The Ramsey Show - App - Is Living in a Van To Save Money a Little TOO Gazelle Intense? (Hour 3)

Episode Date: September 29, 2021

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Thank you very much. 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. I'm John Deloney, joined by George Camel, and we are taking your life on relationships, mental health, your finances, getting out of debt, trying to figure out what retirement vehicle is best for you. All of it.

It's going on in your house, in your home, in your hearts, everywhere. And we are here for you. 888-825-5225. This is your show, and we're here to walk alongside you. Some people say the advice is worth what you pay for it. Zero. Just make sure that's clear. It's free.

This is free. It's toll free. 888-825-5225. George, how's your world going, man? It's going great, John. Excellent. We had a great event last night. A lot coming up.

Fine print. I'm having a blast with that podcast. Yeah. I'm just happy to be here with you. It's pretty rare we get to host together, so I'm trying to cherish it. I know. And Ken Coleman sits between the two of us, and so. Oh, that's true.

At our actual desks, to make it clear. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's not underneath the desk right now. At our actual desks, yes. And so, yeah, it ends up we never get to talk. We never get to see each other. We never hang out except for this live in front of everyone. It's a big moment before this gets any weirder.

Let's go to Caleb in Fort Lauderdale. What's up, Caleb? Hey, how's it going? How's it going, guys? We're good, brother. What's up, dude? How can we help? Yeah, man.

So I'm out here in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I'm 21 years old. I'm a dad of a one-year-old. I have a girlfriend. I'm running out of an apartment for about like $1,200. I'm in debt for about, I want to say, 20, yeah, about 20 grand. Currently unemployed. I've been doing customer service for like the last three, four years.

And really, my general question would be obviously, you know, how to get out of debt, you know, be debt-free. And I've been having to do side jobs like Uber Eats and a couple of other side jobs, whatever I can find to be able to pay my bills because really my expenses are more than what I'm actually making. You're unemployed, so you're making basically zero, right? Yeah, currently, yeah.

I was just unemployed, yes. I was laid off yesterday. So now I'm kind of unemployed today yeah correct dude um i'm sorry that happened that's no good who who laid you off i mean not who not the company but what'd you get laid off from from customer service say that again you got laid off from your customer service job? That's right. Well, this was a sales position, but yeah. Okay. All right. So, 21, girlfriend, kid, 20 grand in debt, just got laid off, and you woke up today. Today feels heavy, huh?

Yeah, definitely, definitely. I mean, I've been kind of watching you guys for a little bit, and I was like man i gotta i gotta i gotta give him a call man i just don't know what to do right now um you know yeah yeah so what caleb what do you want to do man well um currently i mean i've been just looking for jobs you know like just moving yeah i got that i got that what do you want to do I'm currently, I mean, I've been just looking for jobs, you know, like just moving. No, no, no, no, no, no. Yeah, I got that. I got that.

What do you want to do? Like my future, my dream job? You're in a boat that has a big hole in it, and you've got a cup, and you're trying to bail the water out. And then you added a girlfriend. Then you added a one-year-old. And then somebody dropped a bigger hole in that boat. And what you're looking around for is another cop and what i'm asking you is what boat do you want to be in man two years from now

five years from now what do you want this thing to look like down the road stability man stability uh i know what do you want to do free what do you want to do well i would like to become a professional trader. I mean, that's something I really love doing, looking at charts and things like that. It may not be everyone's dream or anything, but I'd like to become a professional trader. A trader, T-R-A-D-E, like a stock trader? Yeah, correct, like a stock trader. Yeah, I'm really into that.

So what steps have you taken to become a stock trader? Well, I've done a lot of studying, but I know the biggest thing is if you want to make money, I mean, you kind of have to have money in order to trade and things like that. And I'm not going to be borrowing money to trade or anything like that. So I'm trying to essentially be able to build an account with money,

you know, saving that account to then be able to go ahead and start trading with little, little small sizes and, you know, be able to grow my account long-term, you know, within the next five, 10 years. So can I be honest with you? Yes, sir. That's real close to a get rich scheme, some kind of scam, some kind of shortcut to try to dig yourself out of

the hole that you're in. Now, wanting to trade stocks, wanting to be an investment banker, all that stuff's great, man. But when you've got a baby and a girlfriend and an apartment and $20,000 in debt, trying to build your portfolio over there on the side, you see what I'm saying? Right. So what things do you have? Man, you and I could talk for a while.

Here's what I'm worried about. I'm worried about you got a little baby there. You got a scared to death girlfriend. You have rent due. And you got a little baby there. You got a scared to death girlfriend. You have rent due. And you got to start figuring out, A, I got to get some money to go pay the bills right now. Whatever that looks like. Not one job, not two jobs, but three jobs. And at the same time, you're going to have to build some sort of, you said I've been doing some research.

You can't just get on the internet and Google stuff about how to trade stocks. You need to go learn about what that is. You need to take some finance classes. You need to get in there and learn. Does that make sense? Right, correct. And so you've got to get a game plan together that's going to be both, I need some cash right now, which means I've got to suck up all my pride,

all of it, and get after it. And I've got to make some stability plans with my family. And I got to start planning for the future. And brother, you got to do this all at the same time, which means for the next two, three, four, five years, you're going to be tired. You're going to go to bed exhausted because you're going to be working your butt off.

You're going to stay plugged into that kid. You're going to marry that girlfriend and you're going to connect your family together and you're going to start planting some roots. Does that sound exciting? Does that sound like, yeah, that's what I'm talking about? Or does that make you be like, no, bro, I just need to open an account. I can make trades. No, that sounds exactly like what I'd love to do. Are you currently day trading and stuff? What's going on on that side? No, no, no, no, no, no. I haven't traded a dollar in my money. Okay.

As of yet, yeah. How much cash do you have? I wouldn't want that. What's your cash position? Do you have any money? Probably, I mean, to be quite honest, about like 800 bucks in my checking account. That's about it. Okay. So, and what kind of debt is this $20,000?

That's an auto loan. That's an auto loan and uh yeah credit card are you underwater on the auto loan what's the car worth versus what you owe uh yeah the car is it's a fourth focus i'm i'm all about like i think like 13 at 13 and it's only worth like nine so i am a little debt little down i was thinking i mean i'm not sure if it's a great idea possibly about turning in the car and just paying whatever's left on it and just because because we do have a second car that's paid off but you know it's my girlfriend's mom she gave it to her yeah i was just thinking about just sticking car uh i mean at this point dude i'd rather you take that car um it's it's not worth a whole bunch of money. $9,000, I mean, you're in a mess right now.

I'd rather you take that car and start scratching and clawing. So this time tomorrow, you have a job somewhere. You've got a job somewhere to get some sort of income coming in. And then you're going to have a second job by the end of this week. And you're going to start looking at finance school, local community college classes. You're going to get plugged in there. And you and your girlfriend are going to go out and have a planning session and figure out what tomorrow and next month and next year is going to look like. People all over the country are discovering a faith-based and budget-friendly way of meeting health care costs through Christian Health Care Ministries. Thank you. CHM is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Live Events. This is the Ramsey Show, 888-825-5225. We're going to go out to Great Falls, Montana and talk to Joseph. Hey, brother Joseph, what's up?

Hello? Hey. Hey. We're here. Are you? Yes, sir. What's up, man? How can we help? Well, I wanted to find out we would like to try to do an Airbnb in our basement. We have a basement that's kind of separated from the rest of the house and wanted to see if a home equity line of credit would be something that would be good to do if i had a big buzzer i would hit it right now joseph what do you think you know what show you're calling i do walk me through what you're thinking trying to well we're trying to we have a basement that's not completed. It needs some finishing. And so we're trying to figure out a way in order to do that with the current budget that we have.

Are you unable to cash flow this over the next X amount of months? You're talking about as far as monthly payments go? No, no, no. I'm talking about... Could you pay for this renovation in cash? What would that take and how long? Well, we have not got a firm figure yet from the contractor, so I don't know. We're just estimating based on the little bit we know about renovations and it would take, I'm not sure what it would take. It'd probably take at least a year to year and a half, I'm guessing, to set aside to do the renovation. So here's what I'm not sure what it would take. It would probably take at least a year to a year and a half, I'm guessing, to set aside to do the renovation. So here's what I'm thinking. I want you to pay cash for this, obviously.

I don't know, is there a sense of urgency driving this Airbnb thing, or is this just you guys got excited about making some extra income? Pretty much, just excited about making extra income. So if there's no urgency here, I want you to do this at the speed of cash. And I want you to also think about the ROI. Look at the market for Airbnb in the Great Falls area. What are people willing to pay for a basement apartment for a night in your area? And then go, okay, based on all of that, plus the expenses, the fees that Airbnb takes, the cleaning, all of that stuff, how long is it going to take me to recoup my investment that I made in cash? Okay.

Once you do that, you can start to reverse engineer this thing and you go, okay, it's going to cost us $20,000 to get this basement in good shape. We don't have to go crazy. And we can put $2,000 a month towards this. So in 10 months, we're going to cash flow this thing. And then all of the money that comes in from that Airbnb is yours. And it's not going to pay off this stupid HELOC. So that's the right way to do it.

And by the way, 20 grand is probably – it's more like probably like 100, right, Joseph? What do you think this is? Any general estimates? Well, we're thinking between 30 and 50 depending on the materials that they use or the grade that we go with. I was closer, John. I was like price is right. I win the prize that we go with. I was closer, John. I was like, price is right. I win the prize.

Without going over. Joseph, here's my concern. I'm just going to make something up out of thin air here. Let's pretend that we had a global pandemic, say. And let's say that travel just shut down. And you've got this beautifully renovated home that you now owe debt against your house, the most important asset you own, you've now leveraged against the basement and you have no income coming in on it.

That's my favorite. And I'd much rather see you and your wife get firm numbers that you can create a true real budget with and set up a cash flow. Because here's what you're going to do. You're going to get real excited about this and you're going to work your butts off to get that cash or you're going to stop watching so much HGTV and this is going to be less of a cool.

You know what I mean? It's not going to be quite as cool as you thought. And be honest with me while I got you did you watch some awesome bob vila episode and you're like i think we can do this is that well i've done that several times and done it yeah i could tell he was a vila fan dude i know man it's i i go down this rabbit hole myself like oh dude i could just i we're good yeah it's gonna be incredible i just need to get thirty thousand dollars i got this much equity in my house don't do it don't do it don't set yourself up to lose your home over your basement yeah and on paper you go oh my gosh this airbnb is gonna make so much money so it's totally worth it to take out the heloc we're gonna pay this

thing it'll be great and then life happens and then great falls is gonna pass an ordinance that says we don't do airbnb anymore and you're going to say, wait a minute. Or they're going to say you can't have guests or they've got to have this or you can only have vaccinated guests. So it's going to cut your population, your customer base in half or whatever it's going to look like. Pay cash, pay cash, pay cash. And then if you pay cash and suddenly life happens,

then you can go sleep down in the basement in this new place, Joseph, and you won't owe anybody any money on it. Let's go to Logan in Louisville, Kentucky. What's up, Logan? How are we doing, brother? How are you doing? Can you hear me? Yes, sir, we can. How's it going?

How's it going? It's going pretty good. Hey, guys, I have a little bit of a weird one for you guys. So I'm 19, and my friend's also 19, and I started listening to Dave Ramsey about a year ago, and since then I went in, and so I work at two jobs. I work at Kentucky Truck Plant. I work at Ford, and then I also just work a little side job,

and we live in a van, both of us, and we both work two jobs. We've saved up about $20,000 over the course of, like, this year doing this year doing this and we're just trying to like i'm really concerned about my future i don't want to go into debt so like i don't have any debt neither one of us and we just want to know where do we put this money do we put it in roth iras do we put this and say like uh maxing out my 401k at work where do i put this money so i'll let george into that but let me is this a romantic interest or is this just you and like a roommate? No, this is – yeah, no, this is like a friend. Yeah, this is just me and a friend, a roommate.

Okay, so I would first say don't speak in terms of we when it comes to y'all's money. Okay. Yeah, y'all aren't building wealth together. Y'all aren't saving money together. Your van mate will have money and you'll have money. So this is your individual money. Okay?

Don't, don't, Ghostbusters 1, man, don't cross the streams here, okay? Okay. So you said there's a side business. Are you talking about $20,000 is from the side business that you guys do together?

No, no, no. So basically, no, we've always just said that the money is just, like we've always just put the money together. There is no side business. It's just two jobs. Why are you putting the money together? Well, just because, honestly, I don't know.

We've just been friends for so long, since, you know, real, real young. I'm good friends with John, but we don't put our money together. It's like Bill and Ted's one and two we're going to get married together again I got great great friends that I've had my whole life that's awesome you guys are scrappy 19 year olds sharing a van

you got no expenses again not how I do it but high five to you man but yeah when it comes to sharing money one of you is going to meet somebody one of you is going to meet somebody one of you is going to get another job and want to move out and untangling that's going to be chaos you're going to lose a friend over this that's right and i don't want that for you so you you've been listening to the show for a year so you you know the baby steps so do you have any debt

currently either of you no no no zero and do you have any emergency savings? Do you have a fully funded emergency fund? Well, I mean $20,000 we have. And I'm guessing, okay, so you personally, how much money do you have? That's where this gets real confusing, right? Because you're saying, I don't personally have $20,000, we have $20,000. How much of that is yours? Well, we would just cut, I'd say $10,000. You'd split it. I would literally just cut it right down.

So I'm guessing $10,000 is three to six months of expenses for you or more. Oh, yeah, way more. Oh, yeah. Okay. And at that point, you'd be at baby step four where you can begin investing. The bigger question here is what is your long-term future? I mean, do you want to be in a van for the next five years? Well, maybe not the next.

I mean, yeah, probably. Honestly, yeah, five does doesn't sound bad maybe not 10 i wouldn't like to push it like past that but yeah i just i want to like be able to have a big you know like uh dave's always talking about you know having buying or you know having like a you know a wealth building tool and you know your income is your biggest wealth building tool and you just got to free up everything so i thought well what was the best way you know gazelle intensity what was the best way to like free up all my expenses okay just live in a van and then get somebody else in here and then if we're both doing it and you know we're both

going hard at two different jobs i don't know we're pretty selfless people as far as like each other but i can definitely see how that would like be a problem like like you know the money situation but yeah in my head it's always like yeah i just want you to have a vision for your future and get a great job that you love and a career that you can sink your teeth into uh aside from the van yeah and man you are a scrappy 19 year old brother i want to high five you i'm i'm further down the road than you are, and I want to also pass along the importance of a good night's sleep, of a shower, of some stability. And so this might be a six-month plan. This might be a nine-month plan.

Get a one-bedroom apartment, a cheap one-bedroom apartment that you can begin to have some stability, invite some friends over, and build a future. find out for yourself why blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window covering you get free samples free shipping and with the new promos they run every month you'll save even more use promo code ramsey to get the best deal. Rules and restrictions apply. Today's question comes from Bella in California. I have $150,000 in school loans. My fiance has no debt and has more than that amount in savings for a house down payment. We've been together for five years. I believe my loans are setting us back on marriage and buying a home together. He prioritizes his quote financial planning more than the progress of our relationship.

I'm working my butt off to pay these loans while he has the cash to help me and ultimately us. He insists on holding on to the down payment money instead of helping me. He says he wants to marry me, but I feel that his timeline is not very timely. I need perspective on whether I am right in all of this. George, you've been married sooner than me. What are your thoughts on this? Well, I feel like this is less of a financial question and more of a relationship question. I don't like this idea of he's prioritizing financial planning over our relationship and I want to know if I'm right and if he's wrong. These are just backwards ways of thinking about this relationship.

And I think both of them are wrong in some ways. I think they need to have a we mentality if they're about to get married and these loans are about to become his loans and their loans instead of, well, that's her thing and I've got my money here that I've worked so hard for. Now she's screwing all this up. That attitude is going to hurt them in marriage. Bell, yeah, there's a big giant flashing red sign saying stop, danger ahead.

And I know you love this guy and I'm confident that he loves you, but y'all are living parallel lives and parallel tracks, and you are trying to combine lives, combine futures. You are hitching your wagon to this guy and him to you, but you're trying to do it halfway,

and so before anybody takes any more steps, y'all need to get in with a premarital counselor today, tomorrow, ASAP. This is a recipe for a disaster, an absolute disaster. You're not on the same page financially. You're not on the same page relationally. You're not on the same page for supporting one another. Earlier in one of the breaks, I got a question on social media. Somebody asked me some secret tips of marriage.

I asked George, and he said, out-serve each other. That's exactly right. And this one is out-earning. Y'all are trying to out-earn each other, trying to out-compete each other, out-work your butts off for each other. And it's just the backwards way into a marriage. Backwards way.

By the way, this question right here, I need perspective on whether I am right in all of this. Not what to do, but whether I'm right. Let me be super clear. If you have an argument with your spouse or your fiancé, and one of you wins, you both lose. Arguments in marriage are not to be won or lost. You're not at war in competition with your spouse or with your fiance.

The problem is the problem. The challenge is the problem. You're trying to solve something together, not win against one another. And if you find yourself in competition, I want to know if I'm right. I think he's wrong. You are on dangerous ground man john i can count on zero fingers how many times i have won an argument with my wife and it brought us closer together zero never zero never so here's my thing if i'm in their shoes and they can get on the same page what i don't want is for him to be resentful because he had all this

money and i paid off the loans instantly as soon as they got married and now he's resentful because like all this i worked so hard for this and she took it all away it's going to create a lot of resentment now that's the right thing to do financially because now you are one and her debt is your debt but i don't want this to create resentment i feel that like that's what's going to happen if he does this yeah and if it doesn't it's going to create resentment on her part because she's stuck paying her loans and he's going to go, I'm not paying your loans. I'll get us the house because that's my thing, but I'm not touching your debt. And then she lives in quote unquote his house as his wife, as the mother of the children

in that home. They're all living in his house because you've got this debt you're working on. It's a dangerous situation. This is not heading down a good road already. So they need to get on the same page, or otherwise this is not going to work, regardless of the finances. All right, let's go to Melissa in Richmond, Virginia.

Hey, Melissa, what's going on? Hi, good afternoon, George and Dr. D. I appreciate you all taking my call. Of course, what's up? I'm going to make this quick because I have a lot to disperse, but I have, I take, I took a job, I obtained a new job, a position that I had wanted to take and do anything that I wanted to do. I deal in a male-dominant field. However, I feel like that I am still feeling the symptoms from my old job of being burnt out, of being not included. And when I've shown my passion, I've shown that I want to be included, and I know I have the desire.

And for some reason, I think that with everything else that's going on, I'm finalizing a divorce. I'm not being able to co-parent properly with my son's father. I walked out on that job. And I don't know why. Well, I know why, but that was not my character. And I feel so bad about it. And so I'm just wondering with going through baby step two, I was in the midst of that. How do I get the motivation to not take what I've learned or what I've experienced in the past to a new opportunity?

And I definitely don't want to make, I don't want God to be mad at me that I have not being grateful for this opportunity and new job things that I had been wanting to do for years and never got a chance to. And I just feel so bad about it, and I don't know what to do from here. Melissa, thanks for sharing that. You are in a storm. You're in a tough season. And a tough season of loss,

a tough season of figuring out what's up and what's down and one of the temptations we have sometimes when we get hit by the tsunami of life is we make it a character issue i should have been able to swim better should have been able to hold my breath longer and i don't want you to look in the mirror and see a defeated, broken person. You're in a tough season. It's winter right now where you are. The sun will come out again. So some quick math here. Are you unemployed now? Or when you said you walked out on your job, did you just walk out and you're going to

go back tomorrow? What's your employment status? No. No, you know, I don't think that, you know, I'll be going back because they, you know, I mean, I haven't yet heard from HR. She sent me an email. I sent her an email, but she haven't responded to what I sent her. So I don't think so because I'm just, I don't think that things will be better at that job. You know, I'm a very analytical person, so I was analyzing. Do you have money for food and rent?

Well, I'm going to have to use my emergency fund probably for my rent. I just moved here around the time I started the new job. Here's what I don't want you to do. I don't want you to do. I don't want you to make a, your body is in fight or flight. You're exhausted. And you used the word burned out. We're going to, I want you to pick up a copy of the Nagoski sisters book, Burnout. It's a remarkable book that helps people walk through, um, uh, when their body takes over

in order to keep them safe. You're going through a divorce. You're messing with your kids. You're in a new town. All these things are circling around you, but I don't want you to lose sight of you still got to eat and pay rent. And I know it feels like you are so cooked right now. And you, I just, I got to get away from everything. And I get that, but you are so cooked right now. And I just got to get away from everything. And I get that. But you're going to wake up in 48 hours and you're not going to have money to eat. And it may be too late. If it's possible and you are safe, go back to work and make that a part of your recovery, a part of your healing journey.

Oh, yes, definitely. I'm not the one to be still. I know, I know, I know, I know, I know. And I don't want you to hear that as a character thing. I want you to hear that as you have a heart and a body that is trying to keep you safe in the middle of a storm. And you've got to deal with the realities I've got to eat. You will have a moment for your dream job. You'll have a moment for finding out the best thing

that's going to best meet your skills. That's not today. Today is you're going to enter in a season of healing. It's going to be a year or two. You're going to enter into a season of peace, but you got to pay your bills along the way. They'll have you back and your job is safe. I want you to go back and get that job.

I want you to start your healing journey. Find a counselor. Find a pastor and get on. Today's scripture of the day is Psalms 910. Those who knew your name trust in you. Today's scripture of the day is Psalms 910. Those who knew your name trust in you, for you, Lord, have never forsaken those who seek you. Rosalyn Carter says, You have to have confidence in your ability and then be tough enough to follow through.

That's a great quote. You have to have confidence in your ability and then be tough enough to follow through. Let's go to Johnny in Utah. Hey, Johnny, what's up, brother? Not a lot. How are you guys doing today? Good, man. How are you?

Good. Thanks for taking my call. My portion kind of falls more in the category of some of the other calls earlier today where it's kind of more of a confirmation. I have a credit card. It doesn't have a balance on it. I'm debt-free, you know, all that good jazz. And I just have a sentimental value to it. I just can't seem to get rid of it.

Is it cute? Well, I wish it was. Does it make you feel safe? Why can't you get rid of it? Why is it sentimental? Just because it's like I didn't really have, you know, growing up, I didn't really have a, you know, support system and all that. And so there was a time in my life when I had a lot of debt, and I had to have it, so to say.

But I'm not there anymore now. You know, thankfully, I'm good financially healthy, financially healthy, so to say. Yeah, so tell me about, you had to have it. Tell me about that. Well, originally, when I started kind of stacking debt on it, it was just more of like, you know, I needed it for rent. I was just going out of a bad relationship at the time. But why did you need that credit card for rent? You're coming out of a bad relationship.

Why did you need the credit card to help exit a bad relationship? Just pretty much to be able to... I didn't want to leave my partner hanging at the time, so I had to cover that half of the rent and then find a new place. And at the time, I just didn't have the money for it. So young and dumb. But what I'm trying to get you to is you didn't need it, but it helped you do things that you wanted to do.

Is that fair? Yeah, that would be a fair assessment. Okay, okay. And I'm not trying to poke at you or anything like that. What I'm trying to do is you've got some tight emotion. This thing is wound into you somehow. And it sounds like it's wound into the dissolution of a relationship that meant something to you, of a tough season in your life,

and it's become a security blanket. It's become something that you hang on to as a just-in-case of a just-in-case. And so what I'm trying to unwind here is you don't need it. Like, you need air or water. You don't even need it financially. Are you out of debt now?

Yes, sir, I am. Yeah, man. Do you have an emergency fund? I do, six months. Brother, that should be sentimental. Not a piece of plastic that a company printed out with your name on it. Yeah. Would you cut it up on the phone with us, or is that too hard for you? What was that?

Would you ever cut this card up on the phone right now while we're on the phone with us or is that too hard for you? What was that? Would you ever cut this card up on the phone right now while we're on the line? You said you needed confirmation, so you know what you need to do. Cut it right up. I don't have scissors on me, but I'll basically get rid of it.

No, no, no, no, no. You have it on you. You love it. You have it on... I pictured you holding it while you called us. Or on a necklace. No, it's just...

It's just my wall right now. Pull it out and cut it up. Dude, cut it up today. You can call him up and cancel and tell him Dave Ramsey told you to. Do whatever you got to do, but you need to get this out of your life. You're in a different place. You worked so hard to get out of debt, and you know you're never going back again. Let that be sentimental.

The hard work, your never again moment where you said, never again am I going to have to rely on a credit card to pay rent. You've done so much hard work to get to this point and now you're sentimental over a literal piece of plastic. Just take the emotion out and just look at it logically. A company printed out a piece of plastic and gave you money, not as a gift, but so that they could make money off of you. I want you to get angry at this company, angry at this card. Cut it up, put it in an ornament, put it on your Christmas tree. How's that for sentimental? I probably won't put it on a tree, but yeah, that definitely.

But you're keeping it in your wallet. There's not much of a difference, is there? Yeah, or cut it up and mail it to us. Cut it up and set it in a fireplace. I like that idea. John will shoot it. I'm i'm not gonna shoot it but here's the thing you know what you need to do and i i will i'll honor the fact that this thing has woven itself into you but as george said i want you to flip that connection around it is not something that's kept you safe it's something that's kept you trapped it's something that's kept you safe. It's something that's kept you trapped. It's something that's kept you enslaved.

Be angry at this thing that has grown roots into your soul and it's time for it to go. And you've done all the hard work already. Call it and cancel it. Do we have your word in front of the entire country? Today's the day. Yes, today's the day. I don't want it anymore. It's awesome. Today's the day. Yes, today's the day. I don't want it anymore. It's awesome. Today's the day.

Today's the day. You are free, my brother. Congratulations, man. I'm excited. It's awesome. Congrats, man. All right, let's take one more. Let's go to Ethan in Toledo. Hey, Ethan, what's up, brother? How's it going? Hey, better than I could possibly earn, brothers. How are you? Same here. Same here. How can we help, man?

Proverbs says that in the multitude of counselors, there is safety. So I'm just calling to see what your guys' thoughts are. If, you know, we got Baby Step 1, $1,000. Baby Step 2 is where we're at. And if we believe that it's going to take, like, 10 to 20 years in Baby Step 2 is where we're at. And if we believe that it's going to take like 10 to 20 years in Baby Step 2 just because the debt is so many times the income. 20 years? Yeah, so if it's going to take that long. Do you have a million dollars in debt?

What's your debt load? No, no, no. No, no, there's definitely things that can be done. How much do you owe? Let's talk numbers here. All right. How much debt? Go quick

because we're going to get up against the clock here. How much do you owe? Yeah, so say $400,000. You owe $400,000? Yep. Okay.

And an income of $60,000. What kind of debt is this $400,000? Mostly student loans. What did you go to school for? I'm actually calling for a friend. I think it was like psychology and criminal justice. I don't, but there's like several degrees involved.

So this isn't your debt or your money. You're calling on behalf of a friend? That's correct. Okay. Well, this is a big hole and a very little shovel. To answer your question, Ethan, the answer to your question is no. The answer is no, you don't need a bigger emergency fund.

Is that what you're about to ask? Okay. Yeah. No, what you need is – I'm going to save $1,000 for like one to three years, but I'm wondering if it's going to take – No, you need to get a job that pays more than $60,000. And if you've got this, hold on. If you've got this type of student loans and this many degrees,

you need to figure that one out. You need a much bigger shovel. The answer is not to skimp on the plan. This is a catastrophe. This is a world-class emergency room fiasco financially. There is no safety here. There is no $5,000 emergency fund is not going to keep you any safer. $400,000 against $60,000.

You need a way, way, way bigger shovel because you're in a big, big, big, big, big hole. And all the, well, we just can't, you got to figure it out. They need to be working three or four jobs for five years to clean this mess up. Yeah. And the action, an action is being taken toward increasing the income. I just wondered, like, is there a, is there a year threshold where you would say, yeah, it's probably wise to do more than 1,000. No, because I don't want you punning off five years.

I want you figuring this out way, way sooner. Way, way sooner. What's the average, George, it takes when somebody gets serious about this thing? 18 to 24 months. And the average time it takes the average person to pay off student loans is 20 years. But we're not doing average here. We're we're going gazelle intense this person needs to live their life that's right you need to tell their friend they need to get four jobs and they need to cut whatever they've been doing with their life and start to make some smart decisions

and that doesn't include having a year supply of emergency fund that's not the issue here i want to thank james childs and Kelly Daniel. Thank you, America, for listening to us and for joining us right here on The Ramsey Show. Have a friend or family member that needs a daily dose of Ramsey advice in their life? Let them know about the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast. It's a quick hit of advice about life and money in under 10 minutes. Check out the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.