The Ramsey Show - App - I Lost My Job Due to Felony Charges (Hour 3)

Episode Date: March 10, 2021

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Music Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studio, this is The Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life and your money. My name is Anthony O'Neill, host of the popular YouTube and podcast show, The Table, with Anthony O'Neill. And co-hosting with me today is number one national best-selling author and host of the Christy Wright Show, the one and only Christy Wright. Both of us are Ramsey personalities and we are excited because we get to spend this hour with you, America, and we love talking about all things, especially money. But if you want to talk about relationships,

if you want to talk about how to find balance, if you want to talk about your purpose, if you want to talk about God, if you want to talk about money, if you want to talk about how to start a business, give us a call. Chrissy's here. She can help out. I'm going to talk about money. She's going to talk about life and money. 888-825-5225. 888-825-5225 is the number to call in. And we would love to take your phone call. Let's go to the phone lines, Christy. Let's do it. Josh is with us in Phoenix. I love that city.

Good afternoon, Josh. How can Christy and I help? Hey, Anthony. Great to talk with you guys. So I have a peculiar situation that me and my wife are in. So we've paid off $150,000 in student loan debt in the past five years. All right. Yeah, it's great. We're definitely focused. So we have one debt left, and it's $140,000. My in-laws took out a home equity loan for this $140,000, and it was $140,000 and my wife's private student loan that they consolidated to make the payment cheaper.

So our situation is they have said multiple times that they will forgive the loan eventually. That has not happened yet. Who is they? We currently pay a monthly payment. Okay. My wife's parents. Okay. We currently pay a monthly payment. My wife's parents. And they have said that they'll forgive it eventually.

There's no specific timetable or anything. We pay the payment on the mortgage directly ourselves and pay a couple extra payments. As far as our situation, in my mind, I want to put the extra money from our snowball towards our home mortgage or a 529 plan for my son, or my wife wants to put any extra money towards that loan that her parents gave us, even though they said that they're going to forgive it eventually. So we just don't know what to do. One thing I want to call out that you are experiencing, Josh, and this is the reason we tell family not to loan family money, is because it tilts the room. It tilts the table. Now there is an imbalance in the relationship because of this financial debt. And so what I don't like about this question

is they have something over you. And even the fact that they're telling you they're going to forgive it bothers me because it's this reminder that they have something over you. They're holding something over you. Even if they don't intentionally mean that maliciously, they may not at all. They may be wonderful people and they may really plan to forgive it. But the dynamics of this need to change. I'm going to let Anthony jump in here first, but I just want to call out, we need to fix this situation, whether we fix it through a conversation and a deadline, or we fix it through repay conversation and a deadline or we fix it through repayment or some combination of both but i don't like this in between where you guys

have this held over your head i don't like it at all yeah yeah i'm right there with you christy um you know josh i i want to have the conversation with with in-laws hey we need clarity okay because we're trying to move forward but we have this hanging over our head when you say forgive it um when okay when is the cutoff date do we need to be paying up until this go ahead yeah uh so their house is paid off right now they live in san diego and in the next couple years they're gonna sell it um which theoretically when they sell it, that loan will be paid off. I got you. So that's a big question now. Yeah, yeah.

So you're in a tough situation because you're waiting on your parents to sell their house, which will eventually pay off the HELOC. And you're trying to figure out what to do. but they expect you to pay between now and then right yeah that's what i'm yeah yeah we've been paying monthly and then we do like one or two extra payments a month just to lower you know just pay off the principal as much as we can yeah i would say if they're sorry i keep jumping in here ao i would say if they are expecting you to pay between now and when and if they ever forgive then you're going to keep paying between now and then regardless. Here's what I would do for my own peace of mind, Josh. I would plan to pay the whole thing off as if they never sell it.

Absolutely. I would just plan on that, expect to, and then if and when they sell it and they forgive it or they say, whatever, then it's like this wonderful surprise, not something you're waiting around on, know tapping your heels going on how many more months do i have to pay this you owe it right so just expect that you have to pay it until the whole thing's paid off and if you don't then it's a wonderful surprise and bonus but for your own peace of mind i would i would try to pay it and expect to and knock it out as if you're you're gonna have to pay it off yeah no i i we're gonna leave it right there i i really do agree with you on that part.

I mean, that was a good answer. I really do. It's just a weird dynamic because it's like maybe, but it goes back to that power control. Because what if they don't? What if they change their mind? They don't want to sell. And they're like, oh, dang it.

I was like planning on, you know, no, just for your own peace of mind. Peace of mind. You owe this. Yeah. Plan to pay it. Yeah. If you don't have to, that's just a fun surprise.

Absolutely. I mean, you signed up for the debt. Your parents helped you out. They said, hey, you're going to pay it. Yeah. If you don't have to, that's just a fun surprise. Absolutely. I mean, you signed up for the debt. Your parents helped you out. They said, hey, you're going to pay us back. Pay us back. And then for me,

I'm not even getting comfortable. I'm trying, I'm sitting out with my wife. I'm saying, hey, how do we pay this thing off in the next year, year and a half?

Well, because if you, because the question he asked us, should we put more toward our house? If you were to do that with that money, it's as if that debt's not there, but it is. It is there.

And it's no different than any other type of debt in the fact that you owe it. So just you need to attack it like you would if you were in baby step two, because you are in a weird way. Pay that off before you put extra on your house, your house. You get to after you're debt free and you're not debt free yet. I love it. Well, you guys here at Ram Solutions, we want to transform so many lives that disruption spreads like wildfire across our country imagine a world where it is weird to have student loan instead of everyone assuming that's the only way to get an education imagine a world where the

majority of people pay cash for their cars imagine a world where credit cars are the cigarette of the financial industry. Imagine being a part of causing that level of disruption with the work you do every day. At Ramsey Solutions, that's why we have a thousand people at our company working together to create digital products and services to help people transform their lives with the goal of disrupting the toxic money culture that exists in America today. If you want to join us on that crusade, we're currently on the hunt for many software engineers with expertise in Ruby on Rails, Java, C Sharp, and front-end technologies.

Or if you're a UX designer, SEO, and content marketing specialist, we would love to talk with you like seriously asap so to find out about all the available jobs by texting make sure to text work that matters again that is work that matters to 33789 text work that matters or one word work that matters to 33789 to find out about all our open opportunities and i'll slide this in there too because i got the mic i'm also hiring for a video producer so not only if you want to do that but if you want to help me reach young people yes text the word work thatS to 33789

and come join an amazing team over here at Ramsey Solutions and your boy Anthony O'Neill. This is the Ramsey Show. Technology and digital products are changing every single day. Ramsey Solutions is no exception. We are working hard to produce shows and design products that will serve people well. But in order to do that, we need people like you to join us on the mission to change lives. Yes, that's right. We're hiring designers, marketers, writers, sales reps, and tons of engineers. We are paving the way with our digital products, and we have massive goals to deliver hope to millions more people.

And you should know, while we always work hard, we also have a lot of fun. It's simply who we are. It's no wonder Ramsey Solutions was named Best Place to Work in 2020 by Inc. Magazine. We want you to join our team of 1,000 folks here in Nashville and come do work that really matters. Text CAREERS to 33789 to apply today. That's CAREERS to 33789. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. My name is Anthony O'Neill, Ramsey Show. My name is Anthony O'Neill, Ramsey Personality.

Joining with me is another Ramsey Personality, number one national bestselling author, Christy Wright, host of The Christy Wright Show. And together, we're taking your phone calls and answering your questions around money, around life, around relationships, around business, business, around ladies, personal development. I mean, we're just having a blast. And so we have about one line that just opened up. So give us a call. Triple eight, eight, two, five, five, two, two, five, triple eight, eight, two, five, five, two, two, five. And Christy and I would love to talk to you.

We're a little bit nicer than Dave. Sometimes we can be just as mean, but, you know, we won't hang up on you. Well, I'll just lie. Let's go out to California and talk to Adam. Good afternoon, Adam. How can Christy and I help? Hi, Anthony and Christy. Thanks for taking my call.

Let me give you guys a little bit of background really quick. My wife and I are debt free. We're big Dave Ramsey advocates. We're now in the market to purchase a house. And it's similar to your previous caller. We have about $200,000 saved up on a house. We're looking around a million dollars as a price point for us. But we're looking, we're putting it down the offers in within four days, there's 42 offers. And the last time we put an offer in, it went over $200,000 in asking price. And so we recently just sold a house in Texas and lost $70,000.

So I have a little bit of angst by buying a house in a bad time. And so I just wanted to get your guys' take with the interest rates. I think they just increased about half a percent in the last month, which is giving us a little bit more buying power. Should we buy now and just say this is the reality of the market? Or should we hold off if you guys know any trends around the interest rates or the market so we can buy at the right time versus overspending and then the market flattening out because of supply increasing. Where are you living now?

We live in Laguna Beach, Orange County. And you own your home? We're renting an apartment right now. Okay. And we cash flow about $100,000 cash that we can save a year. So are you all in a rush to purchase today, Adam? Or do you just want to? We're not in a rush from a living perspective.

It's just knowing that as soon as a house hits the market today, it has 20 offers within three days. And the interest rates keep climbing and the asking prices keep climbing because everyone from the like LA area is moving to Orange County because they don't have to work in the city anymore. Okay. Okay. Here's my suggestion. I'm not going to, I'm not going to rush purchasing a home right now because you're you're saving a lot of money and sooner or later i think patience good things come to those who are patient who wait and i think right now what i will continue doing is keep your eye on the market do not go over your budget do not pay more for a house uh if it's only worth a million don't pay 1.2 Don't pay 1.1. Wait, because you're in

Orange County, California. So to get a good house out there, yeah, you're going to be right up there in the 800 to about 1, 1.2 million dollars to get the kind of house that sounds like you and your wife want. But I would wait, man. I mean, if it takes you another year, maybe two years to find the right house, that's okay. Well, and the other thing, if you think about it from a numbers perspective, I think you said you're able to save $100,000 a year, which is incredible. So when you think about this, let's say you decide to wait until the market levels out, which it should at some point. I'm not an expert in real estate, but an agent can help you kind of know what's going on. You're not regressing in your financial goals by

waiting. You're still making progress financially in your goals by saving $100,000 a year. And then you're able to buy a house at a price that's more appropriate for what it's going to be appraised at. If you try to rush and you overpay, then you are losing that money for right now. And there's absolutely no reason to. You're not in a rush. So keep saving your money. Wait. And unless you, if you found something in between there that's going to go at its regular price or it's rare, it's different, or you get there first or whatever. Cool.

You're ready to jump on it. You've got the money, but don't rush and overpay and just throw that money away. Absolutely. I agree. I agree. Kelton is with us in Memphis, Tennessee. Good afternoon, Kelton. I love your name, by the way.

How can we help? Thank you. Hi. So I'm 19. Up until last month, I was pretty much debt free. I had a small car loan. I was on full ride scholarship at U of M. Okay.

And basically, I was involved in a situation and it left me, I'm charged in three felonies. Now I have $8,000 worth of debt and I have upcoming debt and I lost my job because of this and I'm kicked out of school. I owe my apartment a whole lot of money because

that's where the situation happened I don't even know where to go how to start paying off all this debt I have a job now I got another job and it's paying like $300 a week but it's not even enough to make it dent that's $1,200 a month I said that's $1,200 a month

that's money but it's not enough money for what you need to do. No, not at all. And I don't have much work experience. I had a job paying $19 an hour, but it was through my school, basically. Okay. Without putting too much of your personal information live on air, are these felonies preventing you from getting a better job?

Yes, sir. They're violent felonies. They're aggravated assault. Aggravated assault. Okay, cool. Have you gotten with an attorney to figure out what is the game plan to get these off your record in the future? Yes, sir. I hired a really good attorney with everything

that I had when i sold my car okay um yeah so he's working with you to to eventually get it off your record right yes sir i'm still looking at um potentially some time it's hard to say you know it it just happened not too long ago i have a hearing another hearing next week that's going to give me a better idea of what's going to happen. Each felony carries eight to 12 years. Eight to 12 years. Here's my thing, man.

One, I want to thank you for calling in to the show. Yeah. And I want you to know that I don't know you, Kelton, but I'm going to be praying for you because your future could change dramatically for probably the first time that I've been on the Ramsey show I would say right now I'm not

concerned about your debt I'm concerned about you I'm concerned about your mental health i'm concerned about um you as an individual i i wouldn't i wouldn't encourage you continue working continue doing what you're doing but right now it sounds like you need to get around other men of older men who can speak into your life um who you can just draw from cry on um just really be honest with. And so that they can help you develop yourself into a better man. Heck, and I'm going to be rude to you. I have that. I am developing myself into a better man.

And so I don't want you to feel like you're alone out here. But right now, I'm not too concerned, Kelton, with your debt. I'm concerned with you. Yeah. The one thing I would say that may give you some source of comfort or control, Kelton, and this is super tactical, but it's just an option for you. First of all, I cannot

recommend enough you getting around, whether it's getting plugged into a church or a community of men that can come around you through this season of life, you need people to lean on um but when one of the things i heard in your question was a lot of overwhelm there's this money and this money and then my apartment and then these fees it just sounds it feels overwhelming and it and it is but one of the things you can do to reduce overwhelm as tactical as it is is just list out what those

are not just like well there's money here and i'm not sure. It's like, okay, I owe my apartment $10,000. I owe court fees of this amount of money. You're not sure when you're going to tackle it. That's okay. But I think sometimes when you see something, when you get it out of your head and onto paper and you can see it, you're like, okay, I can tackle this. I don't know how and when and what timeline, but when I can see it, I can do it. And that will just give you some source of control over your situation. It's not this unknown that's haunting you.

You can see it. Set it aside. Get the community around you. And then you can work on a plan to tackle it. Kelton, stay on the line. I'm going to have Kelly get your contact information. I'm going to have my producer reach out to you. I want to speak into your life.

I want to talk to you. I'm going to bring you on to my show and just spend 30 minutes with you, man, and just walk through your stuff and speak into your life, brother, because I think we all need brothers to do that. So stay on the line. Kelly will get your information. My people will reach out to you. This is The Ramsey Show. Thanks for listening, you guys. You're listening to The Ramsey Show.

Christy Wright and myself, Anthony O'Neill, Ramsey Personalities. Taking your phone calls. We have this segment and one more segment left. We have about one phone line open. So give us a call, 888-825-5225. We would love to talk to you over these next two segments. And Joe's with us in Missouri. Good afternoon. How can we help?

Yeah, how are you doing? Doing good, man. What's going on? So I had a question. Me and my fiance got laid off in Colorado, and I'd moved out to Colorado because my ex-wife had moved out there with my kids to help raise them, but then she moved away again. Okay. So we got a really good job offer in southeast Missouri, where I'm from. My family all lives down here, so we moved down here.

And my mom's like, well, you should just move out on the farm. So they've got 18 acres close by that has water and electric. It used to have a house, but it's dilapidated now, and it's really, really dangerous to be around. So it's kind of a big liability for my mom. So we got to talking about it. I'm like, yeah, we could probably build a house out there in the next couple of years. But then they backtracked and they won't put it in our name. They want to put it in a trust in me and my brother and sister's name. And I don't think that's a very wise idea from my standpoint. So then she gave the idea of splitting it up in three,

six acre sections, but it goes up a holler and two of the sections would literally be a hill you can't climb up so then you're splitting property in the three different areas to pay taxes on as well and then i'd have a section down the middle you know where i could actually live and i offered to buy it out from her for 54 000 and only appraised for 34 but i really want to live there. And she declined that because she said that wouldn't be fair to my brother and sister. So I'm looking for some advice.

Joe, it sounds like to me, and correct me if I'm wrong here, it sounds like to me, I hear it in your voice, this is a bad plan. And you know this is a bad plan. Like, I hear it in the question that this is already decided in your mind and it's a bad plan. And you're right, because what's interesting is is anytime i'm hosting this show and we get a call about should i do this in relation to my parents my parents land my parents house my parents whatever the the question we always ask is would you do this if it wasn't your parents

would you want to build a house in a dilapidated house on this property overpaid by 24 000 all these scenarios that you're telling me would you want to do that if it wasn't your parents no no you wouldn't want to do that so we're not going to next question is then they want to put it in a trust is that going to put liability on me if somebody gets hurt out there because they want me to clean the whole thing up my brother and sister are not interested Nobody's been out there really in 10 years. And they just go out there and throw out a couch here and there. So it's trashed on top of the house being dilapidated. And there's neighbor kids on four wheelers riding through there all the time.

And somebody's going to get hurt. And if I'm going to trust with it, I'm either going to have to clean it up or take that liability. And I don't think that's wise either. I don't even understand why they're putting it in a trust with such a small piece of property either. Sorry. Right. No, no, no. You're right here. I'll tell you straight up, Joe. I don't know the details from the legal implications of a trust, but I would imagine that responsibility, this is my hunch here, responsibility cannot be put on you without your consent. You cannot be responsible for property, liability, all these things without your consent, even if it's your parents.

So there would have to be some consent on your part. You need to probably talk with an attorney and you definitely need to talk to your mom. Like, what are you doing? What are you doing? This is not my responsibility. I feel like that you need to have more of a voice in this discussion and really have discernment for what is right for you and your family apart from your parents what is right for you where do you want to live where do you want to build what kind of house that type of thing and and enter into the discussion with that

in mind not making all these compromises and going along with bad plans just because mom came up with it and benefits her and it sucks for you i don't like this i don't like any of these plans for you i don't like neither go ahead what i think would benefit her the most she's been dead up to her eyeballs she had four mortgages at one time they actually took one out on that piece of property to buy the current house there and while they had two mortgages on another piece of property they weren't living in but they were upside down on so they couldn't sell it. So she's 60 years old. My dad's 70. Back in 2008, my dad convinced her to cash out her 401k. So she's sitting on nothing with all this debt. And that's partly why I offered more for the house to help her in the long run. But I think she should just pay me to clean it up and sell it and pay off

her house to try to get to a better position. Well, here's the thing, man. You called in to ask us for advice for you, not for what you want. Right, right, right. You know, and I agree with Chrissy. This is not a good deal. Leave it alone. Leave it alone.

If your mom puts it into a trust, okay, you are not held liable for any of the the issues that come up right now okay once you are awarded what's what's inside the trust then you will be but as of right now you will not be held liable for that okay uh i was just going out there man and just move on with your life to say mom thank you mom i love you um i tried to work with you in this area but i see right now you're just not ready to do it and And that's fine. You know, your mom doesn't have to do what she doesn't want to do. She's a grown person. Would it be wise for me to not even be involved in the trust because it'll be every weekend for nine months for me to get this cleaned up out there.

Yes. And I don't want the liability. I would not take any liability right now. The other thing I would say, Joe, is, and I know it's your mom and I'm talking about your mama here on the air, but she doesn't have a great track record financially with financial decisions. So we're going to look at that track record.

You love your mom. You're never going to not love your mom, and you're never going to not be your son. But when we look at the financial track record, it's not a good decision. So we're not going to enter into more financial agreements with mom because of the track record

and because it's a bad plan. But just like Anthony said, she can do what she wants to do. I want to remind you, you can too. You get to decide when and how and where and if at all you participate in anything with this land. You do not have to do anything. You are not obligated to do anything. You get to make a decision as a grown man what is right for you.

And you do not have to do anything. So just remember that in all the discussions. So good. Good, good good good good good amanda is with us in baton rouge good afternoon amanda how can christy and i help hello thanks for taking my call yes sir what's going on um well i'm in a calundrum right now uh i mean it's not anything major but um i'm currently i'm out of debt the only debt i have is my mortgage so i'm very happy about that uh no credit card just pay off my car note yes saving money i have money in my savings how much but uh a little over 12 000 okay and i'm trying to i'll try to build it up more. But the problem I'm having, I guess, is with the coronavirus and stuff that's going on in the economy.

And, you know, you get worried about your career and stuff like that. I'm getting kind of burned out with my career. Okay. I've been doing the same career for 25 years. And I'm always interested in science. So I was thinking about changing my career, and I contacted someone. It's an associate's degree, and I would be making about the same amount of pay. But the problem is I just found out the tuition cost is $37,000 for just under two years.

And I really don't want to take a student loan out because I'm doing fine right now, and I want to save more money and contribute even more in my Roth because I'm 47 right now and I'm trying to max out my contributions and everything. So I'm just wondering how should I go about this? I don't want to have a loan for this school or should I just keep doing what I'm doing and just save as much as I can? So real quickly before we go to break, what's your dream career field? If you could do anything right now, what would that be? I would say, I mean, definitely something in science.

What I was looking to was, you know, working. The degree I'm looking at is working in the operating room or even forensics or something like that science based because that's what I'm strong in. Okay. I got you. One of our good friends, Ken Coleman says you really, really need to identify what you want to do. So right now we really can't give you the advice that you really need because you don't really know exactly what you want to do. So here's the best piece of advice I can give you today is tomorrow afternoon.

I think right around 11 o'clock Central Time. I want you to get on YouTube and I want you to call into the Ken Coleman show. And I want you to ask this exact same question to Ken Coleman, who is our career expert. He is America's number one career expert, and he can walk you through this process. So know the student loans. But I think we need to figure out what's your sweet spot. What are you passionate about? Once we can identify that, which Ken will help you do that, then we can figure out what's the best path to do that.

So call in tomorrow to the king coleman show go to kingcomashow.com or go to youtube and he will help you out i promise this is ramsey show today's scripture and quote comes from isaiah chapter 43 verses 18 through 19 and it says remember not the former things nor consider the things of old behold i am doing a new thing now it springs forth do you not perceive it I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. Winston Churchill once said, we shape our dwellings and afterwards our dwellings shape

us. I love Winston Churchill. He's got so many great quotes. I just love him. I love him. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show, you guys. My name is Anthony O'Neill. Joining me here in the studio is christy right ramsey personalities host of the christy right show and host of the table with anthony o'neill it's been an amazing hour rocking out with you all we have about maybe six more minutes so we can maybe squeeze in one more phone call

888-825-5225 give us a call but. But right now, Alyssa is in Denver, Colorado. Good afternoon, Alyssa. How can Christy and I help? Hello. Hi, Christy. So I am currently an outside sales professional for a science and graphics franchise. And I have the opportunity to purchase the franchise that I started my career at. And it's very early.

The conversations with the corporate office are just now getting started. But I am in baby step two. It's always been a dream of mine to own my own franchise, but I'm 33. I expected I'd be closer to 50, but the opportunity is here. I imagine it'll be about somewhere between $400,000 and $600,000 to buy the franchise. Do they have a franchise model, or are they starting it with you? No, no, no. This is an existing, a very existing franchise. I'm curious.

You said you've always wanted to own your own franchise. Tell me a little bit more about that. Well, I've always wanted to own this franchise. Well, by always, I mean, I've been in the career for seven years, but I really fell in love with it. I am passionate about what it is that I do from an outside sales professional perspective. I would like to think that I would be a good business owner because I do care so much about the purpose. But I am a little nervous about being a business owner, right? I mean, there's definitely some things that I would need to work on personally. I'm a little tough and I

don't want to scare anybody, but, you know, scare any of my potential employees, but I really love the organization and the business. And I know everything about it apart from like, you know, the business side of it of like taxes and the important stuff. But I, the opportunity is here and I know that I've always, I've been working my way towards owning this franchise, a franchise within the organization. But now the one in my hometown is available for sale and now it's kind of fallen into my lap. I don't want to make a bad choice of being too emotional about this specific location in my hometown. Yeah.

So here's what's interesting. The reason that people typically want to get a franchise is because they want to run their own business and they feel like a franchise is a business in a box. And so there's something appealing about the fact that they are going to give you all the details, the logos, the formula for it, and you don't have to think about that for yourself. The downside to this, though, is it's a very expensive way to start a business and run a business, own a business, when you could start something literally on the side yourself tomorrow with zero startup. Now, you're a little bit different than the average person I talk to that's interested in a franchise

because you love this particular business. What I'm curious is how long would it take you to make back that money over and above what you're making now working for them? And when you run those numbers, I think you'll be shocked at how long it will take you to make that back because that is a very expensive cost of a franchise. And we're never going to recommend you take out debt, which means you'd have to cash flow it.

And I'm not trying to be discouraging. I'm just trying to be discouraging. I'm not trying to discourage you, Alyssa, because you know I'm so pro-business. But here's what I want to encourage in you. How can you pursue some aspect of you would want to do on your own separate from this business that has the same type of impact

or the same type of services, product, whatever? I just want you to explore it. I think that you're onto something here, that you see something in yourself you want to pursue, and I think that is good. I just want you to explore other ways to pursue it outside of paying a half a million dollars, which I'm guessing you don't have.

Yes, that's correct. I do not have it. So just when you say it fell in your lap, lots of bad ideas can fall in your lap. Lots of bad opportunities can fall in your lap. But we think, oh, because it fell in my lap, it must mean it's right for me. Listen, debt is not right for you. Making a bad decision is never right for you. Bad opportunities are not right for you. But the good news is never right for you. Bad opportunities are not right for you.

But the good news is you love what you do. You work for a good company. That's not going to change tomorrow if you don't decide to franchise this. You can still keep doing what you do, loving it, making good money, maybe even coming up with an advancement path with your leader, some type of management.

Maybe there's some advancement there and or exploring other business opportunities that you start on the side. And by the way, you own all of it. You have full creative rights to make it whatever you want it to be. Because the other aspect of a franchise that most people don't consider is you're still working for someone. You quote unquote own it.

But if you start a Subway franchise, you're not coming up with a different Subway logo. You're doing it the way that Subway runs. It's going to be laid out how they lay out. It's the upside of a business in a box, but the downside of business in a box. And so I just want you to explore all your options. I think it's awesome that you happen to love this company. I don't want you to pay a half a million dollars to do what you're already doing because it's going to take you a long time to make that back. And that's just not a good plan. But I do want to encourage you to explore other ways to lean into that thing that makes you light up right now in a different way that doesn't cost a half a million dollars. Stay in line.

I'll have Kelly send you my book, Business Boutique, and that will help you not only explore what those opportunities are, but even test them out. Experiment a little bit. Maybe you start something on the side. Maybe you get to lean into those gifts and you learn more about yourself in the process through reading that. So stay on the line. Kelly can get that for you. Love it. Jen is with us in Billings. Good afternoon, Jen. How can Christy and I help? Hi, Anthony. Hi, Christy. I'm 45, almost 46. My husband's 42. We have approximately 1,800 left in consumer debt. But here comes the but. I have over $100,000 in student loan debt

and my husband has about $40,000 in student loan debt. I'm thinking, I don't know if this is the right way, is once we pay off the last of our consumer debt is kind of put maybe step two on hold, build up our three to six month emergency fund, and then aggressively attack our student loan debt. What's your household income? Between the two of us, about $70,000 a year. Oh my goodness. What did y'all get your degree in?

Okay, so the $111,000 is for me, and it's a master's in human services administration. I was 25, 26, and a single mom when I went to college. Okay. What about your husband? So I pretty much put it, you know, I was living off of student loan debt as a single mom. Okay. All right. Cool.

And what about your husband? He's a citizen network technician. Technician. He does stuff with computers. Okay, cool. So real quickly, because we're about to end the show here um no your your philosophy is off uh jen i'm sorry um i want you and a lot of people say this consumer debt consumer debt is including your student loans okay um anything

outside of your consumer debt would be a mortgage and And so you got to work the baby steps, Jen. I mean, I'm just going to be honest with you. I wasn't sure. I wanted to make sure on that one. And I understand. I mean, you all make decent income. The average household income in America is running between $58,000 and $68,000, depending on what side of America you're on.

So you guys are actually a little bit above that. But you are sitting with over $100,000 in student loans. And I know that looks like a mountain, but Chrissy teaches something real good about just really taking it one step at a time, one bite at a time, and just aggressively going after it. I would definitely sit down, get the budget. And honestly, you too need to come up with a bigger source of income. Yeah, you got to get your income up. Got to get it up. Get some side jobs. I get it. You guys are in your 40s,

but that's still young. Right now, you need to get your shovel bigger. Yeah, to make more progress. Otherwise, it's going to feel like that mountain. You're not making any progress. Get your income up. Start a side business, side hustles, extra jobs, and you'll start to see more progress that'll motivate you to stick with it. You got this. You can do it.

I'm so sorry that you're going through that. Well, Chrissy, it's been fun. It's been real fun. I want to thank our producer, James Shiles and Kelly Daniel. In America, do not forget that the caliber of all of our futures will be determined by the decisions we make today.

In America, y'all made one of the best ones today by listening to Chrissy and I right here on The Ramsey Show. Did you know you can listen to The Ramsey Show on your smart speaker? Just tell Alexa, Google Assistant, or Siri to play The Ramsey Show podcast. Check out all Ramsey Network shows on your smart speaker today.