The Ramsey Show - App - How to Negotiate a Settlement on Debts in Collections (Hour 3)

Episode Date: February 4, 2019

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, 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, America. Open phones at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Anthony starts off this hour in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hi, Anthony. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Mr. Ramsey. How you doing? Better than I deserve, sir. What's up in your world? I want to say God bless you for the work you do. It's been very helpful, as you know. Thank you, sir. How can I help? I'm looking for some guidance and some direction. Currently, I'm a teacher. I'm actually just achieved my national board certification for

teaching. I teach physical education, and I'm thinking I could help more people. I touched on helping, working with people a little bit on their finances very generically when I was doing some health coaching. I became a certified health coach, but I don't see that really taken off like I really thought. However, when I think back to the times where I did have clients and we did talk about some finances. I really enjoyed it, and currently right now with my own personal finances with my wife, I really enjoy it. I'm really motivated. So I was hoping I could get some direction from you about where in my current situation do you recommend I look, what I look into doing,

what's out there that I should be thinking about doing. That's not going to take a whole lot of time, and it's not going to take any debt. Are you a member of a local church? I am. Okay, cool. I mean, one thing you could do, just to kind of flesh this out, because you're a certified health coach and now you're a teacher just passing your boards, and I don't want 20 minutes after you start this to send you off in a full-time direction another direction.

It might be that you put your toe in the water a little bit. realized that academic training left something to be desired, not because it was a substandard school, but because it was mainstream secular thinking only, which leaves common sense out of the mix. And so I started searching into that and found a guy that was teaching at the time named Larry Burkett, who was in the Christian world the precursor to what I do. Larry has since passed away. And I actually was in my late 20s and went to a training that they had for doing coaching in your church.

And I started doing financial coaching as a ministry in my church. Financial counseling as a ministry in my church in my early 30s. And that evolved into doing coaching for pay, and then later on into a radio show and into this whole thing. But, you know, in other words, you could start this as a ministry and see if it continues to ring your bell. You have a kind of a drive-by from some of your experiences when you were doing the health coaching touching on the money but if you actually sat with people who were in foreclosure and helped them stop that or helped them get a budget together and touch their marriage as a ministry in your church you wouldn't get paid anything obviously but that would be a

good way to find out and not just be jumping horses every 20 minutes and keep your day job and then determine if you want to move into the financial arena in a full-time way along those lines. So what you could do is we're actually doing one of our Master Coach training webinars this coming Thursday night. And I can get you signed up for that, and they'll send you the four-part video series from Chris Hogan called Hope Now. And Chris and I teach that master training, and it's all online. And so you can take that and then go over to your local church and ask the pastor if you can do financial coaching there,

help them as a ministry do coaching for couples and individuals that are struggling financially. And that's a good way to get started in it. If you'll hold on, Kelly will pick up, and she'll get you signed up for the webinar. Also, I can get you in touch with the guys over at Master Coach Training, and they'll just help you personally in any way that they can and see if this is something you want to pursue. If you're listening out there and you want to pursue this, you can just text the word COACHING to 33789. COACHING to 33789. That will put you into the webinar this Thursday night.

Kelly is with us in Washington, D.C. Kelly is. Hi, Kelly. How are you? Hey, I'm great, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I have just lost my mind in the last year. I'm normally a very good saver and investor

and have done very well for myself. However, in the last year, I've accumulated about $45,000 in credit card debt. I don't have any car payments. My only other debt is properties that I own. Well, this is so uncharacteristic of you. What made you go crazy? Well, I had this dream to build a dog kennel, and I went nuts with the building, and it had a lot of cost overrun. Oh, okay. So you didn't just go shopping.

You actually tried something, and you tried a good thing the wrong way. Exactly. Okay. So my question is, I've always maxed out my – I'm a civil servant, just was recently furloughed and got my money back pay, and it went right back into my emergency fund. So I'm wondering, with this $45,000 debt that I've accumulated on my credit cards, I figured I could pay it off in about a year and a half.

How much do you make a year? I net $155,000 a year. Why would it take you a year and a half. How much do you make a year? I net $155,000 a year. Okay. Why would it take you a year and a half? Why couldn't you just do it in one year? Well, yeah, if I really buckle down. Well, $155,000 minus $45,000 leaves $110,000 to live on for one year. Well, with my real estate that I have and mortgage payments right now,

I have three houses that I have mortgages on and they're all empty uh no um one of them is being renovated and and the other one the other two i am two, I am in the, I had bought a property that I am renovating that house and will move there when the renovations are done. I see. Okay. And the other one that's being renovated is what? That one is going to be

sold. I got married and we had a his. Okay. When will that be sold? In hours. I expect the renovations will be done probably in about three months, and we'll put it on the market then. So your household income is $155,000 or your income? My income is $155,000. But you're married.

We have, right. And your household income is what? $260,000. Okay. You pay off your $45,000 in 20 minutes $260,000? And you can't figure out a way to pay off $45,000? I can, but my question is

Should I not contribute to my 401k? Yes, you should stop everything temporarily Temporarily and get this dadgum stupid mess you made cleaned up. And don't do that again. Absolutely. But you make enough money to do this. It's time for you to sit down and do a budget and say getting out of these mistakes I made is a priority. It's not a priority.

You're just kind of wandering around looking at it. You need to smack it. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Are high health care costs getting you down? Are you confused trying to navigate your options? Do you wish you could find an affordable, biblical solution to your health care costs? Based on New Testament principles, Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM, helps Christian families, churches, and ministries join together as the body of Christ to share their major health care costs.

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Tell a little bit about your story. Kelly will be in touch with you and will make you a part of the program later here in the week. Rachel's with us in Sioux Falls. Hi, Rachel, and welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you, Dave, for taking my call. Sure. What's up? Well, my husband was caught up in an online illicit affair with a woman overseas

who scammed him out of over $150,000 with the promise, of course, to pay it back. And this was over time from last July until recently when I discovered it all. And he has taken a number of loans out, pretty much $135,000 of loans, some of which are from some friends, but mostly through a bank, unsecured loans through banks, or rather online lending. And I'm, you know, double-edged here. Number one, the affair, but I'm here to talk about the financial devastation.

So the affair was emotional, online. He never physically visited her. Right. Of course, there was the promise she was coming, supposedly American, coming to the U.S. to come back home. Right, all of that. But I'm just saying the nature of the affair was that. Emotional, deeply rooted emotional affair. Yeah, and all kinds of other stuff that we don't even want to know about.

Okay. Right, and we've been married 33 years. Okay. All right, so you're seeing a marriage counselor. Yes. Both of you. Yes. And of you. Yes.

And your intention is to work through this. I believe so. This is more for the marriage counselor. Rebuilding trust is going to be massive. Yeah, really. It's a financial devastation because included with, in addition to those loans, Dave, he also emptied out the IRA we had and another investment we had, plus took $5,000 in cash out of our joint account over time. It's massive financial devastation.

I mean, there's $200 left in our savings account. It's massive financial devastation. I mean, there's 200 left in our savings account. That's it. And what is his income? His income is about $81,000. And what is your income? Not a whole lot, maybe $10,000 a year. I've been a full-time homemaker, homeschool, seven kids, adopted kids, homemade kids.

Are they all grown and gone? We have one special needs son who's not. He's in a residential right now, but other than that, it's an empty nest. He does draw... So you're 55, maybe? Pardon me? How old are you, 55? I'm 58, he's 68. Okay, all right. Well, I suspect you have a really good counselor.

I hope you do, because his behavior is so dark, and it has taken him to such a place of stupidity that the trust is more than a simple affair, emotional or physical, that's a one-off. It's more than simply him lying about some money things. This is an ongoing process that has taken to extremes on both of these fronts and so this is very very dark yeah um and so for you to rebuild trust is more than massive it's it's a big deal um and he's 68 years old wow okay um yeah you're gonna have to have you're going to have to have complete control of the finances and then gradually involve him after that. He has zero rights to any money if you stay.

Zero. He does not have access to it in any way. We're going to treat him like he's a cocaine addict and can't help himself. Because apparently that's about where his brain is. So if you call me up and said, my husband's been doing cocaine for three years and lost 200 grand and we're completely broke, this is the same thing I would tell you. Because that's what this sounds like. Because it's so deep, so dark, and so layered over such an extreme period of time now again i'm not a counselor in the financial world so i are in the marriage world or the behavior

world so i hope you have a good one and i hope he has a good one but that's what i'm observing because i've worked with people in so many bizarre behavior breakdowns over the years so i would treat this that way i would say uh you 100% control of all money and all assets. And after a year, we'll talk about letting him have a little bit of say in it. After two years, we'll talk about starting to put his name back on a couple of things. He will never again have solo access to anything. Yeah. He's lost that right.

I mean, because 10 years from now he'll be 78 and in 10 years from now you're still going to be ouching from this and to some degree emotionally and to some degree financially so um that's the road you've got to take um and actually if you guys emotionally and maritally can't stay together, that is your best bet for recovery financially. Because, otherwise, you're a lady trying to live off of alimony making $10,000. Yeah, well, I would have to get a full-time job, obviously. Yeah, you'd have to have a career again, and you'd have a nice alimony check out of that. And all of this debt would be his problem. So, actually, you might come out better financially that way. But I don't ever recommend people divorce that don't want to divorce. Because I believe in marriage, and I know you do.

And you're trying to fight to save this, and I want to fight with you to save it. So, yeah, the only way you stay in this is if he relinquishes all control. Now, let me ask you this. The bank or the online lenders he borrowed from, those have started coming due. He borrowed them in October and December and January, $35,000, $20,000, and $22,000. And they do auto drafts out of the account. Just shut down your checking account. Move your checking account. So this is one of the things I've been talking to him about.

I, you know, that is our money that this is getting a total of $2,200 a month. No, no, just stop it. Just stop it. Don't give them any money right now until you decide how you want to work with them. Them having full access to your checking account has got to stop because you can't control the situation. And if you don't pay them, eventually they will sue you, and if you don't pay them, eventually you'll work out a payment plan with them,

but it will never again include full access to your checking account. This is going to get adversarial. Yes. Because you simply don't have this kind of money. No. With his income. I mean if he made $180,000 we could talk about trying to plow through this in a year. But this is going to take two or three years to clean up

and the only way it's going to clean up is if they don't control the dialogue and they don't control the financials, the math on this. So I tell you what, Teresa, do this. Hold on. I'm going to have Kelly pick up. I'm going to put you with one of our financial coaches. Oh, it's not Teresa. It's Rachel. I'm sorry.

I'm going to put you with one of our financial coaches as my gift. No charge to you guys to walk you guys, walk with you guys. If your marriage stays together, we want to put you with one of our financial coaches as my gift. No charge to you guys. To walk you guys, walk with you guys. If your marriage stays together, we want to help you be part of that. And if it doesn't, we want to help you. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Did you know that if you combine the data breaches that have occurred in the past 12 months, almost every American has had their personal info compromised or hacked? Over 50% of our listeners and viewers tell us that they or someone in their family has been a victim. And 70% of those folks have had it happen more than once.

See, this is unbelievable. Once thieves get your info, the risk never goes away, and they can use it whenever and however they choose. It truly has become an issue of not if, but when. That's why the only plan I've ever recommended is through Zander Insurance. I actually sat down with them, and we put together a plan that I felt provided the best protection, but didn't waste dollars on things you could easily do yourself or were just gimmicks. The key is getting protected before you're a victim and it's too late. Go to zander.com

or call 800-356-4282. We are all at risk and it doesn't make sense to wait. Numbers don't lie. That's zander.com or 800-356-4282. Thanks for joining us, America. We're glad you're here. Teresa is in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hi, Teresa. Welcome to The Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. Pleasure talking to you. And it was great hearing you on the

Sunday special on the Ben Shapiro Show this weekend. I hope you guys do that again. Well, thank you. It was a joy to be with. Hopefully next time you guys will fix Congress when you get together. If we can do that in an hour on Sunday, we're geniuses. Yeah. How can I help today? Well, so we're a military family. My husband's active duty Air Force.

And we've been at this base, gosh, eight years now. And we finally have found out that we're moving sometime in the next two years. So it could be tomorrow, could be two years from now, but we're definitely moving. We're on maybe step three now. We're going to be wrapped up with that by around July and have a fully funded emergency fund. But we're trying to figure out what should we do now while we've still got time to save to prepare for the move and taking care of the house. And what should we consider in the sell versus rent versus buy at the current location and the future location, wherever that's going to be.

Right. Now, the current place you're staying, do you own or are you renting? We own it. Okay. All right. And you will not return to Raleigh at any point? Maybe. There's only so many dates that we can end up, and who knows? Yeah, but I mean it's a chance of that, but very slim.

Okay. Yeah. So, well, I would sell that when I leave, for sure. I would not keep a rental property. I would not keep a long-distance rental property. So sell that. And then as far as purchasing in the next location, you would want to figure out, try to estimate or guesstimate

how long they're going to leave you in that locale, and then try to figure out if the house is going to go up enough in value, and can you sell it when you get ready to leave. So if they put you in a vibrant market like Raleigh, that's a good market, then you can sell a property when you leave. If they put you in a market that is a small military community, and half the houses are on the market because they're constantly moving people out. You don't want to own in that market. Yeah.

You're better off to rent. If you're going to be there two years, you'll come out better financially, about tens of thousands of dollars to rent if you're not going to be there. But, you know, for instance, some of our friends in the Navy end up in San Diego. Well, that's a good market, obviously. It shoots up in value, and it's easy to sell a property there. So even if you're only going to be there two years, it probably is going to go up enough and be able to get rid of it to buy there.

So how long do you think you'll be in the next locale? Do you have any idea? Oh, they say it's probably going to be another six to eight years at the next place. Okay, then you're probably buying there. Okay, so you're selling this one, buying there. You've got some equity in this one, I'm sure. And then the other piece of it is just all the move costs that they don't cover or that they ask you to advance and then they refund you either one and so you need to save up in addition to your emergency fund a war chest to get ready to move

and uh and then when you the dust settles on the other end and you've bought and you've moved in you paid your expenses whatever you've got out of pocket that they don't cover um and sometimes as you know they don't cover enough and uh so you know, I'm just going to pile up cash right now to get ready for this, even if it takes two years. I mean, if you've got an extra $50,000 laying around, so what? You know, you can use that as extra down payment if you want to on the house when you sell this one and buy in the other market. But I'm just going to use this time to prepare. Winter is coming sometime in the next two years, and we need to have set aside food for the winter.

And that's all we're doing. So you're really not going to work baby steps until you get this move accomplished. And then you'll kick your baby steps back in. But you will have been through baby step three, so it's just a matter of you're not going to do any investing right now once you get past Baby Step 3 until you get this move done. That's what I would do if I were in your shoes. Hey, thank you for your service to the country. We appreciate you guys.

Open phones at 888-825-5225. Lynn is in Orlando, Florida. Hi, Lynn. How are you? Hi, I'm doing fine. Thank you, Dave, for taking my call. Sure. What's you? Hi, I'm doing fine. Thank you, Dave, for taking my call. Sure. What's up?

Okay. So I'm a single mom, and I just got started in October, did my every dollar budget, and finished my baby step one in January. So I'm excited to get things rolling. Good. I have a tax refund. I'm expecting a tax refund. And I did change my W-2, so I won't get one this year,

but I am going to get one from last year. And I'm expecting about $4,500 in return. Excellent. I have a total debt of about $95,000 outside of my mortgage. And $26,000 of that is credit card debt spread over about eight credit cards. And I remember reading about settling a debt and just being able to call the creditors and settle this out. And I calculated like at 15% if they purchased my debt at 15% because mostly all of these debts I haven't paid in a while. So they're kind of bad. Oh, they're all in collections, okay.

They're all in collections. So if they purchase my debt at 15%, it comes out to about $4,000 for the 26 total. So it is about the same amount that I'm getting in my refund. So I just wanted your advice on how to tackle that and calling these creditors up and settling the debt. So you have $26,000 in credit card debt that's bad, right?

Yes. Okay. And so if we settle that for 20 cents on the dollar, you can do that for about $5,000, and you've got $4,500. So you're pretty close. Yeah. That'll work. Right, right.

And so here's what I would do. I would just list them smallest to largest, and I would call them up and say, you know, my records show that I owe you X, and get some agreement on the phone as to what we're owed, okay? And originally I borrowed Y, okay? So let's just make one up. Let's say the smallest one's a thousand dollars and we're trying to settle these for a quarter on the dollar or 20 cents on the dollar and you call them up and they you know it's originally a thousand dollars but they've

added a bunch of fees to it now it's two thousand dollars and they say we want two thousand dollars say well i got a little bit of money and i'm gonna use it with the people. This is the phrase, okay? I'm going to use it to pay the people that give me the best deals. If you want some of this money, my offer for you is $250 or $200, okay, whatever it is. I can give you $250 as settlement in full on this. It's okay if you don't want to do that. I'll just move to the next one on my list, and honey, I got a long list. Okay. Okay.

Translation, you better take the money while it's sitting here because it's leaving. It's going to go to the next one. Okay. And if you want to do that, you need to let me know in the next 24 hours and i'll need here's what i'll need i'll need it in writing that you're accepting 250 250 dollars as settlement in full that's the phrase you need settlement in full or settled in full on this account no more money is due have to have that in the email form or written form of some kind and no you will not have electronic access to my checking account okay you do not allow them have like you're trying to access your checking account because you agree on 250 they'll reach

you and pull 500 out there's nothing you can do because you owe them more than 500 so it's technically not stealing right but they lie you can But they lie. You can tell they're lying if their mouth's moving. Okay, so you are getting ready to enter warfare. I hope you're ready emotionally. I know. Okay. This is going to be a battle royale. WWF, baby.

Should I start with the small one? Yeah. Okay, start with the small one and then the big one. And you can go ahead and call almost all of them. Okay. At 20 cents on the dollar, right? Right, I see. Everything but the big one.

And then the ones that take it do the deal. And then two months later, call them and do it again. I see. Got it. But just don't, you know, just you have to set this up to where that they are chasing you for this money, not rolling their eyes and going, we'll never do that. Well, you don't have to do it, but I don't have any more money than that right now. And that's what I can offer you. If you want to settle, it's done today.

If you don't, I'm moving on to the next one on my list. And, honey, this list is long, which is all true statements, isn't it? Those are all true statements. You're not. But do not allow electronic access to your checking account, whatever you do, and get it in writing, whatever you do. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Our scripture of the day, Acts 20 and 35. In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work, we must help the weak.

Remembering the words of the Lord Jesus himself said, It is more blessed to give than to receive. Maya Angelou said, When you learn, teach. When you get, give. Pretty simple stuff. If you're looking for a way to buy or sell a home, you're thinking about that, one of the biggest challenges can be finding a good real estate agent that's actually an expert

and not just somebody who got their license. And that's why we thoroughly vet agents all across the country who align with our values, our financial principles, and have the heart of a teacher. And they're always in the top 10% of agents in their area. Phyllis said this. She said, I felt I could trust the ELP program, and I have not been disappointed. Last year I sold my home in New Mexico, bought a home in Washington State, and in one year have done so much work to my current house that I say I have flipped the house.

I was able to make over a $100,000 profit and can buy a lovely home back in New Mexico and pay cash. What a fantastic feeling. If you need an agent that I endorse, a high-protein real estate agent, high-octane real estate agent, go to DaveRamsey.com slash agent or click ELP for real estate on the front page of DaveRamsey.com. Ryan is in Bakersfield, California. Hi, Ryan. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave.

How's it going? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, Dave. So since April of last year, I just want to say thank you for the things you've done. Since April of last year, I paid off 30 of the 50 grand that I owed, that we owed. And now I just got one more loan to go. Good for you.

Way to go. Thank you. My goal is to pay it off before Christmas. But throughout that time, I had a wife that was only about 40% on board. And today we just filed our taxes. And we're getting about, like, 2112. And I did what you recommend marriage people to do, lay it down on the table and look at it and say, what are we going to do with it? I obviously want to throw it all on the bed.

She wants to throw half of it on our emergency fund. And I know she low-key wants to fund more of our daughter's upcoming birthday party, which we've been saving and planning on the budget. But she really likes to, you know, you know how on the Instagrams they do the whole going all out thing? That's what she wants to do. And she feels that the money that we're saving for is not going to out thing. That's how she wants to do. And she feels that the money that we're saving for is not going to be enough. And I tell her, well, you know, we're paying off debt. And then that's when the discussion starts to happen. What do you recommend me to do, Dave? Just a side note, she refuses to go to marriage counseling and I don't see the point of dragging her through it.

What should I do, Dave? I really don't know how I can get my wife on board on this. Okay. Well, you're trying to fix what to do, and you haven't gotten together on the why we're doing it. And when your family is in debt and is not in a position to have a bright future, spending money on Instagram or the birthday party is immature and childish. And so obviously your wife does not have the same vision that you've got for your finances. And so it's not a matter of what to do with the refund.

What to do with the refund, not agreeing on that, is a symptom of the fact that you all don't agree on anything. And so, you know, you're going to have to sit down and you guys are going to have to try to find a way, some common ground, to look to the future and say we're sacrificing for the future and we're willing to do that together. We're on the same team. I have no good news for you.

I have no data points of people who drug a spouse kicking and screaming into wealth, kicking and screaming and bucking along the way like a wild horse against everything you're trying to do. There's no data points of anybody building wealth with a spouse that's doing that. I can't find anybody that does it. There may be somebody that did it. I just never met them. And no one in any of our research does that. And so basically because of your disagreement about your future, you are dooming your future.

And so you've got to get on the same page. It's not about a birthday party. It's not about a tax refund. Those are minor things. If you were on the same page and you were in complete agreement and you were going to work together to sacrifice to win and you wanted to cheat and steal some of the money and throw it at an Instagram birthday, that doesn't keep you from becoming wealthy.

But not being on the same page and constantly being at odds the way you all are right now does tell me you're not going to be able to build wealth doing that. And I showed her the vision that I want to build, how it all works out. I walked her through it and she just doesn't really believe it, Dave. Growing up with her parents, she saw how they struggle with money and they're broker than ever, you know.

They fight like cat and dog and bless their hearts, I love them. But she saw how they struggle financially and she even mentioned to me at one point that she just doesn't want to worry about it or think about the money. She just wants to have it. And how old is she? She's 21.

I'm 27. Okay. Well, part of it is that she's acting like a child. I just want someone to take care of me, and I don't want to have to deal with reality. That's what you just told me. Yeah. Okay. And so I think you put your arm around her and just say, baby, I just don't want us to be like your parents. I don't want us to be like Joe and Susie over there. I don't want us to be like Henry and Sally over there.

Look at them. They fight all the time and they're losing the battle. All they do is work and they have nothing. Right? And we're just not going to do that. You and me, we can do better than that. You and me, we can win. And I can show you, I mean, we can walk together and show you how to win here. So, yeah, I do think you need to go see a marriage counselor. I think you need to sit down with your pastor and start to get on the same page. And let's do this. Would she go to the Financial Peace University class if I gave it to you?

Can you get her to actually go to the class? I can talk her into it, and she'll probably watch the online classes. No, no, no, no. She needs to go to the class. I'm not sure. Online is not good enough for her. She needs to be in a class with other people who are doing this, and she sees other people doing this.

She did mention that our local church nearby said that they're hosting it, and she didn't. When she wasn't moaning about it, she actually kind of said it. I'm like, hey, check it out. Yeah. Well, I'll tell you what. I'll put you on hold. We'll have Kelly pick up. But only if you guys both agree to go to the class and attend every class. I do not want to give this to you and you go and this cause your divorce. I don't want to give this to you and her act like she's 12. I'm not going to put up with that. I'm too old for that. So if the two of you together can make a promise to Kelly that you will actually attend each of the nine lessons,

nine weeks in a row, one night each week for nine weeks, I will pay for it and send the two of you through. And that will also include all the onlines for the whole year. But you have to promise you're going to go to the class, and you have to keep your promise. Because if you can't do that, then I can help you grow up. I can help her grow up, and it sounds like it's time for her to grow up, and if she's 51 or she's 21, she's still acting like a child, and that's what you're dealing with here. This is, I'm throwing a temper fit because I want to have an Instagram birthday party for my kid, and I'm 21 years old. And that's exactly what's going on here.

So I'm not trying to be mean. I'm just telling you the truth. And to not tell you the truth would actually be mean. So if you guys both want to go to the class, I would love to have the two of you go to the class, and I will participate in you guys going to the next level in your life. You have the ability to change your family tree. You do not have to end up like her parents. None of us have to end up like our parents, unless you want to, because your parents are awesome.

You know what I mean? So whatever you want to do. But that's the thing. You get to make choices, people, and we'll help you with that. But you have to make Kelly that promise. So you hold on, and I'll have her pick up. That puts us out of the Dave Ramsey Show and the books. Our thanks to James Childs, our producer, and Kelly Daniels, our associate producer and phone screener.

I am Dave Ramsey, your host, and we'll be back. We'll be back before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus. Hey, guys, it's Blake Thompson, Senior Executive Producer for The Dave Ramsey Show. This hour's over, but you can find more great content on our YouTube channel. Catch the most-watched Davez, Deathly Screams, and the very popular Everyday Millionaire segment. Go to the Dave Rantz Show YouTube channel and

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