going to get a small place up here until this covid thing is and he can move down. I'm sorry. The military is moving him, but he's not allowed to move?

Okay, so the military right now with the COVID thing, some of them are not allowed to move. Right. We bought a house in April, so the wives, you know, kids and family can move ahead of time, of course, but he is not allowed to move until they give him the right. Okay given him they've given him new orders to a new location and that's going to happen as soon as covid clears yes okay i see all right and where where is that um florida and you bought a house already there in florida yes. And so you're moving without him, you and the kids, when?

In about two weeks. Okay. When did you buy that house? In April. In the middle of COVID? Right when you knew they weren't going to allow him to move. Yeah, we were about two days after the COVID thing first started. We put an offer in a house because we knew we were moving down there. And then when they put the stop movement together for the second time, we were two days away from closing. Jennifer, are you telling us, based on the math, you said you all have $180,000 in debt, excluding the home, $84,000 in student loan debt, $13,000 in car loans, CARs. So are you telling us you have $83,000 in credit card debt? That and a fixed loan.

Okay. And you did say you went through Financial Peace University recently. Yeah, we did buy the program, and then we're actually taking one of the classes once a week right now. Okay, good. Well, you've got a lot of different things going on. So we need to finish the accounting degree. We need to get the husband moved to you as soon as the military will let him.

And we need to get the other house sold as soon as possible. Because we've got to get your income up above bus driver up into accounting so that you can pay this ridiculous mess off with his help, and we get rid of that other house so you can do that. So all of that together, yeah, you're going to do it as quickly as you possibly can. But in the meantime, yeah, I would hold a little back for the emergency because you've got no margin right now. You've got a huge pile of debt, and you've got like 73 variables in plate spending.

When things calm down a little bit and the house gets sold and you get settled, you're going to want to pull back and do your baby step one, two in order. But right now, you're in a transition period, and so you're not even hitting the baby steps. You're on pause. You're not going to pay off a bunch of debts. You're going to pile up cash, get the house sold, get moved, get your accounting stuff started

back and then push play on your baby steps until then you're going to need the cash to execute every bit of that because you've got a you got a lot of plates that are spinning at the same time and we got to keep them rolling yeah don't take on any more debt okay like nothing not i mean seriously not a thing uh Uh, you guys are, you're, you're, you're trying to do sophisticated stuff and what we want you to do is stuff that works. Um, and Dave's right. Being intentional, piling up money, but really and truly you all unifying together and thinking what's the step we're taking and what's in the best interest of the family moving forward. and so this is going

to be crucial that you plug this and listen i know you bought financial peace university i want you to watch it like go through it go to the class uh yeah because owning it and going through it are two different things yeah so what i hear is you guys are very busy people. You're people of action. And some of your actions prior to learning about the stuff we're teaching you have caused you messes. And so, you know, what you need to do is lay out a very detailed, exact plan. And then all of your action needs to be executing that plan to get these debts paid, get this house gone, get the accounting degree finished. All of that's part of the same picture. And, you know, let all of your action orientation that you have be directed at that

instead of getting off the path and getting into a mess. Dave, I know you have a heart for our military just like I do. I've spent a lot of time with them. They can get called and moved around quite often. At what point do you need to be sitting still before you would advise someone in the military to buy a home? Most of the time, it's five years. And very seldom are they.

It's two years. Right. Most of the time, they're on a location two years. And so most cases don't buy a house. And these are all exact reasons why right here. Right. Because that house is caught in that other market. They did not set out to have a rental property across the nation. No. They all exact reasons why right here. Right. Because that house is caught in that other market.

They did not set out to have a rental property across the nation. No. They just bought and then got moved. Right. And then the house is sitting there. And so you become a landlord by default, sprinkled all over everywhere you've ever been stationed. And so you get into a mess. But, hey, thank you for your service to the country. We appreciate you.

That's exactly what we would do is execute this, push pause on everything right now, pile up cash, work your way through those steps, and then push play again. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Once again, you made The Dave Ramsey Show one of the top four most popular podcasts last year. To get your daily dose of motivation and inspiration from the Ramsey Network, subscribe or follow today wherever you listen to podcasts.