The Ramsey Show - App - How Much Should I Save for a House? (Hour 1)

Episode Date: September 4, 2020

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studio, this is The Dave Ramsey Show. It's where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life and your money. I'm Ken Coleman, joined by my fellow Ramsey personality, Anthony O'Neill. We will be sitting in with you this hour, taking your calls about your life and your money. So you want to talk your money situation. You want to talk your career, your job,

how they intersect so they can get that bigger shovel to be able to get out of debt faster. Anthony and I are here for you. You've got questions about the kiddos and maybe some of the stuff they're going through, Anthony is your guy. So we're going to have a lot of fun. Anthony O'Neill, always good to be with you, man. Man, it is. The Ken Coleman on the Dave Ramsey Show. Oh, yeah.

Well, you know, we just finished up the Ken Coleman Show, part of the Ramsey Network, and walked about 20 feet over, and it's always good to be in here in the Dave Ramsey studio. I will tell you, if you come to Nashville, we'd love to have you visit us. We've got a great group of people out there, fine-looking folks out there waving at us if you're watching on the YouTube show. There they are panning out there. We'd love to have you. We're open for business. We've got treats out there.

We've got the baked goods. We've got the hot beverages, the cold beverages. It's interesting. I only see bottles of water out there. I don't see any of the baked goods. Oh, there we got a coffee out there. So feel free to go over there during the commercial break, but stay put right now. You're not allowed to move right now while we're on the air live.

Let's talk about the cookies. The cookies are good. Melissa Wilson knows what she's doing. Yes. Between every break, I get me one. Oh, do you really? No, I'm just playing. I know.

I know that's not true. 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. All right, let's go to Houston, Texas, where Stephanie is on the line. Stephanie, how can we help? Hi, yeah. I'm wondering how do I fix my negative thoughts and build confidence in my career? I'm excellent at what I do, and I found my sweet spot, so why don't I believe myself?

Where does this fear of failure come from, and what can I do to overcome it? Wow. So congratulations on knowing what you do well and being in your sweet spot, which I define as the intersection of what you do best, your talent, what you love to do most, that's your passion, and then the results that matter most, your mission. So, Stephanie, this is all in your head. And so how you overcome this is by getting to the source of what's creating the lack of confidence. And really, that's a fancy way of saying you've got a lot of doubt. What's causing the doubt? Well, I've been self-employed

for a year and a half. So I feel like I'm sort of new to figuring out how to invoice and make proposals and growing myself as a business. And even though I know that I have good quality work, it's more just even email conversations and waiting for responses and overthinking how I've put an email together, just very simplistic things that have created self-doubt. Okay, great. Is there somebody that comes to mind when I ask you, who could you get with that you respect that has more experience than you in those areas? And ask them, hey, can you look at what I'm sending when I'm interacting with a customer on a billing issue or this? Can you just look at my interaction and critique it? Tell me,

is it good? Is it bad? Is it ugly? Where can it get better? Do you have somebody in mind that you could run those things by? I don't really have a mentor per se, but I have a few people in my family that own their own business. That's perfect. It's perfect. You don't need a mentor in this situation. You just need to get the doubt out of your head. And the only way you're going to get the doubt out of your head is stop overanalyzing and

actually take what you think is a concern and let's get it looked at and go, is this a concern or am I just worried about something that I don't need to worry about? And I'm going to try to help you speed this process up. In these areas that you've mentioned, is this because you've got doubt because you're not naturally good at that part of the business? Because you're the chief everything officer right now, so you're doing some things that you probably eventually would delegate. Is that true or false? True. Okay, and so is that where your doubts come in? I guess I have a few specific examples even to, like, one, for example,

I have had a client since January, and I'm working on an app for him, and he didn't hire me to do his logo. And so I automatically went to self-doubt thinking that I wasn't providing enough customer service or my designs were up to his standards when in fact he just did his own logo himself and enjoyed that process. But it was more that I just automatically self-doubted what I'd been working on for nine months. Yeah. So, okay. That's a really good example. And I'm not going to ask you to reveal too much, but I want you to go back further in your life. Is there, has something happened to you or is there a pattern of behavior

that led to you just naturally going to a place of insecurity in that moment? Well, my first job out of college, they basically told me i was replaceable except for my attitude so i think that that kind of when you're working so hard that kind of stuff really impacts you even if it's been eight years yeah uh you're just wounded you're wounded and you've allowed that to stay in your head so when they said that to you here's what you basically felt i am not worth much at all i'm just a good attitude i have nothing to give and i'm gonna tell you something that is wounding yeah that kind of stuff sticks i think the only thing she's really dealing with here is she's got to get over that rejection because that's a form of rejection and say that is not true about me i've got a successful

business you know i know you deal with young people all the time that something like that will just, it'll, it'll affect their entire trajectory because it was a real wound. I mean, absolutely. But one of the key things can, what I'm teaching to all people is to speak what you seek until you see what you spoke. And so you have to speak what you seek out. So if someone speaks something negative into you or put something inside of your mind, no, you got to throw that to the side. Now, Hey, before you throw it to the side, analyze it, you know, say, okay, is there anything here that I do need to intake to become better? That's good. But if not throw it to the side and then I have to speak positive about myself. I have to be my number one affirmer. Um, I have to go out there and do it and push myself and so i agree with you she just has to you know heal from this wound and start speaking what she's seeking boy

that is good now say that phrase one more time because i here's what i want i'm giving you people out there in the lobby watching on youtube uh listening to the radio show this is really good i want you to write it down or type it in your phone. Say it again. It's from my mentor. I want to make sure this is... Oh, you better give credit because I'm telling you, this is good. This is really good. This is not mine.

That's okay. You know, she teaches me all the time to speak what... To seek what you speak. No, I'm sorry. See, you got me tongue-twisted now. Well, I got to put the pressure on you. Speak what you seek until you see what you spoke. Because you got to... Here's what's great about that yeah they like it out there in

the lobby it's good it's good uh here's the thing this is about focus yeah i'm gonna give you all a little bit of science here because that that is wonderful that right there type it write it down if you're in a place of doubt you're a person who deals with a lot of doubt. Put that on your mirror, put that on your closet door, look at it every day. Because here's some science on this in 30 seconds. We know from scientific studies from neuroscience that the things that we focus on, we have any, any number of thoughts come in our head every day, but the ones we allow to stay in there and we focus on it, that's what we act on. It's what we see everywhere. So if I'm feeling doubt, I see people doubting me everywhere.

Here's the example. Last time you bought a car, and I know you all bought it used and cash, right? But you saw that car everywhere for three or four days. When you drove, you're like, oh, there's our car. There's our car. I see it over here. And you didn't see it the day before. Why? There was a powerful focus in the decision to buy a car

and you were excited about it or it was an important decision and you're focused. So you see it everywhere. So here's the deal. If you think you're the victim, you're going to feel like a victim and see that attack everywhere you go. You better work on what you focus on because that is what you act on.

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It's Christians helping other Christians, and it shared nearly $97,000 to help the Olcheskis. To be a part of Christian Healthcare Ministries, visit chministries.org. That's chministries.org. CHM is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Live Events. Welcome back, America. You're listening to The Dave Ramsey Show. Anthony O'Neill is my co-host this hour. I am Ken Coleman. We are Ramsey Personalities, part of the Ramsey Network. And we are thrilled you're here.

888-825-5225 is the phone number to jump in. It is your show, America. It's a free call. 888-825-5225. Let's go to Chicago, Illinois, where Joel joins us. Joel, how can we help? Hi, Ken. Hi, Anthony. Hey, good afternoon. Hey, all right. So I'm a babysit 3B. I've saved up my emergency fund of about $10,000,

which to me is about four to five months of expenses. And I'm trying to figure out, I'm not sure if I want to buy within Chicago at least in the next five years. Not because I can't save it, just because I'm not sure if I want to stay here. So I'm trying to figure out how should I tackle this question of how much to save for a down payment versus what I'm not putting into retirement if I can't afford it. So, yeah, I just want to get thoughts on that.

So let's dive deeper, Joe. Help me understand why are you thinking about moving from Chicago in the next three to five years, or is it just like a for sure thing? I'm moving in the next three to five years it's more i'm just not sure long term this is going to be for my careers i'm in supply chain okay and most of supply chain jobs there are some that are in the city i think if i like to live my life as much in the city as i can most of what i'm doing including the job i have right now is out in the suburbs and here with traffic it can be kind of a headache.

Yeah. So part of it is possibly living somewhere else and also just the fiscal situation in the state of Illinois long term. I don't know if I want to pay for that for 11 to 15 years when I buy a home as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's where I'm kind of looking at it. Good question. What's your household income right now, Joe? $55,000 a year. Okay? $55,000 a year.

Okay, $55,000 a year in Chicago. All right. So here's the thing, Joe. You don't have to buy something. There's nothing wrong with renting, especially if you're thinking about not being there long term. Now, here's the basics of what I teach. What I teach is buy if you think you're going to be there for at least three years. So you think you will be there for at least three years.

Don't buy if you are in debt, if you don't have a fully funded emergency fund, and especially if you think you're not going to be there for at least three years. So right now, the option is going to really be up to you but i want to put you at peace for this it is okay to rent until you know for sure you want to buy a home because i don't want you to go buy a home and you really don't want to buy a home you need to be excited about the home you need to make wise decisions about the home until then i would say continue renting but while you're renting you're saving because that could that season could shift. You know, you may feel like this today, but then next year you may be like, yo, again, I'm ready to actually buy a house. My career is looking good. I decide to stay here. I may buy a house out in the suburb.

So you want to make sure you do have some money set aside to where if you do change your mind, you are in a position to where you can. But let's just say you don't change your mind. You're still winning because now you have some money in a savings account that you can go towards something else. But the option is really up to you there, Joe. Yeah, I think there might be a little bit of overanalysis going on here. I heard that he loves the city, loves his work. His work may take him out, may not. He's thinking about schools down the road.

I just think there's too much over-analysis about the future, and I think you gave him great advice. Go ahead and do it. Pull the trigger. Make sure it's a good buy. That's going to be a good investment two to three years from now, and if life changes, you've got yourself a good, solid investment because you got a good down payment and you made a good buy.

So don't overthink it. 888-825-5225 is the number let's go to kelly who joins us in portland oregon kelly how can we help hey there hey dave thanks for taking my call sure it's ken and anthony how can we help hey so well um pretty just simple simple uh way to go about this is, um, or long story short, I should say is my boyfriend and I have been together for two and a half years and we want to get married, but, um, something has come up with his dad and threatening, basically kind of threatening him saying that if we get married, then he wants us to pay his Parent PLUS loan that he took out for a son. And I thought that, you know, I'm not me, and I wouldn't be responsible for that, correct,

if we did end up getting married. Is that correct? No. You personally. What is the Parent PLUS loan? How much money? What are the conditions of it? Well, he actually took out two loans for him and his sister.

Um, so altogether equals about like 70,000 altogether. Um, but he's saying that if he were to pass away, um, it would go on to his, you know, his wife. So, um, my boyfriend's mom, and then his mom would be left with the debt. And so he's kind of making him feel bad that if he does this, you know, and leaving the debt. No, I understand that part. My question is, I've not heard of this, Anthony.

Do you know what a parent plus, I mean, is the boyfriend's name on the loan? Well, I mean, it all depends. It could be in some, the majority of times it's not. In this case, is it? Yeah. No, his name's not on it. No. So legally, legally, you and your boyfriend are covered.

Now, morally, you have to have an honest conversation with your boyfriend and ask him, hey, did you and your father have a conversation saying that if I take out this loan, you will pay me back? Or was it your dad saying, hey, I'm going to take out the loan and this is going to be my portion going towards your education. So legally you are covered. So don't stress over that part. Now you got to go back to the moral perspective. What was the, what was the agreement, Kelly? Um, he just, he didn't, his dad never really actually had an agreement. He was actually at the the time, trying to be helpful.

What did he take the loan out for, college? It was at a four-year university. Yeah, okay. All right. And then my boyfriend also has federal student loans, and if we were to get married, I was afraid, would that go on to me, too, if something were to happen? I'm just thinking ahead.

All right, so here's the deal. Ayo, I've heard enough. I think you broke it down very well as far as this goes, but I don't like Dad's move here. I don't like Dad. How old are you, Kelly, and how old is your boyfriend? I'm 26. He's 33.

Oh, for heaven's sakes. Your boyfriend's a grown man, or at least he should be acting like one. He should tell his dad to back off. No, wait, wait, wait. No, you don't get to hold that over. You do not get to hold that over your 33-year-old son and say, if you marry this girl, then I'm changing all the terms. You don't get to do that.

I agree. This is a broken relationship, and this needs to get figured out. I agree. I'm just saying, before we say that say that we got to ask the question to both father and son to see what they agreed to verbally but i don't think kelly knows there was any agreement at all i do i think the son needs to pay the dad back yes but it doesn't allow dad to say you can't get married or i'm gonna ask for all of it up front sounds to me like it's a threat yeah that's that's foolishness is he saying that yeah yeah that's what he's saying man yeah no i'm with you cat give me some love right there what do you think i'm doing over here listen listen

here's what needs to happen you and your boyfriend need to sit down and go are we in this for the long haul i hope you are yeah and then you boyfriend needs to say, first of all, you need to not worry about this. This isn't between you. You just need to support your boyfriend. But the boyfriend needs to say to dad, listen, I don't appreciate this. If this is a threat, that's really bad. We need to get that figured out. And if you don't want to figure that out, I'm going to pay you back, and here's the plan.

I'm coming up with a plan, or here's a plan. I'm going to pay you back. But this, you've got to pay me back right away right away or all this garbage that's a bunch of nonsense and your your boyfriend needs to step up he's 33 he needs to be a man and he's paid dad back and kelly you you don't say nothing yeah you you you and your husband you and your boyfriend you all have a conversation and you let your father you let your boyfriend go to his father and if his father comes to you you keep your mouth shut you say you deal with that with your son i don't know i tell the father turn around yeah you need to stay out thanksgiving is not going to be fun anyway so we're starting out on a really really rough situation uh this is

this you know there's a book your boyfriend you need get this. Here's what you need to do. Buy the book Boundaries by Dr. Henry Cloud and give that to your boyfriend. You all read that together. The audience is shaking their head. Can I get an amen out there? They're saying, yeah, this is ugly stuff. But this is a good old-fashioned father-son sit-down and let's act like men and get this thing figured out.

Boy, that's ugly. All right. More of the Dave Ramsey Show coming right up. Don't move. The Dave Ramsey Show continues from our Ramsey headquarters in Nashville. Thrilled to have you with us. 888-825-5225. I'm Ken Coleman, joined by Anthony O'Neill, and we are taking you through this hour, and it's going to be fun. We're already having some fun.

We're having some real phone calls. Boy, we had some boundary issues on the last one. So, you know, we'll take all calls. It's life. It's money. It's your career. Whatever you need, we are here for you. 888-825-5225.

Let's talk about your money for a second. We're really, really excited about some of the things we're doing here at Ramsey Solutions. And, Anthony, if there is one thing, and we've learned a lot in 2020, but if there's one thing we've learned, it's that people need people. Yes. We as humans need community. And if you've been struggling with money, you're going to need cheerleaders in your life. And there's no better way to get that encouragement on your debt-free journey than by joining a virtual Financial Peace University class.

You'll learn the proven money plan, and you'll go through every lesson with people just like you. And it's all online and now financial peace university is a part of ramsey plus which means you get our number one money course plus the premium features of our budgeting app every dollar and our new baby steps tracker app and today you can start a free trial to everything that I just mentioned that is included in Ramsey Plus, including the class. So you don't have to do this alone. Get plugged into a virtual FPU class and get the support you need to join789. That's JOIN. Text that word to 33789.

888-825-5225 is the number to jump in on the conversation. Now we go to Madison, Wisconsin. Samantha joins us there. Samantha, how can we help? Hi, guys. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's going on?

So I'm just kind of stressing out. I guess i stress out over money a little too much um but i guess i could say i'm on baby step four right now um but i've kind of been skipping over and just like tackling my mortgage like i obsess over a little bit um so i've been throwing an x-100 a month on top of our normal payment. How much again? What's that? How much are you throwing extra on it? $1,500 a month. Okay, $1,500 a month.

So our regular payment is $1,300, and then basically anything I left over between my husband and I, I throw in about $1,500 after everything's said and done. Perfect. My issue is I'm only throwing in 6% to my retirement, and my husband is throwing in 11%. And I guess now I'm faced with a situation that we have baby number two coming in February, and my daycare is about to go up way up to about $22,000 a year. So I'm just trying to figure out if, so it's going to cut my extra payment down by over half.

Like it's going to go down to like $680 or something like that. And I'm trying to figure out if I'm doing the steps wrong now and if I just need to relax and focus on my 401k and just do what I can extra to my mortgage. Or if I should keep pounding on my mortgage, I just worry about it because we do want to get a bigger house. I would hope in the next five years because we have two kids now. How much is left on your mortgage? We have 130,000 left. We only have about 70,000 in it right now. Okay.

We've been there for like four years. Well, Anthony's going to give you advice here, but I'm going to answer your question. You are doing it wrong. There's a reason why Dave Ramsey has the baby steps that are in succession. And so you need to do them the way Dave tells you because you're in good shape. Yeah. Anthony? Okay.

Let's dive deeper here, Samantha, because I want to know why you said that you're making extra payments so you can eventually move into a bigger house. Did I hear you correctly? Yes. And so do you all want to pay this house off to rent it, or do you want to pay this house off to use all the equity to go buy another house? Which one is it? I just want to pay this house off to use all the equity to go buy another house? Which one is it? I just want to have a ton of equity. So I have like such, like basically I want to be able to buy a house and have less of a mortgage than what I have now with a nicer home. Okay.

Because I just hate that. Okay. Listen, I totally get it. We hate debt as well. So here's the thing. Baby steps for you guys who are listening right now, where Samantha is at is pretty much investing, investing 15% of all your income. So Samantha, right now, what's your household income? We're before taxes. We're at about a hundred thousand a year. Okay.

So you all need to be investing 15% of that. Okay. Okay. And so that's the very first thing. And then you have kids. Are you already investing into their college experience, like a 529 or anything like that? Not like that. No. Yeah. So you need to take care of these two things. The mortgage is an asset. All right. And so you're trying to make so much payments towards that. But honestly, you can sell that house and use that equity to go buy something. But you are missing out on your retirement. You are missing out on setting your kids up properly to go to school. I want you to take care of those two things. And if you got those two things going and you still want to aggressively go after your mortgage, that's perfectly fine.

But right now, your retirement is very important. Your house is going up in equity. OK, but you're losing out on money by not investing 15 percent. OK, and so what I really want to do is focus on right now is just slow down on the mortgage payoff right now. Going ahead and beef up your retirement, going ahead and open up a 529 because you sound like you're such a loving parent, a loving mother, and you want the best for your kids. You can show that to them

by going ahead and investing into the college. Samantha, do you feel like you and your husband are topped out on your earning abilities? No. Yeah, of course not. Samantha, you got over 50% equity in your house now. You don't have that much left. Do the baby steps the way that Dave tells you to do them because now you're looking at the holistic long-term. You're only looking at one piece of the long-term puzzle,

and it's because you're amazing. We're not getting on you. You've got drive. I love that you want to pay that house off, and you know what? You will, but you've got to do this the right way. You've got to take care of the daycare and you've got to take care of the long-term investing strategy. And then you've got to save for the kids' college. The house will be there. The house will come, but you're already doing really, really well on equity. So just relax a little bit and get this thing in order. Okay. You're doing great. You got this. Okay.

All right. All right. Good deal. I love it. You know, here's the thing that I think a lot of people need to hear, hear us say for clarity, baby steps one through three are done in that order. One, two, three, baby steps four through seven. You can do them simultaneously all at the one time, but you still want to go ahead and

make sure that you're fully funded into your retirement before you start aggressively. So let's say, for example, you are doing baby steps number four fully. You can be doing that while paying off your mortgage if you don't have kids. So it's like you can do all four of them at the same time, but you don't want to go after your mortgage and skip over your investments and skip over your retirement. So I love her heart, her passion. Oh, yeah. You know, she's like, I hate debt. Well, we hate that, too.

We want you to pay off and be weird and have that mortgage paid off. But at the same time, we love you so much that we want you to retire inspired. Well, there's a reason why you asked the question, you know, Samantha, to you and your husband, you feel like you're capped at your income growth? And the answer, you heard how quickly she answered? She's like, no. So that's the answer. You go back.

We get baby step four fully funded. You get that 15% of both you and your husband. We start working on saving for the kids. And then we go, all right. Man, can't pay the house off fast enough. Means I can't buy that bigger house that I want with that extra bedroom and the room over the garage and all the things. And I get that. There's nothing wrong with that desire.

Let that desire drive you. But you've got to have the discipline alongside of the desire. That's the issue. There you go. Because if you don't have the discipline alongside of the desire, the desire wins. And that's when we start to cut corners and we make bad decisions. And so the issue here is this couple needs to sit down together this weekend

and they need to say, you know what, how do we increase our income? How do we help each other grow professionally? And as we increase that income, now we take that increase of income and we throw that at the house. And now we're really cooking. You know? So you just got to have the full big picture, not just one part of the picture. Love it.

If you're looking at a picture frame, folks, of your future, don't get stuck in one corner. You got to look at the whole picture. That will help you focus on what you need to focus on. All right, Ken Coleman, Anthony O'Neill. We're having a blast here on the Dave Ramsey Show. Don't move. More coming right up. You're listening to The Dave Ramsey Show, where life is happening call after call. And we're talking about your money.

We're talking about your purpose, your career. We're talking about your purpose, your career. We're talking about your relationships. It's all intertwined, and we are honored that you are joining us. I'm Ken Coleman, joined by Anthony O'Neill this hour, and we are Ramsey Personalities, part of the Ramsey Network, and we are excited to be together today. Good friends. We sit about three feet apart here at the office.

I'll say about two feet. Is it about two feet? Yeah. Yeah. All right. That's good. And by the way, I would point out that Anthony O'Neill has always, when he walks in the office, always has a very nice scent to it.

You know what I'm saying? I mean, some people, their area may smell. You know, we all worked around the coworkers. We don't want to be around their cube. You've always got a nice, fresh scent going on. It feels a little weird, Ken. Does it? You shouldn't feel weird about that. You smell good. I like hearing

that from a woman, not from a man. That's good. I understand that. Don't take that the wrong way. Thank you, Ken. You know what? I got the nice scent. You always had the fresh shoes. What shoes you got on today? Today I'm rocking some New Balance.

See? You can't go wrong with those. All right. Good team. I smell good. You look good. Let's do this thing. All right.

Let's see if we can help people do good. 888-825-5225. 888-825-5225. Let's go to Philadelphia. Ray joins us there. Ray, how can we help? Hi. Hi, Ken and Anthony.

It's nice talking to you. Good to talk with you, sir. I have a bit of a career question. So earlier this year, I took the should I quit my job quiz, and the result was wrong role, wrong company. And it really wasn't a surprise to me. I've been pursuing other opportunities for a little over a year now and only really have had one, you know, one on-site interview to show for it. And I read your book, Ken, earlier this year. And so lately, you know, I've been trying to put that into action. I've been having a lot of informational meetings, you know, just a lot of phone calls.

But nothing's really turned up. I don't feel like I'm getting a lot of informational meetings, you know, just a lot of phone calls, but nothing's really turned up. I don't feel like I'm getting a lot of traction. And meanwhile, you know, for me, it's just, you know, each day just feels more and more like a grind at work. And I feel underpaid and underappreciated. And so I just, I guess my question is, is there ever really a point where you can just kind of just simply just walk away? So I can give you a little bit of background about me. I've got a bachelor's and a doctorate in engineering. I've been looking to go into the pharma industry, but with my graduate work, it kind of lends itself to maybe going into data science.

So I enjoyed that work as well when I was doing that in graduate school. My wife and I are looking to move closer to family, you know, in the Midwest. And then we're also, we got, you know, more than six months to save it up. And we're just entering baby steps four, five, and six. Wow. Good for you. Well, the answer is yes, it's okay to walk away, but it's how we walk away. That's always the issue. So first we look at financially. We don't want you to jump off of a cliff and you're not in that situation. You've got six months saved up, but that touching the emergency fund. The emergency fund is an emergency fund. So if you're going to walk away from the current job that you don't love, you're stuck in that job, and you're going to walk away and you don't have something, then that means you're going to have to have an additional amount of money. Because I don't want you touching the emergency fund.

So if you have an additional two to three months and call it a floating fund, all right? I just made that up right here. But that's the idea that I don't want you to step away because you're miserable and go, well, I've got six months emergency fund in the bank, and then you eat through three months of that, and then a real emergency hits, and that can really hurt you. So there's some discipline to this. But you don't have to just walk away. You could walk away into something.

I think you're really frustrated because you've been trying to get something for a year and you've only had one interview. And so you're going, I just need to cut clean. And you might have to, but you're going to have to plan for it. And so the move to the Midwest, to me, seems like it should coincide with the move away from the company you're in. Is that what you and your wife are thinking that maybe the best thing to do would be to make the move to be closer to family and then get a job there? Or are you looking to get a job here and then eventually we go to the Midwest? What's that timeline look like? I was going to say, we're hoping for in the next year or two, I would say. And I mean, I've been targeting companies back home, back closer to home.

So I've been, you know, and like I said, most of my informational meetings have been with companies back home. And they're just not going anywhere. They're not turning into interviews. Yeah. And so and a lot of it and even, you know, and I think, you know, and COVID, I think, is certainly at play here. I mean, I don't think that that's negligible. Well, the other question I have is, you said you have a bachelor's and doctorate in data science. Engineering. Engineering. Okay, but have you been going for engineering jobs?

Yeah, I've been looking for that. And then I've also been kind of, you know, expanding my skill set a little bit to make it so that I might be more qualified for data science. Okay, got it. Well, here's the deal. You read my book, The Proximity Principle. There's no secret to what I write. It's just good old-fashioned hustle. And for you to get an interview, you're going to have to have more than just a really great looking resume

because there's so many people. This is a competitive industry. And that's where I talk about the web of connections and the relationships part of this, where you've got to have somebody who's talking about Ray. Let me tell you about Ray. Ray's got this and Ray's got this. And this is how I know Ray. I really think you need to interview Ray.

And that might be two, three, four degrees of connections, and it might take some time, but the way you're doing it now, you've already played the interview lottery, right, or the resume lottery. You've just applied and you've applied and you've applied. And that just doesn't yield a lot of great results, certainly in a very competitive market right now. So I think my advice to you is if you're saying it's one to two years before we move back, I wouldn't be concentrating on companies in the Midwest.

I'd be concentrating on companies in the Philadelphia metro area. And getting in, even though you know you may leave in a year or so, because you get that experience, you get in, and you kind of get a little bit of momentum in your life. You get out of that yuck, stuck job, and then you move the other way. And that's where a lot of your relationships are right now. But I would also say this, double down, double down. You know way more people than you think you do, and you've got to beat this thing like a drum. This is what I'm qualified in. This is what I want to do. Identify some companies. And then everybody you know, you're asking, do you know somebody there? Do you know somebody that knows

somebody? And you just keep after it. You don't quit. Eventually it pops. Now, Ken, let me ask you a question. Uh, cause this is new space for me and you're the expert in this area. You, you said earlier that you teach people, if you're going to leave your job, have extra money on top of their emergency fund. But if they don't have to. If they don't have something to walk into. Right. So if they don't have something to walk into, they shouldn't just stay there until they do have something to walk into? I'm saying if they feel like they can't be there any longer, they get to a point where you get a lot of people that are just emotionally fried.

Yeah. And it's a very toxic situation. Gotcha. And I'm saying if they're willing to sacrifice and save that money up. Yeah. But, but you're getting to the point. Yeah. The reason I put that out there is, is it's a form of parenting. Yeah. You know, parents will say something, they'll go, well, you can do this if you do this. Right, right, right, right, right. And so what we do is we find out how how painful it really is there you go because then they're going to start looking for a job to walk into right it's not what i'm saying is the the the best step good but i don't want people leaving the job just because

they're unhappy come on without any money thank you because then they're going to get in real trouble now now they're going from i'm miserable at work to i'm desperate in life right well listen you can put up with miserable at work as long as you've got stability in other parts of your life and i'm saying put up with it as long as you have to either you save up some money to where you can just say i gotta get out of here and i'm willing to i'm gonna go full time job hunting well if you got the money set aside that's not emergency fund money, I'm fine with that. But I would much rather you just stay and get super motivated. Take that misery and turn it into motivation.

Because I was asking that question because I know a lot of young people heard that. Oh, he said as long as I have a little bit of extra money and I'm unhappy, I can leave. That's not what you're saying. No, because a lot of people think, oh, I've got an emergency fund, I can leave. No, you just started eating into the very thing that's there to protect you. There you go.

And you didn't have to do it. That's what I don't want. Love it. So that is the issue there. Hey, check out my man, Anthony O'Neill. You've got to check him out on YouTube. I wanted to mention that guy's doing some great stuff. Hey, thanks for being with me.

Ken, thank you for allowing me to do it. Hey, I want to thank our producer, James Childs, our associate producer, Kelly Daniel. And most of all, we want to thank you, America, for listening. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. This is James Childs, producer of The Dave Ramsey Show. On your smart speaker, you can add our skill by saying, Alexa, open the Ramsey Network skill. From there, you can listen to all our shows,

ask Dave money questions like, how do I invest my money, or what is the debt snowball? Find out more at daveramsey.com slash smart speaker.