The Ramsey Show - App - I Got Burned by a Crypto Scam (Hour 1)

Episode Date: July 8, 2022

Free Livestream: Is the housing market going to crash? Register now: https://bit.ly/3n9bhyR Ken Coleman & George Kamel discuss: Rebuilding a business after a move, Picking up the pieces after a crypto scam, Bad TikTok investing advice, Renting a car without a credit card. Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3nInETX Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6

🎵 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, this is The Ramsey Show. It's where we talk about your life, specifically your money, work, and your relationships. I'm Ken Coleman, joined by my colleague George Camel. We're here for you this hour to take your calls. It is a free call. Somebody out there needs breakthrough today, and we're going to help you do it. We're going to have fun along the way. 888-825-5225 is the number.

888-825-5225. Great-looking crowd out in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions watching the show live here. Good to see you fine folks today as well. George, how are you doing? I'm doing great, Ken. I've got to say, I'm looking at the screen and you look real tan, which tells me you've been in the sun, haven't you? Yes, this is not a spray tan.

I wasn't going to assume. Well, you know, these people, the people that watch it live on YouTube have opinions. Well, we both just got back from a nice vacation. Not together, mind you. Yeah, thank you for stipulating. Fresh back from vacation and ready to serve you all. Fun in the sun. Swam with dolphins in Cabo, James.

I can't wait to tell you about that. It was a life-changing experience. You know what? Maybe we'll work it into the show. The dolphins swam with Ken Coleman. Thank you, George. There we go. Now, I was starstruck by Kalea, a sweet nine-year-old dolphin.

But I digress. We are not here to talk dolphins. We're here to talk about breakthroughs, getting you where you want to be. Let's get it started in Los Angeles, California. Dan, you are on The Ramsey Show. What's up? How are you guys doing? We're living the dream.

What's going on with you? Excellent. Good. So my situation is we have been talking about actually moving to Nashville for the past few years. The two biggest holdups are family, obviously, but then my business. So my wife just got a permanent work-from-home job, which is huge because we'd have an income. But my business has taken off in the past few years. So my wife just got a permanent work-from-home job, which is huge because we'd have an income. But my business has taken off in the past few years, and I'm willing to start it over there.

And I know I can. It sounds incredibly daunting, but we're also willing to do whatever. We have a three-year-old daughter, and we're just kind of done here for a multitude of reasons. I'm sure you've heard it a thousand times. But we're just not really sure how to do it because, so do we sell our house? We'll have a decent amount of equity to buy a new house. Do we buy a house immediately? Do we rent, which I really don't want to do. I feel like it's just throwing away money.

But at the same time, it does sound prudent, only because then we can find the exact house we want. Sure. Okay, I'll tell you what. George and I are going to walk you through what you need to do, but let's get a couple pieces of information. With your wife's job, will you all be able to, forget renting or moving for the moment

but will you be able to live off of her income for a month two three months four months or are you guys going to be really really tight until you get your business or some income up and going what's what's the situation no i've saved i'm a saver so i've saved a decent little chunk of change plus like i said we'll have quite a bit of equity in our house. So on top of that. Which I don't want to use. I don't want to use that to live on at all. I want to put that all towards a house and get my mortgage as low as possible.

If I could get without a mortgage, I'd be ecstatic, but I don't think that's going to happen in this environment. So income isn't the issue. And so now, if I were you, and I'll let George address the whole rent is throwing money away myth, but if I were you and we knew Nashville was the place, all right, I would be making several trips here. You got cash to do it. Have you done it? Have you found housing? Do you want to go, we could, with the sale of our house in California, make a really strong down payment the way we teach ramsey solutions 20 can you do a 15 year you know uh have you figured that

out or are you going to have to rent for a while just to be able to get in that position no so we visited last september um i actually just talked my wife can't really leave right now because her job's somewhat new but i talked about going out again in the next few months. We scouted a little bit while we were there. We loved Franklin, but that's really the only place we went, so we wanted to branch out a little bit more. But the down payment is no problem. I'm definitely looking within our budget. We could put at least half down. I'd like to put even more down on a house. Then what are you afraid of? Because I'm hearing all positive things here. So what are you afraid of? Starting my business over is the biggest thing.

What kind of business is it? I'm a full suite real estate marketing. I do photography, videography, floor plans, virtual tours, all that. So I'm an architectural and real estate photographer. How long did it take you to get that business up and running in California when you started it? Quite a bit. So I got up to about 60 grand a few years ago, and now I'm at 200. I've made 200 for the past two years. So how long did it take you to go from zero to 200,000? 10 years.

Okay. How long did it take you to go from zero to 200,000? Ten years. Okay. How long did it take you to go from zero to 60? About five years. Okay. And now that you know what you know, how much faster could you do it now that you've done it before? That's the thing. And I know that. And I'm not a bragger at all, but I'm good at what I do.

And I know that I have that confidence. Good. You'll get here. You'll make connections. You'll build a client list. You'll get connected with some great real estate agents. Nashville's a hot market. I have no concerns that a guy like you is going to get this business up and running soon, especially with the financial position that you're in. How much capital do you need to start this business over again? We come to Nashville. Not much at all. I have my whole system in place. It would really just be marketing in Nashville. That's really the only expense. So here's what

I'm hearing. I'm just going to tell you what I'm hearing. I'm hearing that you have a lot of equity in your home. Your wife's got a really good remote work job. You've started a real estate business, kind of an ancillary type service business, and you've built it to a very nice income once before. You're coming to one of the hottest real estate markets in the country, in Nashville. You've got money saved for the little bit of capital you need to start it. And we know you can live off of your wife's income for several months, and you could get another day job while you were out hustling and building relationships. George, that's what I hear. Dan, do you hear that?

Do you hear anything silly or risky or crazy, scary in that narrative that I just repeated back to you? No. From what you said, I don't. All I did was repeat back to you what you told us. Yeah. You just got Ken Coleman. Boom. Is that a thing? And it is now. So Dan, I would come here, I would rent at least six months, if not a year, to figure out where you want to live, stack up more cash, you'll be able to put down a giant down payment and pay that mortgage off very quickly. And we live in this county that we're in, Williamson County, which is where Franklin

is, you mentioned, the 11th wealthiest county in the nation, which means people want to sell their homes for top dollar and they want a great guy to market it for them, get the high-end video, all that. So I think you're going to do great here. And Dan, Stacey and I, when we moved here eight years ago to join Ramsey Solutions, we rented for two years with three kids. We did not throw any money away. And I want you to change that narrative to

I'm throwing money away to I'm giving myself options. Buying yourself some patience. Buy yourself some time. Get settled. Where do we want the kids to go to school? What's the best place for us given our work-from-home situation? What's the market look like?

Renting is not throwing money away. Renting is giving you options, giving you time to make the best decision. Dan, you're a good dude. You've done it the right way. You're an entrepreneur, small business person. You are the American dream. Way to go, pal. Thanks for the call.

Don't go anywhere. More of those kind of calls coming up. This is The Ramsey Show. I just saw a study that really made me sad. It showed that families owning life insurance in the U.S. was at its lowest point since the 1970s. After what we've been through the past few years, I'm just lost on how people don't make this more of a priority. How are you going to make sure your family needs are met if something happens to you? This is why getting term life is an absolute necessity. Rates have never been cheaper and the whole process to apply is pretty simple with many companies not even requiring an exam anymore.

This is why I send you to Zander Insurance and I have for almost 25 years. They'll make sure you get the right protection at the lowest cost possible and they're there for you and your family every day. I challenge all of you to make sure your families are protected. It needs to be a top priority. Call Zander at 800-356-4282 or visit Zander.com. That's 800-356-4282 or Zander.com. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman. George Campbell is with me this hour.

We're here for you. You've got a money question, a work question, a relationship question, a life question, a fun suggestion. We'll take it all. You've got to get through the screener, though. That's all on you. Once you get through, we're here for you. 888-825-5225. So, George, a lot of people are starting to freak out about the rising interest rates, real estate.

Are we in a bubble? Has it popped? What's going to happen? Oh, my gosh, the sky is falling. And, of course, there's a headline for everyone. Oh, yeah. No matter what your opinion or your fear is around real estate, you can find yourself a headline. Nobody wants to click on the headline that says, hey, everything's going to be fine.

Right. Well, we've got that headline. That's right. Very nice, George. Thank you. Very nice. You gave me a good George. Thank you. Very nice. You gave me a good segue. I'm here for that.

Because next week, you, Dave Ramsey, Rachel Cruz, hosting a live stream event called Real Estate Reality Check, where we're going to tell you, what, George? That everything's okay. Everything is going to be okay. And it's free. So you don't even have to pay for the pleasure of hearing us say, everything's going to be okay. And we're going to do it with facts, with analysis, with humor, with stories.

It's going to be a good time. So bottom line, you're going to find out why the real estate market is not going to crash, why it's still a good time to buy or sell. So don't miss this event. It's a live stream event called Real Estate Reality Check next Thursday, July 14th. Less than a week away. Yeah, register for free right now and get the answers you need to make a confident decision. RamseySolutions.com slash Reality Check.

That is the site to sign up. RamseySolutions.com slash Reality Check. Are you going to get the guitar out and sing everything? We have not discussed that. But it might be a really beautiful... Because that's in your range. A kumbaya and... Give us a little bar. Everything is going to be all right. We have not discussed that, but it might be a really beautiful- Because that's in your range. A kumbaya ending. Give us a little bar.

Everything is going to be all right. A little reggae. James is looking at me like, if you dare sing a lick, this thing is going down. George sings very well. Give me a little everything is going to be all right. You know what? I'm going to say you have to sign up for the event to find out. George, I'm really disappointed that you didn't take that moment to show people-

I got nervous. That you're a very gifted singer. He is. They can listen to my music on Spotify, Ken. They don't need't need to hear it all right i wasn't setting you up to pitch your music i just wanted to have a fun moment but you did it anyways and we thank you ah see now that's what's going to get get you in trouble all right matthew is on the line in san diego california he's a new listener i'm told matthew you're on the ramsey Show. Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my phone call. Yeah, you bet. How can we help, sir?

Yeah, so I'm new. Basically, I went on the Internet and Googled financial coaches, and the Ramsey Show popped up. Nice. Yeah, yeah. We like the Google. We like showing up on the Google, don't we, George? It's hard to do, and we did it. And I'm glad we—

Well, now you are here, Matthewew why were you looking for that well so um i was listening to a podcast and you guys did a couple segments and i really really loved it um and i kept listening to it and then one little five segment popped up about uh crypto fraud and um unfortunately in the past couple of weeks, I am a victim of crypto fraud. Oh, man. Sorry to hear that. Yeah, I got scammed all in all about $35,000. Oh, my goodness. Is that money you had?

No, it's a loan that I took out. Oh, boy. Gosh. Yeah, and I thought it was legit because I originally invested $500, and that grew, and I was able to extract that into my bank account. And so that's when I thought it was real. So they had big promises about returns on your investment, and they proved it with a little investment to then get you baited into more. Is that what happened? Exactly.

Exactly. That's exactly what happened. Oh, boy. So now you're in a $35,000 hole on this. Do you have any other debt? Yeah. So we took out a personal loan at the beginning of the year of $25,000 to consolidate my wife and I loans. We're recently married. We got married last year. We were supposed to get married in 2020, but COVID, and then we had to push it back a couple of years because we wanted more than five people to be there. So we pushed it back and then we got married, consolidated all

of our loans, and now we are expecting a kid next month, our first baby next month. Oh, that's excellent. Thank you. So, yeah, so we got a $25,000 personal loan that we took out, and then we have both of our student loans, and then we have her car loan. All right. So there's a lot going on. I'm assuming that you called for us to help you come up with a plan to dig out of this, correct?

Exactly, yeah. So I was looking through your website, and there's a lot of information on there, a lot of books. And I was just wondering what would be the first step for somebody like me to start in this program? Love it. Well, the first step is to not go into any more debt. We've got to stop the bleeding and make sure that we've got our four walls covered. So that's your food, utilities, housing, transportation. Do you have all those bills covered?

You can make ends meet? Yes. Okay. The next thing we want to do is get on a tight budget. We've got a free app called EveryDollar that you can download and list out your income minus your expenses. We want that to equal zero,

meaning you've assigned every single dollar a job. What is your income? Household? My income, I'm salaried at $100,000, and then my wife is hourly. She brings home maybe about $50,000, so we're about $150,000. Okay, great. And what's the total amount of consumer debt you guys have? Probably a little over $100,000. Okay. So what we're going to do is lay them out smallest to largest, and I don't want you doing any more consolidation loans because that's not fixing any problems here. We're just moving around the debt and feeling like we did something.

Okay. And so I want you to separate all the debts, put them in a spreadsheet, whatever you need to do, list them out on paper, smallest to largest, and ignore the interest rate. Don't even write the interest rate down. And I want you to make minimum payments on all of those debts except for the smallest one. What is your smallest debt? Smallest debt would probably be the $5,000 loan. Is that the car? No, that is one of the loans that I took out to invest to give to the scammers because they wanted $5,000 to open up a channel directly to me. Oh, boy. Okay. Well, and who's that loan through? It's through my bank. I don't know if I can say that. I'm trying to figure this out.

The bank gave you a loan? What did you say the loan was for? It was for a personal loan. Oh, okay. And then they go, whatever you do with that money is your business. Exactly. All right. So we're going to knock out that $5,000 debt as fast as we can.

How quickly could you do that? Do you guys have any money in savings? Yes, yes, we do. We have a stock account that has a pretty guys have any money in savings? Yes, yes, we do. We have a stock account that has a pretty good amount of money in there. Okay, let's go ahead and cash that out. Now, you've got to look at the tax implications, talk with your tax advisor, but we're going to just get out of any non-retirement accounts to scratch up as much cash as we can to attack this debt. How much do you have in stock? Right now we got a little over $10,000.

Okay. So yeah, I would cash that out. The tax burden won't be big on that and you'll knock out that first debt today. Okay. And once you feel that progress, we're going to keep going down the list until we knock out all of the debts using that debt snowball method that I just walked you through. And if that means cashing out till you just have $1,000 in savings for a while, I'm okay with that. Because right now, your hair should be on fire at this debt. And so that might mean getting a side job to bring your income up to $150 so that you're not trying to plow through this for the next few years. Yeah, I work in agriculture, so I got plenty of work. I picked up a second job, so I'm scraping.

It's minimum wage, but I'm just doing as much as I can to bring in as much as possible. Well, we want to gift you something. You were asking about resources. I'm going to gift you Financial Peace University, and I want you to sit down with your wife, watch all nine video lessons, and with that, it'll come with every dollar, our premium version to connect to your bank and start your budget. And that's all included in Ramsey Plus. So hang on the line. Austin will make sure we get that taken care of and over to you. But man, you got to get real serious about this. We got to stop playing around with crypto and stocks. And I mean, you touch the hot stove now. And so you know that that was a bad move.

So I feel good about that part, Ken, that the behavior changes. He's ready for it. Yeah, and Matthew, welcome because you're joining throngs of people that have made bad financial decisions. And I think the word I want to share with you as we let you go is I don't want you to have any shame. The bad news is you made some bad financial decisions. The good news is there is a plan. There's a way. We're giving it made some bad financial decisions. The good news is there is a plan. There's a way. We're giving it to you, financial peace.

And you're going to climb out of this, and you're going to be better for it. So get your head up. You'll get out of this. But you're going to have to really, really hustle for a season. But on the other side of this is going to be true freedom. And we are here to walk with you along the way. Thank you for listening, watching, and for calling in. Don't move.

More Ramsey Show coming up right around the corner. Welcome back, America. This is the Ramsey Show, where we talk about your life. We talk about your money. We talk about your work. We talk about your relationships. They're all tied together. If you've got a dumpster fire going on in your money, it's going to affect your relationships. It's going to affect how you perform at work.

If you're in a dumpster fire of an office with toxic coworkers and a pinhead leader who has no idea how to treat people, that's going to affect you at home. And, you know, this is why we do what we do is for breakthroughs, so that you can be who you were uniquely created to be and live that life and live it with abundance and total financial peace. So excited that you're with us. George Camel with me. We think we're kind of fun.

Like we think, you know what, we're going to get you your advice, but we also think we're going to have fun doing it. So we're going to have a fun show today. It doesn't have to be awful. On some level, people listen for entertainment as well as some education. Yeah. So we're going to have a fun show today. If you're listening, you're doing it. It doesn't have to be awful. On some level, people listen for entertainment as well as some education. Yeah. So we're going to treat you well. We're going to respect you, and we're going to help you out, and we're very, very excited that you're here.

In fact, George, the people have spoken. I'm also a self-proclaimed man of the people over on the Ken Coleman Show. I like to say that all the time. Yes. people over on the Ken Coleman show. I like to say that all the time. But in this case, you've had a lot of viewers and listeners send you a particular TikTok video that they're up in arms about. Yeah. So I get these videos all the time since we've been reacting to different videos on social media, on TikTok and Instagram, and I'll get DMs or tagged at least 10 times a day on random videos where they go, you got to debunk this. You got to react. Oh, I like this. And so there's this one particular video that has just been nagging me. I get it at least once a week

for the last three months. So I thought we'd play it for our viewers and listeners. And what you're going to see in this video is a woman talking about 401ks and how terrible they are. Is this a financial expert of some sort? We have no idea. Oh, we don't even know. No one knows. It's the internet, Ken. Oh, it's just an interview. And so below that is a guy reacting to her video, and he's pointing an agreement, and I know who this guy is. Oh, you do?

So we'll talk about it after. All right, let's get it, guys. Let's watch this. 401K was never meant as a big retirement plan. A 401K was developed because after the Depression, people were not getting back into the stock market. So they created a 401k to make it easy for the average person to get into the stock market. So you've really got to do some research. I mean, everybody, all of us need to really do our research when we're looking at just blindly accepting advice from somebody.

So I don't think today you can save yourself to retirement. I mean, the interest rate's 2%, right? It was almost negative because it was zero something, and the fees you're paying brings you negative. So if you're saving money, are you trying to build as big a nest egg as possible to live off of? And who knows what's going to happen with inflation, deflation. There's so many factors.

So I don't think saving and a 401K is a good financial retirement plan at all. Okay. Now, can I just – The muse again. The lady. Epic. So dramatic. Yes, right.

And he was very excited with the finger pointing and the touching of the ear. But I want to go back to the lady, the so-called expert, who says, you got to do your research. And did I hear her? I want to make sure I heard this because I was doing my own research on the Google while she was talking about research. Doesn't take much Googling to figure out that. Didn't she say that it was 2% on the 401k? She said a lot of things that have no merit. Okay, so for the lady who said you need to do your research, while she was blathering on, I pulled it up.

And the average rate of return on 401ks just over five years from 2015 to 2020 was 9.5%. There we go. So I found that on the Google. Well, my favorite part, Ken. Immediately. She's talking about how after the Great Depression, 401Ks, no, 401Ks didn't come about until 1978 and got popular in the early 1980s. I don't know what Great Depression she's talking about.

Research lady needs to take her own financial history class. Goodness gracious. See, this is why, and again, I'm not trying to bang on this expert, but this is why we got to be careful what we consume. Sure. Somebody put her out there, and she's saying nonsense. Well, can I tell you, I know the underlying reason. And then this guy clips it, and then he goes, what was this move?

That's the new move, by the way, James. When somebody says something I like, next time I'm on with Dave, co-hosting with Dave, he's going to say something great. He has no context of this clip, and I'm going to go... There we go. Just point up in the air like, Dave's right.

Listen, or maybe I should point this way. Anyway, I digress. I know too much, Ken, and here's what I know. What do you know about this guy? The reason this video has taken off and has been reacted to so many times with people in agreement,

guess what industry all of those people are in? Whole life insurance. Oh. So, hear me out. The old bait and switch here's the here's the connecting point all of these people uh either sell permanent life insurance indexed universal life insurance you name it all insurances that we know are garbage okay stop right there we have a lot of new people like record numbers of new people watching and listening all the time why do we think that those products are garbage, George? Because they are astronomically more expensive than term life, and it's trying to do two things at once. It's trying to be insurance and an investment, which is how these policies are touted. They're touted by all these guys as,

this is a way better investment than your 401k. Your 401k is trash. You should invest with me in this whole life policy in order to make money. And so that guy in the bottom of the video is an index universal life insurance salesman. Of course he is. And on his website, on his academy he sells, it says index universal life insurance is without debate the best choice for secure compounding. So that's the promise they're making, and it's why they're all railing against the 401k. And here's what we found in our millionaire study, Ken. 10,000 of them, 79% of them reach millionaire status through their employer-sponsored retirement plans. So this lady's saying, 401k is terrible. What about inflation? And she's just trying to

fearmonger people away from doing a wise investment into hey put your money with me and index universal life insurance and you'll be way better off it is such a nonsensical statement to say that 401ks were not meant to help people with retirement it's just it's literally like saying uh i don't even know i can't even think of something so stupid because it's like it's the whole purpose it is an investment fund and it allows you to invest and as you said the real numbers from the largest millionaire study that's ever been done ramsey solutions says that it works and it works over and over again and again yeah let me give this further

uh some real skin on this thing uh the third largest group of net worth millionaires from this study were teachers. That's all you have to say, but you look at the median income of teachers in the United States right now, you're looking at about $65,000, $68,000, I believe it is. It might be $60,000. It's one of those three for all your fact checkers out there. So I've got your multiple choice. Someone will do it. But the point is, is in that range of income, you are making enough money to invest in a retirement account like a 401k and absolutely retire with tremendous dignity and live a very full life.

And we've seen it over and over time and time again. Baby Steps Millionaires are being created because they follow our plan. Baby Step Forward, invest 15% of your household income into retirement accounts like 401ks and IRAs. Roth is even better. So I think what's happening here, Ken, is a lot of the younger generations, they're poo-pooing all of these old, boring, antiquated investment vehicles like 401ks and IRAs. And they're trying to take shortcuts and get tricky and go, hey, if I do this and get this index universal life policy and some crypto,

man, I'll be way better off. Yeah. But as we're seeing, where are all the indexed universal life millionaires? Right. I haven't met them. Yeah, go poo-poo that, you said. You said poo-pooing, by the way. I knew you'd like that, Ken.

Well, I like the emphasis on that. It gave it a little extra panache. Thank you. Poo-pooing, you know. So all that being said, take everything on social media with a grain of salt. And I'm starting to, you know, just wade in the waters of TikTok. And let me tell you, it is a

toxic place. Yeah, it is. We are swimming upstream over on TikTok. Oh, this is a perfect example. People watch this and go, this lady looks... They'll get a million videos on a video like that. Yeah, it was a very erstwhile host was asking the question. So here's the question, Ken. She seemed very serious. Always ask yourself, what is it?

I think this kind of stuff is like a purple snow cone. What do you mean by that? It's all sugary. Here's your little snow cone, your great purple snow cone, and you bite into it and it gives you all the feels. There's no nutrition, no value at all. No. I mean, have you ever bitten into a purple snow cone, Jordan? I've done it before. When you bite into it, there's no nutrition, no value at all. No. I mean, have you ever bit into a purple snow cone, Jordan? I've done it before.

When you bite into it, there's nothing there. It's not like meat or something to resist. It's just like biting into ice. I've never heard. That's what taking on TikTok advice can be. You think you've bit into something that's good for you. Oh, no. There's a crash after the purple snow cone, by the way.

What does this person have to gain by posting this video? And if you dig into that question, you'll usually find your answer. There it is, folks. Purple snow cone or not. Love the breakdown. See, you come to the Ramsey Show for that kind of depth, folks. Wow. Only at the Ramsey Show do you get that kind of breakdown. All right.

Hey, good news. More calls, more breakthroughs coming up. This is the Ramsey Show. D-Show. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman. George Campbell joins me here in studio as we take your questions. 888-825-5225. Find out for yourself why Blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window coverage. You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos they run every month,

you'll save even more. Use the promo code Ramsey and you'll get the best deal. Today's question comes from Katie in Michigan. She says, I'm engaged and my fiance currently has $15,000 in debt that he's paying off. I am debt free and currently have $15,000 in debt that he's paying off. I am debt-free and currently have $18,000 in savings. Once we're married later this year, I would like to pay his remaining debt, but I would like for us to still live below our means until we pay back my savings. He doesn't agree with this plan. Uh-oh.

Help! Oh, boy, George. Exclamatory help at the end there. Yeah, for sure. Well, Ken, I am inclined to agree with Katie that it's important we refill this emergency fund, but I don't think he sees it as that. No, and the

problem is they're engaged and they're in the final countdown, right? Oh boy. And you don't want to kick the can down the road and deal with this after marriage. We got to find out where this financial value is coming from. Okay, time out. This is a emergency press conference, right? We got to sit down and hash through this. So here's what I'm thinking. Right now, he sees it as her plan and his plan.

I think we need to get on our plan. And that means he needs to understand where she's coming from. I don't know that she's explained, hey, this money is my emergency fund of three to six months. And if something were to happen, I want us to be protected from whatever happens in the economy, a job loss, HVAC needs to be replaced, whatever it is, we need to have the money and savings so that we don't go into debt. And so I think we need to have a mindset shift, and that's one of the beautiful things about Financial Peace University. When you go through it as a couple, you now have a shared language that you can use to communicate.

You understand where each person's coming from. And so I think that would be a great next step for them because currently they're on different wavelengths when it comes to money. And I feel like I'd like to have a one-on-one with this young man. He's yet to discover the universal truth. Happy wife, happy life. And, you know, he needs to figure this out.

Not only because of that, but because it actually is the right decision. Come on, man. Figure this out. You've got a really level-headed fiancé who's trying to help you out. Yeah, she's got money in the bank, no debt. She's clearly doing something right. Well, she's paying off this knucklehead's debt, which I appreciate when they get married.

I appreciate that. It becomes our money and our financial mistakes. Yeah. Katie, I've got to tell you, this is a full stop. We have got to dig into this. You need to know my heart on this, why I believe this, why I want you to do this, how it's important to the vision that I have for our marriage.

That's the key word. What is the vision for our family when it comes to money? Yeah. And I think once they nail that down, everything's going to be great. But right now, this feels like a solvable problem. Yeah. Oh, it absolutely is. But it is a red flag.

Thank you for the question, Katie. All right. Let's get to the phones. Kevin is on the line in Maui. Oh my goodness, George, you ever been to Maui? Never. Really? Love to go. You need to go. Maybe we could go see Kevin, depending on how good the advice is on this call. We'll see. Kevin, you're on the Ramsey Show. No, both of you would be most welcome. Ken and George, a real pleasure to speak to you. Oh, that's awesome, Kevin. We are on our way. That's the Hawaiian accent I was hoping for. Kevin, how can we help today? Well, let me let you know, I have not had a credit card

in over 10 years. I only use cash and debit cards. I am debt free. I own my own home. I own our cars outright. I am even a coordinator for Financial Peace University. Hey! Awesome. Kevin, that's awesome, man. Thank you for doing that. But I am in a quandary about how to consistently rent a car with a debit card, and I'll explain why. In February, I reserved a car with a major rental company in Memphis at the International Airport. They took my money, but after two hours, they did not rent me the car because I have insufficient credit. So I decided at that moment, I'm only going to use the company that Dave recommends. And in May, I reserved a car in St. Louis, had no problem. But yesterday, my wife and I flew to Oahu with two of our friends for a day trip, I had reserved a car with the same rental company

at the Honolulu Airport several weeks ago. They had already taken my money, but for some reason ran a credit check. And again, because my credit was insufficient, they would not rent me the car. And so, hallelujah, one of our friends had a credit card and was able to pay for the car, because if that hadn't have happened,

we would have literally been stranded without a vehicle. So what's the solution? Is there a consistent answer that keeps me from being stranded somewhere in the South Pacific? Oh, well, now, Kevin, you love a good drama, don't you? You like drama. Stranded. You like some drama, Kevin, because there's no way you're getting stranded. You could have got an Uber.

You could have got an Uber. You could have got a driver. I was in Mexico for the last week and we didn't have a rental car. We got everywhere we needed to go. So I appreciate the question. George can jump in on this. He's the financial guru. But come on, Kevin, you're not getting stranded there because you can't rent a car. So the key here, Kevin, is to do the research beforehand and verify with the company you're renting with that what their debit card policy is. So I just Googled renting a car with a debit card and immediately Budget, Avis, and Alamo immediately came up with a blog about how they allow you to rent a car with a debit card. I've

had a great experience with Enterprise recently where they sometimes just add a hold, 20% hold or something like that, to the card in order to rent. Now, if you're getting a certain type of vehicle, I have heard that it can be more difficult to get the giant SUV, for example. Are you trying to rent a specific type of vehicle usually? No, no. Usually it's the least expensive. And in the past, they have put an authorization of like a 500 deposit down which i'm happy to do that's not the problem it's just that all of a sudden the very same company that rented me a car two months ago will not rent me the car here yeah i wish i could speak to the inconsistencies of each company um but there are other options too. Outside, I mean, I haven't had a lot of poor experiences

with this personally with different companies. I usually rent through, you know, a site like Costco Travel and I've had good experiences. Usually a company like Enterprise is great. But there are other options. We've talked on the show before

about doing Uber or Lyft if you're going around a city with good transportation. You can also rent a car through Turo and you can do that with a debit card. Have you heard about Turo? T-U-R-O? No. I gotta tell you. No. Big fan. Ken's a big fan.

I've used it several times. This is where basically Ken Coleman can list his car for you to rent. Yeah. It's person-to-person. And it's just an app you download, and it'll show you cars in your area, and I've heard from many of our listeners that they've had great experiences with Turo, so that might be a great option for you to check out as well i love turo kevin's not he's not happy hey kevin you're in maui man did you get are you

at the airport stranded right now because i'll make a couple calls or did you get where you needed to go no well we we eventually did because somebody else was able to rent the car. Oh, that's right. Hallelujah. I was unable to rent the car. Right. I get it. And that was the thing. The very same company with the very same thing at an airport rental rented me one two months ago and didn't rent me one this time, and I just couldn't understand why. Well. I'm a minister, and I'm a big fan of following the rules and having some level of consistency.

Otherwise, everything's chaos. Right. And so I'm just trying to find the company that will, you know, not put us in a quandary right there at the rental car company. Yeah. And suddenly, you know, because you're right. Absolutely, there's Uber and things like that. But the reason you rent a car is so that you can go out and explore.

And if you explore Uber, once again, I'm not going to be a very good steward of my money if I'm spending three and four times what I would normally spend on that car rental for the day if I go a different route. Well, we totally feel you. And understand this, big corporations aren't consistent sometimes. And so it's frustrating. We totally feel what you're feeling. But again, George gave you some real big-time rental companies, maybe the one in Maui.

They've got a district manager out there who's like, you know, the – what's the guy's name from the office, the horrible boss? Michael Scott. He's like the Michael Scott of the local rental car companies. He's got his own policies. Who knows? So what do you do? You pivot.

And Turo's an option. You go, okay, I want to explore. I'm going to get a ride to the house, and we're going to call a local company that'll rent you a Jeep to drive around Maui for the day. A Schnozberry Jeep, maybe. Ken and I took a call about that one time. We did. So yeah, the key here is do your due diligence.

Call that location. Get the name of the person, the manager, who said, yep, you can run with a debit card, and you'll be okay. But it does take a little bit more work, but I'm okay with that. It means avoiding the credit card game. Happy to do that. Absolutely. All right, good stuff.

Good hour, George. Thank you. Always fun. And to the team back there in the control room, there's so many. I don't have time to list them all. You folks are amazing. Thousands of people. Thousands back there.

To the amazing people in the lobby, thank you for watching. Fun times. Hey, that's going to do lobby. Thank you for watching. Fun times. Hey, that's going to do it. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, folks, Ken Coleman here. Did you know The Ramsey Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world? Get your daily dose of advice on life and money. Check out all of our shows from The Ramsey Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world? Get your daily dose of advice on life and money. Check out all of our shows from The Ramsey Network wherever you listen to podcasts.