The Ramsey Show - App - Is It Okay To Ask My Kids To Help Pay Bills? (Hour 3)

Episode Date: April 23, 2024

Девочка-пай Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Camel, joined by Rachel Cruz. This is your show, America. Call us up at 888-825-5225, and we'll help you take the right next step for your life and your money. Megan joins us up first, or maybe let's go to Sarah first in St. Louis. How's that?

Sarah, how are you doing? I'm very well. How are you? We're doing great. How can we help? So I have a question as far as involving children in the household finances when the father loses their job. When did that happen? So my husband lost his job. It's been a year in March and we had gone through Financial Peace University a year, well, we went in in 2019, I think is when we took the class. And we were in a pretty good situation and the job loss just came out of nowhere. And we have been stacking up credit card debt, I guess, for about six months

now. He had cashed in an annuity to kind of help pay for current bills. But just to get to the point of it all, I have basically three adults living. The kids are three adults. The oldest son is 26. Daughter is 22. Youngest son is 18, full-time college student. Just wanting to use this really as an educational point for my kids to show them what really happens when you lose a job and when you are looking at digging into your retirement. And I'm just curious, you know, is that a bad parent call? Good parent call? Sarah, why hasn't he worked in a year? Has it been a year? Oh my gosh. He has been interviewing and, you know, you think he's got two and three interviews,

thinks it's a done deal, and we think it's going to go back to normal. And it has been truly devastating. But have you guys had no income at all? Like he hasn't even done Uber or like there's been no income? Correct. Well, I mean, I work part-time. We had savings. Well, yeah, okay, okay. Why aren't both of you working full-time, doing anything? Yeah. Well, I mean, that is, you know, that is what it's pretty much come to now. I have been looking for a second job for probably two and a half, three months now. I work part-time for a financial advisor.

Okay, and what was he doing? He is in sales and has been extremely successful in sales since he graduated college. So this is just completely not in our, just completely unexpected. And he is just, you know, going down this rabbit hole of what in the world are we going to do? I mean, sales are largely commissioned jobs, so it's kind of like you get the job and then let's see what you got. Well, it's salary plus commission, but yes. What kind of selling was he doing? Is what he's looking for so high up income-wise? Yeah, it's $150,000 to $200,000. Plus commission on top of that? His base is that? His base is 150 to 175, yeah. I mean, I would take 75 over 175. I would take 75 over zero. So can he go do something for now

and work his way back up? He has had two different companies say that they didn't want to hire him for what he wanted, but they said anything lower than that. They did not want to hire him because he is overqualified. They would not even consider him. Okay. Okay. I think, um, so my, yeah, I think for you guys, Sarah, you and your husband, regardless of the kids or not. Yeah. I think you guys are coming to that point of realizing, oh my gosh, we got to do, we have to do something, right? We have to do something. And that I hate that it's taken a year and cashing in retirement and all of that. So almost my conversation with the kids is, hey, mom and dad messed up this year, right? I mean, I think that you guys both can look at, and then that's not a shameful thing. It's not

you as people, but our actions when it came to money, that we were on the sidelines for too long. And we made decisions because we just didn't go get X, Y, and Z job. Dad didn't just go get X, Y, and Z job. And because of that, we racked up credit card debt. We cashed in retirement. We've gone so far backwards because of this job loss, which I know is excruciating. A job loss is like a punch to the gut. And especially if you're making high money you know i i totally hear that i i don't want to i don't want to be insensitive to that but do i do say i kind of want you guys to wake up and say like you can't do this like this can't be you obviously have sustainable but that would be my conversation to the kids if you lose a job you're an uber driver the next day right i mean you have to bring in income to pay bills and

that may be humbling yourself because you were this top-notch sales guy making 400 grand, half a million a year. And your life just looks a lot different in the meantime. We want you to get, you know, him to get back to that place for sure. But I don't know, there's just a... What is the 22 and 26 year old doing? Are they working full-time? So, yes. So the 22 year old, she's sitting out college. She does work full time. Um, the oldest one, he just got his like first big boy job and he's getting ready to actually move out of the house. Um, but you know, like each kid, like

their cars are paid off. They pay us, you know, they pay us for car maintenance. The oldest one does pay the rent, like I said. So they are, like even the boys are, like they've set up Roth IRAs for themselves. Yeah. So I think for that conversation, Sarah, for my kids, again, for a season, them being home, if there's a big transition happening. But for their dignity's sake, you know, there's just, even though you have a Roth IRA, there's something about growing up that when you live on your own, it just happens. It forces you. And I know this is such a stupid example. I don't know

why I always use this example, but it's almost like you look in the fridge and there's no milk. And when you're on your own in an apartment, you're like, well, crap, I got to go to the grocery store and get milk versus mom, you know, it's these like, it's those like small things to the big things that really force you to be an adult. And you make different decisions. You think critically, you think in a different way. Right. So like all of that. And now if they're there for a season to hit some number or goal and you guys agree on it and there's a time frame, like all about it. But I think for the dignity of your kids sarah i would i would have a conversation to say for the good of them and they're obviously really smart i mean they're doing really well um but i think that that extra

step for them is good you know yeah well that's really i think that's really what i wanted to hear and what i thought because anytime you can educate your children on something, a major life change is good. But I also feel guilty because they are so responsible and they do pay for certain things. And I would feel bad to go, hey. You're not harming. I don't think you're harming them. I think you're actually loving them really well as a 26-year-old adult. And it doesn't have to be you're harming them. I think you're actually loving them really well as a 26-year-old adult. And it doesn't have to be you asking them for money.

It could just be, listen, we need to cut back. Mom and dad, we're not doing great financially right now, and here's the areas we're going to cut back on, and here's how this might affect you. And at least that's a baseline. Yeah, but I think I would still hold my line, Sarah, with them, regardless of your situation or not, right? I think regardless of y hold my line, Sarah, with them, regardless of your situation or not, right? I think regardless of y'all's financial struggle, for just their sake, like, you know, there's a part of me that I don't want them to feel like, oh, we're having to move out because of mom and dad's situation. Even though that's part of it, they're moving out because they're 26 years old, you know?

Right, right. They're leaving, right? And I don't think that would be an issue. Yeah, totally, totally. How much debt do you have, Sarah? What's the total amount? Just, I mean, for credit cards, about $25,000. Okay, step one, we got to cut these cards up,

and we need to go to work. Yes, non-negotiable. If that's delivering pizzas, Uber, it does not matter. We need to swallow our pride and bring in income. We cannot keep going into debt. Wishing you guys the best. For sure, Sarah. We're cheering you guys on. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Campbell, joined by Rachel Cruz. Our question of the day comes from Emma in Georgia. What does Emma have to say, Rachel? She says, I met one of your financial coaches who was absolutely wonderful.

So glad. I'd like to begin the six-month coaching sessions, but I have to get my husband on board first. How do I convince someone that is a live in the moment, I might die tomorrow, so spend my money today guy? That financial piece is actually worth it. I'm considering asking for marriage count, asking a marriage counselor, but I truly do not think that this is a marriage issue. I believe he needs to change his mindset to believe that sacrifice and living a

debt free life is worth it before we can begin our journey. Otherwise I'm just dragging someone kicking and screaming and that's not going to work. I've tried to get him to listen to your podcast but his excuse is i'm not interested in learning about money it's just it's just not interesting to me is what he says but then he'll complain about living paycheck to paycheck help wow this this sounds like a marriage issue because you're married to him i don't know how else to spin it. That is the reality. Yeah, and it's a marriage issue that he's not listening to his wife.

Can I say this? We do not have a perfect marriage. Never will I ever claim that Winston and I have a perfect marriage. But if I keep telling him something like, hey, this is like, I'm fearful in this area, or I'm like, I worry about this. If he's just like, wow, I don't care. I don't care. I'm like, you are such a jerk.

Like there's a point where you're like, oh my gosh. Not that he has to go and do every little thing that she wants, right? She may be the nerd in it. But there's a point that, yeah, it is a marriage issue. Because your husband is an opposite too, right? Like if this was a guy and he's like, and my wife doesn't care,

I'd be like, your wife is kind of a jerk. Like, I don't know. Does that make sense? Like with Whitney, like if you, like if she kept saying something to you that she's like and my wife doesn't care i'd be like your wife is kind of a jerk like i don't know does that make sense like with whitney like if you like if she kept saying something to you that she's like really worried this really matters to me and i was like well it doesn't to me so i don't care sounds like a personal problem i mean she's not asking him to go to yoga class with him right this is your personal finances this is your money goals and then he complained yeah it sounds like immaturity and then he complains about living paycheck to paycheck and i'm like well you can't have your cake and eat it too yeah that's the saying i think this is a symptom of other communication issues with their marriage value

issues with their marriage so i would absolutely work with a marriage counselor to get to the root of this because you nagging him as as you kind of call it is not working yeah and if he's unwilling to communicate i think having a third party there to point out some things that maybe he's not realizing that could hit him in a different way. That's not his wife. I think that could help. For sure. And the truth is people that engage in this process of becoming debt free, you have to like really believe, right? Like there's a point that you're like, oh my gosh, like this is something that I is really important to me because it's not going to happen. We always say you can wander your way into debt you can't wander your way out right there's a very

intentional plan there's some sacrifice involved things have to change like in order to become debt-free those things have to be true and so obviously this is very important to her and it's important to him because he's complaining about it yeah right so i mean this stinks we're living paycheck to paycheck yeah but to engage in a debt-free process you're not just like yeah that'd be fun sure why not it's because like oh my gosh i have a level of fear or i have a level of anxiety with my money or i hate so much that i work so hard and we have nothing to show for like there's a deep motivation in emma to get to this point it's not this flippant thing in life yeah like, like, oh, I just want to go to a yoga class. So the fact that your husband is not taking the weight

of what you are talking about seriously, that's a marriage issue, Emma. A hundred percent. I mean, you're either growing together or growing apart. And in this case, as she begins this financial journey solo, it's going to cause a rift in their marriage. Yeah, and you can't, I mean, like, if you are trying to get out of debt,

but he's taking the money and going deeper into it. Doing what he wants with it. You're not making progress. I mean, you you can't, I mean, like, if you are trying to get out of debt, but he's taking the money and going deeper into it. Doing what he wants with it. You're not making progress. I mean, you really can't. Yeah. So I would absolutely seek the help of a marriage counselor. Because it is a marriage issue, Emma. And get him involved in the coaching and saying, you're going to sit here and you're going to be involved.

And you're going to like it because I care about our future and I hope you do too. Yeah. So that's a tough one. It's a journey. Sorry, one. It's a journey. It's a journey. There's a lot of people out there though where one spouse is

gung-ho and one doesn't care and that's a hard, that's a hard place to be. And it can take time. Sure, totally. Yep,

yep. All right, let's go to the phone. Zach is in Atlanta, Georgia. Zach, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Are you with us, Zach? Did we lose you already?

Hello? Hey. There he is. How can we help? Hey. Sorry about that. It's all good. Just a quick question for you guys.

Me and my fiance are looking at marriage. We're getting married in August. Career change is coming up for me. She's working a study nine to five. We're seeking premarital counseling, but we're really trying to figure out a game plan for preparing financially for our future so both have college degrees um but we want to figure out tangible steps so we can do now so that we can live

comfortably later on for prepping for kids and uh grand, buying a house, things like that. So just wanted to get you guys. Nice. Wow, grandkids. Zach, you guys are planners. Okay, so four months to the wedding. Congratulations. Is it paid for already? The parents, so her parents will be paying for it.

Wonderful. That's awesome. And do you guys have any debt? Nope, zero debt. Okay, and how much do you have in savings? So I've got about $51,000 liquid. Okay. And I have another $13,000 in a 401k. She has about $10,000 in her 401k and $62,000 liquid. Good night, Zach. So between the two of you, you guys have $113,000 of cash? Correct. That's awesome. So let's call that your emergency fund plus some down payment?

Yeah, we all want to buy a house soon. Right, right. We've been looking. We're a little, I mean, we tore it up looking for houses probably three or four months ago, just seeing if we could even get close to what we wanted. And we came up short every time because interest rates are killer. We're really, the core of it is the 20% it would take us to get out of PMI is quite a chunk of that.

So, I mean, sure, we do have $113,000, but 20% on a $400,000 house would basically eat us alive. So we were trying to figure out a great game plan. Yeah, and I honestly wouldn't advise buying a house in your first year of marriage anyways. I would just go find an apartment and rent and just kind of be married, enjoy that season. Because the great thing about renting is if stuff happens, if things break, it's all fixed for you. You don't have that burden of homeownership right away. And so I do think renting somewhere for a year or two, I think is fine.

And then be looking at what you guys can buy. What do you guys make a year together? Sure. So I make, together, we're about $160,000. $160,000. That's great. And with no debt, how much can you sock away in a year with that kind of income? Right, right.

I mean, our goal is to- Can I save up another 60 grand, 70 grand, 80 grand? Exactly. About half of that earnings. Yeah. How old are you guys? She's really frugal, which is a blessing. I am 27, and she is turning 25 this year.

Okay, great. And neither of you own a home right now, obviously. That's correct. Okay, yeah. Yeah, I would wait a year, Zach. Keep piling up that money, and then there's, yeah, and then have a great down payment. And even if you don't hit that 20%, I mean, we say for first-time homebuyers, it could even be 5% if that gives you a little bit more breathing room. But I mean, a great goal for sure is that 20% because of PMI. But yeah, y'all are in a fantastic place. But that would be my next goal is to look for that home. And then get it paid off while enjoying your life,

investing 15%, paying off the mortgage that puts you in baby steps four and six. Obviously, you don't have kids yet. But once that happens, you'll be funding that college and it sounds like you're in a great spot. Yeah. And it's even small things. I remember even when we got married, we didn't have enough furniture to fill some of the rooms in our house um so you know you think about furniture budgets right and you're like yeah we want to we want to furnish you know our house and we want to go on a great trip with friends or you know i don't know what the what all the stuff is that you guys want to do with your life but um you get the honeymoon already planned and paid for yeah we're getting

close to putting the final stamp on it so yeah where are you guys going paid for it yeah but uh it's wedding planning is a little crazy as you guys probably already know but we're between a cruise nice and cheap or flying out to europe and just kind of having ourselves like a five six thousand dollar budget just to have a little bit of fun with that's so fun gosh you guys are so wonderful i'm so excited for you and we're going to gift you as a little uh premarital counseling slash wedding gift financial peace university so you both can use that for the next year along with every dollar i think you're i mean the sky's the limit yep this is like the poster children of oh my gosh you're like what should i do to get step right financially you've done it you're out of debt with money in the bank. This is what everyone wishes their marriage started off with. I know. Well done, Zach. A pile

of money, no stress. Just enjoy getting to know each other. It's great. So fun. Enjoy Europe or the cruise. Oh, to be young again. Oh, to be young again. This is The Ramsey Show. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. It is National Financial Literacy Month, and this month we're celebrating teachers. The teachers of America, they love our kids well. They work hard. They're helping to shape the future by making sure our kids get the education they need to succeed with whatever life throws at them. And here at Ramsey, we want to say thank you to all of those teachers with a teacher appreciation giveaway sponsored by Ramsey Education.

So one teacher will win a $5,000 vacation. They can do whatever they want with that and go wherever they want. And we have two additional teachers receiving a $3,000 vacation. That's nothing to shake a fist at, Rachel, to wherever they choose. So this is completely free. No purchase is necessary. You just need to go enter at ramsesolutions.com slash teacher and enter today for your chance to win.

So let a teacher know in your life. We love our teachers. We, our kids, I was, I said something on Instagram. People were like, your kids go to public school. And I was like, yes, because our experience with our little public school here in Williams County, you know, in Nashville. And to be fair, this county has some of the best schools in the nation. It does.

And every teacher we've had, I was just texting with one earlier. They're just amazing. Like they're the most amazing human beings and the staff and all of it. So all of you teachers out there, I know people have their opinions with everything, but you're just amazing. So there's some great teachers that I feel like sometimes, you know, they don't get the cred. That's right.

So George, I'm hosting the show on Thursday and then I'm getting in a car. I'm driving to Atlanta. Oh, that's right. It's my last book signing for my book. I'm glad for where I am. My new kids book that's out. I was out all last week on tour with New York and Phoenix and L.A. and Dallas. And my last stop is in Atlanta.

So on Friday, if you're in Atlanta, Mansellsell Crossing the Barnes and Noble there from 1 to 2 o'clock in Atlanta on Friday I will be there to hang out with you guys and sign books say hi to your kids we did a little story time so many kids about 75 kids showed up in Dallas with their parents I know so we did a big story time

and it was so fun so Atlanta make sure to come hang out on Friday Friday afternoon. How do you land the story time? Like when you finish, are you showing the pictures with each one? I do. And I talk to them. You know, I'm a mom.

I got these kids. So yeah, we talk about what we're grateful for, who brought you to this book signing because the whole book is about your family, really. That that's the foundation of like our gratitude. It's the things that money can't buy to really start there with our gratitude. And so they're so cute though. Kids funny were there any uh like older kids yeah some yeah they're

like i'm 18 right yeah some are teenagers with their moms and they're like hi and then a few just great you know strangers with no kids who just wanted to say hi yeah and they came with other books that we have and signed those met met them. That's sweet. Yeah, whether you have kids or not, come on out. It was so fun meeting all you guys on the road last week. And a lot of them listen to this show. They listen to Smart Money Happy Hour, George. Love it. I know.

It's so fun to be out in other cities and hang out with you guys. So Atlanta, come on out. Can't wait. All right. Let's get to the phones. Megan is in Vancouver, Canada. What's happening, Megan? Hi, George. Hi, George.

Hi, Rachel. I'm just calling. So my husband and I got married in September 2022. We were lucky enough in October 2022 to win a million dollars through the Canadian lottery. Whoa, my gosh. Yeah. That's amazing.

Oh, my gosh. Yeah. That's amazing. Oh, my gosh. Was it one of those that you had to, like, pick numbers, like the Powerball here in America? Or what is it? Scratch-off ticket? To be honest, it was a $10 ticket that we bought because my husband had just switched from oil field services and wanted to try a different industry and be home. So we were making a joke at a gas station, and it was the third ticket i've ever bought and i just yeah that is so wild okay so this was back in october of 2022 it was yeah so do you take a do you take a lump sum or payments like how do they do it in can? In Canada, there's no taxes or anything.

There's no taxes on the lottery? No. So you actually got a million dollars. Should we move to Canada? And it was a lump sum? They just wire it to your bank? Write you a check? To be callous, I picked it up at a shopper's

drug mart at a pharmacy because they send it as a check in the mail. Wow. Okay. So you deposit a million dollars into your bank account. What happened to it? Yeah. Is it still there? Is there any still left or Megan's just go crazy? There's actually quite a bit left. And so that's where my husband and I have kind of two different ways that we're thinking of approaching it. So just to start off, we did pay our home outright and got rid of our mortgage. Amazing. So that was $350,000.

We did get a newer to us but still used vehicle, which was $25,000. And then we paid off. Luckily, we worked through my entire education. So I didn't have any student loans or credit card debt. So we did just have $25,000 in vehicle loan as well. Oh, my gosh. So you guys have like $650-ish left? Yeah.

So then we did put some into our RFPs, $25,000 each. And then right now we have about $550,000 that's still liquid. Wow. Okay. You can do whatever you want with it. Is it in a savings account? It's in a high-yield savings right now. The interest per month is really not doing that well.

It's probably, well, it's like $1,000, I think, a month, roughly around there. What's the interest rate on the account? They tell me that it's 4%, but that doesn't make sense. I would look into that. You might want to move the money. Yeah, and is it FDIC? I mean, I don't know what you have over there.

We have FDIC insured, so your money's insured up to a certain amount in that account. Yes, yeah, I think there is some there as well. To be honest, I still really haven't done too much on that end, which is really a fault of mine. I've kind of just been sitting there trying to decide what we should do going forward, which is why we're calling you. Okay. So you said you had two different opinions here. invest in a portfolio and have someone manage it. And then I actually, we, there is a rental property in our area that we could buy. And there's, if someone currently as a tenant,

and then we would just assume the tenant and do a little bit of renovations as things gone on, have gone on, but I'm hoping that we could do like a 15 year plan. But overall goal for us is to get out of like city limits and have land. So my thought is to have our house now and the other rental property help pay towards the mortgage as well as our salaries, um, towards the land. Whereas my husband's thought is if we invest in a portfolio, um, we would still have like less liquid cash because there is a $500,000

minimum investment with the person that we found that's fairly reputable. Okay. How soon do you guys want to move? Yeah, we, I mean, in an ideal world, we'd like to move sooner rather than later. I just want to be realistic about it. How much would it be? I'm just curious, like to get what you want, land and everything. Like, I don't know. I just know real estate's expensive everywhere, but what would it be? Yeah. So when I've looked at properties that we're actually interested in, it's probably 800 to 900,000. Okay. What's your current home worth? So we just had an assessment, yearly assessment. So I would say probably 365.

It's gone up since we bought it. Okay. So if you sold your house plus the cash you have in the bank, you could purchase this land and live your dream today. Yes. I think what I always get worried about is like we, with this other rental property, it would also be paid out. And then if we have both of those paying towards our acreage with our salaries, we would be fairly comfortable.

And then we would also have those as like long-term investments. But that would require you guys. I don't love going back into debt at this point. Yeah, you'd go back into debt with that plan. Okay. Okay. So your best advice would be to just sell the house that we're in. Yeah. But then all of your money though. So the only thing, Megan, it's all tied up in just

one house, right? And so for me... Other than appreciation, it's not going to make you any money. Yeah. I would want a little bit more of diversification and I would want some of this money be making money for me, right? I'm like, there's something about it earning, you know, interest that you guys may be able to use to help with lifestyle in general, right? Or to move towards something you want. Right. So, yeah, I mean, the real estate's a great investment. I don't think that you guys could go wrong necessarily

either way with the rental property or putting it in the markets. I think we'd say both if you run the numbers correctly could get you what you want. And it also depends on your age, your nest egg, what your retirement goals are. So that's something to think about as well as you calculate all of this and figure out the next steps. I want to make sure that if you wanted to stop working at some point, you could and not just be stuck in this dream home that you now can't sustain. And so make sure that you're still putting away money in retirement, that you're going to retire with a million, two million, whatever your nest egg goal is, and you have this beautiful dream home. But wow, what a story. That's great. That is wild. Canadian lottery.

Who would have thunk it? Our scripture of the day, Proverbs 4. 4 26 watch the path of your feet and all your ways will be established taylor swift once said that's a left field uh left turn right there rachel taylor said even if you're happy with the life you've chosen you're still curious about the other options oh do you know what that is that a lyric? That reminds me of one of my, and I'm going to make James answer this because he has a mic. That's one of my favorite questions to ask people. Here's a great dinner question.

If you want to get to know something. You love a dinner question. I love a good dinner question. If you're ever at dinner, invite Rachel because she will get the table talking. Is if you were to wake up and have a completely different life, different job, everything, what would it be?

James would be a musician wouldn't you you'd be like part of a band yeah totally yeah you'd be part of a band i think he'd be a music critic though it's more fun for him to critique and judge than to actually make art i'm not right now what would you do george if you were to wake up tomorrow and you had a completely different life single not married you can do whatever you want whatever oh gosh well i feel like i would want to be married to whitney still that's great i mean that's probably good okay i'd probably i'd probably want to host like a late night show you know that's good yeah the desk the crowd the vibe yeah it'd be super fun how about you that's good uh i would be a political correspondent

oh wow yeah for like a network which network can you travel i would do anyway i would be very open i'd bring my unbiased opinions. Wow. To biased networks. I think you'd have to create your own network for that, Rachel. I know. But like travel to all the campaigns and like report on. Ramsey News Network, RNN. Yeah.

I don't know. I think it'd be interesting. That's fun. There you go. Where did that come from Taylor Swift? Because she said, even though you love your life, you want to know other options. And I would live in Manhattan. That's what I would be doing for sure with Winston.

That's good. I'm glad you still chose Winston. See, I was like, is this a trick question that's going to get me in trouble? No. I'm not falling for it. No, no. Oh, that's fun. That's a good dinner question.

That is something that you like to do. Dave is not fun to play with, though. He's like, I choose my life. My life's great. That's exactly what he says. He's like, I just be me and I'm like you are so grumpy you gotta be creative Dave

what would you be like a water skier or like a scuba diver instructor I don't know all your his weird habits that he has are not weird but he has some

he's lots of lots of hobbies he has lots of hobbies but he would just be him there you go America that's a free Ramsey dinner combo for you

that's Dave's children's book I'm glad for who i am there it is it's just dave on the cover smiling thumbs up if you can't be dave be you that's the second best thing that's so good what a story that would be all right i'm glad he's not listening all right let's go to that's fine andrea in little rock save us from ourselves andrea how are you doing i'm doing good how are you i'm doing well how can we help you All right, let's go to Andrea. Andrea in Little Rock. Save us from ourselves, Andrea. How are you doing? I'm doing good. How are you?

I'm doing well. How can we help you today? Okay, so I basically have two kind of basic questions. I'm trying to see how we can save money to fund our dream and also stop living paycheck to paycheck. So the basics are my husband makes about $3,500 minimum a month bring home, and our expenses are around $3,400. I'm a stay-at-home mom. I homeschool our kids.

And we've gotten very blessed on our rent is below. We pay a lot much lower than most people in our area. I'm on level for all of our bills so we have like a set amount every month um and we still cannot figure out how to really save and our goal is to own land and build our own home on one day and we have already purchased the land we've saved and been able to do that um so we own the land we just need to start saving now for being able to build on it and a little bit of backstory is we were um homeless at one point and we ended up getting money to be able to stay in a hotel and then everything we were making was going into living in a hotel and then we just both worked our butts off to say, to be able to finally get a house. And we started from the ground up. So, but now we're like in this cycle of paycheck

to paycheck. And it's a lot of anxiety for us, obviously, because we know what it's like, uh, to be at the bottom and we don't want to do that again. Wow. Um, do you guys, it is do you guys have do you guys have debt no no debt okay um is the land paid for in cash yep where did you guys get the money for that um saving and then we got a little bit of a tax return so we pretty much took all of that and invested it into the land and paid it all in cash okay what kind of home are you in now or how much you owe on it? And which is it worth? We are renting. We rent. Okay. Okay. And we've looked at like, you know, to see if there's something cheaper in the area. And like I said, the landlord, um, he needed a lot of work done to it before we moved in. So he really kind of looked out for us. And most of the other houses in our area are four or five hundred dollars more per month so yeah are you guys investing at all right now no we were um and then you know

like i said when we kind of lost everything uh that kind of went out the window because we had to pull everything out to survive so we're like literally starting all the way over totally and i don't want to be a dream killer in this because I think building a home on that land is a very reasonable dream. Right. And I think that it can happen. I just think it may take longer for you guys. And so I think some patience because what I want for you all is to have a level of stability that you just don't have right now, because even though you don have debt you are still paycheck to paycheck do you guys have any savings um we have about 500 in savings right now so what i would do i think what's gonna i think what's gonna yeah relieve a lot of this anxiety because that is that i i mean that's yeah that's an anxious place to be um is to up that so i think all of your goal is to get three to six months of expenses saved before anything else happens. And that may mean that he's going to be working extra.

It may mean that he even, I don't know, what the jobs are in your area, even looking for something that may not be his dream job or what he loves. But if you can get something that's paying even 10 grand, 15 grand more a year, you know what I mean? Because you guys kind of,

you are at that fine line that if something were to happen, you know, I mean because you guys kind of you are at that fine line that if something were to happen you know I mean that $500 can go very quick so I would be doing some extra stuff and even for you I know you're home homeschooling the kids but if there's anything from an online standpoint I find a lot of moms are really great at administration and so even if there's a virtual assistant job that you can work, maybe it's 15 hours a week and you can do that at night to help. I don't know. I'm trying to give you some options, but it's probably going to require upping income because I think you guys are at a low point expenses wise. I don't know how much more expenses you can cut.

If you look at the budget, there's nowhere else to cut. I mean, you can reshop insurance, you can nickel and dime, get the grocery costs down to see, can you get that down to 3000 of expenses? That way you've freed up, you know, 500 bucks a month because saving a hundred bucks a month, that's just not enough margin to do anything, whether it's emergency fund or otherwise. And so you guys are just too tight. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. I'm sorry. I'm done. I was just going to say that's one thing I have looked into is I have a doctor, a medical issue. I have to go to the doctor for every month. And we did not have insurance because we didn't think we could afford it. So I've had to pay $500 out of pocket every month.

And I finally figured out how to get insurance and do all that. And it's going to cost about $110 a month for the whole family with the tax credit. And then we'd have a co-pay. So it'll be like $150 a month with the insurance and the co-pay, which will save us a good amount. So we're going to, starting May 1st, we will finally be able to cut back there. Does his job have any benefits um so when he had an opportunity for the open enrollment and we didn't take it so we would have to wait um other than that he was working through a temp service and he's now in the process of being hired on so i don't know it was like attempt to hire so i don't know if once he's hired on you know other

doors will open in that aspect but whenever they have he works a minimum of 50 hours a week um the last month they've been doing almost 70 so whenever there's overtime he takes it um yeah and then what kind of work is he in job he's a minor okay so and then like i said once he gets hired on officially his income will go at two dollars more per hour. And then I had a job PR in as a nursing assistant that helped us bring in some extra money every month. But with him working the later hours, they don't have openings for me to only come in for a few hours. So that's why we're like, we're kind of in a pinch either way we go.

And it may be a decision long term. I mean, this is personal, but putting the kids in school, if you're able to work full time and that helps you reach your financial goal of getting this dream home. Yeah. So there's lots to chew on and think about, but it's only two ways to skin this cat. It's spend less, make more. That's the way to get margin. And that's what you guys need right now to get the emergency fund, to invest 15 percent, to get this house. You got a lot of goals. And I would emotionally let the house be a few years out.

I think getting you guys grounded right now was the most important thing. Absolutely. That puts this hour of The Ramsey Show in the books. My thanks to Rachel Cruz, the co-host today. All the folks in the booth keeping the show afloat, the audio running. And you, America, thank you for watching. We'll be back before you next time.