The Ramsey Show - App - How Do We Set Ourselves Up for Success? (Hour 2)

Episode Date: February 14, 2024

Девочка-пай Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people with their money, with their work, and with their relationships. This is a special Valentine's Day episode. I'm John Deloneyoney joined by my good friend Rachel Cruz and we're taking your calls on just about anything but especially if you've got a

question about your marriage, about somebody you're dating, if you have a question about who's right. We would love to take that one. You or them. Rachel and I will solve it for you. 888-825-5225. It's 888-825-5225. Let's go out to Los Angeles, California and talk to Madison. Hey, Madison, what's up? Hi, my husband and I recently got married. We are debt-free and about to finish saving our six-month emergency fund. Good for you guys.

One of our goals is to own a home one day and we want to start investing, but we don't really know where to start. We want to be good stewards of what the Lord has blessed us with. What advice would you have for us? Should we even have the goal of owning a home right now? You want to buy a home in Los Angeles? We live about an hour outside of Los Angeles, so not right in the city. So if you start saving now, you'll be ready in like 2068 probably? You know, give or take a month or two. Madison, how long have you guys been married?

We've been married for three months. Okay, congratulations. Y'all are awesome. Congratulations. How old are you guys? I'm 19 and my husband's 23. Okay, so great. And debt-free, fully funded emergency funds right around the corner. How much are you guys making a year? Combined, we make $98,000 a year. $98,000.

Okay. Awesome. And you're just renting right now? Yes. Okay, so good. Yeah, I mean, I think owning a home is a great next step i mean john was joking that it's gonna yeah not really joking but kind of joking 60 60 years more like 2050 i know i know um have you just priced out for the fun of it some houses around your area that you guys are like that would be a great spot to you know a great area or type of house like do you have any idea on price ranges yes we've been looking a little bit i don't know if we have like a price range right now um but i guess we were more wondering like investments or because we don't currently have any investments you know should we invest and save for a house at the same time? How should we do that?

I don't know what, what practically does that look like? Yeah. Well, I mean, number one, you guys are young. So I want you to take a little bit of this pressure off of any of this, right? You, you have time to do both. You have time to save for a house and time for investing. So just, yeah, I want you to just know, okay, we are way ahead of the game. So any of this path that you're going to take, you guys are going to be fine as long as you're consistent with it. So what I would probably do, Madison, is I would open up some retirement accounts. If you guys, do you guys have 401k options at work? Does your employers match at all? Yes, my husband does. Okay. And how much this his employer match up to oh i'm not sure okay so i would find that out um and then together yeah and this is after you're about to fund your

six-month emergency fund so we'll just pretend like that's done um and then moving forward yeah i mean i would invest 15 of your income into retirement because you're not super serious about buying a house right this second if you guys had a house in mind and you were like, we have a, you know, somewhat of a down payment, we want to save more. We have a goal in 12 months. We want to put this down. Like if you, if it's very specific like that, then I would say you're totally fine holding off on investing, but it's just the idea of a house right now. So if you're kind of just in that spot, I would go ahead and start funding some retirement for the calendar year. I would both of you guys open up Roth IRAs. And I would go ahead and fund 15% of your income into retirement and go ahead and just start that process. And then here in the next, I don't know, year, two years. I mean,

again, it's not a rush to go in and buy a house. Renting is okay. Especially since you guys are newly married, putting any level of that on you, it's a lot. So yeah, I would kind of look around and just kind of see where you guys want to be and maybe have it a goal by maybe next summer, we're going to start really saving for a down payment towards a house. I mean, I would give yourself about a year. And again, be looking at prices, be looking at places around. But I would go ahead and make it a goal for this calendar year to fund retirement. And then come 2025, if you want to back off of that 15% a little bit in order to put more down for a down payment, I would put no less than 5% down on a 15-year

fixed rate with your payment being no more than 25% of your take-home pay. It's kind of our formula that we go by. So run those numbers. And then in 2025, if you guys really start seeing, okay, that's the kind of house we want. This feels reasonable. We can save up and do a 10%, 5%, 15% down payment. Take some extra money. And if you have to lower that 15% a little bit during that time, that's okay. But I wouldn't worry about a house this year. I don know for me it's easier to to see life and calendar year

sometimes so like just for you guys you've been married three months enjoy this year fund some retirements uh and then in 2025 start i would start looking and just say okay you know i mean that's where you guys are in the process but don't feel like you have to rush into anything perfect does that help? Well, thank you. Yep, absolutely. Congratulations, Madison. You're way, way ahead of the game.

That's fantastic. Let's go out to Naples, Florida and talk to Sandy. What's up, Sandy? Hi, John. Hi, Rachel. How are you today? So good. What's up?

Well, I have a head versus heart situation. I actually have two, but my main situation is I could be debt free, but in a way I don't want to give up what I'd have to give up to be that way. So I live in Naples, Florida. It's beautiful. It's warm all year round relative to the Cleveland area where I came from. And I moved here on a job transfer. I've since left that company. But unfortunately, I was laid off in November of last year. Small severance, which has ended.

I'm now living off of my savings. I've done okay. I'm single, 61, and I imagine I'm going to stay single. I don't see that changing. But I bought my condo in 2017 for $169,000 and I owe $122,000 on it at a rate of 2.89. The only other debt I have is a car at 0% for 60 months. I owe 10,000 and I have that 10,000 tucked away in a savings earning four and a quarter. So my condo today is worth about 305,000. I could sell it myself. I have the knowledge and ability to do that. I could probably walk away with about $160.

Where would you go? Go back home to my Cleveland area. I could pay cash for a very modest home or condo there. Where do you want to be? You want to be in Naples. I want to be where it's warm. Yeah. That's where I would like to be. How much do you have in retirement?

So I have in savings, and again, that includes my $10,000 for the car. I have about $34,000. I have $71,000 in two brokerage accounts. And I have $387,000 in my 401k. Okay. And you imagine you'll be getting another job to bridge some time. Yeah, I don't want to do that. That's the other head versus heart.

Sandy, you've got to get a job. Yeah, you've got to get this paid off. I mean, you could even throw the 71 at it. Pay off the car today. Pay off the car today. And then you're going to have to go back for a little bit. Your retirement's great, your account there. But I would work to pay off that condo, but stay where you want to stay. Yeah. Don't sell your condo. Get out of debt. Solve for freedom.

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podcast that i listen to from friends even here at the office and we'll send each other podcasts that we love so if you love it or if there's an episode you think oh my mom needs to hear this send it to her right or a buddy that you did oh this marriage sounds like yours send it to him be careful make sure to tell him that be careful with that but yeah that's right hey let's go out to honolulu and talk to the MAX. What's up, Max? Hey, how are you doing? Thank you for taking my call. You bet, man.

How's Hawaii, Max? It's nice. It's nice. Sunny. You're not Max Holloway, are you? One of my heroes? No. All right.

What's up? I was calling because something happened where my brother kind of holds a lot of anger towards me because he got fired from his job and I had to take it over. And I'm getting ready to move out now and I'm worried it's going to cause more family disconnect. So I'm just trying to get some help navigating the situation. Is it a family business? It's like a financial and family thing. I mean, the business? No, it's somebody we know that he worked for. What is it?

What kind of job? What kind of business is it? It's a pool cleaning job. I take home like about like 50 a year. So it's pretty good. 50 a year. And why? Why did he get fired? He had gone on a trip for an extended leave, and I was covering it for him. And the boss at the end of it decided to fire him and offered me the job. Oh, man. So you did a better job? I don't know. It was just like he didn't break a rule.

You just out-cleaned the pools, and the boss was like, I kind of want you instead. There were some issues with him, and that was a part of it. I wasn't sure if my brother would even be let back after anyways. Okay. So what is his beef with you that you weren't ride or die? Like, yeah, forget these guys. Is that the beef? I think what happened was he's just feeling like he lost out on a good opportunity.

He did. He wasn't a good worker. He wants somebody to blame for it, and it's me. He wants to blame me for it instead of himself. All right. I'm okay with that. The main issue is the money from the job helps financially support my family. It comes from a single mom household, and I'm 19. I'm trying to move out and financially support my family. It comes from like a single mom household and I'm

19. I'm trying to move out and be on my own, which would mean that I wouldn't have the same amount of money for my mom anymore. And I'm worried that's going to create even more of a family disconnect. So I don't really know what to do. What's your mom do? She cleaned, she's a cleaner. She, she works like two jobs cleaning. how much does she make um i'm not sure exactly i think i think i went over it with her one time okay how much does she how much difference does she need does she like how much are you covering the bills in the house i'm contributing about it was about fifteen hundred dollars i was paying off some debt on the water bill and then now it's like to about thirteen hundred I pay some of rent I buy all of our food and I cover the the water

is she does she have other struggles max um no I mean I think like with addiction or with mental health challenges do um no I I don't I'm, what was that? I'm asking, does she have... No, not with addiction or mental health. Okay, so... She just, yeah. Why have you become the caretaker of your mom? I think it's just, it's really expensive here, and it's hard to afford to live out here

if you aren't making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year exactly and i have two the main thing is that i my mom i think she'd be fine on her own but i have two younger sisters and that's where i feel weird leaving i feel like i'm abandoning them how old are they they're 11 they turned 11 yesterday is it at a point where you need to sit down with your mom and have a hard conversation about the financial realities so i have about six months ago and i've been keeping up i told her six months ago i plan on moving out of march okay um and she hasn't really done any much action towards like figuring out another situation. So I don't know,

like if I should just stay and keep helping so that we can stay, they can stay in their house or if I should just go on and, you know, put my oxygen mask on before there's, you know, man. Well, I just feel like Max that,

I mean, you've put yourself in a caretaker's role at 19. You know what I mean? Um, for, and it's, and it's heroic, right? In one sense. I mean, you've really stepped up and helped your mom, but this will be your whole life

unless something else changes. And I feel like that's unfair to you in your life, in your future family, to feel like you have to be the one to carry this burden and and i understand obviously why that is but long term i just don't think it's it's fair for you to play this role yeah i think i've come to a similar conclusion i just feel like i'm i'm like sure what like what yeah what do you do does your mom like lose the house with your two little sisters? Right.

Yeah. And then it's like, where do they go? We have family here and I'm sure they could move in with my grandparents or something. But hold on, hold on. Your mom also plays an integral part of this. If you told me, Hey, my mom really struggles with addiction and my mom struggles with some mental or emotional health disorders. Then I would tell you like, man, life handed you a mess.

And it's just, it might be a season, right? It may be that you're going to stay at home for a few years and see these, these young girls until they get older, right? That's not the case. Your mom's making some choices on a daily basis as to where she's going to work and how much money she's going to make and what she's going to ask of her 19-year-old son. And so you're making decisions for an adult, and that's not your job. Your job is, unfortunately, you've been cast in the role to make sure your 11-year-old little sisters have food and water, which is never your job,

but here we are, right? And so, man, you're a man of noble character. But I want you to hear what Rachel's saying. Five years from now, what would be better? For you to have started pool cleaning and also gone to get a couple of community college classes on the side, and five years from now you've got an associate's degree and now you've got four employees of your own

and you're making $200,000? Or you're still making $50,000. This guy had to lay you off because business got slow and now you're making $35,000 and you're in the same bedroom in the same house except you're 24 years old. Like if you think on a, on a longer time horizon, what's the best thing you can do for your family? It might be to go spread your wings and fly. I think so, too.

I think I just needed some, like, I didn't even feel like I was crazy or anything. No, you're not crazy. You're going to feel guilty. Because it sounds unkind, right? Yeah, it sounds unkind. You're going to feel guilty. Yeah, like it sounds like, oh, my gosh,

I'm abandoning my family. But what I want to relieve you of is that was never supposed to be your role and like john said if there was like a dire situation of something um that's another conversation but but yeah i mean like it's it's it's a it's a grown-up problem that your mom who has two daughters at home should be the one calling the show and saying i can't pay my bills. What can I do? And looking at her budget and all of that. And I think you can help guide that, Max,

but you can't even change the way she handles money either because you don't have that ability. We don't have the ability to change people. Here's where I think you can get some peace in this transaction, okay? Number one, you're going to feel guilty. Just know that's coming, okay? You may have heard me say this on the show. Choose guilt over resentment every time.

If you just stay there and wither, you're going to resent your mom and that's not fair to her so choose guilt the second thing is come up with a number and sit down and tell your mom for six months i'm going to send a thousand dollars home i'm going to send 750 dollars home and make sure that everybody's clear on when this money is coming and give her a ramp. You'll sleep a little better at night, I think, and it's going to be not just a cutoff, but it will be a peaceful departure. I'm sorry, my brother. Let us know if we can help. Thank you. This is the Ramsey Show, 888-825-5225. Our question of the day is brought to you by Neighborly, your hub for home services. Nothing can ruin your Valentine's Day faster than a plumbing emergency.

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the door and he goes, I got you. You called neighborly, didn't you? And we're yes thank you he saves the day go to neighborly.com slash ramsay to find a locally owned mr rooter plumbing if and when it goes sideways today's question comes from ella in minnesota Ella, Ella, Ella, umbrella, what's up? My boyfriend of 12 years listens to you all the time. We have three daughters together, but he doesn't want to get married as he doesn't want us to pay for a wedding or risk paying alimony if we ever split up. He thinks this is in line with the baby steps theory.

What do you think? I don't think we've ever said that. This is the greatest question ever. I like that she blames it on the baby steps. And that the baby steps are just a theory that he thinks that oh i think dave just um his head exploded in the other country where he is right now i think he just like he was like i got a bad headache because somebody called the baby steps a theory i love it um uh Ella you need to we all are basically married

you're playing married 12 years together kids together your boyfriend is a child and you all need to have a hard conversation because this ends unfortunately this ends in a pretty gnarly way he is married to you

he lives with you you all have three kids. Y'all have created humans together. And he's holding onto this. Nah, nah, dude. Nah,

we're just dating. Just dating dude. Cause I don't want to pay for it. By the way, he would pay alimony. There's a thing called common law marriage. And I don't know what the rules are in Minnesota, but he's going to pay.

You can't just have three kids and be like, nah, bro, I'm out. Nah, dude. Nah, I found somebody else at the bowling alley or this dude hangs out um so yeah i i don't think this has anything to do with the baby steps

i think this has to do with um a man who is playing some kind of weird vocabulary gymnastics in his mind and pretending he's not married but he really is yep yeah it just it feels like a level of immaturity to me because i'm like okay pay, pay for a wedding. You don't really even have to do a wedding. Let's just be honest. Go to the JP and get done with it. It's more the alimony or whatever it is, but to John's point, yeah. You're going to pay.

Common law marriage, yeah. No, in the baby steps, we would tell you, like, get married for multiple reasons, but get married. And so there's not a particular marriage baby step in the baby steps theory, but yeah, we would recommend that you get married before you start having kids and buy a house together.

Because as, as this man did wisely point out, it makes things real complicated financially if you don't have a plan. And there's not, there's not business protections on the back end. Yep. That's right. Oh boy.

Ella umbrella. And there's not business protections on the back end. Yep, that's right. Oh, boy. There you go, Ella. Ella Umbrella. You need to sit down and say we're getting married or else. Let's go out to Detroit Rock City and talk to Andrew. What's up, Andrew? How we doing? Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my call today.

You got it, man. Thanks for calling. What's up? So, I guess long story short, my wife was diagnosed with cancer back in July. Oh man. Because of that happening, I started going through mental health stuff on my own. Basically had kind of what is a manic episode and maxed out all my credit cards, not really caring what happened. And now I am stuck with regret and $15,000 in credit card debt.

What kind of cancer, man? Uh, it was ovarian cancer. So due to that, we're not able to have natural kids anymore. So we're looking at adoption and me being $15,000 in debt doesn't help with paying for adoption. Yeah, but let's do this all in order. As a family, y'all got hit in the mouth, right? Yep. How old are you guys?

We're both 25. I'm about to be 26. And did you go in for, hey, we want to start a family and y'all had a big exciting time and y'all planned it out and then you started trying to have a family and then she went to the OBGYN and found this out?

Is that how that happened? Exactly, that's exactly how it happened. Okay, so you have to stop right there for a minute and just grieve this everything in your life is different now the debt we'll get to the debt but we have to own this part now did she um did she have surgery and she's clear uh yeah so we just found out a couple weeks ago the PET scan came back good yes yes so now she's just got to keep up with scans yep excellent excellent excellent thankful for that and so um you may have had what someone would PET scan came back good. Yes. So now she's just got to keep up with scans. Excellent. Excellent.

I'm thankful for that. So you may have had what some would classify as a manic episode or however you want to diagnose it. Here's what I want to give you. I want to give you another picture to that. Okay? What if your body is just working perfectly? What if it just went into hyperdrive for a minute

and you did some dumb things and now the smoke is clearing and we're back yep right yeah so let's don't carry regret moving forward let's just pay this stupid 15k off and move on you see what i'm saying like and I'm minimizing it on purpose you did something dumb yeah you did okay cool let's solve this problem and move on this problem doesn't define you that moment of cancer doesn't define your wife or your family

y'all had these dreams of biological kids it's not going to happen so cool we're going to go down the adoption route see what I'm saying like we're just going to look at the next thing in front of us I'm not going to carry old cinder blocks with me I'm just not going to do it man life's too heavy moving forward to carry old crap with us yep how does that sound does that sound cheesy and lame are you are you hearing what i'm saying no i'm good i'm getting it i'm hearing what you're saying that's awesome yeah

because there's a level of um what john's saying that yeah what what you've done in the past it doesn't have to define you andrew and the thing thing is, in one instance, I'm like, you know, there is light because it's not like, oh gosh, I've struggled with overspending for the last three years. And now I've realized I have to face it. It came at a point of crisis and a point of pain. And that's how you chose to cope and to keep yourself alive in that situation. Right. I mean, like your body said, no, no, no. And you're like, all right, yeah, I did it this, numb, numb, numb. And you're like, all right, I'll do that. Yeah, he just did it this way, right? So here we go.

Yeah, and was it the best thing ever? No, but you may not have had the tools to do otherwise. So this is where we're at. And so I think kind of just setting all that down and saying, okay, how do we move forward now? How much do you guys make Andrew a year? Well, she wasn't working throughout the whole thing. So I was bringing in about $45,000 a year. Okay.

She's getting ready to go back to work and she brings in around $60,000. Okay, great. What do you do for a living? I'm a mechanic. Okay, awesome. And what other debt do you guys have? We own a house. I think that's like $160,000.

Okay. And then she's got some student loans from nursing school. How much are those? I want to say around $90,000. Okay. I'm not positive, though. Okay. Yeah, well, I want you guys to get on the same page on how much you guys owe total.

And was there anything with the credit cards that you bought that you're like, hey, I could just turn around and sell a bunch of this stuff? Or return it? Yeah, we kind of went down this route. I've already basically sold everything that I could. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I think when I... I began paying some of them off, but...

Okay. So, yeah. And how many cards total? Was it three, four? I think it was like, I think it was four or five. Four or five, okay five okay to the point like all the payments are just like piling up yep yep okay so what i would do andrew's i would split all of those up into four to five payments like whatever each card is look at that and and and

line them up smallest to largest and then throw her student loan debt in there too and this is your family's snowball that snowball this is what we're going to pay off and have it all together. And then you guys sit down together and, you know, and Andrew, I think that there is something, I don't know if this is healthy or unhealthy, so John can correct me. But if I'm your wife and, you know, and just walk through all of that, you're grieving the fact that you're not going to be a mom. Now there's a little bit of that financial burden that's there of the 15,000 extra in debt.

If I were in her shoes and you came to the table with a plan and said, okay, here's a sample budget. We're going to do this together. But like, I just ran some quick numbers. We could save this per month. We could be out of debt next amount. And I'm going to work extra. I'm going to put in an extra three nights, two nights, Saturday per month. I'm going to put in an extra three nights, two nights, Saturday per month. That's going to bring in this much more so we can get out of debt this much faster. Like there's something about the proactiveness, Andrew, in you to run some numbers,

look at it and come to her with a plan, not a finished plan, but this is what we're going to do. You're not going to tell her this is what we're going to do, but you're going to say, here's an idea of kind of where we're at. I want your feedback.

But seeing the proactiveness from you, I think she will give her a level of safety that you want out as bad as you're saying with a plan. Hang on the line. We're going to send you every dollar app for a year on us, the premium version. And we're going to hook you up with FPU. This is the Ramsey Show. Welcome back. 888-825-5225. It's 888-825-5225.

Let's go out to Fresno, California and talk to Jason. Hey, Jason, what's up, man? Hey, I'm just basically just looking to see if you guys think that I'm in a position to be able to buy a new car or a new to me car. I know that's not usually a good thing to be doing, but I just feel like I'm kind of in a position in my life where I can do that. And I'm wondering if you guys think so, too, or I guess, you know, how much is enough when you're wealth building at some point? Do you go get something that you enjoy? Because, you know, life's short. I just. just yeah yeah that's no i think it's great and we love cars

around here i feel like people think we just like hate cars and tell people sell cars all the time which we do because usually people can't afford them but we have a good car so we're not mad at cars so what's your what's your situation do you have any debt i I do. I have about $140,000 worth of debt on a rental property. But it does cash flow, but it is cash flow positive every month. And the interest rate is so low on it that I bought it luckily in 2020 when interest rates were super low. And I just feel like I've had some advisors in my life that have said this. Oh, I'm sure. Sorry. Yeah. Go ahead. Totally. How much do you make a year? Right around 400 grand a year. Nice, Jason.

What do you do? So this is going to be a weird one, but I actually race cars for a living. And that's another question that I had because it's such a high risk occupation. If it's not a good idea because of that as well, because at any moment I could get hurt or something crazy could happen with that um yeah i mean i i know there's like a netflix documentary about like formula one racing i don't

know much about racing um okay so can i just like ask i'm just curious is it like sponsorship deals that you get are you are you do you win races and there's cash prizes? How are you making $400 doing this? Correct. Yeah, your second guess there is exactly how it works. Okay. Okay. Very cool.

That's awesome. How old are you? I'm 27. 27. Okay. That's great, Jason. Do you have a primary residence that's paid off? I do, yeah.

I do. Yeah. So you have no other debt that's paid off? I do, yeah. I do. Yeah. So you have no other debt other than this one rental property? Yeah, I have another rental property that's paid off as well. Okay. Good for you. Yeah, I mean, I would make it a goal to pay this rental off as soon as possible. I mean, I think having just paid off properties, you know, to your name is amazing.

So I would work to, to pay this off. I mean, I'm okay if you keep it just because of your income is so great. So what kind of car are you looking at or what price range? I want to get a, uh, the price range is probably like right around 50 grand. Um, which I've got the money saved up. Like wouldn't necessarily have to finance or anything like that. I do yearly contribute to a 401k and that's gotten built up fairly decent now. So I feel like I'm in a good place, but I'm always so nervous

because I feel like my income could fluctuate depending on circumstances of, like I said before. And on top of that like I said before. And on top of that, it's like I just never know, like, when's enough enough. I drive a, you know, basically the car I bought after I graduated from high school. It was a rental car. I bought it for $15,000, and I paid cash for that. But I just— Dude, you're awesome, Jason.

Yeah. How much money do you have just saved? Maybe just in a high-yield savings or something. Yeah just saved? Maybe just in a high-yield savings or something? Yeah, so I did it in a high-yield savings, and that's part of the reason why I'm debating on doing this or not because I don't want to take it out of there necessarily. But like I said, life's short. I've seen friends of mine crash in accidents and not be here anymore.

So it's like, but I've probably got about 100 and right around 185 grand saved up i think you can buy this car jason our here's our rule of thumb our rule of thumb is if you have a net worth of a million dollars and you're you're about well and that's a brand new car is this a brand new car the 50 000 i mean so if i if i bought brand new, it'd probably be about 50 or 60 grand. I could probably get a used one for 45K, 40K, but I want something that's newly used. Like, I wouldn't want, like, a demo vehicle or something like that. I'm just, I'm not interested. Like, if I buy this vehicle, it's not going to be one that I'm going to go get another one in two years.

Like, I'm going to keep it until the wheels fall off or at least until it's really old. So I just feel like if I want to, I want to go get something that I want, and so I'm going to go get it. Yeah, no, I hear you. Jason, go get a car. Go get a car. And pay your rental house off. Yeah.

Live on $200,000 and pay it off this year. Here's your greatest hedge against something coming. And by the way, you bring up a great point, brother, and I just want to hit this. You make $400,000 a year racing cars, and people are going to look at you and you think this, like, man, I'm in a job that anything can happen to any day and I'm out of a job. That's true. Yes. And there are people who go to $400,000 a year jobs at their hospital or at their law firm, and they think, I'm in a secure job.

They're not. And we know this because we talk to them all the time where the hospital lays them off or they have to go on furlough or the law firm downsizes or whatever's going on. And so I think there's this illusion, Jason, that everybody, there's some jobs that are super stable and some that are just are kind of fly by night. Everybody needs to look at their risk portfolio and say, Hey, am I just hanging out in the wind? And if you don't owe anybody any money and then you can't race anymore, awesome, dude, you'll have two paid-off rental houses plus your property plus a nice $50,000 car that you can drive for the next 10 years.

Bro, you're set up. You could go work at a grocery store for the rest of your life and you'd be all right. Yeah. You see what I'm saying? Yeah, that's true. I just always get nervous. I watch my parents grow up and struggle at times,

and I just never want to be, I want to, I'm only 27. I'm probably going to get engaged pretty soon, and I'm always in this constant battle in my head of, do I go spend money and go get a car, or do I keep building wealth to the point where I never have to worry about money and my kids are car or do I have do I keep building wealth to the point where I never have to worry about money and my kids are going to be okay forever and I'm just

yeah it's always a constant battle in my head yeah and what I would say to you Jason is you can do both of those things you can do both you don't have to pick one and I think understanding that giving needs to be a part of your plan too you need to be saving which you're really great at,

and you need to enjoy some of this, right? You're working hard for it and risking your life, literally driving this car. So those three things have to be part of your plan. I want you to be giving some. I want you to, the saving is there, and go and spend and enjoy. And I think that this is one of those things

that you have to build into your rhythm to know that you're going to be okay. You can spend some money and you're going to be okay. And the amount of savings with the rentals and yeah, and what you have in your income, your retirement, all of it. Yeah. Just so you know from where we're sitting,

the fact that you make 400 grand a year and you have a paid for house and you've come up with the number of about 50 000 that tells me that you're being super super wise because that's just a small percentage of your income and you got cash that you've been saving up and saving up and saving up and um most of the time on the show we have people who call in and they make 28.5 and they have a $50,000 truck, right? Yeah. And so that's not you.

You're a wise kid. The only thing I would tell you is I know you got a killer interest rate. It's amazing. And everybody around you is like, bro, you should invest the gap and then you can take home 7%. You're the one that goes to bed at night

knowing hey this could all go away tomorrow and i still have a house note over there yeah so just get rid of the house note yeah okay solve for peace you've been solving to survive for a long time because you watch how your parents live you've done that you've solved to survive now let's start solving for freedom let's solve for. I'm not going to owe nobody anything because I'm freaking Jason. I'm a race car driver. Right? You see, like it just sounds cooler, right? Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I appreciate that. I'm proud of you, brother. That's so good, man. That's awesome. Congratulations. Well done. Yeah, thank you very much. I appreciate the advice too.

And that was going to be my next question about the rental property. And yeah, it makes total sense. If I'm you, I pay that off today and I go buy a car this weekend yeah those are your two goals and then you can just drive around town in your new car looking around and wondering um how many other people who are 27 at the stoplight next to you have three paid for houses and i'm gonna tell you very very few of them very few of them. Very few of them, man. Wow. So great. It's amazing. It's impressive. I know. That is so, so impressive. Yeah. And even with the rental conversation, I always remember people, it's a part-time job. It's a great

investment when you get to that point of maybe step seven to diversify and have some other things you're investing in. Investing in real estate is a great one, but just do it with cash and do it slowly. But Jason's in a great position to be able to completely pay it off. That's another hour in the books right here on The Ramsey Show. Stay tuned. We'll be back soon. Thank you. We'll see you next time.