The Ramsey Show - App - I'm Facing a Layoff...Is It Time to Try Something New? (Hour 1)

Episode Date: November 12, 2020

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, 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. My co-host on the show today, Ramsey personality, number one best-selling author, Christy Wright, joins me as we talk about your life and your money. It's a free call at 888-825-5225. It's free, and some say the advice is worth exactly what you pay for it. 888-825-5225. Christy Tyler is going to start us off in Kansas. Hey, Tyler, what's up?

Hi, Dave. Thank you for your time. Sure. How can Christy and I help? I'm in a situation where I know I'm going to be laid off later this year, and we've been pretty smart with our money, and I'm wondering if it's time for me to try something new and not worry about my salary. Like what? What are you suggesting? Just anything that I would think that would make me feel better, because I've been in engineering for 20 years,

and I think I'm kind of burned out. And so my wife is pretty supportive because, you know, financially we've been smart again. And I'm just wondering if I should be able to take the risk, and I want your input on it. Well, what are you risking? I mean, what are you going to go do? I guess just something locally.

I was thinking maybe even teaching at the schools or something i'm not hearing something yeah you said you're burned out and you're going to be laid off so are you saying to just do something now just switch gears now or go ahead and plan for that whenever you get laid off? I guess there seems like some gaps, Tyler. Yeah, I guess I really don't want to do engineering, and I was thinking if I was to go work for retail and even get minimum wage. You just want to do something different. Yeah, that's ridiculous.

Okay, that's ridiculous. You're running from something, not to something. And everything you're describing I'm hearing is just like roll over and surrender and let life roll over the top of you. Well, no thanks. I'm not going to participate in that plan. No, you need to come up with a new dream, dude, that's better than engineering. Not working a big box store for freaking minimum wage.

But would it matter if I've been doing this for a while? And I think i've reached the point where we're financially independent that i should throw my how old are you 43 okay so you're gonna do lame-o underpaid work for the next 25 years because you're financially independent i'm not doing that and i've been financially independent for 25 years. I guess my wife tells me I should at least do something mentally stimulating, and that benefits society. Well, here's the thing, Tyler. The whole premise of what you're asking is, can I either make good money as an engineer and be miserable, or make no money and be happy?

There's a different option here where you make good money and you're happy. Yeah. It doesn't have to be one or the other. And you do something that has meaning. And so what we need to do is step aside from the burnout and say, okay, that's going to be in the rearview mirror at whatever point you decide to make that step. But let's run to something that has some zeal to it and some passion to it and make some dadgum money. And you're a smart guy, Tyler. You're an engineer like

you can use those skills in a different way even if if you don't want to use it in the traditional way you've been using it for 20 years that that burns you out you can still use your skills and do something that makes good money and makes you happy yeah the the the thing is just because you've got a problem let's say you got 10 million dollars okay i'll just make up a number uh you don't have to work but it still doesn't mean you need to go work a brain dead job you know you need to go do something that's fun and that's stimulating and that your wife is right that that uh benefits society and you might go make more money than you've ever made in your life not because you need money but because you're

finally doing something you love and you got some passion for. So I would jump into Ken Coleman's materials if I were you and start dreaming again. It sounds like you're just, your spirit is just low. It's just like, well, I don't have money. I'm not doing anything. Instead of like, woohoo, I get to do something, you know, so you need to, that's what I would want for you. So yeah, you need to make a change i don't have any issue with that and depending on how much money you got and how much money you're gonna spend on the change how you make the change would be up for grabs but right now i don't have anything i can sink my teeth into to help you with that part of it so yeah get a hold of ken coleman go to ken coleman.com and start thinking about you know what it is that makes you smile dude what it is

that makes you happy i know what it is makes me smile i love helping people i'm a great teacher and communicator and when i'm doing those things i feel alive and um you know if i can do all those things and make money too that's a touchdown yeah and it's interesting too because what i keep hearing dave just like you said he's running from this job that has burned him out or whatever but what's interesting is if you work this retail job at eight dollars an hour whatever it is and you're used to making really good money and you're a really smart guy and you're not challenged at all you're not going to like that either that's not going to be fun you think it's fun because you've escaped the bad situation you need to find something that's going to give you the dignity of your intellect and your

experience with the paycheck as well and you'll actually be proud of it and have fun it's not because you need money no no so being financially independent just allows you to do some of those things but it doesn't it doesn't mean we have to dumb it down the purpose of uh becoming financially you know building a pile of cash to live like no one else so that later you can live like no one else and that's not living all right annette is with us in colorado hi annette how are you hi dave i love you so much we love you annette what's up kiddo um so i bought your book the total money makeover about a year and a half ago and i cannot explain to my husband anything, and I don't even know how to begin to talk to him anymore about it

because it is an ongoing fight. We're in marriage counseling because of it. Every time I try to tell him, no, you don't need to spend everything you make, he's like, well, I don't work this hard to not spend my money, and I'm like, yeah, but we're so far in debt. Stop. So I was just going to see if you had some advice to like i don't know knock some sense into it i think you've been trying to knock sense into him it didn't work so

knocking sense into people usually doesn't work so you're in marriage counseling for real yeah we're seriously in marriage counseling because the fighting over money has gotten to the point that we don't really speak sometimes. How many sessions of counseling have you gone to? Seven. And how's it going? Are you making progress? Not particularly, but this is our eighth session coming up next Monday on our fourth round. But are you making progress? No, no.

Why? It's still that ongoing battle. Because we're really not that far into debt. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I asked about your marriage counseling. Are you making progress in your marriage? No, because all we do is fight about money and we so the counselor sucks or you guys aren't listening um eight sessions and there's no improvement no he's still because i tried to see his side of it and i'm like okay it's okay

to take a little out to have fun. It doesn't have to be the whole paycheck. And he'll agree, and then we'll come home, we'll do a budget, and then he'll end up spending like $300 or $400 that I'm having to go, wait, wait, wait, nowhere to go. Okay, you don't have a money problem. You have a money problem. You have a marriage problem. So stay in marriage counseling and learn to work together. And it's not about you acquiescing or him acquiescing. It's about learning to communicate and being agreeing on your values.

And that's what you're going to have to lean into. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. I get asked all the time about what people need to do to improve their family's money situation. Two of the most overlooked things are term life insurance and disability insurance. Both plans make sure that you have income to pay bills and take care of yourself and your family if something were to happen. For term life, you need to carry 10 to 12 times your income, and I recommend 15 or 20-year plans for most families. Stay away from cash value or return of premium plans. They're just a ripoff.

Disability insurance is just as critical. How are you going to pay your bills if you're unable to work? Disability is the leading cause of bankruptcies and foreclosures. That's why I send you to Zander Insurance. They've been helping my listeners find the right plans at the lowest cost for almost 20 years. Call 800-356-1780 or visit zander.com and compare online that's 800-356-1780 or zander.com My co-host today on the Dave Ramsey Show, Christy Wright, Ramsey Personality, number one best-selling author of the book Business Boutique. Morgan is with us to start this segment off from Canada.

Hi, Morgan. How are you? I am great, Dave. Thank you to you and Christy for taking my call today. It's an honor to speak with you. You too.. How are you? I am great, Dave. Thank you to you and Christy for taking my call today. It's an honor to speak with you. You too. How can we help? My question is about term life insurance and whether or not my wife and I need it at this point in our lives. We just completed FPU online. We're on baby step two. We're about halfway through our debt with $38,000 left, and we expect to be debt-free by the end of November. Our household income is about $170,000 before tax.

We're currently renting. We don't own our own home yet, but we're planning to buy a house in the next year, year and a half. We don't have any kids or any dependents. Currently, through my employer, I have a small amount of life insurance. I think it's one time my actual salary, one time my annual salary. And my wife does not have any through her work or any other form of insurance. How old are you? We are 32 and 30. Okay. And we're just wondering if we need more life insurance, if we need term life insurance more than what my employer provides. Yes, you do.

At this point in our lives, or if we need to wait. Yeah, you do. Because if something happened to you or something happened to her, your life is going to be materially changed by a lack of money. Right. And so we have to supply the money for that loss. And so it's not as acute. The need is not as acute as if you had three kids running around there.

But if something happens to you, her life is a mess. And at 32 years old, it didn't cost anything for you to buy half a million on you and half a million on her or 750,000 on you, 750,000 on her. It just doesn't cost anything. It's the cost of a pizza. And so, and, you know, the way I know this, and Christy, we've seen this so many times, is we get to talk to the spouse of the 30-year-old that wasn't going to die and did. And how they feel, you know, just run the picture out. What happens if there's no insurance or just enough to bury you and you're gone? And what's the situation financially, the structure of your wife's life after you're gone, if you get hit by a car tomorrow?

Vice versa. Same thing if something happens to her. And you go, well, i would just keep working yeah you would but you would have been knocked over on your head and you know it just doesn't take a lot of money to make sure that everything's okay if it was if it was thousands and thousands of dollars it'd be different but it's just a few it's just a few dollars yeah it's interesting how you always weigh out that cost because especially when you're young you can get it for relatively cheap and i think people always think of life insurance as just a thing for kids that even how he asked that it was like well we don't have any kids i think a lot of people often think that that i need it if i have kids i don't if i don't but like you said it's going to change their lives and you need to

account for that well the the need is is more obvious obvious when there's kids. It's more acute. But, you know, would she be able to struggle through if something happened to you? Yeah. I mean, she's making good money. You're making good money for a total of $175,000, unless one of you is really killing it and the other one's not. But, I mean, would she be able to make it if she's making $80,000, $90,000 a year? Sure, she'd be able to make it if she's making $80,000, $90,000 a year? Sure, she'd be able to make it at 30 years old.

But there's a gap there, and she might like to have some other options. And so I would put life insurance on you guys now and get used to carrying that until you have a large enough pile of investments to where you don't need any insurance because your investments would take care of you you become self-insured by getting rid of all the debt and that includes your home and you become self-insured by the kids being raised and leave if there's kids involved and you become self-insured by the pile of money and so if you have no mortgage the kids are grown and gone and there's a million dollars in mutual funds you don't need insurance yeah in most cases you'd be fine but if you're sitting where you guys are sitting you got no money and uh you know a little bit of insurance and a little bit of debt and a great income so

it's not as devastating as it would be for other people probably but yes it's as inexpensive it is i would make sure i got life insurance in place. Check ZanderInsurance.com, and they'll help you get a quick, easy quote among a bazillion different companies where you can get the best possible price. Greg's in D.C. Hey, Greg, how are you? I'm fine. Thanks for taking my call. Sure.

How can we help? So I have kind of a two-part question. First question, well, first thing is me and my wife, we're on baby step two. And she just, about eight months ago, she gave birth to our second child. And now she breastfed both our children for a year. Now we're getting to the point where we're not having any more kids. And she kind of wants a mommy makeover. And I want her to feel comfortable, but I don't I want her to feel comfortable but I don't know how to fit that into what we're doing now I'm sorry he doesn't know what that is I can tell you right now Greg uh it's an expensive procedure um I would say that that I'm gonna let Dave take it but I would say if you're on baby step two then that would be treated like any other expense that you would want to probably push after you're debt-free.

But, Dave, you take it away. Yeah. Well, I mean, you're talking about cosmetic surgery? Yeah. Okay. All right. Yeah, cosmetic surgery is not an emergency. It's a desire.

And it can be, in in many cases a reasonable desire i would do that after baby step three after you finish your emergency fund uh same thing you know it's um you know these are you don't a going on vacation is not a need it's a want buying a new couch is not a need it's a want this is a want and it's not required for life. If this was a medical procedure required for your life, then it would be an emergency, and you'd stop everything you're doing right now, and you would do that. And it may be a valid expense. It may be something you all want to spend money on, the two of you, when you talk it through.

There's nothing wrong with that at all. But I would do that after you have your emergency fund in place and after you're out of debt, because it's going to make it very easy to save up and pay for the portion of the procedure that you have to pay for out of pocket. Yeah. And I don't know whether medical insurance will cover that or not. It depends on your health plan, I guess. Yeah yeah and depend on what it is too yeah but i mean like i had a call the other day from a guy who our lady i believe it was i don't remember uh someone and

they had lost like 150 pounds and they were like the skin they wanted to have their skin you know put back yeah and i'm like, you went through all that? You dadgum right? I would want to do that. That's pretty cool. I mean, your dadgum hero losing 150 pounds is amazing. And so, yeah, I would want to do that. But is it necessary to live?

No. And so it's an item. It's cosmetic surgery. Yes, I would. But I think the procedure was like, Deloney was on with me. I think it was like $20,000 or something. But, yeah, I would spend $ spend 20 grand on that yeah but it's a personal choice but it's not an emergency it's just in the same hierarchy of priorities like you would do anything with

your expenses that is a uh like you said not a necessary expense but you just roll it into okay once for baby step three it's a reasonable goal save up for it yeah is visiting you know paris france a reasonable goal absolutely yeah if that's what you want to do with your money and that's cool go do it yeah and uh highly recommend it yeah you know but but that you don't do that when you don't have an emergency fund yeah i would say the other thing too with greg's situation is a lot of times at least i experienced this dave when we as a family we're like okay we're our family is complete there's something so um that feels urgent of like i just want to get back to myself i just want to feel like myself again so i'll probably hear that in his wife of like let's do it right now because

i just want to feel like me again and and she she has time she's you know i mean like she like you said you can save and and still have that procedure where she can have her confidence feel like herself again but it doesn't have to happen tomorrow you know i mean it's it's she's she's just had a baby like just have a little bit of grace for herself in the in the process well i mean you spend a lot of time that get back to you i mean that's what the new devotional yep that we're messing that you're building out and uh that's what it's all about and yeah well especially too when you're going through that season of having kids of feeling like you know everything going on with your body when you can do anything whether it's go for a run or do yoga or just wear your old clothes, anything that makes

you feel like yourself, you feel like, oh, yeah, there I am. You know, for years I've been having babies, taking care of babies. Like, I want to feel at least for a moment every now and then like myself. And so I think anything that helps you do that, you know, within reason is a good, healthy thing. Absolutely. Absolutely. It's money well spent, but at the proper priority.

Right. Right. That's good. Well done. Good. Good questions. Christy Wright, my co-host today here on The Dave Ramsey Personality, number one best-selling author, is my co-host today here on The Dave Ramsey Show.

Open phones at 888-825-5225. Casey is with us in Ohio. Hi, Casey, how are you? I'm doing good. Thank you guys so much for taking my call. Sure. Yeah, how can we help? Yeah, me and my girlfriend are very new to you, Dave,

and we have been living together for a year and a half, and I wish we were turned on to you right sooner, but we're trying to set up a budget to start saving. We're on baby step number two. We both have $1,000 saved up for an emergency fund. We both have a little bit of debt that we're trying to work out. And we've been together five years and budgeting has always been like a touchy subject between us. And I'm trying to figure out the best way to set up a budget and the best way to talk to her about budgeting.

Will you marry me? That would fix it. That would be the first step to fixing it, if you want to talk to her. I'm messing with you. But we don't recommend that you budget together with your roommate, only your wife wife because there are legal implications and uh other implications of relational implications as well and so as long as you're going to be roommates you need to run separate finances um i mean as if you had uh

you know a guy roommate from college or something right and you still got to negotiate over whose mustard that is in the refrigerator and all that crap right but you need to run separate finances and we split the rent we split the cable bill or whatever just like you would with a traditional roommate but uh you know you you then begin, because if you want to join in on your goals and you do that without the benefit of marriage, you set yourself up for all kinds of problems in the event that we don't get married. Because legally, you own half of this car, she owns half of this car, you die, now she owns half of the car with your mother

because she doesn't have any rights you see what i'm saying okay yeah um so would you just do 50 and 50 we both go in half until we're married then on household expenses? Yeah. Yes. And run separate budgets. So when are you getting married? I was going to ask it if you didn't. I was waiting for my chance to ask. What? The only thing that I'm struggling with is she's had some issues. Well, we both have had issues financially, and she doesn't really want to share her financial financial um history with me or basically

where she's at financially and it usually kind of gets us in an argument because she's gets kind of ashamed about um her credit card debt and where she's at and that kind of prevents me from wanting to get married so i'm trying five years dude way to Yeah. Yeah, this isn't five months. This is five years. So, listen, you do whatever you want to do. Like you said, you're new to us, and when you call in here, we're not trying to be mean to you or snarky with you or something. How old are you guys?

We're both 26. Okay. I have a 28-year-old son. And if he called me with this question, what I would tell him is that, as his dad, what I would tell him, and I love him, is that I would want to see this marriage or this relationship probably sit down with someone and do some pre-marriage counseling and start to see some of these areas heal to where we can move forward in the relationship, because a five-year relationship that is stagnant is not a good, that's not a good omen for either one of you having a positive outcome 10 years from now. And so I would want to see your relationship start to heal these areas of shame that she's dealing with. She can start to open up, and you can give her some grace in those areas

to where you can see yourselves combining the mistakes of the past and the assets from the past and um for richer for poorer in sickness and health and i'm trying to talk you into getting married but because i because i because that's what i would tell my own son yeah and you know this the sort of kind of thing doesn't bode well for your careers, your health. It doesn't bode well for your relationship. Statistically, the data points, and it certainly doesn't bode well for your wealth building. Yeah. There's a huge marital benefit to wealth building.

Yeah. I think it's interesting what he said about with his girlfriend and the shame or regret because that seems to be like the holdup. That's where we've got to work and, like you said, do the healing, counseling, whatever that looks like. Because if they don't fix that, that lack of trust, the lack of connection there, you're never going to get married. You're never going to make progress.

You're never going to share finances. We have to figure out what's going on that she doesn't feel comfortable enough to share that or what the wound is there? And once you get that, you may just realize like, wow, that was the one thing holding us back. Now we can get married, combine finances, and reach our goals together. And having coached people with those same kinds of things inside of marriage over the years, I've watched a lot of people have some real good healing experiences in the relationship by just working on that. And going, you know know when i went broke

you know my wife bless her heart she thought she married sir galahad turns out it was goober you know and so there's this crisis of confidence and it took a while for her to have trust yeah again well there's that and there is such shame and that's reasonable yeah there's such shame even when matt and i got engaged matt had always been a saver still is and he had a good savings account and i came in with debt like i was i was working on baby step two whenever he and i were dating you brought a negative net worth and he bought a positive yeah but it's embarrassing too to have to reveal that to sit i remember the first time we sat down and to accept it that he's gonna now you're gonna combine it and what he's done positively is gonna be damaged right by what

you've done negatively. Thankfully, I actually became debt-free the week before he proposed. He didn't know that the timing worked out that way, so I was on baby step two when we were dating. Okay. And then paid off my debt, the final debt, the very next week he proposed. So I was able to go into engagement debt-free. But what's interesting about that, let's say you hadn't. Right.

And you were going to bring debt in. Right. And he had positive savings. Right. Or it could be the other way around right lady man switch or switch that out but what's interesting is the one with savings doesn't worry about it yeah but the one with the debt is all jammed up about right because you're embarrassed it's it's like he said shamed right and because shame there's three negative emotions that drive people's money crazy shame and guilt and and so grace for yourself and

for the other people in your life around that is a big deal and uh and that's not being codependent it's not saying i'm going to continue to endorse your stupidity but because you had stupid somewhere in your past you give people shame you know you, you give yourself grace and you give others grace in that. And then the other one's cynicism, which is where people have been messed over by money people and they're, you know, they immediately think anybody talking about money is a shyster. You know, so Dave Ramsey is a snake oil salesman, all that BS, right? So, but the point is, is that there's a, you know, he's really on to something there, Casey

is, with recognizing that in her and that gives you an opportunity because all relationships are growing or they're dying and so there's no there's no just in the middle and so it's what i'm encouraging you here is to push on this in a you know it's like in a healing way yeah that causes take some steps that cause healing and that'll move you towards marriage or it'll move you away from this relationship one of the two right and one of the two needs to happen yeah because it's just hanging out thing it's there it's not got positive implications for your future yeah and that's the reason the budgeting conversation hasn't gone well anyway so when he's tried to bring it up it's been this kind of digging heels in because there's this information, this holdup, this kind of barrier between them.

So I agree. I think if they fix that, then it's going to open up a lot more clarity about the future. The thing is, Casey, the reason we're talking about this so at length is that your situation is like everybody. Very common. That's right. Yeah, it's everybody. And so we've got 17 million people listening to this discussion right now. And this applies to 15 million of them. I mean, it's like somewhere in there, people are having this discussion. It's the number one cause of

divorce and disagreement is money and money fights. Because when you cannot agree on your dreams and your fears, you can't agree on hardly anything. And it's all reflected in your money. Christy Wright is my co-host today here on The Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. We'll be right back. Christy Wright, Ramsey personality, joins us as our co-host today here on the Dave Ramsey Show. Rebecca is next, and Rebecca's in California. Hi, Rebecca. How are you? Hi, Rebecca. I mean, hi, Rebecca. Oh, my gosh. Hi, Dave.

Hi. Thank you for taking my call. Welcome. How can we help? So I'm calling because my husband shows up last week from work and he says that he wants to buy a $5,000 gun. We just got out of debt. We handed in the fleeces. We purchased our first car cash and we are stocking up money, piling up money to buy a house. And I have a dream killer now because he thinks that he should be able to buy this $5,000 gun. So I just wanted to get both of your point of view on this. So you're out of debt, you have your emergency fund, and you would have the $5,000 beyond that, but it would come out of your down payment fund

for your house. Am I understanding you right? Correct. Yep. We have about $72,000 saved, but we're still, we live in California, so it costs a lot to buy a house here. So that's just scratching the surface of buying a house. We probably need to save more along the lines of $150,000 for a 20% down on a home here. Okay. What's your household income? We make about $145,000 a year between my husband and I. And is there anything unique about this particular purchase? I mean, it's a custom gun, and he sort of new to the, he's sort of new to it all. He has a few that he's purchased, but I mean, it just, we've been like gazelle intense

for the past year and a half. And so I'm feeling a little, a little like, Hey, that's a little fair. You get to buy a $5,000 gun. What about my $5,000 or you know we've really been we've really really been to go on 10 feet past here so it just didn't kind of off to buy a five thousand dollar gun we're still in the middle of trying to buy a house right well you're at the stage that you would buy items if you wanted to um but it's it's it's just so fresh off the back of the debt snowball that it feels weird, I'm sure. It does. So, you know, I think if you came in and said, I want to buy a $5,000 Louis Vuitton, he might have a double backflip.

Woody? I think so. I mean, well, okay, so I posted back to him, and I said, well, what about, you know, I'm not a bad person, I'm a bad gal, well, what about, you know, I'm not a bad person. I'm a bad gal. I just want to, you know, I really want a house. That's really what I want. So I'm like, you know, you're setting back our goals by you wanting to buy this gun.

I mean, we could probably save $5,000 in two months and cash flow the gun. You have the $5,000 now. You'd put it back in the $72,000, right? We do. We do. We do. So that's not the issue, but the issue is just a matter of priorities. So here's what Sharon and I learned.

We decided it's not no, it's just which one comes first. So we got in an argument like this about the time we were at the same place you were. She was driving a god-awful, nasty old blue Astro van with 900 million miles on it. You know the two-tone blue ones? Like redneck ugly. You know what I'm talking about. And if you're driving one out there, I'm sorry, but it were redneck ugly when we had one, too. And it was newer back then. So she's driving that, and she wants to upgrade to a Suburban.

She's got a house full of kids. And, you know, we're off the back end of this bankruptcy stuff. We're starting to make some money. And I'm like, you know, $20,000 or whatever the stinking thing was, I can do a lot of work at the office for that. And I was wanting to do some investing and stuff here at Ramsey, and she's wanting to buy this car. And so, you know, we got in this big thing about

it and what we finally sat down and figured out was it's just a matter of when yeah and so she got the car first and and then uh as soon as that was done then I'd got to do the investing at the office but it wasn't like we said you know you can do one but can't do the other right or there's something evil or wrong about buying a five thousand dollar. That would be really hypocritical on my part because I own several. But the one I carry on my hip is about that. So, I mean, I'm sympathetic with him, but I'm also sympathetic with you. And I will tell you sometimes when I get a $5,000 gun, it does cost me a Louis Vuitton occasionally. It's a deal you make.

It's a good trade-off. But that's way late in the baby step seven game, right? So I think you guys just need to talk through, you know, are you willing to wait on other luxury purchases to get the house? This is a luxury purchase is all it is, which in and of itself is not evil. Rebecca, is he the spender? He is the spender. He loves to spend, and I've sort of been the,

he was the one with the leases and all the debt and all the stuff. So the reason I ask that is because you have a little bit of money, and I'll tell you, I'm the spender in my marriage, and as soon as we had our emergency fund and started to save up some money, when you have a little money, if you're the spender, you're like, but I got it. What's the big deal? It's very tempting to get more careless because you have a little bit. Like Dave said, this purchase is not evil. It's not a bad thing, but I think for him, he's looking at this savings account going, well, I've got the money.

What's the big deal? But you're looking at it from a goals perspective priority i wonder if there's almost a compromise to kind of like dave said not the necessary bag for gun trade right now but does it have to be nothing or a five thousand dollar gun or could he get excited you said he's new to guns maybe he could get a five hundred dollar gun there's cool guns for five hundred dollars or nine hundred dollars that wouldn't set you back so much that would scratch that itch of him he's already got some of those um there's a there's a i wonder if it might work if not if not if not then i think you have the conversation about like you said what comes first in priorities because to you you're looking at it as this is going to set you back but he's looking at it like hey we've got

the money what's the big deal here here's the good part of the whole discussion a you're discussing it b you're going to pay cash for whatever you do and you're going to be in agreement if you can continue on that pattern you will be successful with money regardless and so it could be that you're saying that you know i'd like to go on a five thousand dollar trip well that would be okay and delay the house down payment by five thousand dollars that would be okay too that's back when payment by $5,000. That would be okay, too. That's back when people traveled. You remember those days. Right.

And so I would say cruise, but we would all laugh out loud right now. But as an example, you could spend that $5,000 a lot of different ways, but in any of those cases it would be okay, but you're choosing to delay your house by that little bit amount when you do that. So one last idea is um i would either say wait until after the house but maybe you just say you know when we get to uh you know we're 72 now we need 150 is our goal when we get to x between now and 150 maybe we stop there and you have a splurge and he has a splurge, and then we reengage the house thing or something like that.

Maybe there's a couch that you want to buy. I don't know. Whatever it is. Because none of those things at your stage are out of line with what we teach. They're wise purchases. They're fine purchases. It's just a matter of what you want. What you said, Christy, is exactly right.

What do you want? What does he want? And the good news is we talk about it and certainly on an expensive thing like that it's good to know who's the saver and spender though because when i went back to my marriage matt and i i'm the spender he's the saver if matt came to me and said i want to buy a five thousand dollar gun i wouldn't even question that purchase because he never he never wants to spend money it's such a big deal when he does that that's such a uh out of character thing it's such an exciting thing like yeah what's this purchase let's let's you know make sure we've got the savings and so on but for me i have to know my temptation which is usually to rein it in because i'm the spender so

for you to know you're part of the discussion too yeah you know it's a good thing to say out loud look um i'm the i'm the tightwad and so i'm the no person the dream killer i don't want to be that person but you also don't want to be the spender that runs us back into the hole we just got out of yeah because a lot of those purchases were you and when you bring this pattern to me it scares me yeah and that's a fair thing to say yeah to know what your weak spots are yeah and so um you know sharon and i have had those discussions because i'm the spender and she would say you know when you're doing this or acting this way it's reminding me of back when we went bankrupt yeah and uh it's like it like opens up that wound yeah you know and so just have that discussion just talk about it out

loud then you can walk through and come up with plans to get some stuff you know whether whether it's a couch a gun a purse a trip i don't care or a house none all of those things are proper there's not like you're an absolute idiot for doing one of those others it's not this is the stage that you would do those things at but only when you both feel good about it and honestly rebecca you might be more concerned about his pattern of spending than you are this actual purchase it might be bothering that it's looking like it did before like it did with sharon so good good discussion thank you for calling in this is the d Ramsey Show. Hey, it's Kelly, associate producer and phone screener for the Dave Ramsey Show.

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