The Ramsey Show - App - It’s Time to Grow Up and Own Your Life

Episode Date: May 15, 2025

📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Are you on track with the Baby Steps? Get a Free Personalized Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📱 ⁠Watch the full episode for free in the Ramsey Network app.⁠ John Delony and George Kamel answer your questions and discuss: "Should we financially support our mother after she was abusive to me and my siblings?" "How do I recover after being scammed out of half my life savings?" "How do I get my fiancé to commit to paying off his debt?" "How do we balance saving for our kids' future vs. having more fun in the present?" "How do we get out of the cycle of being underpaid and living in poverty?" "My husband has no interest in combining our finances" Next Steps: ✅ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Help us make the show better by taking this short survey!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📞 Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 weekdays from 2–5 p.m. ET or ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠send us an email.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ❤️‍🩹 ⁠Get trusted insurance coverage that fits your budget.⁠ 💰⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Hurry—Your chance to win $5k is almost over! Enter the Ramsey Cash Giveaway today!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Connect with our Sponsors: 🛒 Stop paying more and start shopping smarter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Aldi⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🌱 Get 10% off your first month of⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ BetterHelp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📱Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Boost Mobile⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to switch today! 🏥 Learn more about⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Christian Healthcare Ministries⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏡 Get started today with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Churchill Mortgage⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🔒 Get 20% off when you join ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠DeleteMe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏦 Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ FAIRWINDS Credit Union⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for an exclusive account bundle! 🥗 Save 15% on your first ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Field of Greens⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ order with code RAMSEY ⛨ Find top Health Insurance Plans at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Health Trust Financial⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💸 To find out more about student loan refinancing, check out⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Laurel Road⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💻 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ NetSuite⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ today to learn more 🗂️ Use promo code RAMSEY for 18% off at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Nokbox⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵 Learn more about ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Timothy Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏛 Get started with ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YRefy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or call 844-2-RAMSEY 🔐 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Zander Insurance⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for your free instant quote today! Explore more from Ramsey Network: 💸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Ramsey Show Highlights⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🧠 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Dr. John Delony Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🍸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Smart Money Happy Hour⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💡 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Rachel Cruze Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💰 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Kamel⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🪑 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠EntreLeadership⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy⁠⁠⁠⁠

From the Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by my very best friend, Dr. John Deloney, and we are here for you America, taking your calls at 888-825-5225. Whatever's going on in your life, we'll talk about it, we'll help you take the right next step. Laura is gonna kick us off in New York City.

How can we help today, Laura? Hi, thank you so much for having me on the show. Absolutely. Okay, so my question is, should I, do I have a moral obligation to give my mom money when she was abusive to me and my siblings and historically not financially responsible. Oh, you framed that really heavy, like moral responsibility. Where does that, the weight of that come from? I think it comes from, I grew up in a Christian church and I still am, I still follow Christianity.

Okay, so hold on, what's the directive there? Well, I want to do the right thing. But what's the word used? What's the directive in Scripture? Oh, okay. I can think of one where it starts with an H. Yes. Yeah, honor your father and mother.

And then there's also a verse in like Matthew 15, where Jesus is telling the Pharisees, you're giving your money to the church, but you won't even help your parents. And then the other reason for that moral obligation in fact, there is my, two of my siblings really think it is morally our job to give my mom money. And we recently had a sibling conversation cause she just keeps asking us all for money. And two of us, two of my siblings kind of just give her whatever she asked for.

And then me and one of my other siblings are not really feeling that. And, um, so we're kind of under this place where it's awkward in our personal relationship, where they think we are morally wrong for not agreeing to just give my mom whatever she asked for. And so what you're hoping to do here is to find a way that your abusive mother and your enabling brother or two siblings don't make you feel uncomfortable. It's maybe the greatest gift George and I could give you today is there's no path forward for you that's not going to be uncomfortable. And so using discomfort as the barometer for what's a right move and what's a not right

move is the wrong barometer. Right. I can feel that I cannot be objective about this. Okay. about this. Okay, so can you, is it honoring your mother to continue to feed, to hand her cash that she is going to use to make herself less and less and less well? Well, I mean, I don't know. Or is honoring her, is honoring your mother No, 270. Or is honoring her, is honoring your mother, having a honest, direct conversation about boundaries,

about if you want my money, and I'll be willing to help in this particular way, then so be it. Or is honoring saying honestly and with integrity, I'm still too hurt from how we grew up, and at this time, not that I can't, because that's not honest, I'm choosing to not give you cash. Okay. You know what I'm saying? Honor does not mean you have to do whatever somebody else tells you to do

forever and ever, amen, regardless of, that's not what honoring means. Yeah. But also sometimes honoring is uncomfortable. Yeah, that I can't even imagine how that conversation would go. Right, right. Can we play out the other side where you actually give your mother this money and you become resentful? Because you know, it's not the right thing to do and you're not cheerfully giving you're going. Oh my gosh I can't believe I'm doing this to this person who hurt me in this way who's been financially responsible

That's gonna eat you alive, isn't it? Every time she calls you you you hate that she's calling that is dishonoring And you hate that your siblings calling, that is dishonoring. And you hate that your siblings guilted you into this? Yeah. So I don't, I'm just kind of painting a picture of both worlds where we have the hard conversation and say no, and we feel better about it and it doesn't consume us versus the other side,

which is, all right, I guess I'll do this. It's the last thing I want to do and I don't feel good about it. And this is not being a good steward of my money and my wealth but I'm going to do it anyways. And let's ask that question because we get that, George and I get that a lot. Do you even have the money to give her? Well, no. Okay, period. Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. You don't have the money. No. Okay, period. Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.

You don't have the money. Yeah. Now what will your siblings say when you say, hey, even if I wanted to, I don't have the money? Well, they've said you could just make more lifestyle changes and just come up with money. Which we already, if on one income, have kids. Can't your mom do that too? Because I need your calls. Yeah, yeah, I know.

That's how I feel like. Now if you don't give, is it on the siblings? Are they gonna have to take on more and they're still gonna do this regardless of what you do? Yeah, that's kinda, I think that's the rub is I know it makes my siblings finances harder because if I don't- Nope, that's not true, not true.

Your siblings choose to make their situations challenging because they are choosing to still try to find a way for them to have a relationship with their mom and at this point The only path towards a relationship with her is you give me cash So they are making choices too Yeah, they're choosing a transactional relationship. Yeah, because they feel better that way And just the same you get to choose and if you would feel better not giving. And just the same, you get to choose. And if you would feel better not giving

and setting that boundary, that's a path to go down. But here, say again, there is no path you can take that is not gonna be uncomfortable. Or that fixes any of this. Yeah. Someone's gonna be upset. Yeah. Your siblings aren't gonna like you, your mom,

I don't know how she feels at this point, I don't think it's gonna fix anything whether you give her money or not. Or you're going to feel really guilty because you can't solve this problem for everybody. And you've probably been in charge of solving all of your family's problems since you were a little bitty girl, right? Yep. Yeah. What's your next financial goal? Right now, my initial goal is to probably get enough money in savings that we could purchase like an investment property.

So you guys are in a decent place financially, you have no debt, fully funded emergency fund? Mm-hmm. Is part of this financial progress because of your past? Did you kind of run the other way and said, I don't ever want to be a burden financially to my family? Oh, yeah, yeah. Because my parents kind of train wrecked their finances from.

I watched that and it made me want to go, I'm going to be really responsible. I'm not going to have any debt. I'm going to work hard and live under my means and all that. You're changing your family tree. That's a pretty cool way to honor your mother and father is to leave a different legacy. And honoring doesn't always mean everyone's going to like you. Yeah. I think you're on the right path, Laura.

I think you, we can't make this call for you, but it sounds like you know the next right move. And sometimes the next right move is scary and really hard too. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Campbell here with Dr. John Delaney. Mark is up next in Burlington, Vermont. Mark, welcome to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Kamel here with Dr. John Deloney. Mark is up next in Burlington, Vermont. Mark, welcome to the Ramsey Show. How can John and I help today?

Hi, I, um, I've friended somebody on Facebook who I thought was NASCAR driver Denny Hamlin. And we developed a friendship and it quickly turned financial and I thought it was Denny Hamlin and it came all about my money. And I ended up doing like six quantity, $500 gift cards. And I was told that he had a, um, briefcase stuck in customs and his documentation to get it inside the United States expired. So I ended up doing

a withdrawal on my 401k and killed my IBM 401k. And then it kept being held in customs and I ended up doing more loans on my other Global Foundry's 401k and I lost like $100,000. Oh man, I'm sorry dude. That's awful. I'm so sorry Mark. I know it didn't make you feel any better, but people are getting scammed right and left all over the world man, I'm sorry.

And it's smart people too. So the easiest thing to fall for is, well I'm just a big idiot. It could happen to anyone. These scams these days are getting so sophisticated that the smartest people out there are still falling for this stuff. And I'm sorry that you were the next victim. When did you realize that this was a scam? It was later on.

This happened like February. It started February of last year and it started out with like five or six, six five hundred dollar gift cards. And from there it went to him saying his documentation and get his stuff inside the US expired. And then it went to his bank was dragging his feet and he needed to have me do another loan. And I just- How did you send all this money?

It was by a cashier's check. And I sent it to a place in, I believe in Virginia, in Virginia. And I had the police, no, it was in Arkansas, sorry, Arkansas, and I had the police in Arkansas looking at it, I called the police, no, it was in Arkansas, sorry, Arkansas. And I had the police in Arkansas looking at it. I called the US secret service. I called the FBI. I called the state police.

I called the Berry police and you name it. I called it and one by one, everybody just left me. And my lawyer said that I needed to have a different type of lawyer. My lawyer was helping me out for quite a while and then my other lawyer has not really gotten back in touch with me. So let's pretend that there's a worst-case scenario where we just have lost this money and we have to rebuild. Where are you at today? I just barely looked at my 401k and I thought that I had I thought originally it was like

200,000 which to me was alright considering it's just me because I'm divorced. How old are you? And then I am 54. Okay. And I looked at my balance as of today and it was 146,321. So it's not 100, thousand like I thought it was. It's $146. Okay. Do you have any debt today? No. The only thing I do, I pay a thousand dollars for rent and that's heat hot water utilities trash recycle

and then I pay $60 for phone and then I paid like $50 a month for Wi-Fi and that's it. Good. So you have low expenses. What do you make a year? I make about $60,000 a year. My pay per hour is $24.71. Okay. So how can we help today? I'm scared and I'm fearful and I'm wondering what to do. What are you scared of specifically? My answer is worrying how I'm going to afford things. What happens when I need a car?

How do I get my money back that I lost? I think you have to go in, when everything feels overwhelming, I think you have to go in a particular order and go slower than you think. Here's what I mean. In your guts, you want vengeance, you want to find out who hurt you, who weaponized what you thought was a new friendship, especially on the back end of a divorce when things are tough. Somebody weaponized what I think is the most sacred thing

and that's a relationship. And then inside that relationship, somebody asked you for help and you're the kind of guy that helps. That hurts, man. Yeah. I feel like I was financially raped. It's fair enough.

And so you wanna go get all that money back. Your car transmission doesn't care about that. And so while this, I wanna get it back, I wanna find the guy, I'm calling all the people. Like that's like front and center in your guts. You feel that really heavy. When we're hurt like this and it feels overwhelming, it guts, you feel that really heavy. When we're hurt like this and it feels overwhelming, it's important to feel that feeling

and then go do the next right thing. And in your case, we just gotta start again financially. And it sounds caustic, but there's not another option. And so here's the good news. You have 150 grand. Yes. You didn't wipe it out. So we're gonna start building the back.

We're gonna get an emergency fund built up. So we have, we're our own bank. And so when our car goes, we're not gonna, we're gonna be a couple of years away from getting the big, nice truck we wanted. Cool. We're gonna be able to have money in the account just in case we need to go get a new Camry.

Great, cool. Problem solved. Onto the next one, onto the next one. And in the background, we'll gonna be able to have money in the account just in case we need to go get a new camera. Great, cool, problem solved. Onto the next one, onto the next one. And then in the background, we'll do what we can. I don't know, I mean, the chances that you get this money back are very, very, very slim. Very slim. What I don't want is for this to consume you.

Obviously it already has, but for the next 10 years, you're just on this hunt and this search. And over time, it becomes more and more apparent. It's not gonna happen. And so I also don't want you to waste your time kind of chasing, going down this rabbit trail, all for nothing. I'd rather you spend that time rebuilding

than recovering. And so we can rebuild, you might have to work a few years longer than you wanted to. You're 54, I just crunched some numbers for you. If you just invested 15% of that $60,000 income, never got a raise, but you'd have to work till 70, you could have a million dollars in that 401k

and retire with dignity, especially if you keep your expenses low. So I'm not worried that you're gonna like just go completely broke. I'm more worried about Mark as a person, emotionally and physically. Thank you. Can I give you like a homework assignment?

Kind of, yeah. So I know how you guys say to jump start and go and pay off one bill and then do a snowball and go after the next bill. So a friend offered to pay off my small loan that I have. I thought you said you had no debt. Well, no, those loans that I took out on my 401k, I have two loans on my 401k that I took out and- How much are they? Let's see.

One is like 19,000 and the other is like 3,000. Okay. So is that all of your loans and debt to be clear? You don't have any credit card debt, no car debt, just the 401k loans? That's it. I would not put money between you

and yet another relationship. No. And so your friend is awesome, he's just like you. He's a guy who shows up and helps, wants to help. And you've tried that before and you put money between you and what you thought was a friend and it went sideways, I would recommend not doing that. But I would also recommend you double click on that friendship because he's the kind of guy that will show up in the middle of the night to help you out.

Pretty cool. And then say, hey, I love you, this is one I got to work through. Because part of your healing will be in the sweat equity of earning that $3,000. This guy is probably one of the most godless people I've ever met in my life. It's awesome. That's awesome. I would recommend not taking that money even though it feels like an easy solution. I would recommend saying hey thank you. You showed up in the night for me and I'm grateful but I want to work this one off. It's gonna be my sweat tax. It's gonna be my sweat tax. It's gonna be

my reminder to never get into an online relationship like that again. I don't loan money to friends. I might give it to you but I gotta look you in the eye before I hand it to you, right? Yeah. Could you throw 3600 bucks a month toward these 401k loans if you got scrappy? Could I do that? Yeah. No, I am. How much could you got scrappy? Could I do that? Yeah. No, I am. How much could you throw at it? I am. I am so broke that I can't do hardly anything.

What I'm doing right now is I anticipated having to owe like eight thousand eight hundred eighty three hundred on the taxes from last year that is in debt and the negotiation. Hang on the line, Mark. I'm gonna send you a copy of my book Breaking Free from Broke. It's gonna walk you step by step through this, but it's gonna take getting more income and cutting expenses and getting rid of this debt. W fan of the show, take a second, hit the subscribe button, leave a review, share it with a friend. It means more than you know and you don't know the impact that that can have. And I just got a great story from the Ramsey Baby Steps community

on Facebook. Mike dropped in this story about this lady. I don't know her name. It's not listed here, but here's the story. She said, I lost my job in March. I'm 56. They dragged me into HR with no notice, no warning, nothing, and laid me off. I was pretty upset about it, but here's the thing. Dave saved me.

I will never make it to the show, but I want everyone to know to keep going. I have a paid-for house. It is small, but it's all mine. I paid for a reliable and great car, no debt at all, and $450,000 in the bank. When I found Dave, I was $20,000 in credit card debt and had no savings whatsoever. I've been single my whole life, so it has always been just one salary and always well

below $100,000. Anyway, I'm sort of happy about the job loss now, and on to better things. I know Dave will never read this, but if he does, I want him to know he saved my life and my future. Well, we did read it and I'm sure Dave will as well. And can we just say this out loud? Dave didn't save your life. I'm glad that he gave you the hope and some tools,

but you did this. You did all this hard work. And what a great testament to the Ramsey Plan just to show people, hey, it's easy when life is going your way, but when it doesn't, are you prepared? And here's the frustrating heartbreaking truth about life. There's big swaths of our lives

where things are not going our way. And that's why it's important to do the things that are hard and annoying and frustrating, like saving money, like not getting the newest car, whatever, it's important to do those things along the way so that when life hits, you're ready to rock and roll. And it ends up, I love how this ends, I'm sort of happy about the job lost,

now I'm onto better things. We never realize until we have to that often the best things in life are on the other side of fear, almost always. And so, I mean, sometimes on the other side of fear is that cancer was real, right? Sometimes on the other side of fear is like, your kid's not coming home.

Like there's truth to that. But also on the other side of fear is, I thought this job was everything to me. And it's not, it's awesome. And now I can go do some things I want to do with my one precious life and all that and all that. We keep talking about it. But, and George, I've become, I don't know, it's like a light switch that flipped to me about two weeks ago. I've almost become obsessed now with being a flashlight in a world that is just insistent on everything's coming down.

And I don't know how to even do that right, but I've just become obsessed. And I think I'm gonna start reading these kinds of stories over and over and over again, because it's easy just to keep reading the news channels and listening to the, ah! And then you just hear about this amazing woman who in the dark just plugs away and plugs away

and plugs away and then life happens and she's like, you know what, actually my life's better now. I was ready. Pretty awesome. You kind of built your own insurance plan for your entire financial life. That's right. By following this stuff.

So thank you all for sharing it, leaving the reviews, hitting the subscribe button, telling your friends, texting the link, it all matters. Danielle is up next in Tulsa, Oklahoma. How can we help Danielle? What's going on? Woo John, I sure need that flashlight right now. Well, come on, bring it on.

Y'all, I'm so done with that. I'm getting married in a week and a half and my fiance is on board for us getting out of this mess but I'm having problems getting him to be intense with our money, be intense with the plan, moving forward with the plan and I just need help lighting a fire under him. Can I ask you a personal, personal question just between me and you and a couple million people?

Sure. Have you ever been told in your life that you are quote unquote a lot? Yes. Okay. Have you ever been told like, hey, shh. Not very often. When you were little? Yes.

Okay. Here's why I'm asking that. Don't change a thing about you. Okay. But often you're heading into a humongous life transition. Is that fair? Yes. And you're nervous and excited and cannot wait

and oh my gosh, what am I doing? All of it. Yes, okay. There's no possible way anybody that you would choose to marry unless you were clinically insane would be able to match your level of intensity right now. And in fact, probably the reason you love this guy is because he's a walking Xanax for you.

Fair? You nailed it, you nailed it. Okay, so don't mistake his calm, I'm in. I'm in. Let's do a budget together. First, let's get through this wedding together. Let's get through this honeymoon together. Then I'm in.

Don't mistake that steady presence for, he doesn't love me, he doesn't want this like I do. Don't do that to him, okay? And also by the way, on Friday night when he says, let's just stay in and he married you because you'll go, no, we're going dancing and we're gonna go horseback riding first and then we're gonna jump out of a plane. That's why I married you

Fair Actually the opposite he's the one that wants to go out and do everything I want to stay home I'm sorry your body's already tired by Friday night. Yeah Your body's like whoo what actual Conversations have happened What words has he used when you talk about this debt payoff plan because you said you're like he's in But he doesn't have the intensity that I do. Yeah, part of it is because he's been broken down for so long. We've been going through a lot.

We've been together 14 years and in the last probably two years, things have got really intense. We've had a lot of big life changes. And this last job that he took has just been, was just kind of out of necessity, and it's kind of a dead end job. So one of the big things that needs to happen is he needs to get a job somewhere else, but I think life has just kind of bummed him down

a little bit to where- He's lost his mojo. Yes, exactly. He wants some purpose. He wants to feel like he's doing the right things and spending his energy on the right things and he's just sort of floundering right now, which makes sense. Why he's not like, yeah, we're going to get out of debt. He's got some foundation to build right now of just getting his income and getting it

stable and doing some work that he enjoys doing and becoming a provider now to a wife, that's a lot of life change. And I think once he gets the stability and finds that purpose, the fire will be lit. And you may try to light that fire for him. I would recommend not doing that. Okay. You may come in and be like,

all right, I got 14 job opportunities. I heard Dan's hiring over there. And if he does that, you know who else did that to him? You know who did that to him? Have you been listening to our conversations? I know, you know who did that to him? His mom, his mom did that. Yeah.

And so let's don't be mom, but let's do have this. Can we agree on a dollar amount that we have to have in this house for us to A, survive and B, pay off this debt? Yeah, I can agree to that. All right, I'm earning 3000 of that, then the other 3000 you're on board for. And that's our covenant, that's our commitment, and that's our spit shake, and that's our, I

swear, and it might be a quote-unquote dead-end job, but if it's helping your family move forward, it's not dead-end. Right, the reason why I say it's a dead-end job is because, you know, the benefits are terrible. He has no option for overtime and he's being paid pretty low for what field he's in. That's cool. So it's not forever, but if it's serving a purpose, then let's honor the integrity of work and let's go find something else. But he's got to feel that sense in that pull and that sense in that pull is not going to

come from you harassing him and beating him down. It's also not going to come from you throwing 40 different options and ideas. Like, and that's just like his mom saying, will you wear this and fix that, fix your hair? Why are you doing that? Have you brushed your teeth yet? Like he doesn't need that either.

And at the other side, he needs a goal and he uses his wife to look across the table and say, I'm trusting you to go get your $3,000 this month. And then we'll begin to look for the career and the job and all that kind of stuff. Does that make sense? Yes, yes it does. Not to over existentialize it.

Let's start with small baby goals. And put some facts on paper. You know, you guys get back from the honeymoon, let's make our first budget. Let's see what our total income's gonna be. What's the total take home pay and what's our total debt? How much extra can we throw at this thing? And then we can figure out how to light the fire and go, hey, what if we could do this

in six months instead of eight? What would that take? Or, hey, you can't get overtime in this particular job you have right now and I know you're putting out applications. Cool. You've got dinner for the next 60 days. I'm going to work as many overtime hours because now us and us are me and me is now we we're going to do this together, it's us now.

That make sense? Okay. Yes it does, thank you guys, I appreciate it. Game on, hang on the line, we're gonna hook you up with FPU as a wedding gift. And that's because me and George like weddings. Plus, it's better getting it from us than someone attending the wedding, you know?

Could be an awkward gift. Could be an awkward gift. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. I'm George Campbell, joined by Dr. John Delaney. The number to call is 888-825-5225. Listen, buying or selling your home, it's a big deal. And between the clickbait headlines, confusing data, it's tough to know what's actually going on in the housing market. So we're here to make the latest trends easy to understand. Here they are. Median home prices

went up slightly last month to about $430,000. More homes are on the market, nearly a million, which is the highest since 2019. So we have an increase in supply, but in a lot of areas, it's still not enough to meet buyer demand. The average 15-year fixed rate rose to 5.9% last month, and it's still under 6%. So if you're financially ready, a small rate increase shouldn't hold you back from buying a homie love. That's not the difference maker here.

So to learn more about the housing market trends and get free tools to help you buy or sell with confidence, head to ramsysolutions.com slash market, or click the link in the show notes if you're listening on podcast or YouTube. Riley is up next in Springfield, Missouri. What's going on Riley? Hey, what's going on? How's it going? How can we help today? So I am 28 years old. My wife is 31. She is a stay at home mom. We have two sons,

five and three years old. We are on baby six six by the way. Awesome. five and three years old. Um, I am, we are on baby six, six, by the way. Um, we are in the middle of a debacle with our budget. I'm trying to make sure I free up enough fun money for her because obviously staying at home is staying at home. It's absolutely miserable for the mother. It's great that she can do that, but it is very tough on her. And so I want to make sure that I leave enough aside in our budget for her to have fun as well as continue to save, you know, for our retirement and everything,

everything else we're doing 15% like it's like we're supposed to into Roth IRA. I have a pension, a union pension, and then I have a simple IRA that I get 3% match onto my employer. Uh, I gross 70,000 a year. Um, now I want to put $200 a month per son into a money market, maybe, I don't know, to save for them to have a down payment on a house. With the way that house prices are increasing, I am scared they're going to not have enough capital to be able to buy as young as I was able to and I don't think

I don't know if the money market is the better out or to put it in our Roth IRA and just pull out contributions when that time comes I'm trying to avoid gift tax and all this other stuff for him to try to make it as streamlined as possible and you guys can tell me what you think because $400 a month is $83,000 some change after 18 years so I'm a little conflicted as to what to do. Woo! Man, what a party it is at Riley's house. Yeah, I'm a talker, I'm sorry.

You're like me, you're kinda like the nerdy dad who wants to do everything the right way and have all the I's dotted and T's crossed and you want the wife to have the fun money. Does your ideal romantic night begin with a spreadsheet? No. It's like they put on Barry White and it's like- Yeah, I'm pretty wild.

I'm a lot. Let's get it on. I'm an ADHD, I don't know if you can tell. Yeah, I can totally tell. But here's what I also know about ADHD. Hashtag, I may be a card carrying member of that group. We love to create future problems that we can then solve in the present

because most of us got a message our entire lives that there's something wrong with us. And we find it very hard to be still in a relationship, especially when that other person says, I pick and love you. We find it very hard to be still and just wrestle with our kids because we think there's something wrong with us

that we need to go fix real quick. Yeah. Okay, so George is furiously typing on the math over here because he knows how that works. I'm still not great at it. But I wanna tell you, having been where you are, having been where you are like last night at midnight, how about that?

That's me for vulnerability here. I had my spreadsheet out and I was looking at land, okay? I was trying to solve a problem that literally doesn't exist yet. Yeah. I probably would have been of more value to my family had I gone to bed at 10 and woke up a little more clear-eyed this morning and had fun when I shared breakfast with my children.

Yeah. Does that make sense? Do you know what's gonna happen? Put it this way, in 18 years, that is four presidential elections from now. Yeah. Two presidential elections ago, would you, would you have predicted anything that the world is right now? Nope. No. Nope. I was just looking at, George and I were looking at this new toy that came out that's connected to AI. It knows everything ever. Ever. Ever asked. It knows it. And it just is supposed to talk to your kids so that they never have to talk to a parent or a person in 18 years you know what the world's gonna look like I don't know and so what I would tell you is solve

today's problems today and today's problems are your kids need a focused present dad on all fours wrestling with them on the ground does that make sense yeah yeah you're doing your head more than you know, bro. You are so far ahead. You're already putting money in retirement. You got a pinch like you're doing good stuff. You even I'm saying? Yeah. Yeah. I just come from a lot of like my parents just got divorced last year on the 28 years of marriage. I know and you're trying to solve that on a spreadsheet. Solve it with connection. Yeah, no kidding. And that's scary and hard. Yeah. Scary and hard. George, talk about... All right, we can talk numbers now just to give you some ideas and options. Number one,

you're investing for your own retirement. Are you saving for their college? No, I opted to not do like a 529 or something like that. I suppose I could still do that and then roll it over into IRA if I got to that point down the road. And then if I did not go to college. Well, let me play this out for you. Here's my fear. Your kids have a great down payment, but they have $200,000 in student loans to deal with.

Well, he's already Googled that and he's made the bet that there won't be any college in 18 years, fair? Exactly, trust me. No, no, I just, I know this guy. I don't wanna force them to go to college and stuff. You know what I mean? Like I wouldn't have to cut it.

There's no forcing, but I'll tell you what has happened in most American households. The parents go, well, figure it out. Well, the time comes for junior to go off to college and he chose a pretty expensive school because the parents never sat him down and set a boundary. And now it's 150 grand and the parents took out some Parent Plus loans, they could took out

some subsidized loans from FAFSA and they got a mess to deal with. And so I'm telling you that to say, what I do in my own house, I put my mask on first with retirement, then I focus on college. Then if there's money beyond that, that I wanna put away for my kids one day,

I would just do that in a taxable brokerage account. And you can gift for married filing jointly, currently you can give 36 grand a year to each kid with no gift tax. A taxable brokerage account? Yeah, just basically a non-retirement investment account. Your money market account is not going to get you very far, and you've got such a long time horizon with a three and five-year-old, I'd rather see that money experience some compound growth in the market.

And I would rather you put that money and pay off your house. Yeah, I know, I want to really bad. That's another big pick item. I know, I know, but so that's why I'm saying, to John's point, I would focus on that after you're through the baby steps. That's when you can start having some fun going, all right, we paid off the house, now we can set up our kid's future.

Right, you know what? Yeah. This reminds me of my buddy, Dr. Layne Norton. He's one of the smartest nutrition minds on the planet. Here's his phrase, and I stole it directly from him, and I love it. Most people, when it comes to nutrition, step over $100 bills trying to pick up nickels and pennies.

They don't exercise, they don't lift weights, they don't eat right most of the time, and then they're like, oh my gosh, what essential oil is gonna save me? Or did you hear about red number 40 or whatever? Maybe, but also how about you just walk after dinner and lift weights and you see what I'm saying and what you're doing is what all great powerful love loving ADHD people do is

it's way harder to take that $400 a month and put on your house payment because it's boring and it's slow and it's right now and so it's sexier and feels it gets your heart rate up a little more to think about this future thing and I'm going to look at the rates and what's I need to move it over here and by the way you know this as well as I do within the next year you'll have a new plan for that money you know that oh yeah so pay your house. The greatest gift you could give your kids is a regulated dad. Yeah. And for you, that means I don't owe anybody anything.

The greatest gift you could give those kids is a mom who's got a group of women in her life that she goes and has fun with and laughs with and gets out of that crazy house and she has a community. Mm-hmm. Spend money there. How much fun money are we talking for your wife? Have you guys talked through this number? I guarantee it's like money there. How much fun money are we talking for your wife? Have you guys talked through this number? I guarantee it's like $17.

No, I would give her way more than that. Hold on, you aren't giving her anything, my brother. Y'all are deciding this together. Yes. Yes sir, yes sir. It's our money, I'm sorry. I misspoke on that. Okay good.

I accept your apology. Yeah, no. What's the number? Is it $100? Is it $400? We are ironing out. This is literally our first month of being in Baby Step 6. $300 a month. That's it. $400 a month. Let it run wild. I say if the kids get $200 to the college account, she should get $200 as well.

She should get $600! There we go. At least. 3X. We just made that up. That's Baby Step 14. Start the negotiations tonight. From Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by bestselling author

and Ramsey personality, Dr. John Deloney, and we're taking your calls at 888-825-5225. Kelsey's going to kick us off in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. What's going on, Kelsey? Hi, I'm a stay-at-home mom, herbalist, and nutrition coach, but I'm currently not making much money from that. In fact, I'm losing money from the booth spot I'm renting. Um, my husband and I, we have three children together and um,

our mother in law lives with us. Uh, we've been, we've been in a rental for two years and I emphasize that because our housing situations was very like, um, bad before we were like living with people on and off. And so my mom in law pays a portion towards rent and we pay a bigger portion, of course, and we pay all the bills, but my husband's old job, he just lost paid only around 2000 a month and he was the only one working. Almost a hundred percent of our income went to bills and we were relying on credit cards to do laundry at the laundromat

and basic things. Um, and we're on government assistance. Um, my husband thinks it's better to try to do an online business, but uh, that's not secure and we have tried online businesses and they've generated a few thousand here or there, but not anything close to livable and secure. Um, my husband, he just lost his job recently. Um, he scared a lot of jobs, won't pay well and thinks it's better to live off of savings in the hopes of

starting an online business. Uh, he thinks that's how people get rich. And a lot of jobs he's applied to just aren't getting back to him. We live in the ghetto and want to get out. We actually want to homestead. So my question is how can my husband get a job where he's not underpaid? How do we get out of this cycle of poverty? And what are your thoughts on this? Like what mistakes have we made? What and what small things can we do today? I mean if you were here I wouldn't say anything other than I would ask you if I could just give you a hug and if I could give him a hug. Y'all are a part of a system that absolutely stone

a media ecosystem that preys on people like you. They prey on you and not not P-R-A-Y, but P-R-E-Y. And my heart's broken for you. Okay? You all got three kids, you said? Yes, three young kids. Okay. Here's like, if I was to give you any advice at all right this second, I would implore you. I'm not going to bag you, but almost, really close to bagging you and your husband to close the freaking screens in your house. Instagram and these websites and these opportunities, they're going to bankrupt your soul. Because more than anything in the world, you allall need one thing. Y'all need money. You don't need another scheme. You don't need to get rich. You need to survive.

You're not even surviving. So we need to choose reality here and go, hey, we can't pay the bills. We can't launch a business out of a place of weakness. Again, homestead. At this point, the homesteading websites, you know what they are their pornography They're a fantasy life that takes you away from the reality that you live in and it allows you to not address the challenges in your home right now And the challenges are you have is your mother-in-law work or does she stay at home too She stays at home, but she does do cleaning jobs once in a while so she's not employed she lives on widow's pension. Okay if you were my sister or

you were one of my close friends here's what I would tell you to do. Mother-in-law you're gonna whatever she makes a month cleaning you and husband are now gonna pay because she's now the primary caretaker of those three kids between the hours of 8 and 6 p.m. for the next year. And y'all are gonna sacrifice a year and that might mean you get up and you sob on the way to work. But this stops with you two and y'all work two jobs. You go to Home Depot and then after Home Depot you go to Walmart. After Walmart y'all drive an Uber ride on the way home until Waymo takes that out of your community too. And you'll just simply have to earn money.

There is no way. George and I both had to keep showing up hour after hour, day after day at a job. It just so happens that after a few years, they put our job on the internet, but it wasn't a scheme. This isn't how it works. It's not real. It's just pornography.

I wanna say something. I'm really sick of like on X, there's always this- Get off. Hold on, I'm supposed to stop. Just close it. Just get off. Just get off. Because here's X's job.

The 14 year old millionaire is the new norm. It's not. It's not. Here's what X's job is. Not to tell you the truth. X's job is to keep you on X. That's the job. It's clicks and views and engagement. That's Fox News' job. MSNBC's new CNN.

All of their jobs are not to give you truth or reality. It's just to keep you on the platform. Period. End of story. All of their jobs are not to give you truth or reality, it's just to keep you on the platform. Period. End of story. Yeah. So here's the hard truth. You asked for some tactical advice, how to get out of this. You gotta stop living in a victim mindset, going,

well, life's just gonna keep happening to us and we can't trust the jobs because they don't pay enough. Develop a skillset that someone's willing to pay for. Go serve someone and they'll give you a president's face on a dollar bill. As a way of saying thank you. And so that's the hard truth is anytime you're spending scrolling on X needs to be spent working. And I don't mean starting an essential oil online business.

I mean, going to an established company business that's willing to pay you a stable salary. So that means giving up the dream right now of the booth, because you're losing money on it. And that means your husband's gonna have to do something that he probably doesn't wanna do that might be beneath his skill level, and it's gonna be swallowing his pride going,

I'm willing to do whatever it takes to take care of my family. How old are you, Kelsey? 28. Okay, 42. That was the year I got my six acres. And I've wanted that my whole stinkin life. Okay? So you're not behind. And by the way, it is awesome. And it's also a crazy pain in the butt. You know what George did last Saturday? I don't know. I mowed for five hours. I wish I was doing something else, right? So it comes with all these other things,

but it is awesome. 42 is when I got mine, okay? But here's the deal, you're not gonna be able to think your way or online course your way into the four jobs that are, it's not how that's gonna work. Your husband's gonna have to go get a job at Home Depot today or Walmart today and then he might find out,

I have kind of a mind for logistics. We put these things on this shelf, but they should probably go over here. Or I have a mind for customer service. I love it when somebody comes in mad and I can talk them down and I'm pretty good at that. Or I love it when other people that I work for come and ask me questions. I wonder if I should get in the management track. That's how that happens. He actually was a supervisor at his last job, but they didn't pay supervisors very well. Right, then here's the deal, here's the deal.

Okay, but don't get on that. That's victim mindset. They didn't, cool. The next one might. And the next one might after that. And by the way, y'all's predicament, his predicament is not a them problem. And so if they don't pay enough, cool, I got to get a second job because y'all's problem is a math

problem. And math doesn't care about what your dream is. It doesn't care what you want to get one day. It cares what, how much bills cost. Just math. Hang on the line, we're going to send you our buddy Ken Coleman's book, Find the Work You're Wired to Do. And I want you all to go through that and check all that out. But I want y'all to check that out after y'all both have two jobs. It's game on, game on. Josie is up next in Colorado Springs.

Welcome to The Ramsey Show. Josie, how can we help? Hey guys, thanks so much for taking my call. I'm a big time listener of the Deloney Show. Oh, wonderful. You've got the right guy here. Yep. I just wanted to ask for some advice.

I've been married for two years. My husband and I have at thirty two year age difference uh... i'll tell you where is this a real thing uh... he's older i was hoping you're sixty four years thirty two is gonna be awesome okay so it's flat and so yeah so gap he's older one uh... seven b nine

thirty eight and uh... um 79 38. Okay. And um when we first were um courting um I initiated the idea of a pre-marital agreement. I guess I was so concerned about what people thought, even though I was already established on my own. Um, and so the agreement was that we were just going to keep every thing about our finances separate and that's not good. Um, and so we, about, um, probably about six months ago, we kind of had some discussions and arguments

and he does contribute. However, we just did the day randy class and he just wants to go through like all my spending and like my debt, which I don't have any, but he doesn't wanna talk about any of his stuff. And it's just- Has he always been this way? Very cagey around money conversations? Or more like a dad.

Is he like, I have my stuff together, but we can fix you? Or is it just, hey, I'm not going? No, no, he, no, that's only come up when I asked him like, Hey, will you help me with the spending plan? And I really would like to take the day of randity class. And he's like, yeah, of course. So no, he's not been like, but he has always been You know not really wanting to share about his do you know what he makes I? Don't you know his net worth you have access to any account that he has No, where do y'all live on mine? We live in Colorado in a small town. Whose house? And he's, it's mine. I owned it for four years before we got married. Is he paying the mortgage on

it too? Now on my bank account. Is he paying the mortgage on it too? So the answer to that is he contributes every month. So it could go towards it, but it's not enough for the mortgage payment. What's the mortgage payment? It's 1632. And how much money does he give to you every month? It just started to be $1,500. Okay.

And what was the agreement here? Was there like a, hey, you got to start paying? Or was he just like, hey, I'll pay you $1,500 to help cover bills? No. No. Here's a- The agreement was, before we got married, that you 1500 bucks to help cover bills. No, no. Here's a- The agreement was before we got married that we were gonna keep everything separate. But then, like, yes.

Go ahead, go ahead. Then really there was no actual agreement of how much. He's like, I'll just give my social security and it's a thousand dollars. And then it came out that it was not a thousand dollars. It was 16 something. Okay, let's do this. Let's do this. This is an awesome place to be. And here's what I mean awesome. Y'all made something up. Y'all made like a handshake

quasi prenup at the beginning of your marriage and you didn't sign off or have lawyers draft anything. No, we did. Oh, you did. Okay. On the pre-marital. or draft anything. No, we did. Oh, you did? Okay. And what is the- On the pre-medal. What's the spark notes of this prenup? Is it, whatever I came in with, I keep,

whatever he came in with, he keeps? Yes. And you get an allowance? And we're gonna keep finances separate forever. And his name is not on the deed of the house, so he has no ownership in this house, even though he's paying toward it. And he's okay with that.

Correct. But if you pass away tomorrow, suddenly, his kids will sue you for his part of that house because they're gonna say he gave you his social security amount and it's gonna get dragged through, right? Yes, that's what'll happen, 100%. Yes.

Yeah. So you're keeping your finances separate except y'all are Venmo-ing each other, as George says. Like y'all are like. Well, no, he got on my account and he began depositing 1,500 every month because I was like, well, yeah, I know it was a lot to take on, you know,

me and my four kids, but why did I think it was... What do you mean four kids? Like you're paying for everyone? Well, he has recently started contributing, so no. The answer to that is no. So what do you cover and what does he cover? I'm just so confused by all of this. Back out of the question. how can we help? What are you looking for? How to talk to him about, like I don't think it's right to have the benefits of being married, but and like me having 100% accountability and like I just think... Let me say this way, y'all are married legally.

Y'all haven't joined houses. Y'all haven't joined hearts. Y'all haven't joined spirits. Y'all haven't joined missions. Yeah. You just haven't. And that's okay. That's the arrangement you'll set up.

The beauty about arrangements set up by two people who shake hands is they can change that arrangement. It's not like you're paying the butt. You have to call a lawyer or whatever. But y'all can do that. Yeah. And you can say... I guess I need advice on how to talk to him about it. I don't feel safe in this marriage and I don't feel safe in my home because if you drop dead tomorrow, I don't know

where things are, I don't know what is what, I don't know who gets what, I don't know any of that stuff. I'm scared to death. Yeah. And I was scared to death last time in my previous marriage when I had four kids. I'm scared now, will you help me? And he might look at you and say, I will not. That's not your, that's not nothing for you to worry your pretty little head about. And it's okay to share your frustrations

that you're taking on the brunt of this financial accountability while he sits back and sends a Venmo every month. Yeah. I think you want more partnership in this marriage and that's a fair thing to ask. Can I tell you this? You are in a burden.

Your kids aren't a burden. He signed up for that. You don't go to apologize for him or take on more just out of this guilt. Like he signed up for it, he married you and you came with four kids. Yeah, yeah. And so you don't have to walk in already

wincing to a conversation. Yeah. It's just hard to talk to him. Okay, then that points to a bigger challenge in your marriage beyond finances. Yeah. Oh no, for sure. Yeah. Definitely.

But he just won't, like when I bring specific things up to him, he just flat out will ignore it. Like... Well, would he be willing to go to, you know, involve a third party and go to counseling with you guys to just work through some of these communication issues? He has gone to a couple sessions with me, yes, but he still looks at the whole situation as he came in and rescued me. So he's got a savior complex. He's like, well, I'll go to

counseling with you because you need this and I'm here to support you. Yeah, I'll go with you to this Dave Ramsey class for you to get your crap together. And you send me your budget and I'll review it for you. He has more debt than me. But he's just like, oh, it's no interest for a year. It's not even debt. But I mean, but let's be honest, you knew that when you married him. You mean as far as him not addressing? Yeah, he didn't just start avoiding feelings and things after you married him. Right? Well, kind of. Well, kind of. and things after you married him, right?

Well, kind of. Well, if he did, then here's the deal. Then I think you put that on the table. But at some point, you're gonna have to either confront this fact that he won't talk to you or share his life with you or any way be engaged with you at all about him. He's just serving as a dad to you, or you're gonna have to make peace with, this is the guy I married and this is the world I have.

One of those two things has to be true. Both will be hard. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Campbell joined by Dr. John Delaney. Today's question of the day is brought to you by WhyRefi. When life happens and those private student loans go into default, WhyRefi offers real possibilities instead of judgment. WhyRefi will help you explore a low fixed rate loan based on your unique circumstances.

You can learn more by going to whyrefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Rebecca in Maryland. My husband and I have children together and children from his prior marriage that live with us most of the time. Is it wrong of me to save for my children's future while not as regularly contributing to my stepchildren's accounts? My husband's ex hasn't helped

with lunch money, child care activities or anything and he refuses to push the issue. I essentially cover her half and have grown resentful about it. I love my stepchildren but I can't help feeling like she should be contributing. At what point do I put my responsibility to my children first and let her decide if she wants to do the same? Yuck, yuck, yuck. So I would need a lot more context here, but I'm just gonna read this as this is, George. When you married him, his kids came too.

And these are now y'all's kids. If you want to treat them as just two strange, strange youngsters living in your house, or that guys, that's cruel to them, that's cruel to your marriage, it's cruel to your own kids, that they can see their mother treat other young kids that way, they live in her own house. So there's something about joining together. It sounds like you have a problem with X, that she was in his life, that she's not cool, she's whatever, that she's around, I wish she wasn't. And that you're picking up her slack.

As you see it. I don't look at it as picking up her slack as much as I am taking care of children, period. And then the next layer is you should be, we can argue over who's taking care of the kids, but the most important thing is we're taking care of kids and these kids live in your house most of the time and so I think it's you sitting down with your husband and saying do you and your ex have a plan for their college for their food for their groceries for their whatever and y'all sharing y'all's money together because when y'all got married y'all are sharing money together and y'all sharing y'all's money together because when y'all got married y'all are sharing money together and Y'all have kids whether they're bio kids or whether they're

Step kid like they're y'all's kids too, especially when they're living in your house. So this whole thing is just Gross and messy and I guess the thing that's that's sitting with me Not right is at the end of the day, the adults in this scenario are acting like kids and there's hungry children. And I just, I can't stomach that. Take care of kids first and then the grownups can solve their little bickering contest. You should pay. No, you should pay. That comes after we make sure all the mouths are fed. And that's after we make sure kids have lunch money and they have a little league game. They can go play if we have the money.

So that's my take on that. Yeah. I'm just thinking through this and I'm going, the children didn't ask for any of this. None of this. And I think it's fine. By the way, it's not your kids. It's y'all's kids with this same guy. So this is their brother and sister or their half brother and sister.

Yeah. So is it wrong of you? I don't know that I wanna call it wrong or right. And I don't know that everything needs to be equal, but I think that needs to be equitable. I think we need to prepare for all of their futures and make sure that they all have the same opportunities. And I'll say, well, you're not my kid, so you're not gonna get to do this thing over here.

That feels cruel for no reason. Right, or imagine the stepkids talking to their dad saying, dad, why does my brother and sister that I grew up in their same house, why do they have a car and why do they get to go to college and we don't? And he's like, well, actually their mother loved y'all more than your mother loved you. So sucks to me. Oh, should have got hers. You can't do that.

I would figure out a plan. But all of this is the this is mine, this is yours, all the way down from the money. And I don't know if they've combined finances. There's a lot further questioning I would have here. Right, so many more questions. But I would try to save for all of their futures. And I don't know what that means.

Is that college? Is that something else? Again, we don't know. Here's the important line. I love my stepchildren, but I can't help feeling like she should be contributing. She should and she's not. So she's not. So what's the next right thing? We're gonna feed hungry kids, the ones living in our house first. We're gonna start right there. And

she should be contributing. Yep, you're right. You're right. Absolutely right, hundred percent. Your husband's kind of spineless. He should go sit down and talk to his wife or get the divorce decree out and hold her accountable He's not have that real conversation not make the kids suffer for it. That's my thought on it. Amen George just like a lot of adults not acting like adults It's brutal because you want to just solve it all with like a math problem and like a financial It's not there's so much that just comes down to deep work. Yes, having really hard conversations that you don't want to have and adults choosing to be adults and having big big feelings and then go doing the right thing anyway.

Right. That's that's that's that's the definition of adult. I have this feeling and I'm gonna go do the right thing. And not just do what feels like, feel like doing, nope, I'm gonna feel really angry and I'm gonna take care of these kids. I feel taken advantage of. I'm gonna take care of these kids, right? And then I'll get on the whatever, on my soap box.

Anyway. Thanks for the question. That's a tough one. Mike is up next in San Antonio on the line. Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, what's up, dude? How's it going? What's up, how are y'all? We're doing all right, man.

How can we help? I'm on my soap box, so help me get off here a little bit. Talk John off the ledge. My question is, so me and my fiance, we're getting married this summer. We have, we're both 21, and we have combined like $35,000 saved. We live really freely We're gonna be paying for a thousand dollar apartment. She brings in about 4,000 a month I'm not working because I have one more semester left of school and we made a budget and

We determined that it's gonna be okay. Like I don't need to work until I graduate. So my question is regarding cars. I have a car with 170,000 miles on it and it's becoming pretty unreliable. She has a car with 120,000 miles on it and I'm trying to figure out like what we should do. Has the car been in the shop? How much money have you sunk into this thing

in the last six months? Quite a lot. I don't know exactly. I think it would probably be like 2000. Have you sunk the money and now it's running? It's still running, yeah, but I have to replace possibly the catalytic converter soon what's the car worth today I'm not sure I looked it up online it was saying about

35 hundred but I would not sell this car until you're done with school and you have a job and you could pay cash for what's next and unfortunately for you you called two guys that drove to work today in cars that have over 200,000 miles on them. Woo! Just, you picked the wrong day to call the show. Sure, it was the wrong two dudes. I'm like 170, that's cute.

We're getting started. I know, I know. What kind of car is it? I want to pat it on the head. Yeah, okay. What kind of car do you drive? What is this thing? It's a Ford Fiesta.

I guess my main concern is that The transmission might go out because yeah, we might get hit by a meteorite dude. The deal is you don't want to drive that car Yeah, what's the question behind the question? You hate that car. That's cool. I Mean I honestly don't hate it. I like I really like it. It's a good gas mileage But here's the thing, you guys have the money to cover necessary repairs. Yeah. Right, and you don't have any debt?

But either of you? No debt, we're both a graduating debtor. Amazing, so when and if that car does completely die and the repairs are worth more than the car, then at that point I would say, all right, we're gonna go buy a used, reliable car car for ten thousand dollars. Are you trying to like get sell it so you can get some value out of it you think you're gonna just appreciate it into the mud? Yeah that was my like if the transmission goes I wouldn't be able

to sell it but if I can sell it now I get money from the car. To a single mom who's got three thousand dollars that she scraped together to buy a car? What was that? I'm sorry. I mean who are you gonna sell a car to that you're worried about the transmissions right about to go? I need to get out of my driveway really fast before it blows up? I don't know. Trade it in and someone takes it. I wouldn't sell it myself. Okay. I would wait until that day actually comes and we'll cross that bridge and you'll probably trade it in for a thousand bucks. Yeah, you get a thousand dollars. Yeah. That's what I've done in the past. And then I go, okay, well, we knew this was coming. It's not a surprise. So let's set aside money that is Mike's upgrade car fund and not say,

this is an emergency, drain the entire emergency savings while I'm still in school and we're not even married yet. I would make this decision together when that time comes. ["Dreams of a New World"] ["Dreams of a New World"] Hey, if you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck, you're wondering where your money's going, your first step is getting on a budget.

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Eli is in Huntsville, Alabama up next. Eli, welcome to The Ramsey Show. Thank you guys for taking my call. Hello. Sure. How can we help? So I just had a quick question. So we were trying, thinking about doing the Dutch Snowball. I hardly watch the show, but I've seen some shorts on Instagram. And so my wife got her bachelor's and is not able to find a job. And we, I'm considering to just, instead of doing the death snowball, saving some money

up for her to get her master's, because I feel like that'd be a bigger return to investment than trying to pay it all off now. Please don't do that. Please, please, please, please, please. I'm not sure if that's a good idea or not. Yeah, please don't do that. What's your degree in? So I'm a nuclear pharmacist.

No, not you. What's her degree in? Oh, it's in psychology. Okay. And what is she trying to find work doing? Well, she's just been trying to, she was trying to use her degree just kind of be, I don't know, just in like mental health counselor facilities with just the bachelors and she wasn't able to really find a solid job.

Yeah, I mean to practice, I mean to even sit for a licensure exam, you have to have a graduate degree. So I get that. Yeah. Talk to me about your debt load that you all have right now. So we have around, she has around 20,000, Well, I guess we have 20,000 for her bachelor's and I have 70,000 for my doctorate degree. Is that all of the debt? No credit cards, no car loans, just student loans? Yeah, but we're also closing on a house

at the end of this month as well. I don't know if that's considered a loan or it's a mortgage, I guess. Yeah, that's a big one. That's a big financial step. While you guys are trying to pay off debt to add on the stress of home ownership. How much are you putting down on the house?

See, that was a problem, and I didn't, I put zero down on the house. Oh, God, Eli. Was this like an FHA loan? Yeah, I got it. I was approved for an FHA loan that kind of will cover the down payment and stuff like that. That's just called the more loans. That's just called more loans.

That's not a gift. They don't hook you up. Yes. Yes. I understand. I understand. And even the word approved, the word approved and bro, we're like, just imagine us sitting at a table with you, like sharing nachos.

We're like having fun with you, not at you. Okay. Yeah, I know. But like, even the word approved, like- I got approved for $150,000 of student loans. You're like, that's not as awesome as you think. It's like, we're gonna consider whether we can own you for 30 years.

We'll get back to you. And you're like, please, please, please. How much do you make a year? So right now I make 90,000 a year. Oh, big box of farts on a stick. So y'all have 90,000 in the hole. How big of a house did you just buy? It was 218,000. Okay and that's what's on the mortgage? And that's what's on the mortgage. Yes and also I'm every year I'm gonna get a a $10,000 salary increase. Up to $130,000.

Are you sure? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I'm 100% sure. How 100%? Because I have some friends who work in the forestry service who are pretty sure they'd have a job to share and they don't. Well, the thing is I took a pay cut to get this job. So the average salary is $130,000.

Why did you take the pay cut? Well, the way it worked is to get into the nuclear, it's kind of competitive, and he was able to get me in and pay for the schooling, and he promised me to, it's an agreement, to increase $10,000 every year, and it's like up to $130,000. But I can just leave and go to a different pharmacy and make that money now, but obviously I have a commitment.

So when you say paying for schooling, is that paying off your student loan debt? Oh yeah, yeah. Yes, well here's the thing. So when I say pay for schooling, I meant paying for her to go school, but it wouldn't be, I'm also paying my debt as well. So you're telling me you can go out

and get a job making $40,000 more today? Per year. Yes. But you're forgoing that to cover her potential master's degree? No, I could do that now. Like right now I could leave and get a better job. But the career, nuclear pharmacy is very limited in locations and the career I chose,

I made a deal with him, like where I was gonna work for him, for Lower Peca, and I can still afford, I can still afford paying her, her schooling and pay our debts and everything. It's not, that's not the problem. I was wondering if I should snowball that now. Yes. Or. Yeah.

Don't wait until you have more money. That day will never come, because it'll always be, well, if we just made a little more, we could clean this up faster. Or honey, I'm pregnant with twins, or the car explodes, or that guy, that boss gets fired. And there's always gonna be a better time to pay off debt. So I think we need to face the reality

and go every single dollar that's not food, shelter, utilities, transportation, insurance, and debt minimum payments needs to go toward cleaning up this debt. And it's not a disinvestment. It's like you've bound yourself in an algorithm that doesn't need to be bound the way you've tied yourself up. Here's what I mean. If she goes and gets a job for two years, working as a receptionist in a psychiatrist office, she's gonna get incredible skills into how the business of being a psychologist works.

She's gonna learn how to do scheduling, how to do budgeting, how to do time, how to do cancellations. That is a incredible business ROI on the practice of being a therapist, that many therapists don't get until they blow it. And so, or getting a job as a hospital runner, getting a job as a hospital chaplain,

sitting with people who just lost a loved one, all of these things. My job as a dean of students, sitting with people who had just cheated, and I've got to say, you can't be in college anymore, or sitting with kids who are about to go to jail, or sitting with people who had just cheated and I've got to say, you can't be in college anymore. Or sitting with kids who are about to go to jail, or sitting with parents whose kids just died.

All of those things gave me tools that when I finally went to get a PhD in counseling, I had so much more context. So the idea is it's an ROI, dollar for dollar. You can't think of it that way. You have to think of what's gonna make her the best therapist over time with the dollars

that we have in our house right now. And y'all are negative $90,000. Yeah. That's the important thing. Your negative $90,000 not including your mortgage. So let's get to zero. Let's get 20% of that house paid down. And then let's exhale and then say,

okay, what do you wanna do next year? And by the way, I'm making 20,000 more dollars. See how that, you give them, and here's what George and I are solving for, resolving for peace in your house. And most Americans do not have that. They don't have peace in their house. Is that fair?

What would it cost for her to go get this Masters? 30,000 and I have Total? I calculated enough, yeah total because it'd be UNA, University of North Alabama. Good on UNA man, I didn't know there were any programs under 50 or 60.

But you're telling me your employer's going to cashflow that on her behalf? Well I'm gonna get the money and I'm to be paying it off, yeah, basically. Well let me make it clear, you took a $40,000 pay cut every single year to pay for a one-time $30,000 bill. Yeah. Don't you think that's bad math? Well let's see, okay, the reason I did it when I did it, I was rotating for pharmacy and I really, really want it.

I want to get into nuclear. And everyone was telling me you're not going to get into nuclear. It's impossible. That has a low turnout rate, turnover rate. So when he offered me the job, ninety thousand. I mean, I already got the nuclear licensing, so I could theoretically leave. But we kind of, I kind of feel indebted to him.

He's a really good, he's like the, it's a small business. And he's been teaching me a lot and all that. And that's kind of the reason why I'm staying there with the 90,000. And we're saving enough where I can debt snowball a little bit, I can put in like 500 extra. And I'm telling you, you are stunting your financial growth and future by being quote unquote indebted to your friend.

I would say, hey, thanks man. I need to get out of this hole. And I'm not asking you for a $40,000 raise, but I have this opportunity over here that's gonna get us out of debt years ahead of time. And we're just gonna cashflow her degree. I appreciate everything you've done for me. And you know what makes me feel like a really,

I have got amazing friends, is when I go to their house and I see they've got my book on their shelf, and they didn't ask me for it. They got online and bought it because they wanted to support me. And so a great friend may not ask you to take a $40,000 pay cut just as a high five. Just food for thought.

I hope that helps, man. Best of luck with everything. From the Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by the host of the Dr. John Deloney show, Dr. John Deloney. We're taking your call to triple 8, 825-5225 and Terry's going to kick us off all the way across the pond in London. What's going on Terry? How can we help?

Hi there. First and foremost, thank you for taking the time out to speak to me. I just need some guidance and some real help. I'm just currently not in the best place mentally or financially. So long story short, I'm not earning enough. I'm also in deep debt and I'm just trying to get myself in a better position and yeah just at least try and build wealth. So I just I'm lost and I need the guidance and what to do. Man I can hear it your voice you sound scared brother. Yeah it's probably not been the best time like 2024 is probably the worst year of my life.

Tell me about that. I'm just okay. I was meant to get married so me and my ex fiancee we were both working two jobs, you know, trying to pay off a wedding. At the same time, you know, my father was ill and I was taking care of him alongside my siblings. In the space of two to three months, the wedding or the engagement failed and my father passed away, so I had to quit work, go back home, bury him, come back and yeah just all of this whilst losing everything and it's just been very tough mentally. So can we exhale on that for a second? What was your old man's name? It was Gabriel.

Gabriel? He's a good guy? Good dad? Yeah. He did good by you? He did. Did he believe in you? Yeah, we kindled our relationship. He wasn't a part of our life for about a good 10 years because he had his own issues. But by God's grace, the last four years, he allowed us to have the final moments with him so yeah

he did. Amazing. Amazing. So beyond the money thing I think it's just acknowledging dude you got hit square in the mouth the last year. You lost the love of your life, you finally got to rekindle your relationship with your old man, which every son dreams of doing, and it was taken away too quick. And now you're wrestling with,

like, what value do I even have? I can't even make enough money to pay my bills. And there's a math problem here, but I don't wanna just blow over. And just want you to hear two guys on the other side of the world being sad with you for a second, okay? It's heartbreaking and I'm grateful that you had the courage to say it out loud. Most men don't and I'm proud of you for saying it out loud. Thank you. Okay. And I mean I can get choked up

pretty quick thinking about you getting able to hug your dad. And I'm grateful y'all got those four years back. That's awesome. All right. So tell me George about your financial situation. Are you back at work? Yeah. So I, when I came back, I just focused on getting a job. I managed to learn something part-time, nothing special, customer service, working at Tiffler. But the income, I mean, that personal was great, but now I'm at a point where it's just barely getting me by. Is it still part-time?

It is still part-time, yeah. Could you pick up another part-time job? I've been trying, I've been trying. You know, the job market in the UK is not the greatest, but I've definitely been trying. I'm pretty much doing like 50 applications a day. What were you doing before? So before I was working in IT, I was working in tech.

I was working completely remote, and I was also doing like concierge. Is that what you wanna get back to? I'm working in a residential apartment. If I snap my fingers, you'd have a great job in tech and IT? Not necessarily. But if I had to do it just to get my income up, then sure. What do you want me to do?

If you answer the question. I want to use the gift I have, which is around training and presenting. So either like a technical trainer or learning and development or pre-sales consultant just around those fields. That's ideally what I would like to do. Love it. Okay.

Well, my hope is that we can get you there over time. Right now we kind of have this survival situation of just trying to cover our bills, get rid of the debt. So how much total debt do you have? Yeah. It totals around 34,000 pounds. I'm not sure what that is in dollars. What kind of debt is that?

What it is. Break it down for me. So yeah, break it down. One of them, it's a bank loan, which I took, stupidly took. Another one, it's a car loan, I took, stupidly took. Another one, it's a car loan which I took on top of the bank loan which doubled stupid. I don't know right now, Dave Ramsey's pulling out his hair

which he doesn't have at the moment. He didn't even have any left, man, you're good. He's pulled it all out. Yeah. So you got the bank loan, you got the car loan, anything else? I've got a credit card loan, or yeah, two credit card loans. And then of course my phone bill.

Those are like the major, major debts that I- Okay. What's the car worth? Outgoing, I should say. It's worth around 19,000 or just under 20,000 pounds. But I can't, I do have a settlement figure of, you know, 16,000 and a half um but I would be just to come out of that I would I'll be in negative two and a half I guess. You're saying you owe 16 and a half? No no no so that's the settlement figure in terms of like um if I wanted to settle the payment for

the entire car it would be 16 and a half um But the total outstanding balance of it is $19,000. And that's about what it's worth if you sold it? Yeah. Okay. And you have nothing in savings? No, I'd use all of that to fly back home to help with the burial. And are you still going further into credit card debt every single month to cover your bills? No, I literally can't even use my credit card. It's been maxed out.

So I don't touch it. I literally don't touch it. I do minimum payments and worst-case scenario, it ends up getting used. Well, clearly, you can see on paper there's an income problem here. We need to make enough to cover our expenses plus the minimums on the debts. And right now you're working part-time making how much per month? What's your take-home pay? It's around, take-home pay is around 1200. Wow. And what are your expenses every month?

My expenses, including the minimum debt payments, your food, utility, shelter, transportation, insurance. Yeah, it's more or less 1200. So that's what I'm worried about is you continually going into debt so we need to cut our expenses down to the bone I don't know what else you can cut I think we probably need to get rid of this car as soon as you can that might mean you save up a little bit of money to get a little beater car right now to get you from A to B. Do you have public transportation in your area?

Yeah. Could you do that for a season? I could. Man, that'll wipe out your payment plus insurance plus gas. That'll free you up to just clean the rest of this up even for six months, get you through the summer and into the fall. Yeah. That might be my solution right now while we go find two or three more part-time jobs and eventually get a full-time job doing something that we enjoy making way more.

Can you do something crazy for me? Sure. Keep sending out applications, but I want you to get on the phone and call 10 of your old IT buddies and ask them today, you guys know of any jobs, I'm back on the hunt. I'm back in the game.

Don't shoot them emails, don't text them, get on the phone and call them. Let them know I'm back in. See if that might spark something than just a generic interview. I like it, Terry, I'm rooting for you, man. Best of luck. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. Carolina is up next in Florida.

What's going on, Carolina? Hi, thank you so much for having me. It's such a blessing to talk to you guys. Oh, well, we're honored to talk to you. Yes, thank you. I'm calling on behalf of my mom who is 71 years old Sorry, I got super excited We love it. Okay. Yeah, I'm just really in here for her

I love her so much and I want to coach her well and I follow your steps to the team my finances But her situation is more complex and I don't know what to recommend her so here's the detail she's 71 years old she bought a house a year ago she has a mortgage of $96,000 at a 5.5% she has a CD of savings at a 4% with the total savings of $50,000 a year. She has an emergency fund of $20,000 and a money market that also has $20,000. So my question is, what do you recommend in looking at everything from the baby steps, you know, guidance? My intuition is that she could put the 50,000 and the 20 from the money market into the house so that brings her mortgage down to $26,000. Then that gives her maybe

about two years to aggressively attack the house and be completely debt free. She has no other debt. She's very good steward of her money, but she's 70, 71, 72, and she's tired. You know, she doesn't want to work forever. She works full-time. What does she make? And, Mommy, how much do you make? Like maybe 40, 38, 40 a year. Okay. like maybe 40 38 40 a year okay and so so my again my intuition is based on baby steps like show everything there keep your emergency funds protected that's 20,000 that's pretty robust I would think because her expenses are pretty low really and but my my thought and also the question here is, well, how can she, because if she

pays the house in two years using the strategy and proposing, then that leaves her at step number seven, which is build wealth and give generously. And she's 71, she's healthy, she's strong, but I also see that she doesn't wanna be stuck in a full-time job forever. She wants to do other things and I support that. Yeah, is she living on her own? She's living on her own and I actually moved in with her a month ago for my own sake of my finances.

I'm paying my student loans. I'm very close to being done with Baby Step 2 so I can go to Baby Step 3. Good. And so I'm paying my student loans. I'm very close to being done with Baby Step 2, so I can go to Baby Step 3. Good. And so I'm paying her rent. So that's an additional income for her. That's helping. Yeah, I'm telling her, Moni, go.

Like gazelle intensity, we know that. I mean, I speak your language when it comes to Baby Step. You're on it. I mean, you've just nailed it at every single point. Yeah, yeah, I'm on it. Yeah. Okay, what's the house worth? Mommy, how much is your house worth right now?

So she bought it last year, and she bought it for $165. So whatever the market has done from then to now, we really don't know. OK. The market since then has done this. Who knows? It's all over the place. Right, right. I like your plan personally.

If she's able to work, I love the idea of minimizing her expenses as she heads into retirement. And this money, you know, if you would, let's say you took that 70,000 in the CD money market and invested it, it's not gonna do that much in a year or two. So I'd rather put it to work with this guaranteed rate of return of her interest rate at five

and a half percent in the mortgage and then her knocking this out maybe with your help with the rent payment so that at 73, her expenses are down to what? A thousand bucks a month? Has she added that up of what it's going to take? She hasn't added that exactly like a budget. I've been encouraging her to keep a clear budget like we, we, you guys teach. But the main question she had with this proposal was she's concerned about the taxes on the house at the end of the year that add up if she doesn't okay so if she doesn't let's say she pays the house debt-free and then works part-time you know doing something that she enjoys she just

doesn't want to be tied on money when at the end of the year she has to pay like three thousand dollars of taxes for yeah she'll always have property taxes and insurance and that will likely continue to go up over time. And so what I'm hearing is there's zero nest egg here. All the things you just laid out, that is her entire financial picture. Yes, yes. Is there any social security or anything like that?

She has what you could call like a very small pension from Columbia. We're originally from there, but it's like, honestly, like $200. So it's like... So outside of her 40K year she's making, there really is no social security or anything like that. Right. So that's my fear is when she stops working, what money will she live off of?

Right. And I think that's why she has been afraid to proceed with my recommendation to put her savings all in because she doesn't have a 401k for retirement. Yeah. That's understandable. I mean, I'd be hesitant too when there is no nest egg to be spoken of. Now, I mean, if all she has is 70k to her name, she's going to burn through that pretty quick in retirement once her income goes down to zero. Right. So I think what's gonna have to happen is she works until she can't work anymore and that might mean her late 70s. That's the reality of this. Now lowering the expenses will help but if she doesn't have income to cover the rest of her

bills there's still another problem there. Do you see what I mean? This helps solve one problem. There's a bigger problem, which is we can't cover our expenses once we stop working. Right, right. Yeah, I understand. But if she got rid of the house in the next two years, then the next three years of work could all just go toward stacking away in wealth building, which would help, but again,

still may not solve the 10-year problem of running out of money. Right. So I would develop a plan. I would also sit down with a financial advisor. You can connect with a SmartVestor Pro, ramsysolutions.com, who can just sit down and show you all the options. Hey, if you go down road B, here's what will be the case.

If you go down B, A, here's what will happen. I think just laying it all out will help her make a decision that she feels good about and you feel good about, because otherwise this is going to be your burden to bear is covering her in retirement. And that might be something you're willing and able to do, but I wanna make sure that we're all on the same page before we make any big decisions.

Yeah, honestly, part of my strategy financially too has been considering you know okay well if she pays her house and when I get ready to buy a house I can buy a property where I can build a um like an in-law suite yeah yeah so that then she can sell her house that's kind of my my thinking is that if she can't afford a retirement, she's going to have to eventually sell this house and just rent or live with you to essentially have no bills. But what do you think of this is instead of selling her house, if she lives with me in the future and she rents her house, so that is her source of income and she's no longer bound to having to work. There's potential there. I mean you got to build in, you got to build in. She's

got to be the landlord and cover all the things that pop up and repair the maintenance and... Problem in the leak and so it's like... You still need a good pile of money to make all that happen. That's right. Most landlords are able to pay, like you make money money, if you will, when you have multiple houses. So essentially you might make $200 net after all expenses are paid and depending on what you could rent it for.

Yeah. And you will be the landlord. She's not gonna be able to handle this. So either you need to do it yourself or hire a property manager, which will then cut into the potentially slim profits. And let's say you make $1,000 extra, which is a big margin.

You make $1,000, $1,000, $1,000, and you get a phone call and says, hey, we left the whatever running, and now this has flooded out. And now we're back. And then here's $1,000, $1,000, and then it goes on for two years, and they're like, hey, the air conditioner just went out. And then here's a thousand dollars a thousand dollars and then goes on for two years and they're like hey the air conditioner just went out and that's thirteen thousand dollars and so that just comes with some

headaches too over time. I don't know there's any magic solutions here I love the idea of her going into retirement debt-free but I think we need to have a kind of a choosing a reality conversation about what the next ten years looks like instead of what the next two years looks like. And how amazing that she got you as her daughter who's willing to step in here and love her through this. That's awesome. And that she's healthy and able to work. That's a huge blessing. It is May and the Ramsey Cash giveaway is officially here.

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That's ramsysolutions.com slash giveaway. Brent is up next in Indianapolis. Brent, welcome to the show. Hey, pleasure to be on. Yeah, what's going on with you? So in July, I'll be leaving on a church mission for two years. Wow. And I'm wondering, that's quite the mission. That's like, you're a missionary at that point, right?

That's like a profession. Yeah. Okay. Just making it clear. So, I will have no income though, and so I'm wondering with my savings that I'm leaving behind, should I invest them or should I put it in a CD fund? Are you single? Yes. Okay. And how much is in savings? About $29,000.

Will you have any expenses over the next two years? So the $29,000 is besides the money I have saved for the expenses. That's all the money that I'll need on the mission is set aside already. The 29,000 is the surplus. Awesome. But what about like fun? Are you going to have fun over the next two years or is it all work internationally? No joy. It's, it's pretty strict just doing the work of God, you know?

That's impressive. Okay. So you're asking if this is a two year- Work of God can be fun too. Yeah, John would make it fun. You can go to the pool. I mean, okay, but cool. Like that's y'all's deal.

Okay, cool. So no expenses. No expenses, I got 29,000. Would I invest it or save it knowing that it's gonna be a two year journey? I would just save it. I would put it in a high yield savings account. Right now that's gonna be like three and a half, 4%,

nothing fancy, but it's just too short of a timeline to be invested. And the other question is, this sounds like your emergency fund mostly. Oh yeah, it's like a college fund for when I get back. Okay, you plan on going to college when you're back? Yes. Okay, even more on going to college when you're back? Yes. Okay, even more reason to keep it more liquid

and less impacted by market returns. I would lock it up in a high-yield savings account and just don't touch it for two years. And again, you're not gonna make much money either way. If you invested it and it made 7% or you had it in a high-yield savings and it made 4%, you're not talking about $100,000 difference here. Okay.

Do you have enough money to pay for college with that? That'll account for about the first two years and then I'll be working through college and that's besides scholarships and everything. So I'll be working through college. Dude, you're amazing, dude. Well done. Pretty awesome. How old are you?

I'm 18. Awesome. You have 29,000 bucks Pretty awesome. How old are you? I'm 18. Awesome. You have 29,000 bucks as an 18 year old. How'd you get that? That's insane. Well, I graduated early at 16 and then I've been working full time for the last two and a half years.

What a guy. You're not even real, dude. You're like AI. Congratulations. That's amazing, brother. Yeah, and best of luck on the mission trip. That's pretty cool. Yeah and best of luck on the mission trip. That's pretty cool. You get to do that. So rad. Jason is up next in Seattle, Washington. Jason, how can we help today? I have a question about when

you go to pole retirement. So my wife and I currently are both 28. Baby steps four, five and six. You're 28? Yes. And you're asking about the mandatory withdrawal? Well done. No, not mandatory. Not mandatory withdrawal, but when the stock market went down recently, it just got me thinking about it because I'm kind of a nerd. No, no. Jason, we're the same person. It's fine. Don't listen to John. Recently, it just got me thinking about it because I'm kind of a nerd No No

Jason we're the same person. It's fine. Don't listen John So, I mean right now we have about a hundred twenty five thousand dollars in retirement Not including my wife's pension So I think we should be fine by the time we do retire definitely but when say for example, this is a question I've never heard on the show. Say for example, we only have a million dollars in retirement. Okay. And you only want to pull off of the growth of the nest egg and never touch the nest egg.

Well, if the stock market returns 10%, you then pull $100,000. But the stock market only does 3%, do you still wanna pull 100 and leave you with 930 for the next year? Or would you only wanna pull $30,000 and never touch the nest egg? That's a great question. And a lot of, if you meet with

pretty much any financial planner, they're gonna look at your whole situation and go, okay, let's have some cash reserves set aside so that in a market downturn, you don't create what's called a sequence of returns risk. And what that says is essentially what you're explaining is hey, if you take 100,000 out when the market's down and then the market's down the next year

and you take that same 100,000 out, you might never fully recover, quote unquote, back to your principle, right? The other theory is that you always need to have the principle balance no matter what. Well, that's a pretty insane theory. There's no rule that says you have to die with five million dollars left in the bank. And so it's okay to see that balance go down over time. Obviously the goal here is to not run out of money.

And so what I, what my goal personally when I'm in retirement age is to have run out of money. And so what I, what my goal personally, when I'm in retirement age, is to have so much money that it's not gonna be a problem to pull the amount I need for expenses and some fun money. And on top of that, I'm gonna have cash reserves likely of one, two, maybe even three years of living expenses set aside by retirement age in a liquid, you know, high yield savings account

ready to protect me in case of those market downturns. So let's say the market was down 22% one year. Well, I'm probably just gonna use my high-yield savings money that year and then replenish it when the market is back up. That makes sense. So that's a way to kind of mitigate all the risks. You're not as worried about living off the retirement,

but I just crunched the numbers for you. You're 28. By the age of 62, let's say you invest a thousand bucks a month on top of the 125 you guys have. That's $7 million, that's 62. Yeah. Not counting social security or pension.

I think we should be fine. I don't know if we can actually burn through that amount of money. Exactly, and that's the thing, the nerds like us, Jason, these are problems we'll never actually experience. Bro, I can burn through $7 million in a weekend, dude. I mean, man, your wife married well, brother,

because I could put a hurtin' on $7 million. But even taking out 1% of your $7 million portfolio in retirement, that's 70 grand a year, at 1%. Which means by the time you actually die, that portfolio is gonna be like $50 million, most likely. Because it's gonna continue to grow far outpacing what you can spend. But it's a great discussion to have.

It's a fun nerdy discussion to have. And if it is something that you want more clarity on, I would connect with a SmartVestor Pro to go, hey, can you just lay this all out for me? I'm 28, here's how much we're investing. Lay out all the scenarios, run some simulations as to what could happen based on past market returns. But really, I just said it and forget it and go, it's going to be fine. I'm going

to have more than enough. And you're not going to be riding the edge every year going, the market's down. I'm freaking out. You just go, yawn. It went from 7 million to 6.8 and we can still live to fight another day. I do think though, George, this is me climbing on myself a little bit. I'm always telling people, don't look, it's a roller coaster, it's whatever. My parents are in their 70s. And so a dip or like a recession, I can go, you know what, there's recessions every 10 or 15 years and I'm going to be fine. That's scary, right?

What feels like a speed bump for John at your age feels like driving off a cliff. If you got into the Ramsey plan when you're in your 50s and you've just got enough to cover your bills and suddenly the market's down 20% and you're 76, I guess it's a reminder to me to have compassion for folks who are watching this thing really closely, especially folks who are about to go to retirement or in retirement, that's scary. Absolutely. Because that's a real impact on real money.

Yeah, I'm more flippant with a 28 year old who's thriving than I would if this was a 68 year old calling saying, I have $300,000 in my nest egg total, what should I do? And the market just went, lost $7 trillion or whatever, did a couple weeks ago, like, it just got gnarly. Yeah, and it's a great reminder of the importance of living below your means. For a long, long time.

For expenses low every single year, no matter what, building for the future so that if the market does have a dip, you're going to be okay. You've got cash reserves, you have an emergency fund on top of that. And so that would be my encouragement to anyone out there who's on the path building for retirement. Now, if you're in retirement and you don't have money,

that's a different problem. Right. But don't just sit on the sidelines going, well I'm scared of the market so I'm just going to put it in a savings account. You have a bigger risk there. Inflation is going to eat away at your money and so you've got to be investing and if you want a free investing guide, we've got it for you. Just go to ramseysolutions.com slash guide. It pretty much covers everything you would need to know about investing and more. It's completely free. Our scripture of the day, Matthew 5 16. Let your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and glorify your

father in heaven. Jordan Peterson said, compare yourself to who you were yesterday not to who someone else is today. Mmm. That'll preach. Amy is up next in Philadelphia. How can we help Amy? Hi. I was calling because I need help. I listened a while back to John talking to Dave and talking about making a plan. My husband and I are kind of in desperate need of making a plan to pay down debt. You know, we have kind of like the same old story. We have a lot of debt.

We have $60,000 in credit card debt that we just, for years now, we have wanted to try to pay off or trying to cut our expenses and we just can't seem to get it together. We need help with making a budget and sticking to it and an actual rubber to the road plan. How long has this been going on? How long have you guys been married? Twenty-two years. Have you always had debt? We didn't. For probably like the first 10 years. We were really,

really good. And we sold our first house. We bought at the height of the market. We sold at the bottom of the market, kind of like a lot of family issues. You know, we had a death. My husband lost his dad. His mom was dying. We bought their house for not much, but we gave them enough. We took on enough of a mortgage that and lost enough money that it really kind of just started to snowball and we had more and more kids. So we had, you know, we had no kids and now we have five kids. You know, we got twins on our last pregnancy and we're really, really blessed. God gave me the family that I really never thought I could have, but now we're in debt and I have to steward

it that our money better so that we can be a bigger blessing to our kids and the people around us. You know, like we make pretty good money. How much do you make? I'm a nurse, my husband. Combined, we make like $215. Amazing. A year. I'm a critical care nurse. I work full-time, so we have five kids. I, you know, and I'm in school. That's kind of the other thing is an expense that I've had to do because I have to finish my bachelor's. I have been had my degree and RN for 20 years. I work in

an ICU, but I have to finish this. And they're not paying for it? They're paying for a small portion of it but you know they don't pay for all and the longer it takes me the more money it costs and with five kids and working you know I'm a leader on my unit too so like I have a lot of obligations. Yeah. Are you cash flowing this on your part? No, I am now at this point where we thought at first we could, but it's just taking too long. So I have now started taking student loans for it. Well, it's hard to get out of debt

when you're still getting into it. That's what I found. It's like, we're trying to get the water out of the boat, but we keep adding water in the boat What do we do biggest expense for years is that we sent our kids to private school and up until last year You know we We finally decided like we just cannot do it like there's just it's not happening. We're just bleeding money I wasn't working full-time as a nurse. So I pulled them all out of private school We pulled them out of private school.

They're all in public school. They made the transition fabulous. Our kids are straight A students. They are honestly a huge blessing. Where'd that money go? That probably saved you what, $90,000? It was like about 35. For all three?

Right, and that's for five. They were five, yeah, it was 35 a year. For all five? Right, and that's for five. There were five. Yeah, it was 35 a year. For all five of them? In our area, that was, you know, not a bad, you know, it was a good, all Christian school. That's awesome. Okay, so saving 35 grand, where'd that money go? That's what we said. Where did the money go?

Like we, we, my husband, we finally said, like, I think we were just so far in the red that we... I don't think so. I don't think so. If you go look at your checking account, it's going to give you a nice little list of all the reasons you're broke. I don't think you were that broke. I think it just, I think it went out the door. And now you're ashamed that you pulled your kids out of something that you valued. And then you didn't, you weren't a good steward of that money. I do.

And it's such a pressure because we do feel like we're not stewarding our money well. So we dial in on what we're spending in on. He did start making a budgeting app, going on one of the budgeting apps, like one of the free ones, because again, we are trying not to put any money out. You know, we do our tithes first.

Are you guys doing any investing right now? No, no, because we're not, because we're just trying to pay. So you're all in on this? Yeah. So my guess is you guys are bringing in- No, my husband won't get- What's that?

My husband's not in on like the Dave Ramsey thing. I feel like he doesn't like to. What does that mean? What is he in on then? He just, he's, you know, he'll tell you if you know. He wants to do his plan? He wants to pay off debt, so he doesn't wanna set, he doesn't, he just wants to not spend money.

That's, you know, that's what I'll tell you. It's always the goal is to not spend money. I find my biggest waste, I will tell you, is I do give in to the kids all the time so I'm trying to say no, you know the extra pair of sneakers that they want or the Extra, you know, do they know your situation? Have you sat down with all the kids that hey guys family meeting mom and dad we have been Irresponsible with money for a long time and we're trying to fix that and here's

what that looks like for our family. We did last year when we pulled it out of the school and we did cut back on just everything. You know, we really... Is all of this credit card debt? It's always expensive. Your entire debt is 60 grand, all credit cards? No other debt? Yes, that's all credit card.

We do have more. We have our $65,000 on the house. I have one car payment. We have one vehicle that can cart everybody around. What's left on the car loan? To be honest, I don't remember. Let me see if I can have it right here. But I, you know, it's not a fun.

Is it 10,000 or 50,000? Just give me a ballpark of what is out there. Oh no, it was like 10,000. If it's 10, you know. I know our house would be paid off in three years and our, if we just paid what were normal payment and the car is also paid off in that same year. But I don't have the exact number.

Well, the every dollar budget will work for you. If you guys sit down and you go, okay, we make two 10, here's our take home pay after taxes and healthcare deductions, here's what we're actually bringing home. We're gonna put that at the top of the budget in the income section, all of our paychecks. And then we're gonna list out all of our expenses. You can look back at your bank account

and get a ballpark for all of this. And that's going to show you very quickly. Every dollar will show you at the top, hey, you're in the green, you have a thousand bucks left over every month to throw out the debt, or you're in the red and you're overspending. And my guess is when you do the budget, it's going to show you on paper that you should have $3,000 left over, right? Right. That's where it's disappearing. We should have a bunch of money. And this is where we go, we're sticking to the budget.

We said $200 for groceries, that's what we're going to spend this week on groceries. And you're going to get real creative and you're going to make a lot of sacrifices and you're going to realize you don't need half the stuff that you've been spending on the checking account, the subscriptions, the streaming, the frivolous, the fast food, the eating out, all of that's going to disappear. There's another layer to this, I think. You don't like feeling uncomfortable. And until you can accept I'm living a life that's uncomfortable either way I go, one of these lives is causing me to be buried in debt, me and my husband not on

the same page, us living separate lives, or one of these paths, this uncomfortable path, will eventually lead us to freedom. Because you're miserable right now. We can both hear it. You're just spinning and spinning and spinning. And you're a registered nurse, you know how to help people not die. You know how math works. But when your kid comes and says, Mom, I really want these cool shoes, dude, they're so cool. Right then, something probably from when you were a little girl, the switch flips and you're like, all right,

let's do it. Mom, let's eat Chick-fil-A tonight, please, please, please, please, please. Like, you're like, you know what, I don't want to cook it. Like, yes. Is that fair? Probably no in the head fair. Okay you have to decide I'm going to feel uncomfortable and just because I feel uncomfortable doesn't mean I'm doing something wrong in fact right now

means I'm doing it right and you and your husband have to decide we're gonna feel uncomfortable together so that we can finally have some freaking peace in this house. Y'all are way too smart to over complicate all of this. Don't believe the lie that you're a bad mom if you say no. No you're a great mom. You're a great mom. You're giving your kids freedom. And they're watching you. They're seeing every single decision you make and they're going I'm proud of my mom for doing a really hard thing. Hang on the line Amy I'm gonna send you every dollar premium so you guys don't have to pay for it so that money can go to debt instead.

But it's just like anything, a workout plan. You've gotta actually do the workout to make it happen.