The Ramsey Show - App - I’ve Had Enough of My Debt and I’m Ready for a Change! (Hour 1)

Episode Date: May 12, 2023

Dr. John Delony & George Kamel answer your questions and discuss: "I'm in debt and just lost my job", "My house is a money pit; what can I do?" "Should I accept student loan forgiveness?" Using a HELOC, "I'm 59 years old and have no retirement" Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 Weekdays from 2-5pm ET Join a Personality-led FPU class. Click here! Enter The Ramsey Cash Giveaway for a chance at $3,000! https://bit.ly/TRSgvwy Shop our bestsellers during the $10 Sale! https://bit.ly/TRS10Sale Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3cEP4n6 Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6 Interested in advertising on The Ramsey Show? https://ter.li/s64ye3 Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy

Девочка-пай Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Pods Moving and Storage Studio, it's the Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your money, your work, your life, all of it. I'm your host, John Deloney, and I'm joined here by one of my best friends in the history of my life, George Campbell, the greatest humans you can ever meet.

And we're taking your calls on life, money, everything. 888-825-5225. It's 888-825-5225. Give us a shout. It's a rainy day here in Nashville, and we have a packed house, man. It's good to see everybody out there. They're bringing the sunshine today, John. They are bringing the sunshine.

What a great way to start the show, George. Thanks, best friend. You're welcome, bester friend. Let's go to Alex in New York, New York, New York, New York. What's up, Alex? Hey, guys. Thank you so much for taking my call. You got it, man. What's happening?

Hi. So, I am currently in $24,000 a bet, and I just lost my job. Ah, man. What were you doing? I have been working as a server and barista. Additionally, I am an actor. I am currently in school, so a lot of my jobs, like what we call survival jobs, are in the service industry. Excellent. So is there a chance that losing your job has set you free? Yeah. I mean, yeah.

Excellent. In terms of the place I was at, it was poorly managed and whatnot, which also gives me opportunity to move forward, but it does put me back behind quite a bit. My wife is also affected by the ongoing writer's strike right now, so I'm just trying to do my part as her husband to also be there for her, especially when it comes to financial needs, but I'm just falling behind. Sure. What kind of debt is this? A lot of it is credit cards. And I've been listening to your show for quite a while now to give me some inspiration

because I've been putting myself in this position a couple times now in terms of credit card debt and consolidation loans. And now, like, I've had enough. Like, I'm ready to tackle it. I am motivated to destroy it. And I'm ready to take on three, four, five jobs and get work to start knocking it away. Good, because that's what needs to happen. Number one, we've got to quit borrowing money.

And that means cutting up the cards, and that means we're not going to start looking for shortcuts. We're going to look in the mirror and go, if I had no other option other than to make money, what would I do? And that's going to be a great start for you. You're already there because you're angry at this situation. What we need to focus on right now is you guys are in storm mode. We've got to cover the bills. Your wife has no income coming in right now, or does she still have something? She's about to start nannying for the time being until this whole thing's resolved.

It's just hard to say when the last one was a hundred days. This one could be longer. Hopefully not. I think, I think this one's going to be longer, Alex, personally. Let's pretend it's going to be a few months.

Absolutely. And so what do you need to cover your food, utilities, housing, transportation? Have you figured out what those expenses are? Yeah. So my wife is supporting me as well with my debt journey, so she hears me talk about the rice and beans, beans and rice quite a bit. Hold on, you're saying she's supporting your

journey. Is this not y'all's journey as a couple? We support each other, other of course a lot of this debt is just strictly mine um for my bad habits that again i've had the realization that like i want to destroy those as well i'll just spend spend spend well i'm wondering if this process would speed up exponentially if you guys decided this is our debt we're going to tackle this as a team. It's not Alex's debt. It's our debt. And I understand that it's his fault, but it's our responsibility now as a couple. Have you had that conversation with her?

We have not. I guess just me being me, I've tried to keep her out of it. But that's actually something that I'd be willing to explore as well good i think we've got to let go of the shame and guilt yeah before the weekend is over alex i want you to take her out to a breakfast that y'all probably can't this is gonna be the last meal out you have for a long time it has to be something cheap and i want you to look across

a small bistro table there in new york and her, I'm sorry. And I'm inviting you into this process. And I've tried to be something that I'm not. And I've tried to duct tape and tie this thing together with bailing wire to make it all work. And it's not. And this is me surrendering and saying, let's make this an us thing. And I would be willing to bet that she will weep with joy that finally her husband is saying, let's really be married for the first time. I can feel that. Okay. Amazing. Here's what we're going to do.

We're going to give you Financial Peace University. I'm going to give it to you. But you have to promise that you and her will sit down on the couch and watch these lessons. Y'all aren't doing anything else. That was a low dig, but it was kind of funny. Y'all watch these videos together. Fair? Absolutely.

Yes. Also going to give you both EveryDollar app, the best app there is when it comes to finance stuff. So y'all can start tracking this stuff. And when you spin something, she's going to know because it it's gonna show up on her phone too okay okay but here's the big thing have you reached a point and i've grown up with actors or some of my closest friends have you gotten to the point where you're ready to put acting on the background and go get a real job i say real job but stop pretending after year five and six and seven and eight that one day this thing's going to happen.

Because here's the deal. One day it might happen, but it probably won't. It's both and, right? Yeah, absolutely. And for every John Kaczynski story, like, I was my last job, I was going home, and then I got the call to be on the office. For every one of those is a whole bunch of people who really went

in, went all in, and it didn't work out. And that's great, and that be on the office for every one of those is a whole bunch of people who really went in, went all in and didn't work out. And that's great. And it's awesome. They went for it. What are you going to do next? That's the question you have to answer. So you're in school. What are you studying?

I am studying acting, actually. It's a two-year conservatory program. How much is that? One of my, it's $750 a month. And then with the work-study hours that I put in there, it usually takes me down to about $200 a month now. Who's paying for that? Paying for the school?

Yep. Me. Okay. Are you running up, putting it on a credit card, or are you actually paying for it? No. So basically what I've been doing is basically keeping my head above water with all of my debt and then putting rent and

school payments as priority. Okay. So Alex, when we gift you every dollar, here's what I want you to do. Open that up. You're going to list out your income for the month. That might not be a lot this month. And then you're going to list out your expenses and there's a paycheck planning tool inside of the premium version we're going to give you. And you can lay out all of those bills and you're going to see when the money's going to run out. And so you've got to make some decisions on what needs to go. Of course, the four walls is first. You're pausing the baby steps right now. We're not going to be able to pay extra on the debt. We're just going to pay minimum payments. But once we have enough income in the door,

we're going to start paying them off smallest to largest balance, regardless of the interest rate. And once you get your income back up, your wife gets her income up, you're going to be able to knock out this $24K in debt, and it'll be in the rearview mirror. Yeah. But this is going to be a tough season, man. Like you mentioned, four or five jobs for both of you while we figure this thing out and get rid of this debt.

By Sunday, I want you both to have more than one job. And everybody's leaving New York. I just saw the real estate number. Everybody's leaving. There's going to be plenty of jobs. Take the first couple of jobs you can get. And over the next few months, work your way up to a couple more dollars an hour here and there. But you got to work like crazy, work like crazy, work like crazy. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back this is the ramsey show i'm john deloney with the greatest guy who's ever lived george camel and we are taking your calls 888-825-5225 we're live talking about money mental health relationships work whatever you got going on. And listen, you all loved the first edition of our Questions for Humans conversation starter card so much. George,

I remember Dave in a meeting saying, we're not doing these. These are a small ball. What are we doing? He's like, I got in the sink to change lives and you're here with a deck of cards? You're here with a deck of cards. Like the worst magician of all time. Now he's like, hey, man, you going to make some more? You going to make some more? Well, it's because people loved him. Yeah. The thing blew up.

It's been wild. Listening to grandparents talk to their grandkids for the first time. Moms and dads talk to their middle schoolers for the first time. It's been couples talking to each other for the first time. Excellent. So listen, we ran them back, and we went back to the drawing board and came up with even more fun, sometimes ridiculous,

sometimes really deep and insightful questions that make it easier for people to connect. The new editions are ready for the real world. We've got all new friends, parents,

and kids, and couples decks so you won't be running out of things to talk about anytime soon. And what's better than some real-time questions

with my friend, George Camel. All right, dude, Georgeorge i got a question for you okay um what's the worst physical pain that you've ever felt oh man you know i try to avoid pain like at all costs but i'll tell you second grade real hard one time no second grade i cut my thumb opening a kool-aid six-pack those jammers with a razor blade a box cutter and I just sliced right down my thumb. And what hurt more than the slice was the stitches I got. I cried like a baby. It was so painful.

And I still can't do a thumbs up to this day. I want to hug you a little bit. You've never said that before. I haven't. How about you? I feel like you've experienced a lot of pain in your life. I have. I trained MMA for years.

I got knocked out, kicked my shins, all that. Literally punched in in the face. Yeah. That's gotta hurt. Can I tell you the worst pain I can remember other than tooth pain? Like I've got a bunch of, I've got a gummy candy issue. And so I've got a bunch of root canals. Tooth pain is real, dude. Yeah. I've built some second homes for some dentists. This is embarrassing, but one time I was with a group of kids. I was a sponsor at a youth event, and they were out at the beach, and I just went sprinting and screaming like an idiot into the beach. I was waving my arms over my head, and somebody had put a railroad track,

like a long piece of metal, and I ran in and I kicked it and my third toe exploded and i remember i was in the er i was yelling so loud it hurt george it hurt in a way that i couldn't understand when you get knocked out your whole body absorbed like you're just out yeah you break an arm or something it this was so so isolated and so painful and i remember being so embarrassed that my toe hurt so bad um but that's it man that's the last one that's coming to mind that's strong it's embarrassing but such it is one of the other cards in these decks is interesting what do you wish they made a vending machine for oh man i haven't even been to a vending machine since i

can remember yeah but you've got that cigarette vending machine. Oh, that's right. In my house. Yeah, in your house. I think it would be cool. I think working here, especially with James as the producer, we don't get a lot of positive feedback very often. So I think a vending machine where I could put in a couple of dollars

and just pull out like a happy message. Wow. I think that would be great. That's sad. It's kind of dark, but I know. Actually a good idea. I think that'd be good. I was going to go with like puppies be great that's sad it's kind of dark but actually a good idea i think that'd be good i was gonna go with like puppies but that's also sad that's real more sad wow i just thought it'd be fun to just see a bunch of cute puppies and just all the mental health professionals in america just went yes with guys like you we're always like that's

the kind of conversations this will spark a lot lot of judgment amongst your friends, a lot of laughter, and a lot of memories and good times too. And so these are more than just great conversation starters. Let's be real. It's hard for people to have face-to-face conversations, to connect in a way that's not weird or forced, and these cards help take some of the pressure off and helps people do that. That's right.

So all second edition Questions for Humans cards are on sale today. And, George, we mentioned this yesterday. Nothing is better than being on commission and having Dave say, hey, we're going to offer all of your products at half price, but they're on sale for 10 bucks. They never have been 10 bucks. Go to Ramsey solutions.com slash store. It's Ramsey solutions.com slash store. All right. Let's go out to Nick in Denver, Colorado. What's up, Nick? How are we doing, brother? I'm doing great, guys.

Thanks for taking my call. You got it, man. What's happening? Here's what's going on, guys. I live in a house. It was built in 1913 originally, and it's proven to be a bit of a money pit. What does that mean?

My wife and I, say pit. What does that mean? My wife and I, say again? What does that mean? You know, just a few months ago, bathroom tiles were starting to fall off of our wall. And our fence is hanging on by a thread. I think if I sneeze too loud, it's going to fall down to the ground. Don't sneeze, man. We've got gutter problems where they leak in certain areas. And, you know, currently I have buckets over there,

just been hesitant to spend money. So things like that. And so that's it. We're just trying to figure out, you know, should we stay here? Should we move? If we move and try to follow the guidelines, it's going to be tough in our area. We're currently on a 30-year and

dropping it down to a 15 could just prove difficult. And so we're just trying to figure out our next move. Should we rent? Do we stay here and try to cash flow some repairs? How much money do you guys have in the bank? We're in baby step three. So we probably have 18 grand in the bank right now, and that's almost a fully funded emergency fund. Okay. I'm sure it keeps getting drained because of these home repairs. Yeah. We just redid the bathroom recently.

It was $15,000. While doing baby steps two and three is what was going on at the time, we cash flowed that. Well, I'm proud of you guys for making it this far. What's the house worth as is? If you sold today, what do you think you could get for it? Yeah, I'm trying to guess what an inspection might spit out and what a buyer might buy. I bet you we walk out of here with $180,000 in cash. After you're saying that's your net profit?

That would be net profit, sellers, fees, any type of things that pop up in the inspection, I bet you we still walk out with $180,000. Okay, so let's call that the down payment on another home. Would that allow you guys to move into something comparable? That's less of a headache? No, it really wouldn't. Our interest right now is four in the low fours and rates are floating higher than that. And so even just to get an equivalently priced house, our payment would go up. And actually, we'd break the rules out of 15. So what if you could pause, start to do some of these repairs, get by for another year or two while you save up, and then move out when you have enough money to where you've got the repairs,

you've got the equity, you can roll that over to the next one on a 15-year and have it make sense. And you can always refinance later to get your rates lower. Yeah. Would that be a good in-between? I think so. And it feels kind of like a baby step 3B, except instead of a down payment, it's going kind of into the house, which would probably help us on our next down payment. Do you hate this house? Oh, the answer to that is definitely yes. But also, I think we realize that at similar prices, we're not going to find much better.

We have three kids, and so desire to have multiple bedrooms and bathrooms and the prices just go up in our area. So that's what I was getting at. Here's what I've been guilty of. I don't want to put my world onto you, but here's what I've been guilty of. I've been guilty of. I don't want to put my world onto you, but here's what I've been guilty of. I've been guilty of hating a car. And I just, I grow to hate it more and more and more. Or I had one particular house I'm thinking of. I just, I just grew to not like it. And as the great Brene Brown says, what you go looking for in the world, you are sure to find. So I began to see every single thing that was wrong with it.

And then I start casting out five years from now and 10 years from now, I'm going to have to replace this and fix this. And I end up almost casting this vision upon this place that isn't actually accurate. Now I'm not saying you don't need repairs. I'm not saying that your fence isn't embarrassing. All that stuff's true. But have you just begun to mash down on this house when really some of the challenges are you got three kids and life got really chaotic and you and your wife haven't redesigned your marriage yet to accommodate three kids. You're still trying to live one kid marriage or your job's crazy, or you're just nervous about the economy. See what I'm saying? How we cast all of this other drama onto one thing. We just make it so, so wild. So here's my challenge. My challenge

would be for you and your wife to go out somewhere out of the house and sit down and talk to each other and just cast a vision for this house? What do we have to do to make this thing habitable? You got to fix the leaks, that kind of stuff. What can we get by with for the next 24, 36 months? Would we be willing to do that? Could we live in this five more years? And if so, just pay the stupid thing off and crash there for a while. Or if it's got to go, then you got to go. But let's sit down and be intentional about it and don't just get so mad you do something rash. This is The Ramsey Show.

We'll be right back. This is The Ramsey Show, 888-825-5225. It's 888-825-5225. I'm John Deloney, joined here by George Camel, and we are taking your calls on money, marriage, relationships, mental health, work, whatever you got going on. We probably got an opinion on it. Give us a shout.

888-825-5225. Let's go out to Anthony in D-Town in Dallas, Texas. What's up, Anthony? Yes. How are you guys doing? We're doing fantastic, man. What's happening? Just had Yes. How are you guys doing? We're doing fantastic, man. What's happening? Just had a quick question for you.

I'm a combat veteran struggling if I should take a student loan discharge or not. Just wanted to kind of get your advice and your opinion on it. Tell me a little bit more about what – are you with a program? Are they going to cancel your loans out? Tell me what you're talking about. Yeah, exactly. So just due to my time in Iraq and Afghanistan and my VA rating, if you have a certain rating, they completely forgive your federal student loans.

And I currently have about $110,000 worth of. I would take that right now. What's your hesitation? Well, part of me, I mean, it depends on the day. Part of me feels like it's a benefit I earned, take it and just move forward. But then the other side, I guess, being what I did in the military, I'm all about ultimate responsibility and I feel like it's my loan. I signed for it. So I should kind of honor that signature. I agree with that. So that's something I tell everybody.

You put your name on a piece of paper, be a person of integrity, but you also put your name on a piece of paper, and that was part of the benefits package you accepted when you decided, I'm going to put my life on the line for the Deloney family. Gotcha. So what I will say as a taxpayer, I'm happy to participate in discharging this for you. Okay. Okay. It's an honor for me and my family to pitch in and help you have the next chapter of your life. How about that? Well, much appreciated. It's just been a struggle for a

while. So let me give a call and kind of get some advice. Well, I mean, you're a person of high, high integrity, right? Now, if you were somebody who just kept going to school and going to school and, I just want to, I don't know, I'd have a different story. I would tell you, you put your name on a piece of paper. But you did. You signed a loan, and you also signed up for something that part of the agreement was, we're going to pay for this when it's over.

Got you. See what I'm saying? George, what do you think? I'm fully with this. Am I out to lunch? No, I mean, this is something that he has earned. It's not something that he feels entitled to. And if he wants to pay it forward, man, you go be super generous for the rest of your life because of this.

And so I'm going to accept grace when it is given, you know, in terms like this where it's part of a benefits package. There's nothing wrong with taking advantage of that, especially when it propels you in your financial journey. Won't it, Anthony? Oh, definitely. How many years would you spend just trying to pay this off, getting by as a combat vet? No, sure. Probably about four or five, easy.

What's your degree in? It's a master's, an MBA in finance. Will you please do good with that? It's like you just got out of Hogwarts with one of those little stick wands and you can just be mean or you can help people. Will you be a good MBA? You know, actually

I'm kind of switching fields and going into the healthcare industry just to kind of help other people deal with some of the things I have to deal with. But I can use that to help them in other ways, absolutely. Excellent. Excellent. Yeah, man, I'm, I'm, I'm fully supportive of you, brother. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm grateful for you. And like I said, the Deloney family's happy to pitch in. And I like George, I like what you said, man.

Sometimes I don't call it survivor's guilt because that's not what it is, but there's a sense of, I see all these people struggling around me and i got this get out of jail free card but it's not even that i earned it right i earned it um but i feel weird about taking it and so i like the if you still have that sense of take the agreement that you shook hands on right and pay it forward, right? Go find somebody who's just enlisting, who's not going to have this rating and say, I'll help you out a semester because that's somebody help me, I'm going to help you.

You can do whatever you want to, whatever your conscience and your finances allow, but I do like that. I like paying it forward that way. That's pretty cool, man. All right, let's run out to Jessica in Orlando. What's up, Jessica? How are we doing?

I'm good. How are you? Outstanding. We're up against the clock, so hop to it. What's up, Jessica? How are we doing? I'm good. How are you? Outstanding. We're up against the clock, so hop to it. What you got going on? So, my husband and I are thinking about taking out a HELOC to expand our home, and I listened to you guys long enough to know that you're probably screaming no in your head right now.

Internally, I was. Listen, I literally stopped myself from interrupting you. I was trying to hear you out. So, let me just try to get through this super quick. So we owe $280,000 on our home, and we have 10 acres of land. And right now, with the way the market is, if we were to sell this and make $400,000 or $500,000 off of it, that is what 10 acres alone is going for. And the price to build is up to 165 a square foot right now. So it would cost us almost double what it would cost for us to take some of the equity

out and make our home bigger. We now have three children and we've significantly outgrown the size of our home. So in the end, our mortgage payment, what we would owe, would be almost half of what it would look like if we did the reverse, where we sold it and tried to build on 10 acres somewhere. So you have backed yourself into a very tight either-or corner. Okay. Give me a third option. So a third option, I know another thing I thought about is if we were to go further outside of where we currently live.

The problem is my husband's in law enforcement and he has to live within a certain mile radius from where he works because of his work car. That's just like 1B. Give me a third option. I'll give you one because I'm going through the exact same thing right now. I live on some acreage outside of town and it was incredible and we loved it. And then my wife is like, man, you know what I don't like? Taking an hour to get to the grocery store.

And so now we're having that conversation. The third option might be, what if we rode this out for 24 months or 28 months and we came up with a plan to pay for x of this thing up front so we don't have to sell this place because what you're doing is you're trying to justify buying something that you can't afford or you're trying to say if we don't do this and we have to sell everything and burn our dreams to the ground and i just don't think either one of those things is the either or. Okay. How big is this house? It's just under 2,000 square feet. Okay. And there's five of you running around having fun? They do. So I hear you and you're right. You know, when I think about it, because we paid about $65,000 off in the last two years. My husband and I each took on

extra jobs and we've been very aggressive with that. So we're completely debt-free. We have our emergency fund set. Awesome. And so I know it's something we probably could fund in a few years. It's more, my son just turned 13 and now I feel like I'm running out of time. So I have to do this for him now. Your son is living, my son's 13. Our two boys are living outside of the matrix right now because they get to wake up and go outside and work outside and mow grass and listen to trees and see deer. They're having different lives than kids that are running up and down streets with screens and all that stuff. Right. So whatever you think you need to rescue him from, I want to put you at ease.

You don't, if you want a different kind of life and that's all, that's all well and good, but you're not abandoning or destroying your kid's life. I'd love to see you buy your husband a shop, which is probably what this is all about. Get him a shop out back or get yourself a shop out back for about 50,000 bucks and be able to just smile all the way through it. Right. The other piece of this equation, Jessica, is HELOCs are going to put your home at risk. Right. There's a variable

interest rate and it doesn't create any cashflow. And so I would pause, if you really want to stay here, we're going to pause in cashflow as quickly as we can to do these renovations. If you can't wait, you need to sell the home and you need to find something in the area that you can all fit in comfortably. And it might mean compromises. But either way, the HELOC is not going to be the saving grace here. Can I say something hard? Yeah, absolutely. My dad's a police officer. I grew up in that home.

And your husband's in law enforcement. You live in that home. My dad, your husband, they were one incident away from getting put on disability, from having to fight the city or the municipality or the county for disability check. Man, that's a high-risk job to put your house on the block for an add-on. I just wouldn't do it, especially in that kind of high-risk field that your husband and my dad are in. This is The Ramsey Show.

This is The Ramsey Show. I'm John Deloney, joined by George Camel, and we're taking your calls on money, life, mental health, marriage, whatever's going on, 888-825-5225. It's 888-825-5225. Listen, if you're a new listener and you want to dive deeper into the Ramsey baby steps, if you're listening to this thing, you've been watching some clips on YouTube or the TikToks,

Dave is a tiktok sensation now i wish that was a joke but he actually went viral and it was insane like atomic viral like elon musk is replying to the tweets it's pretty wild if there's it i think that's actually like china was like oh this would be funny for us i i mean i really do think it was like a national flex. They're trolling Dave by giving him to the algorithms. He's like, oh, you can talk about it about TikTok. We're going to make you TikTok famous. You're 30 million views on a video that's seven years old.

But listen, if you're catching us on TikTok, on Instagram, on YouTube, wherever you find us, and you're wondering, what is all this financial peace lingo? What is all this baby steps nonsense? What are y'all doing? Go to ramsaysolutions.com and click on the get started button. We're going to help you figure out the best next step for your financial journey based on exactly where you are today. Go to ramsaysolutions.com and click on get started. We're going to answer all your questions. We know it can be like just wandering into the wrong door and suddenly you're in a big cult meeting.

That's what it feels like. I know that's what it feels like. Go to ramsaysolutions.com and click on Get Started and we will walk you through it all. And it is amazing. All right, let's go to Debra in Tampa, Florida. What's up, Debra? Hi there. How are you doing? Hi, John. Hi, George. Thank's up, Debra? Hi there.

How are you doing? Hi, John. Hi, George. Thank you so much for taking my call. Of course. How are you? I'm very excited. I promise we're more excited.

And thank you. Well, anyway, I am 59 and single. I have not saved anything for retirement. When you say anything, do you mean literally zero? I have $1,800 in the deferred compensation and I work for the state. So I'll have a pension of about $1,500 if I retire when I'm 67. Okay. And I wanted to start a Roth. I hear you talking about starting a Roth IRA, the way that we do it in the baby steps, except I paid off my house instead of starting the retirement. I got excited, started listening to you and started paying off the house. And I did that. So I'm in no debt and paid off the house. Good question. Do I, the deferred compensation

that I have at work, which is just pre-tax, I haven't found any of the investments that look like it matches what you guys suggest. So I didn't know if there was something else that I should open up besides one Roth IRA. What are your other options currently for retirement? Do you have any? I don't have anything else at work. Okay. So outside of that, you do have, do you have a? I don't have anything else at work. Okay. So outside of that, you do have, do you have a health insurance plan? Yes, but it's low. I'm not eligible for the HSA.

Okay, not eligible for the HSA. So your other option would be a taxable brokerage account outside of retirement. If you don't have any tax advantage or retirement options, no HSA, and you do have the Roth IRA you can contribute to, which you do have catch-up contributions because you're over 50, which will help. It's not going to change the game, but it might mean we work a little bit longer than we wanted to and we throw a lot more than we are comfortable with towards investing. But you should have tons of margin because you don't have a mortgage payment. You have no debt. What's your income? So I actually have, I can do the $625 a month for the $7,500 to catch up on the Roth.

For the other account, so I shouldn't open a traditional Roth or do the deferred comp even though I don't like the options to invest, I still have about another, I'd say $500 a month I can put in that account. I'm living off of, I'm being very frugal. Good. Well, the math on the Roth versus traditional at your age, it may kind of be a wash at this point, but I still like the idea of whatever's in that account is what you get, and you've already paid taxes on it 10 years down the line. So do you have a plan on when you want to stop working or are able to? Is it 67? 67. I really don't want to go past 67.

Okay, because here's what you can do. Let's see where we're at at 67 with our investments, our pension, our expenses at that point, and if you're able to retire comfortably, then we can go, all right, we're good. We've got enough to make it, but this is going to be tighter. I mean, you're going to be able to retire with dignity, but it may not be all the luxuries you once dreamed of. Sure. And so do you have a financial advisor currently?

No, I don't. I think we need to put some of this on paper and crunch some actual numbers. Number one, to give us some reality, but also to give us some hope. Because you'd be shocked at what compound interest can do for 10 years when you're really focused. And that might be a mix of the Roth IRA, maxing that out, catch-up contributions, taxable brokerage account, on top of building up your savings and have a few different buckets you can pull from in retirement. Yes, because you guys motivated me so much. I just want to tell you, last year I was making $31,000 and now I'm making $42,000 and I think I'm going to get a 5% raise in another month. What do you do? What do you do for work? I went for a promotion to try to get

out of the situation that I was in and I was able to pay my house off with a difference. I'm still living on what I was making prior to the raises. That is awesome. Awesome. Debra, I want you to make me and Georgia promise. Without you guys, I wouldn't be doing that. Well, we just run our mouths on the radio. You are the one actually out there doing the work. Listen, I want you to make me and Georgia promise. Okay. Say, I promise. I promise. I can't tell you how many folks I've talked to between the age of 59 and 70 I promise. of times someone's told me they're going to retire next year. They're going to retire at this age. And I ask the question, can you afford to retire? They look at me as though that question has never crossed their mind. They don't know. And so I want there to be nobody on planet earth who knows the insides and outs of your financial situation better than Debra. I want you to know to the dollar, to the $10, how much time this is going to take you. If the market does X, what fund I should put this in.

And that's why you got to sit down with a smart investor pro. Go to ramseysolutions.com slash smart investor pro. I want you to go talk to those folks because they're going to walk you through and they're going to, more importantly, they're going to teach you how and why your money is doing what it's doing. And then you're going to have to deal in reality. You may really want to be done at 67. You may be exhausted, but you may have to go until 71 because that's just math, right? But I want you to take ownership of this thing. You've been avoiding it for a long, long time because it's scary.

Let's just take this sucker by the horns. Is that fair? Yes, it is. All right. We are super proud of you. Proud of you, Debra. You're killing it. Thank you. Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. George, I, you know, last time we co-hosted the the show together we took a couple of calls about how do i get that a passive income oh yeah that was right those are my favorite or hey i think i'm gonna retire as though you can just wish it into these are sign up sheets yeah yeah yeah

it's a big problem it is and as somebody who somebody who has spent, especially in my younger years, I spent a lot of time avoiding these numbers because I didn't understand them. And when I don't understand things, it makes me anxious. And so I just avoid it. Man, when I'm having these conversations with 59, 60, 65-year-olds, seven-year-olds,

it's both heartbreaking and scary because you realize, oh, you don't understand. You don't just walk outside and be like, I retire and money shows up. You just quit working and need a paycheck stop, right? And some of them are heartbreaking. Now, luckily, Debra's in a much better spot than most people who have nothing in retirement because she has a paid-for house. But when someone calls in, they're in their 20s and they're doing dumb, that's fine. You've got a lot of time to make

up for that, thanks to compound growth. When you're 60 and you want to retire two years from now, that's a problem when you have nothing saved. And so the best time to plant the tree was 30 years ago. The next best time is today. And so I'm glad Debra has taken the steps to do what she can to have a somewhat dignified retirement. But please do not depend on social security or your pension to float you by. As we've seen the last few years, inflation is a beast and life just keeps getting more and more expensive. And we want to do more and more stuff as we get closer to retirement. And that doesn't happen without a plan and diligence and consistency over a long period of time. And as we see in these debt ceiling fights, these kids in the sandbox throwing

crayons at each other, not solving any real problems. Man, Social Security, man, it is on a thin thread, my friend. On a thin thread. Hey, I want to thank you, George. Great job. I want to thank the gang in the booth. And I want to thank you, America. Listen, it's building non-anxious life. Pay off your debts.

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