The Ramsey Show - App - Make The Most of Your Financial Choices—They Matter

Episode Date: December 19, 2025

🤔 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Think you’re good with money? Take our Money in America quiz!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ While we are out for Christmas break, we've compiled some of our favorite Dave and Jade calls from the past two years. We'll be back with a live show in the new year! Merry Christmas! Dave Ramsey & Jade Warshaw answer your questions and discuss: ‘I'm paying $500 a month for my leased HVAC system' ’I'm 18 years-old and already have $110k of debt' 'My grandma opened a credit card in my name.' 'My new husband keeps his finances hidden from me' 'Husband lost his 401(k) to a crypto scam' 'How much is too much to spend on a wedding?' 'My husband says he won't leave anything to me in his will.' Next Steps:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ✔️⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Help us make the show better. Please take 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 💻 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Find out where you stand with your money and get a free plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Start your free budget today by downloading the EveryDollar app⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🤓 ⁠⁠File your taxes with 100% accurate software that’s less than half of the price⁠⁠ Connect With Our Sponsors: Stop paying more and start shopping smarter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ALDI⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Amazon is making it easier than ever to find top gifts at amazing prices this season in the ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Holiday Shop⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Get 10% off your first month of⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ BetterHelp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Boost Mobile⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to switch today! Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Casper Sleep⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and use promo code RAMSEY to learn more. 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! Debt collectors hassling you? Take back control of your life at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Guardian Litigation Group⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Find top health insurance plans at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Health Trust Financial⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Use code RAMSEY to save 20% at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Mama Bear Legal Forms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ NetSuite⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ today to learn more. For more information, go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠SimpliSafe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. 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

Hey, before we get rolling, listen up, if you want to win with money in 2026, you can't keep living normal. Normal's broke. You need a plan. Get a personalized plan and start living like no one else by downloading our every dollar app today. Normal is broke, common sense is weird, so we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Network and the Fairwinds Credit Union Studio, this is The Ramsey Show. Jade Washall, number one bestselling author, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. The number here if you want to talk is AAA 825-5-225, and we're going to talk about you right in front of you.

Nancy's with us in Clarksville. Hey, Nancy, how are you? Good, Dave. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. My question is I have paid off all my debt in step two, but the problem is I got involved in a lease for an H-PAC system. The total cost of the system, when paid off at 10 years,

will be over $62,000. So I'm wondering, do I pay it off using the debt snowball method and just get out of it, meaning I'm responsible for that, or just leave it until I, I do the house stuff. Wow. Okay. I didn't know you could do a lease on a heat and air system.

That sounds like you got. I went to the Attorney General and I went to Better Business Bureau and the Attorney General Consumer Protection Department said it is legal. It's being done all across the U.S. So, yeah. But it's so bad that they, yeah, it's horrible. Okay. So a lease typically, I have no idea in this case, but.

typically would have an early buyout provision because leasing is simply financing. Yeah, their leaseing is termination. Okay. What does it cost to terminate it? The cost of the whole contract. No. What you have remaining, yes, yes, sir. No.

Yes, sir. 47, right now my lease buyout would be about $47,000. Oh, my gosh. I've paid 15. Now, you're at an attorney, look at that part also. so, right? I'm getting there. Right after I did the system, I got diagnosed with cancer. So I got kind of sideline for a few years. Now I'm like, wait a minute, I don't want to keep doing this. This is fevery. It's theft. Wow. But, okay, because I've, I mean, I know a lot of

equipment leasing, certainly car leasing, and I've looked at the contracts on all kinds of leasing deals, even employee leasing they have out there now, which is really strange. And every one of those have a buyout provision that is less than the total of payments because you're giving them their capital early. You're giving them their money early. And so they're not collecting interest, so to speak, even though there's not technically an interest rate. And so almost everyone I've ever seen, but I've never seen a heat and air one. so I don't know.

My God, honey. All right, so let's do two things. Number one, I want you to re-investigate that part of it. Okay. Because as suspect as this whole thing is, that part of it's suspect. So if the total of your remaining payments is 47, a normal buyout provision would put you somewhere in the 30s. And the way you would do that, if that's the case, is instead of paying them in advance, like double payments like you would on a debt snowball,

you simply save the money up. You pay yourself into a savings account and then write them one check. If there is a discount for early payout, okay? And there typically is. If there is not, either way, what is your income? I just retired from federal service, so my income is roughly $2,400.

Okay, this goes in babysat. step six then because it is the equivalent of a second mortgage and it's a lien on your house because it's a lean on your heating and air system and you would pay it off in baby step six when you're paying off the house okay what is your interest rate on your home uh 2.25 yeah no no baino there we leave that alone okay because if you had a higher interest rate I would suggest refinancing and taking them out okay my mortgage balance is 169 578

when you get to baby step 6 you knock out the lease first either way whether you get a discount or not because it's more than half your annual income when a home equity loan or a second mortgage of any kind is more than half your annual income we move it to baby step 6 yeah I've never heard of such a thing I have now

there's a lot of things that I get on this show That is, this is where I learn about it, yeah. And then I have to go look it up later and go, oh, it is a thing. So, you know what else? I didn't ask. She said federal employee. Clarksville is a base, military base. Oh, that's right.

So these may be morons that are preying on our military people. Yeah, that's big. That's, that's problem. Which makes us like double, yeah, a double negative for this company that does that. So if your, if your son is, out there mom and his new job is selling heat and air leases tell him don't be a crook and go do something else with his life oh there we go there you go I helped with that yeah just throw a dart out there into the universe to see if we can hit a balloon why not yeah yeah oh man oh man because I did

have that happen one time I was ripping on the payday lenders at 800% yeah oh gosh yeah a lady called and said well my hunt my son owns two of those stores I said well time to sell them quit being scum He's ripping off poor people. He's oppressing the poor. Read about what happens in the Bible when you do that. It's not good for you. It's not a place you want to be. Messing with widows, orphans, and oppressing the poor.

These are not three things you want to do in the Bible. And really, just as a matter of living your life properly, hello. But, yeah, there's scum. They're scum. So, yeah, it shouldn't be. Don't be scummy. And then you're safe on this show. We'll leave you along.

We won't talk about you. We won't talk about your kid. We won't talk about you. We won't do any of that. So, so interesting to side note, the lease on a car, and I suspect it's true on a heating and air system, is the most expensive way to operate a vehicle. Several publications, including Ramsey Research, have done detailed research on this. And when you run the math out, so you can take a financial calculator and say, this is what the MSRP is on the car, which is what it's calculated on. Here's what the buyout is at the end of the lease.

A closed-in lease always has a number after three years. years, four years, seven years, whatever it is. You can buy the car for $12,000, but it was a $64,000 car or whatever it is. So you've got those two numbers, and then you have the number that is the monthly payment. When you put those into a financial calculator, you can figure out what the effective cost of capital is. That's a fancy way of saying the interest rate. However, interest rates are not disclosed on leases like they are on car loans because Federal Trade Commission requires they hand you one piece of paper with your APR on it, even if they're screwing you. They have to hand you that piece of paper and you'll look down and you'll see 38% or 28% or 12%

you don't know you got subprime, right? On a lease, you don't have to do that because lease is not technically borrowing money, but you can run out, but it is borrowing money. So that cost a capital, there's no cap. No cap at all and no knowledge of what it is unless you know how to run a financial calculator. And I've done it on probably 40 or 50 leases over the years. Every time I do it, it comes out between 14 and 17%. And so those of you that are, I got my BMW on a because my accountant said that was the smartest way to do it you're an idiot you got hammered you're paying 17% you should fire your accountant and get rid of your beamer you're getting hammered but you never did any math you just thought you were sophisticated geez no you wanted a

beamer that's what it was and there's a way to get a beamer very little down a lot a month and very little at the end yeah this is the problem Dave, we've got a lot of calls on this show where life happens. One day someone's healthy, they're working, providing for their family, and then a curveball hits. You know, we hear it all the time, a car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, and suddenly, everything changes. Yeah, and that's why you've always said that having term life insurance from Xander is essential, because it protects your family if the worst happens. Yeah, that's right. You need 10 to 12 times your income in coverage, no gimmicks, no whole life junk, just straightforward term life protection. But there's another piece that people often overlook, and that's long-term disability insurance. Yeah, it's important to understand the difference between them. Life insurance steps in when you die.

Disability insurance steps in while you're alive but can't work. So it replaces a large part of your income, so the bills still get paid while you get back on your feet. Now, if your employer gives you free disability insurance, great, take it. If it's discounted there at a better price, take it. But if not, Zander can help you find the right plan, Whether you're single or married, it's not optional. If you're going to be out of work for a while, then you need to make sure the money still showing up. And that's why Zander is our go-to. They make it super simple to get the right coverage at the best price, no pressure, no upselling. I've trusted Jeff Zander and Zander insurance for over 25 years, and so is my family.

So don't wait. It's fast. It's easy, and it could make all the difference. Go to Zander.com or call 800-356-42-82. protect yourself, protect your income, protect your family. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us. Michael is in Toronto.

Hey, Michael, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, thank you. What's up? So I'm currently 18 and by the time I graduate I'm probably looking at a hundred to a hundred and twenty thousand dollar loan that I'm sitting at and my current car is under my mom's name with her interest rates on it and her credit got ruined by my dad leaving and I'm looking to switch the car with a way less percentage of interest but I have to max out my credit cards for the interest for the down. payment to put on it and I don't know what to do if it's even worth it or not what's your car what do you owe on the car I'm sitting so I bought the car at 30,000 I'm looking at 41,000 I know and you're a college student um first year yes with a $40,000 freaking car what are you doing with a $40,000 car you're a college student I had a $70,000 car and another $60,000 I

sold it, I made profit, but my mom's credit got ruined, and they gave me a 12% interest on it, and I didn't realize until yesterday when I checked, and I only had it for five months. I don't think this is your mom's fault. You bought a $30,000 car, a $40,000 car, and you're in college. You get a $4,000 car. Do you make any money? What's your income? So I'm sitting at $1,000 to $1,500 from my work at retail. And I had side businesses before, and I had like about $70,000. I blew it all. And now I make maybe $500 to $1,000 from my side businesses a month.

Okay. Do you have any money saved? Nothing. I'm in debt by credit cards. Okay. So the car, you owe $41,000 on it. If you sold it private sale, what's it worth? Or you're more.

Right now, if a trade-in, they're giving me $28. Oh, my gosh. That's a trade-in. $12,000 negative equity on it. Okay, but let's look at, that's your homework, is to look at the Kelly Blue Book value if you did private sale, because you're going to get more for it.

No, I did. It's $30,500. $30,500. Okay. If I were in your shoes... I can't, there's a lien on the car, but I can't pay. Yeah, I mean, you make $1,000 a month,

your car payments more than that, isn't it? My car payments comes exactly to $1,000. Oh, my gosh. So how are you paying it? credit cards basically everything at all no no I can't put on credit it's better basically everything I mean if you

make a thousand dollars a month and you spend a thousand month on your car you don't have money to put gas in it and you're any money to eat so math doesn't work out a lot I don't know how no I make like 1500 I can on a good month I make 2,000 on small months in retail

I make 1,500 okay so you got $500 to spare you eat a little bit you pay your insurance you get gas you've got nothing left. Okay, let me, let me stop a second because I did a drive on something a minute ago I want to know more about. You had $70,000 in savings, you said, from a side hustle that you blew. Did I hear you say that? Yes.

Tell me about that side hustle. Where did all that wonderful money come from? It came from, I used to self-screen protectors and cases during COVID when I was 14. Oh. And Amazon. Yeah. So no COVID, no business. Yeah. Okay. And I gave most of it to my mom after this operation. And she's sitting at

$300 to $400,000 to $400,000 herself. Yeah. Okay. You're 18. Your mother is not your responsibility. Your responsibility is to love her and cheer for her, but she's not your financial responsibility. So this has got to stop. And unless you can create a huge income, you need to get rid of this car and get a $2,000 car? I tried doing that, but I have to, so the loan that I would put the $10,000 on a credit card. I'd rather you have $10,000 on a credit card than $41,000 on a car. Amen. I can't.

I can't put it on a credit card. Why? I have maybe $3,500 left on a credit that I can spend. Yeah, okay. Who do you owe the $41,000 to? To a bank. Go down and talk to the bank about signing a note for the difference. do that right and then um what about on the new car uh so that's the thing that doesn't make

sense to me on the new car that i looked at that i'm going to get um seeing monthly payments instead of 96 month phone it's a i didn't say anything about monthly payments i said get a two thousand dollar car because we tried when we went to the bank i didn't want you to go to the bank i want you to come up with two thousand dollars and go buy a car just buy a car. Yeah, are you, are you in school full time? Yeah. Are you on campus?

You're at home or at home? Campus. Oh, like, where do I live at home? Okay, how close are you to campus? What I'm getting at is you might go through two months where you don't have a vehicle and you make it work. And instead of using that $1,000 a month to pay for a car note, you use it to save up and get yourself a little beater car is what we're saying. I have one of your buddies take you to class. I'm not away from campus.

Okay. All right. okay here here's the thing we keep throwing suggestions out and the only answer you've got is it doesn't work so let me tell you what doesn't work your life the way you have it set up right now your situation sucks beyond belief the decisions you have made are beyond suicidal financially so you've got to throw a stick of dynamite in the middle of this freaking mess you've created and it's going to be really uncomfortable but you know what's going to be more uncomfortable you sit there in this pile of stuff and you're going to smell like this stuff as long as you sit

there in it coming up with excuses to sit there in it so you have got to get rid of this mess you've got to create a big you may need to quit school you need to go get some dad gum money and start cleaning up this mess so I want you working like 80 90 hours a week going to school on caffeine and doing what normal people do when they get in this instead of telling me oh my mom got screwed over by my dad when he left. I'm sorry, but that doesn't mean you buy a $70,000 car while you're in college and downgrade it to a $41,000 car and act like that's smart. Nowhere in this conversation is smart.

Smart didn't come up today. No, it didn't. It didn't even show up here. So, dude, you've got to get rid of the car and you've got to figure this out some way or another. Now, we're giving you lots of suggestions, okay? get a buddy that's in the neighborhood to take you to college quit college for a year and take you a gap here and go clean this mess up while you work like a freaking maniac but you are man you you you cannot there's nothing in this that the math works six graders could tell you this math

doesn't work this is a mess and so no you can't keep this car and no you can't keep this life the way it has it designed right now. It's why you called. And you can't get another car on payments. And I'm not going to argue with you about it anymore. I'm through talking to you about it. So you go fix this. We gave you some suggestions. But part of fixing it is you've got to decide that where I live, the land I live in right now is the land of stupid and I want to leave. That's the first decision you got to make. And we haven't even been able to get that far with you. So that's where you got to go, man. That's where you got to go. Open phones here at AAA, 828.8. 255-2-25. Now, Jade, let's just review the policies on this show. Review it. We love you. All of you.

If you've done something stupid, we love you anyway. We've done something stupid. I have a PhD in D-U-M-B. Jade and Sam cleaned up $465,000 worth of stupid in their life. So no one's sitting here high and mighty talking down to someone. So we love you. We love you so much. We're going to tell you the truth. we're going to start gentle and we're going to start by trying to help you move along but if you want to argue with us while we're trying to help you it's going to get nasty fast because we love you I'm going to smack you upside your stupid head until you listen to the stuff that'll make your life better now I will start with a gentle handshake and say honey this is the best way to do it well Dave I listen to you all the time but I'm not selling the car well you're an idiot you got to

sell the car. That's how it's going to sound around here, honey. Okay, so we're going to serve you when you call here. You're not entertainment value for us. You're a calling for us. You're a crusade for us. We want you to win. And we're going to do everything in our power, starting at first gently and turning up the heat by degrees during the time we're on the phone together until we have contact. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, it's Rachel Cruz. The holidays are here, which means family time and giving back and remembering what the season is all about. And let's be real. It also means shopping. Y'all, if you're anything like me, December gets really busy. and really expensive. It's harder to stay intentional with your spending, and that's why I love

shopping on Amazon, especially this time of year. Named the lowest priced US online retailer for nine years running by Profitero, a third-party analytics and research firm, Amazon's prices are up to 14% lower across top categories, and beat competitors by up to 5% in key gift categories. Between In amazing deals, stress-free shopping, and fast shipping, Amazon makes gift-giving simpler, the holiday season a little brighter, and helps me keep my budget in check. That allows me to get back to enjoying this season. What more could a busy mom ask for? So for more information about Amazon's low prices and easy, affordable holiday shopping,

head to Amazon today. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 3,8-8255-2-2-25. Jaden is in Casper, Wyoming. Hi, Jaden. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Thank you for taking a call, fellas. Sure.

Merry Christmas. What's up? My wife's been pestering me for quite some time now, to take her on a vacation. I'm not sure right now is the time to do it. We're both pretty young. I'm 25. She's 21.

We got a little one on the way here before too long, and we're getting ready to purchase a property we intend to build on. Okay. Do you guys have debt? No debt. No debt. We've been very fortunate in that way. Community college educated.

Okay. What's your household income? I bring about 50. thousand home after taxes and she brings about 20,000 and that's part of the issue is that next year her income will be going away she's a preschool teacher now um but with the little one she's going to stay home do you have an emergency fund saved we do the thing that concerns me is that after the down payment on the property that's that's what we'll be left with is with our emergency fund and sort of take that vacation we'd be kind of having to dig into that a little bit well a vacation's not an

so I would not dig into the emergency fund to take an emergency to take a vacation ever um what does she want to spend she wants to go somewhere warm you know Wyoming this time of year you want to kind of leave it a little bit um about 2000 2000 okay so have you run have you run out the numbers on what here's a thing I'm not saying uh I'm not saying no and I'm not saying when but you can decide when you can look at this and go okay my wife wants to take a vacation we've never taken a vacation we're debt free we have an emergency fund we're also trying to move in this house what what can that look like and when is the time to take it because if you just tell her no and you kind of just swat it away like a nat she's going to get irritated um well no that's not your position anyway it's your position for two

she's not a child okay the two of you ought to sit down as two adults and go okay yeah vacation is a good thing. A emergency fund is a good thing. Having a baby is a good thing. Buying this piece of ground is a good thing. None of these are bad things. Now, where do they fit in our lives with our goals as grownups? You know, you can't just be a kid on the cereal aisle throwing a fit. You have to be like an adult, both of you. And so I don't want you being her daddy and have to talk her off the ledge. I want her to grow up and look at it and say, as a grown woman who's has a child, what is responsible for me? Yeah, I want to take a vacation. I'd love to take a vacation. But as a grown woman looking at this, I can't afford to do it right this second because

I'm not going to be working next year after the baby comes. Or as a grown woman looking at this, I've got a child on the way. I really want to do this. You know, we do have $86,000 in the emergency fund. We probably can go ahead and take a vacation because you've overfunded the emergency fund bubba i don't know what's in this emergency fund but i mean she needs to participate in this decision as a grown-up not as someone who um has a parent that they're married to that's right and if she's laid out how you guys can do this then and it's wise and it's wise then you've also got to be you got to be a grown-up though it can't be i want it i deserve it you know i don't bull crap that's what 14 year olds do that's not what grown women do grown men do no um so no you you have to be

emotionally mature and say what is good for our family and if in the midst of that we can do this reasonably and we don't leave our family vulnerable with no emergency fund because we went on vacation that would be stupid yeah that's not um or leave our family vulnerable since you're going to be quitting work and staying home with the child and you can't make your bills because you went on vacation last because it's cold in Wyoming, which is not a shock to anyone in Wyoming, for sure. And so, you know, that kind of, so, I mean, what I want to do is just pull her into the conversation as a grown woman, not as someone who's, I can't get my husband to let me do stupid stuff.

I mean, this is just, that's ridiculous. That's not a conversation you want to have in a marriage. It needs to be the two of you are, we have this child, we have this future, what makes sense. And yes, vacations are part. of the equation. I got no issue with that at all. But where they fit is your point, Jade, absolutely. You know? Where and when? Yeah, they don't strike me as people who are not smart with their money. They paid off their debt. They've got an emergency fund. It looks like they're trying to do this house the right way. I have a feeling that he's laser focused and sometimes has to

remember like, hey, we can we can do some things sometimes. That's just my spidey sense. Could be, could be, yeah, could be loosening the nerd up a little. Loosing up the nerd. Yeah, but she needs to do that with reason. That's right. Not with emotion. That's right, yeah. And that's a fair, that's a fair request for a grown-up.

Stephen is in Little Rock, Arkansas. Hi, Stephen. Welcome to the Ramsey show. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. How are you all? Better than we deserve, sir. How can we help?

Okay, so here's my situation. I'm 20 years old. I'm engaged and I'm planning. planning on getting married in June. And that being said, we're looking to get an apartment together in June, because that's what you do. You move in together once you get married. I'm completely debt-free.

She has a little bit of student-in-depth. But that's kind of beside the point. The question for me is my grandma opened up a credit card for me to use strictly as a gas card. And that's my only credit card. and she always pays it on time but that being said I have credit pays it Oh you're 20 years old

Why's your grandmother pay your card That was her way of saying That she wants to support me through college That was her gift to me And so I can totally afford my own gas But that's just the gift she wanted to give to me And But I know that I want to get this apartment

And I really like the sound of what you'll talk about of letting your credit score roll over to nothing. But I'm afraid that if I say, hey, grandma, thank you, but let's close this card. I appreciate the gesture. I can pay for this, that my credit score will plummet, but it won't flip and disappear before that time in June when I'm trying to get an apartment. Honey, you don't have a credit score to get an apartment. Okay.

That's mythology. We've done this about six times in Ramsey in the last six or eight years. one of the personalities will jump on the phone and call 15 apartment complexes and say, hey, I'm moving to Nashville. Do you guys, I don't have a credit score because I'm just out of school and I got zero credit score.

Do you guys rent to people without a credit score? Nine out of ten say they do. Some of them, a couple of them want an extra deposit. But most of them are just, no, it's no big deal. Come on over. That's just complete mythology that people have spread out there among your age group.

It's just not true. Exactly. Nine out of ten or not, don't care if you have a credit score. Awesome. I did not know that. I was under the impression that my credit score would plummet

and that might jeopardize whether or not we'd be able to move back. Your credits, when you stop borrowing money, your credit score will go away. It's not going to plummet. It's just going to disappear. But to Dave's point, he's right.

There are plenty of places. is that you don't need a credit score to go. And so you'll just do your due diligence and find one. Yeah, just, you know, can't rent from those guys because they require one. I can rent from these people over here, though. And by the way, that's a great litmus test because when you move into an apartment,

you want to have a super or whoever's in charge that uses their brain because things are going to happen. You're going to need to talk to them about things and you want something fixed, right? You want somebody who uses their brain. So that's a great way to start. Yeah. And if the only way they approve you is by a number,

or that's not using your brain, my definition. No. Very good. Good stuff. Yeah, you can look those calls up. We've had different personalities do this over the years, and they're on the YouTube channel, and you can see them making phone calls to the apartments, and it's recorded, and you can hear the conversation.

Yeah, George did one on the fine print, remember? Yeah, that's the one I remember. And he did. He went out, and he was able to call him, and there were plenty that did. You just have to call around a little bit. It's not going to be the first, it may not be the first door step. that you go to. That's all. Yeah. And yes, you need to, it'll be good for your marriage to get off the grandmother doll.

I know. That's right. Wow. Good for you. Good for you, Stephen. Well done, sir. This is The Ramsey Show. If you've got collectors breathing down your neck and you're drowning in credit card debt, you don't need another debt relief company trying to sell you sunshine and unicorns. You need real help. And Guardian Litigation Group is the real deal. They're not a call center. They're actual attorneys.

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That's guardian-lit.com slash Ramsey. Paid endorsement, attorney advertising, Guardian Litigation Group LLP, not available in Minnesota and Oregon. Results vary and no specific outcome is guaranteed. That settlement may negatively affect credit and not all creditors will negotiate or settle. Savings vary and may be taxable. Please review our website terms for more information. information. Thank you for joining us, America. Open phones at AAA 8255-225. There are a few things in my life that I've run into that, other than things from the Bible, that I am 1,000% sure work. teaching the seven baby steps that we teach here.

The first one save $1,000. The second one is get out of debt, everything but the house using a debt snowball and gazelle intensity. As if you're running from a cheetah, the gazelle runs for its life. That's the intensity you use to get out of debt. You sell so much stuff the kids think they're next. You don't see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there and you're not going on vacation because you're a broke person in debt. and you are ears laid back running headlong straight into this, getting rid of it, baby. And we're going to leave it all on the field.

That's baby step number two. And then you go on to building an emergency fund, retirement plan, kids, college, pay off the house and become very wealthy. Those are the seven baby steps. And in essence, and you can find those everywhere. And the total money makeover book is where we outline them. We've sold 12 million copies of that. 10 million people have been through Financial Peace University where we teach those baby steps and how to implement them. So tens of millions, literally, of people, and there's tens of millions of you're listening

at this moment to this podcast on YouTube and on talk radio. So we know that easily 100 million people have done some stage or some process of the baby steps and with varying degrees of success because of varying degrees of commitment and sacrifice like you do with anything. So it's a proven thing. It's not a theory that comes out of a test to. The debt snowball is probably what we've become best known for. Now, this is where you list all of your debts except your home, smallest to largest.

You pay minimum payments on everything but the little one. You attack the little one with a vengeance. You squeeze every dollar, every drop out of your budget, and you throw it at the little one. You work extra, you sell stuff, you clean out a savings account all the way down to $1,000. You stop putting money in your 401k. you get term insurance and cash in your stupid whole life policy, you sell a car if it's too expensive, you do whatever you got to do, and you throw every dime at that smallest debt until it's gone. When that one's gone, you take the payment you used to pay there, and every dime you can squeeze out

of everything else, and you put it on number two, and when number two's gone, the payment from number one and number two are freed up. The snowball rolls over again, it picks up more snow, and it attacks the third one. And you're doing this with just increasing levels of hope, increasing levels of sacrifice, increasing levels of passion. And every time the snowball rolls over and you get rid of another payment, that's that much more money freed up in your monthly budget to attack the next one down. And it's been unbelievably successful. But Dave, I got to be, I'm the person because I know what they say in the comments. I see what people are asking. And the biggest two questions are this,

Dave, I've got my debt listed. What if I have a debt that the interest rate is just killing me? Why would I put the lower one first? Why would I list them small so large as if it means me, you know, having to pay this high interest loan for much longer? What about the math, Dave? It's brain chemistry. A dopamine is released when you complete a task. There's a dopamine release.

And it's called a feedback loop in psychology. And so when you have success at something, you're more likely to repeat the task. That's right. And the faster you have success and the more often you have success, the more you've got the feedback loop and the more the dopamine releases there. And in a spiritual realm, we would call this hope. You start to believe it's going to work because it's working.

And then you lean in that much more and you lean in that much more and you lean in that much more. And that's why this works because no one sat down at their kitchen table and said, hey, let's go deeply in debt because that's a good idea. A series of behaviors put you into debt. and you don't fix a behavior problem with a math solution you fix a behavior problem with a behavior solution and the feedback loop this positive feedback i knocked out one yeah i knocked out another one yeah i knocked out another one whoa and then you're down you're beating on the you're beating on that student loan you're beating on that big one you're beating on that car and you're yeah and now you're

starting to yell at your neighbors think there's problems over there you know because you're getting fired up because it's working and that's the dopamine release that's whole that you're starting to believe and when I first started and I paid off the little one I wasn't so sure and the next one well maybe this will work

and then the next one yeah it's gonna work and the third was like and then your broke friends start making fun of you and you want to punch them you know and so this is this is this is why it works

and that's why the debt avalanche does not work that's right or consolidation you know when people exactly because you don't change your habits that's right

the dead avalanche is where you list you know you list your it's mathematically correct well honey if we were doing math we wouldn't have credit card debt. It's not a math problem. It's a stupid problem. That's what we had to fix the stupid, not the math.

And so the math is, you know, we're going to list it highest interest rate to smallest interest rate because this interest rate's killing me. And here's the problem. While that sounds like it's mathematically correct, it's not because your math that you're using is very naive and you left variables out of the math formula.

Here's a variable you left out of your math formula. probability of completion. If your probability of completion is 80 or 90% with a snowball, but the math is running against you, net of probability of completion, it's going to beat the avalanche because the probability completion is close to zero. Almost no one finishes that because there's no feedback loop, no dopamine release, no hope release, no sacrifice increase, no getting the spouse on board, because this crap's starting to work for the first time in my life.

telling money what to do instead of it telling me what to do. I am not relinquishing this control ever again. You start getting a little swagger, man. You're ready to go. That's true. And that's why this thing works and why so many millions of people have gotten out of debt using the Ramsey system, which is just freaking common sense. But you know, you people that think your debt avalanche is mathematically superior. No, your math is naive and your formula is incomplete because you don't know what the flip you're doing. So Northwestern University did a study of the debt snowball versus the avalanche. And they concluded because of probability of completion that the snowball was far superior because if you quit and you don't get out of debt using the mathematically superior,

which is not really mathematically superior, it doesn't work. That's right. So you don't get completion. You don't get to the goal. So and then Time Magazine comes out and does a story on the Northwestern studio, Northwestern study, and they go, turns out Dave Ramsey was right. Like, we didn't already know that. We've got like millions of proof text here. We've got so much social proof on this that's unbelievable. We beat your research project into submission. So good God, people, this is not that hard. Get your butt out of debt. Your number one wealth building tool is your income. And when you're giving it to stupid Bank of America, Lexus Motor Credit, and Mastercard, who's your master of your life, you know, and you wonder why you work so hard to make $100,000

a year and I got nothing. It's because you're giving it all to these stupid banks. And you've got to get back control of your life. You just, you work too hard to be broke people. You need to retain control of your life. This is so empowering. It is. So Dave, get a little bit more tactical because we know, okay, we're listening to small so large. Okay, Dave, I will do the debt snowball method. but where do cars fit into that? You're telling people all the time to sell their car. That's not my smallest debt. Do I do it first?

Do I wait until I get to that on the debt snowball? When do I sell my car? The rule is if you can pay the car off and all the other debt within two years, not counting your house, and you like the car, keep it in the debt snowball and pay it off. But if the car is keeping you from making it out in two years, if it's one of the reasons, okay? Yeah. But if you've got a $5,000 car and a $200,000 student loan, the car is not your problem. That's right. That's right. But you got a $70,000 car and a $6,000 student loan. You got issues. And you can't make it out in two years. Well, it's the car, stupid. Yeah. So get rid of the dumb car. So can you get rid of the thing and do you like it? Well, I hate it.

Well, get rid of it even if you weren't broke because you don't like the stupid thing. But I love the car and I can pay it off and all of my other debts with the money I have in savings. and the money I can earn and using the debt snowball during a two-year period of time, then keep the car. I'm fine with that. Yeah. And the only exception would be the IRS. That's the only thing that jumps to the top of the list.

Fair? Child support. Child support. Anything like that goes to the front of the list because they're going to come get it anyway. That's right. And child support, you take care of babies before you're doing any of this. Shut up. But the IRS is going to get their pound of flesh, so you need to put them at the front

and get rid of them as soon as possible. They have collection abilities nobody else has. This is The Ramsey Show Hey guys, it's George Camel, and I've got a hot tip to save you some serious cash this holiday season. Shop Aldi first. Aldi has everything you need for holiday get-togethers. I'm talking charcutory boards, holiday sides, desserts without the large price tags. You'll get fresh, high-quality food while keeping your budget off the naughty list.

because Aldi has the lowest prices of any national grocery store. It's true, families are saving up to $4,000 a year just by making Aldi their go-to, which means more money for stocking stuffers. So find a store near you at aldi.us. That's a l-D-I.us. Savings based on regional analysis of Aldi v. Select competitors. Prices may vary by location, product availability, and the market. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fair Wins Credit Union Studio.

Jade Washaw, Ramsey Personality, number one bestselling author, is my co-host. Sarah is in Virginia Beach. Hi, Sarah. How are you? Hi, I'm doing well. How are you? Better than we deserve. What's up?

I guess I have a question. about debt and merging everything. I'm a new wed. Me and my husband recently got married in December 12, 2024. And I didn't know that he wasn't as financially responsible as I thought. He has, I guess, been more secretive about his debt. I'm a bit more like open about it. And he wants the merge accounts, but I'm not comfortable with doing it as yet

because he's kind of been very secretive. has lied to me about certain debts, and I'm working on now using like your plan to get myself out of debt because I bought a home before we got married back in 2023. I have a car I'm working on paying off, which is supposed to be paid off later maybe next year and a couple other few debts, but he has many more that I wasn't aware of and some that I think is secretive about still. We're going to marriage counseling, but I just don't know how to do. more comfortable with merging our accounts together and feel like we'll be deeper in debt

versus trying to have more assets. Give me an example. So let's clarify because part of the solution to the problem is you merging accounts because when you merge them, then you can see everything that's going on, right? There's transparency there. So give me an example of what that deceit looked like. I asked him how much the bill was and he said it was 300, but really it was 3,000. but really it was 3,000. Tell me an example of what that is.

Yeah, so when we, when he moved into the home out of his rental, it was that he wasn't making enough at the moment because he needed to still finish paying off like electricity bills, gas bill, things like that. So I told him, okay, how long did you need to do that? And it was about two months. Okay. And so when I was waiting for that time frame, I had got a bill in the mail, and it was from the gas company, and when I had asked him if he paid it, he told me yes, but when I ended up calling them, they told me that there was still a balance of $1,200 for a gas bill. And when you asked him about that, what did he say?

He told me that it was paid. I never informed him that I called them until a little later, and he told me that he would end up taking care of it. So, I mean, when you said I called them and you lied, you didn't pay it, what did he say? He just said that I did. It was, it was just firm. He was firm about that he did pay it until I showed him, like, the bill. And then was he like, oh, my gosh, I didn't realize there was still an outstanding balance.

We're just really trying to get an, here's what I'm trying to get an understanding of. Are you dealing with a liar? Or are you dealing with somebody who's disorganized and chaotic? Right. It's more, he has lied about many, many things. not just money It's just surprised Yeah

It's not Three months Yeah it's been I guess 10 months now But three months into yes The marriage I found out that he was lying So everything before was being deceived

In two separate homes While we were recording in things And then got married And now everything in the home And I'm seeing it more vividly Okay So here's Here's what I'm trying to be clear about

Because there is part of this to Dave's point where some people are just extremely unorganized with their money and as they learn to get more organized things get better and better and then there's another part of you guys are married and I'm wondering what the communication sounds like because of the communication is did you pay the bill yeah and you're keeping it to yourself no he didn't it's this money right that all of that matters in this in this situation now what I do think is if he's lying and they weren't past lies but there are lies that are continuing on now and you know about them and if he's lying in other areas, not just money, then you do have a big problem on your hands.

Yeah. You have a big enough problem. You need to be in the marriage counselor's office early and often right now because your communication style isn't good because if at my house, if I said, hey, Sharon, did you pay that? She says yes. And I went, I'm going to check. And I call and they go, no, it's not paid.

I would go, hey, I called them. They didn't pay it. I wouldn't wait three days and stew about it. I'd walk in there right then and go, hey, what's up? You said you paid this. Right. Like right then. and she would be going, I thought I did, I screwed up, or I was ashamed, or I was scared, or whatever,

but at least we get to the bottom of it right then. We don't carry it around for four weeks and then label her a liar. That's a bad thing to be married to. And what I'm trying to understand from the beginning of your call is you're saying, now he wants to combine money, but you're the one who's afraid to. So I'm trying to understand if he's trying to make it right by saying, okay, let's just put everything together, then I don't have to try to, you know, keep something over here while you have it over here, but you're saying now I don't feel

comfortable doing that. You're too late. You're married. Right. Are you worried? What can he do? What do you think he's going to do if you combine finances? Let me ask that question.

I think he's going to spend more because I'm, like, what does the term people use, like, the breadwinner? So I make majority of the funds. He helps pay, like, since we didn't have a merge account, he would just send me like $250. What does he make? What does he make? That's another thing. He's kind of private about that, too.

So he works for a cable company, and it's supposed to be, quote, unquote, $12 an hour, but they have a point system. So week to week, sometimes he says he makes $500. Sometimes it's only $300. So would he be direct deposited into your joint account then if you combine finances, is it, hey, now we direct deposit all of our paychecks into this account, not you get paid and then put money into a merger? account, all direct deposits go into the same account. That's how it works. And that's the only

way we're doing this, right? Then we know what he's making. And what do you make? Yeah, that's in the discussion. So I make $62,000 and some change a year. And how long did you all date before you got married three months ago? Oh, it was two years, about two years. And how many times have you sat with your marriage counselor in the last three months? We've been going consistently. It's like once every three weeks, and now he's going one-on-one with the counselor, and I go one-on-one with a woman counselor.

Okay. Well, that's good that you're doing that. And at some point, we have to combine that process, too. All right. Sometimes he's a bit of a spender as well, so it kind of makes me, I guess that's where it gets me a little nervous. Listen, now we're merge everything. Here's the thing, okay?

If you put all of your money into one account and you make a list of all the bills that have to be paid on every dollar and you both agree to them and we agree where every dollar of our income is going to go this month before the month begins, he has agreed to his spending level and you have two before it occurs. If he does otherwise, you're dealing with someone who can't keep a contract now with his wife and then we got a problem there. That's a different kind of problem, okay?

But you're not solving a spender by staying separate from them. Combining is the only way to get transparency and accountability on where every dollar is going. And you need to talk to your counselor about the language you are using towards your husband. You have contempt all in your language. Exactly. You're rolling your eyes like you're so much better than him on every side. subject, and that is one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, the primary reason people get divorced when contempt rolls in.

So you've got to solve for that, or this marriage isn't going to make it. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. The holidays are full of traditions. Some of these traditions we love, some we just survive. And in addition to the traditions, let's be honest, this time of year can also be a time of noise and pressure and loneliness. Here's what I want you to do. I want you to ask yourself what really matters to you this year.

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to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash Ramsey. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality is my co-host, AAA 825-5-2-2-25. Anna is in Austin, Texas. Hi, Anna. How are you? Hi, Dave. I'm good.

How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Well, I received this week. And I received some devastating news that my husband was scammed out of our, his, almost his entire 401 came. And, um, so now it's tax time. And, um, we're going to have to pay taxes on it.

So we have no more retirement and our savings is going to be wiped out. And, um, I don't know. where he began from here what did he get scammed what did you put it in it was a crypto crypto how much and he did 270,000 270,000 yes there's a little bit of a back story I'm not making excuses for him but we've learned a backstory as to why he felt financially strapped that he felt he felt he needed to do this to secure our financial future um how old are you i'm 57 he's 58 um we have no debt we paid off our home in february of 2022 what's your household what's your household income right now he makes me approximately not

$98,000 annually and I'm currently not working. I had to quit my job in January of 2023 because I was diagnosed with cancer and the medication that I'm on just causes me a lot of side effects that we chose. It's better for me to stay home because we could afford it. Obviously, we had no debt again. and he was, I think, he was looking into securing our future so that he may be able to retire early. He started doing some research as to having best money. He knows nothing about, he's not, he's not educated in that.

So your voice is fairly muffled. Speak directly into your phone, please. Okay. There you. He's not, okay. He's not. No, he's obviously, even if he is educated, he's not wise. And he got desperate, it sounded like.

He did. And right after I get desperate, I usually get stupid. That's what it was. So that happened in January, 2024. And about March or April, he came up to me and told me that he invested a little bit of money. And I was like, okay. And he said, and he showed me that it was, he showed me the app. And he showed me that the money was, I mean, we had made it made about three or four hundred thousand.

And I said, okay, how much did you invest? And he told me at that time, he said 30,000. I said, what did you get the money from? Because I take care of all the banking. And he said that he pulled it out of the 401K. And I said, okay, don't mistake, you know, we'll get, we'll get through this. I found a temporary job. I made enough money to cover the taxes.

I calculated we'd probably owe about $6,000 taxes. I said, okay, great. Well, I'll take care of it and I'll get a permanent job so it won't affect our savings. And now that it's tax time, I kept looking for the form that comes in, the 1099R, I believe, and he can't make an excuse as to why he hasn't gotten. We hadn't received it. So I kind of had a feeling that it was worse than what I knew and that it was worse and what he had told me, and this weekend he gave me the paper, and it was $270,000.

So now we will have to... And now it's worth a row, of course. Yes. Well, he... I looked at it last night, and there was about $16,000 in it right now, but... Was it really a scam or did he just lose? Like, did he get scammed by a scammer, or he invested the money and he lost the investment? No, it wasn't an actual scammer. I had the demanded that I, back when he told me it was $30,000, I demanded to know where he sent it, how he sent it. I wanted to know everything. And apparently it was a company in Hong Kong.

And I, I looked up the address and it's, it's in the slums of Hong Kong. I'm like, why didn't you do the research before? Well, the thing is now, he said that it was the 200. I'm like, how can you, how can you go from 30,000 to 270,000? And he said it was about the same time. He invested here, you know, in a couple different. Okay, let me ask you this. Let me ask you this.

Yes, sir. Does he now own that this is stupid or is he still defending? No. No, he owns it. He's been living with this for the past year. And it's, I mean, he had his. Well, he was lying about it 20 minutes ago. Yeah, you said he just came clean with it.

Yeah, he just came clean with it. But he was living with that lie for the past year. But, I mean, he's now saying out. loud. I completely screwed this up. Yes. He has. That's important because otherwise he's going to do it again. Right. And he's like, I'm prepared to work till I'm 70. I mean, he's not a choice at this point. Belly up, buddy. How's your health? Are you improving? It's getting there. I'm on a clinical trial. Okay. And so I'm, I, I'm hoping that this will be something that will, you know, give me more time.

And I feel pretty good, except, you know, just the usual side effects. I mean, not the usual, but the side effects of medication. But thank you. I'm happy, you know, every day is a good day. And I'm not going to let this bring me down. But it does scare me for our future. The good news is you have no payments. And so what he needs to do is max out his 401K, and you all need to max out your Roth IRAs.

and you need to tell him that if he makes any transactions without the two of you being in agreement ever again, that that will be the last time he'll do so as your husband. Absolutely. He needs to understand that this has extreme consequences. Because he not only did something stupid, he lied about it, at length, deceived, created a web, a full scenario of lies.

that concerns me actually more than a stupidity. Correct. And so, you know, that's a big deal. So, yeah, you guys can catch up. I mean, you can make $100, $120, and you max out your 401ks and max out your Roths and work another 10 years, 12 years, and you will have enough of a nesting to retire on if you don't do this again. But as soon as he gets desperate and tries to pull off a fast one, that's when you get messed over. and so ouch i'm so sorry honey with everything you're facing it's just not fair wow all right guys

let me give you a couple principles on that there's a guy who scammed a bunch of people and wrote a book from jail in the 70s the book he wrote about himself was con man or saint obviously he thought he was a saint but he was in jails he was a con man okay but there was i read that book in the in the early 80s and as a teenager early 20s and the only thing i really got out of the book was he said it's very, it's almost impossible to con someone unless they are afraid or greedy. This guy was afraid. His wife had cancer. He's trying to get a bunch of money so that he cannot have to work and take care of her.

And he got desperate based on fear. And that set him up in the emotional category to be conned. The other crypto people that get conned are the greedy ones. They're trying to make double your money in 20 minutes because I'm the cool kid and I'm the smart one. And I grew up with a cell phone in my hand, a smartphone in my hand, so I know everything about digital. No, you don't. You're a greedy fool and you're going to lose your butt in crypto also. The second thing you can do is who can find a virtuous wife for her worth is far above Rudy.

the heart of her husband safely trusts her and he will have no lack of gain if you have to hide the investment or the financial move from your spouse warning warning warning you're screwing up i have no lack of gain because share not talk about it before we do it and it keeps me on the rails this is the ramsay show Finally, mortgage rates have dropped, and you know what that means? People who've been sitting on the sidelines are about to jump back in to the housing market. So if you've been waiting to buy, this could be your window, but you've got to be prepared and do it the Ramsey way. You need to contact Churchill Mortgage.

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What's up in your world? Well, I'll say. Just have a quick question. So my husband and I got a term life insurance policy. see through Xander, when our son was first born. But that was 15 years ago. And since then, life has hit a little bit. We are still making progress with our debt snowball.

We're actually planning to pay off our last debt by hopefully February. However, we're not there yet. But over the years, our income has increased quite a bit. So when we were first married, we were making about 70 combined. Now we're making about 180. So my question is, why is it taking you 15 years to get out of debt? Well, you know, maybe weren't so gazelle intense. Like not at all.

Okay. Right, right. But we're getting there now. So we're getting really close. So you still have a mortgage and you still have what else? We have $8,000 on my student loan. and we've got our mortgage, and that is all we have left. Wow.

So what's the question today? So the question today, we are curious, do we need to consider increasing our life insurance through Zander, given that our income has gone up? I know the recommendation is like 10 to 12 percent of your overall income, or because we're so close to being debt-free, do we not need to take that approach? because ultimately will be self-funded through insurance.

No, you need to extend because being self-insured would denote that you've got a massive nest egg of wealth that can cover you when those situations arise. And you don't have that just yet. If you keep going with intensity, you will, but if you play the next 15 years, like you've played this last 15 years, you're still going to be in debt. You'll still have a mortgage. Well, we are definitely not looking to do that. We're definitely looking to get to a tax that mortgage as soon as a student loan is paid off. When you have enough money, when you have enough money in investments, that the income off of the investments will support you if he dies, then you're self-insured. You're not there.

We want you to be okay if something happens to him. and you're not there okay and we want him to be okay if something happens to you and make sure the kiddos are fed and so forth and that would be that you know and so if you had a million dollars and it was producing 10% that'd be $100,000

okay and that's not even that won't even take care of you now because you're making 180 and so you'd need about $2 million in investments right now in zero debt in order to be self-insured equal to, you know, having the right amount of life insurance. So no, yeah, you need to increase your life insurance and buy new policies. Yeah, if your 15-year-fixed policy is running out by new ones, yeah. And yeah, and here's the thing.

If you do get intense, if that did happen and you get out of debt and you look up and there's a million or two million dollars in investments and zero debt, you can cancel the life insurance. You don't have to keep paying it. call them and cancel it. But if you're not, if you don't smoke folks and you're not overweight, life insurance doesn't cost anything. It's very inexpensive.

So 15 year level, 15 to 20 year level fixed rate. And the idea is that during that 15 years, you pay off your mortgage. Well, yeah. And you get out of debt. And you build up some investments. And the kids grow up and leave. That's right. During that 15 to 20 years.

And so we don't have kiddos to take care of. We've got a pile of money. and you work your way into a net worth that allows you to be self-insured. But you guys have been slow, so you get to re-up your life insurance. And you can always drop it later, but for right now, you're not ready. That's a good question. Yeah. Felix is in Los Angeles.

Hi, Felix. How are you? Hi, Dave. Thank you so much for the opportunity to be on the show. Sure. I'm calling today to get more, to get your advice on my current living situation. I work for a government utilities agency in Los Angeles as an engineer. I currently live in downtown L.A.

I'm paying about $3,000 in rent per month. And I just turned 30 this year. And I watch your show. I hear, you know, your advice about ownership and owning a home someday. and that's a goal for my for my for my life as well and I wanted to give your thoughts on you know renewing my lease which expires this month or going back home to stay with my parents well how much do you bring home every month so after tax I bring home about um somewhere between 6,000 to 6,500 dollars so um what you're telling me is your rents 50% of your take home

yes it's yes it's around that uh if you include utilities and you know yeah i know so i think you know there's there's one of two things that can happen here you can either figure out a way to bus free and suddenly make 20,000 dollars you know a month or you can look for someplace that's far less expensive for rent what would you do if you moved you know away and move towards where your family is, what would you do for a living? Well, I would still be an engineer. My family stays in Fontana, which is about maybe 50 miles away from Los Angeles. You have an engineering degree?

Yes, I have a bachelor's in civil engineering, and I have a master's in environmental engineering. And you make $70,000 a year? Well, that's, no, I make around $105,000. a year. How long you've been on a school? I graduated with my master's in 2023, and shortly after is when I moved to L.A. and got my job in Los Angeles. Yeah, I mean, you're living in one of the most expensive places in the country. So there is always going to be a limit because of that. So if I were in your shoes, yeah, I'd be looking for other places. Now, Fontana that you mentioned, I mean, have you priced it out? What's the difference? What could, where could you get a one bedroom and what would it cost?

Would it get you to the 25% range? Well, in L.A., it's very difficult to find a place to stay. I'm talking about Fontana, like you said. I'll be staying with my parents. Okay, so Felix, here's the thing. What you want, staying with your parents is not your play because it doesn't take you to the future you want. You've said nothing about where you want to be in 20 years. in 10 years and and how staying with your parents is going to get you there all we're doing

solving the immediate problem by going backwards so no I'm not going to do that if I'm you I'm looking for a new job that pays 150,000 in a market where the rent is half of what it is in LA and you make a move for your career you're a single guy and you go out there and make some money and get your cost of housing down because if you're working for utility your bumps your increases in pay are going to be moderate to poor. Yeah, it's a government, it's a government, it's a government job. Yeah, it's going to be moderate to poor. The pay is already low, and it's not going to get better.

You're going to get cost-living bumps and nothing else. And so, as an engineer, you can go out there and make twice what you're making now in an area that costs half what it costs to live in L.A. And that puts you in a position to build a life, a financial life, including a home ownership. But the ratio you're giving me right now, going back to your parents doesn't solve it. No. That's regressing instead of saying, how can I move forward?

So I'm going to be figuring out a way to move forward. Either a different kind of engineer application for my master's in engineering in Los Angeles where I make a lot more or a different city or both. The holidays are supposed to be joyful, but they can also be expensive. Between gifts, travel, and about 1,000 limited time offers, your budget can start feeling anything but merry. And that's why I love this. Boost Mobile helps you treat yourself and your wallet. Right now, you'll pay just $10 a month for your first two months. Then, only $25 a month for unlimited talk, text, and data.

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Hi, Luke. Welcome to the show. Hello. Hi. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can we help? So, I kind of use a unique situation here.

22 years old, household income of 90,000. We inherited and inherited six acres. of land and decided to build a house on it. You don't have any debt. We have not taken any loans on the house. I've built it so far where you've got the roof, walls, and siding, and almost done with utilities. But our goal is that I pay for all the bills, and then my wife, she pays for all the materials

for the house. My question is, should I take what's the step of my income after the bills and throw it towards the house or put it towards retirement okay you're trying to build a house out of your pocket and so far you have but you and your wife have separate finances uh well we've worked together for the finances but not really not really you got you've delegated part of it to her and part of it to you you don't have one pile so you need one pile of money her money your money is our money one big pile out of that pile what is our first goal I would assume it's to finish the house, isn't it?

Yes, sir. So what does it take to finish the house money-wise? How much money? We're living at probably about 10 grand left. We've got drywall insulation and paint. Okay. If you pile all your money, you and your wife, our money in one pile, how long does it take you to come up with 10 grand?

Well, probably a month or two. Yeah. Okay. So let's finish the house. And then you need to make sure you have an emergency fund of three to six months of expenses and then take 15% of your household income, our income, and start that towards retirement. That's baby step four. But you're going to be living in a paid-for house.

That's nice. That's awesome. You got this acreage and you built a house. You've got a lot of sweat in it and you're going to have a bunch of equity, right? Oh, yeah, for sure. What's this finished product going to be worth, acreage and house total? We're hoping for $250. Good. Very cool. And you said you're 26?

22. 22. Wow. Okay. Wow. And your household income, if we put both of your money in one pile, is how much a year? $90,000. How much? $90,000. That's the two of you combined. Okay, good. I make $62. She makes $28.

Okay. Cool. Perfect. Yeah. So let's take 15% of $90,000 after we get the emergency fund in place. And you're sitting on $250,000 house. You're going to be millionaires before you're 30. Whoa. That's exciting. Not fun. I hope they take your advice and put their money in one pile. Well, that's the thing. Yeah. So there's, yeah, there's just so much data that says when you do that,

that your higher probability of winning at marriage, winning at relationship, winning at everything. And let's circle back and say this, nothing to do with Luke's call, but just this, because we get so much bull crap on social media about telling people put their money. together um you should be independent no you shouldn't be independent if you're married that's a dumb but idea this is how your marriage doesn't work because you're so strung out on you that you're worthless as a spouse so that that's the problem so no you don't need to be independent you need to be one the preacher said and now you are one one uno unity all in one and so If we know, and we do know, that the data tells us in America today, the number one cause of divorce is money fights and money problems.

The number one solution to that is learning to dream together and put our money together and handle our problems and our challenges and our opportunities and our dreams together. That is the solution where you don't have money problems cause divorce. If we have the solution to the number one cause of divorce, why are you arguing with us? that's just dumb because people out there are dumb and we will always have a show for that reason so there it is not all people out there are dumb but enough of them are dumb but we will

always have this show are they dumb Dave or do they do dumb things? They're ignorant. I'll take that. I'll take that. I don't know how ignorance. I don't know how. There's things I'm ignorant about I don't know how I used to know when I was a young redneck I used to know how to work on a car but now a car looks like a spaceship when I opened the hood and so I can't even, I don't know if I could jump the thing and get a jumper cable on it nowadays

without blowing it up. So, you know, I'm so, but so I don't know how to work on that car. It doesn't mean I'm dumb. It means I'm ignorant. I don't know how to do that. But then don't argue with experts when you're ignorant because it makes you look dumb. I'll take that, dude. I'll take that. Golly. What? Wow. And Luke was doing none of that. Luke's a sharp young guy, a 22, man. He's got it going on, doesn't he? Yeah, most definitely. I don't even. I was nowhere near that, so. Yeah, I don't even want to talk about it. Jason was in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hi, Jason. How are you? Hey, guys. How are y'all? Can you hear me okay?

Yes. What's up? Good, good. Hey, I just got a quick question for you. I'll give you a quick rundown on the situation. I'm trying to decide if I should sell my house. I live about an hour outside of the Carolina Metro is right now I'm planning to make a move this summer I'm self-employed at sell real estate and so in my new market I'm going to have to kind of start from the ground up I'm near the end of the baby step two

if this move wasn't happening and I'd be done probably by June or July maybe August the flip side so the question is basically Where are you going to live when you move? I'm going to rent okay and so your question is whether to keep your house or not yeah oh sell it

no just just sell yeah you don't need to be a renter and be a landlord that's bass backwards that was risky Dave that was very risky that's what I needed to know yeah I mean really think about it that's backwards you don't want to do that so no you need to get get you know you're in the real estate business you're going to get plenty of opportunities to own a property and live in a house that you pay cash for or buy it and then get it paid off as quick as you can hanging onto this boat anchor that represents your former life out in the burbs when you're moving into the metro and having a deal with that while you're trying to learn to sell real estate and trying to get your business moving nah yeah that's where

my mind was and I thought that was right I just want to make sure yeah you're you're right on track man you're right on track so there you go here's the thing it's interesting um Real estate is such an emotional topic because it has these two strange elements to it. Strange element number one is it is an excellent way to build wealth when you do it right as a part of your long-term plan. Right. That then gets confused with it's always smart no matter what. That's a good point, Dave. And it's not. Sometimes real estate, doing a real estate deal in the wrong situation in your life, could be not, you know, in Jason's, it's just a bad idea, but in other people, it's

even way over into the stupid zone. Yeah, for sure. And so real estate is, it's weird. It is because it's a blessing when you do it right, that gives everybody permission to do it even wrong and it becomes a curse. Yeah. And I think also the other thing that I think we're fighting now is so many people had properties that they locked in at a better interest rate. And so then when life moves them, they feel like, yeah, it's a good deal. maybe I shouldn't get rid of it, even though I'm moving, I should keep it. It's like this weird attachment to it. It's like because real estate is good, I can't, everything I do with it is going to be smart. Right. It just falls in line. And it's like, no, it's not going to be smart. You know, it's not

smart. The only way that, you know, no, there's a good time to cut real estate loose. There's a good time for it to not be there. And buying, buying real estate, you can't afford. Buying a house, you can't afford. We had that earlier in the hour. That's right. So we've got to sell the house says mom wants to come home and not be a teacher and be a full-time mom. That's cool. But we've got to sell the house. We bought a house we can't for it. It's not a blessing anymore.

That's right. It's a curse. It's a problem. Yes. So doing it wrong or keeping it wrong or because real estate's good. It's not always good. Yeah. And it's not that real estate is, actually real estate is always good.

It's the life situation you're in doesn't match up with owning real estate right then. Yeah. And so it's not always good to keep your old house and rent it. Matter of fact, it seldom is. Very seldom. This is The Ramsey Show. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fair Winds Credit Union Studio. Jade Washall Ramsey Personality, number one bestselling author is my co-host today.

Alyssa is with us in Chicago. Hi, Alyssa. How are you? I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? My question is, how much is too much to spend on a wedding? Okay. That's cool. How much are you thinking about spending? 60,000.

Cool. Nice wedding. Good. Okay. Do you have 60,000? So we're actively saving to get to, we have about half right now. So by next September, when the wedding would be, we would have that. So mom and dad aren't chipping in. That's you and him paying for it. We are going with the intention that we're paying for it. They've briefly mentioned that they might contribute, but no hard numbers have been given or anything like that.

Okay. So you're assuming it's all on you. So what do you make? Yeah. I make 90 before. What's he made? A hundred and 90. Cool.

Oh, do you guys have any debt? No debt. Wow. It's not too much. It's not too much, okay. Not if you pay cash. That's exciting. Okay.

You want to know how I did that? Yes. Here's fun, okay? Average household income in America right now is about $75,000. The average wedding in America is about $36,000. It's about half of the average income. So if you spend more than half your average, annual income on your wedding, and if you're paying for all of it, which just sounds like

you are, okay, then you're spending too much on a wedding because you're more than half the average. Now, here's the thing keep in mind, average kind of sucks in America. We don't necessarily want to be average, but you're below 50% of your way below 50% of your $270,000 income. And so you're, you're on a ratio basis. you are half of the national average, which is half. That's a weird way to say that. But yeah. So, I mean, the national average would put – if you spent 50% of your all's income,

it would be 135. So you're well below what the average person is doing. And you're about half of that at 60. And so you're very conservative as a ratio. But now, for somebody that makes 100 grand, it sounds like that, you know, unless has lost her mind, you know. But that's what people say that don't have any money, and you've got some money. So, you know, when you have more money, you can spend more of it.

Without it being a problem. Yeah. So. And if that doesn't include the honeymoon and we added, I don't know, 10 or 15 on top of that, it would still be within that ratio. Honeymoon's a different story. Yeah, I think that'd be fine. And the engagement rings another story, okay?

Yeah, that's a good differential, though. When we're talking about the wedding, there are those three components. there's the rings, then there's the actual party, and then there's your honeymoon. What do y'all do for living? I do medical sales, and he does product management. Cool. Okay. Well, he's going to really like this last suggestion. We've done three weddings at the Ramsey's. I've got three kids that are all married and been married many, many years, okay? And Ramsey's, we like a big party. We like to celebrate stuff like that. And so we threw major parties

on each of these weddings. It was a lot of fun. But we learned, and we did it from the first one. We introduced this idea that for your fiancé will love me. Your wedding is a project. So let's lay out a budget in detail. If we're going to spend 60, how much of that's the dress, how much of that's the reception, how much of that's the videographer,

how much of that's the preacher, how much is the venue, and you lay out a budget. And then guess what? You stick to the budget. And that would be my word of wise for you. you, Alyssa, because when you hear what Dave said, which is, yeah, which is technically you could be spending more if you were being, quote, average. So for you, the hard part is going to say, even though we could spend more, we're going to stick to what we said in the beginning

of 60,000. Yeah, I would pretend like that you work for someone and your job was to manage a $60,000 budget and bring the event in on budget, on schedule. Because you're a manager project. It's an event project. I mean, we manage events here. what it is. And so this is what... And you get fired if you went over someone else's budget. Yeah. If you work for somebody, you get fired if you screwed it up, right? So just treat it like it's serious business. And I know that doesn't sound very romantic, but people use romance as a way to do a lot of stupid butt stuff. So no, we're not doing that. So, no, just lay it out exactly. And you say this is, and you can pull up some percentages. There's some good guidelines

online for how much to spend on the dress. I will go ahead and tell you, if you're going to have a nice reception to have the big party, it's going to be your biggest line item by far. Like how many people you think, I mean, 60,000, you're thinking about inviting a decent number of people, aren't you? It's not huge. So we've already booked the venue and we're going through that process, but I'm more of the favor and he's more of the spender. And so thinking of kind of the rough estimate that we put together with all the, you know, videographer, photographer and all of that. it just sounds like a lot of money.

So I go back before it's a bit hesitant and not. You know what I'm saying? You know what I mean when I say scope creep? Yes. Yeah, this project, this thing will creep up and the 60 will turn into 80. If you do not, if you do not line item this and no rough estimates, it's freaking what we're going to do. And then when you're meeting with the caterer and they go, well, we can't have a leg, no, no, this is all we got. This is what we're doing.

And, well, you know, we can spend, you know, freaking $85,000 on flowers. Who's getting married here? Princess Die? I mean, seriously. So, you know, we're going to go in the field, pick some wildflowers so that we stay on budget. Rachel actually did that one. Well, if nothing else. Because she was over budget on other stuff. And the only way she could get it back in budget was to get the flowers down. If nothing else planned for 54, so at least you've got 10% set aside just as contingency. Oh. That's what I'd do. A little slush fund in the line items. Just in case. Yeah, a little just in case fun. I'd have something in there for that. I don't know if I get away with that.

But wow. Wow. Yeah, that's exactly how. would do it. And Lisa, I think you're approaching it very wisely. You're not counting on the people who have been vague about their possible input. That way you're not under their control. Matter of fact, whatever they come forth with, I'd probably just use that for the honeymoon. And I just lock this baby down on 60 and just go, we're doing it. And you and the fiancee sit down and agree to that. Go, this is a project like you manage at work. We're going to manage this. We're going to come in on budget. We're going to get the details out because there's always something that you can go higher. you can always go one bigger one better on everything you get the extra large shrimp instead of

the large shrimp what was the thing on the father of the bride cheaper chicken oh yeah cheaper chicken yeah you get ice sculptures yeah that's it and so yeah you can do it and you can do that on a 10,000 dollar budget you can do it on a 60,000 dollar budget you can do it on whatever you just manage the budget that's right this is what we're doing and so it's just we're going to get super creative or we're going to do this for 7800 bucks we have a lady here on the team that got married and had a really nice little wedding for 7000 bucks and she just slammed you know they were trying to get out of debt and that's the most they weren't going to spend and uh it was it was really very nice can i tell you the okay sam

and i paid for our wedding what you're pocket oh it was like 10,000 okay um it was a little bit more but i my biggest regret to this day and it was in the name of doing it debt free we didn't have an open bar no open bar that's your that's your regret that you didn't booze up everybody else for free? I mean, we were on a yacht. It just made sense. You should have had, there should have been some drinks on board. Oh, you didn't have a, oh. There was no open bar.

There was no bar. No. No, not, they couldn't even pay. No. Open bar would be like you paid. No. Well, I thought it was tacky to have people pay, so there just was no bar. Just no. Oh, well, okay. I'll go with that. Okay. Listen, it was a mistake. That's okay. You know what?

They don't remember it? You're the only one that does. I guess so. I don't know about that. Sam doesn't even remember. When you're tired of feeling stuck with money, there's just one solution. To get different results, you have to do something different. No one accidentally wins with money. You have to have a game plan, and that begins with our game plan. and that begins with our get started assessment.

Go to ramsysolutions.com slash start, answer some questions, and we'll show you what steps to take next. Don't stay stuck. Take control of your money starting today. Go with ramsysolutions.com slash start. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality, number one bestselling author, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. I am Dave Ramsey, your host. Katrina is with us in Salt Lake City. Hi, Katrina.

How are you? Hi, I am fantastic. Thank you so much for asking. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? All right. So I am going through a divorce, and it's really hurting me financially.

So I'm wondering if I should. take money out of my business account and that I'm actually trying to sell because of the divorce and use some of that money to buy things for my primary job. What is your primary job? I am a school teacher and tomorrow I go back to school and the kids come back next Tuesday but I need to buy some supplies for the students to come back to school. I'm sorry, they don't furnish you supplies for the classroom like they should. well they give me five dollars which would make you every school teacher in america well yeah thank you

they give me five dollars a student but i've already spent that i bought glue sticks and colored pencils and um pencil pouches for the students and and so what are you talking about spending i need paper hand sanitizers folders um and journals what are you talking about spending um i'm thinking i need about two hundred dollars what type of business do you have what's a of it. So, yeah, in the evenings, I run an escape room, but I have to sell it, according to the divorce decree, I have to sell it so I could pay back some of the equity that I owe to my soon-to-be ex-husband. Do you take a, you take a payroll from the business? I don't, it doesn't make enough money, so I just, I run it, and then like it pays for, you know,

$200 changes your life, you have other problems. Well, right now, I'm barely finished baby step number one. I've been using your every dollar app. If you have to choose between you eating and buying your children hand sanitizer, you eat. Okay. I get that. Okay. And so if you, you know, if you're down to nothing, if you have no money and $200 is a huge amount to you,

where you get it from doesn't matter it's where you spend it that matters you don't have the option to be this generous to these students contact a local church and ask them to help you with they've got some journals laying around and maybe they've got some hand sanitizer they can give you from the children's ministry and help you fund this help you get the thing set up without you spending the $200 at Tarje and you know let's go that route because it sounds like this $200 is a lot of money to you yeah and you've got you need to work on the other side of that and that's the overall income. I think I'm tutoring instead of running a game room.

Escape room, yeah. Today's question of the day is brought to you by why refi if private student loan debt is taking away your peace of mind and you don't see any way out. You need Y refi. That's why the letter, R-E-F-Y. They refinance defaulted private student loans. If you have one, they'll refinance it for you.

Nobody else will touch it. And they give you a low fixed rate that is, built for you on a term that makes it work for you so you can get your loan paid off and get it current. So it's not trashing you every month. Go to yrefi.refi.com slash Ramsey today. That's the letter Y, r eFY.com slash Ramsey might not be in all states. All right. Today's question comes from Nora in Pennsylvania. She says, I've been married for almost 30 years and my husband and I have adult children. My husband runs his mother's family business. He will inherit the business when she passes, but he says that the business is not going to be mine if anything happens to him.

He says his will is going to state that our children will get the business and that he will not be providing for me. Ooh, I've explained to him how upsetting this is and that I shouldn't have to go to my children for help when it is his responsibility to care for me. I live on a fixed income my adult life as a stay-at-home mom what can I do to protect myself legally wow you can't so you have a you have a marriage problem my goodness you don't have a legal problem you're married to a jerk um that's a problem yeah I thought this question was going in one direction and then it turned left and went off into the ditch it sure did you know so honey you need to go see a marriage counselor And he's not going to go with you because he's right about everything.

He doesn't need any help if you ask him. And, of course, everybody else listening to this knows he's the one needs the help. But you need to go to the marriage counselor. And the marriage counselor is going to explain to you that your marriage is over if you don't get some serious work done on it. That rattling you're hearing under the hood means the engine's about to blow, kiddo. And this does not describe a loving home where the, the husband is gentle, kind, and serves his wife. I didn't hear anything like that in here.

No, no. So sad. Nora, I'm sorry. But yeah, you need to go see a marriage counselor today. Tell him he ought to go with you, but he won't. And then the marriage counselor will give you words to speak to him that lead to either him coming to the table or the end of your marriage. You can't go forward with this.

And after 30 years, he still chooses his mommy. Wow. after 30 years she's still a mama's boy old men that are mama's boy are kind of pitiful ah that's the worst mama's boys are pitiful period after four years old but old men mama's boys

seriously pitiful and he's going to be one even after she's gone that means this guy's in his 50s he's an old man mama's boy you can title the thumbnail on YouTube old man mama's boy there you go I thought she was going to say something, you know, as I was reading it, I thought, okay, this is a, his mom's family business, it's going to pass to the children, maybe she didn't want to run the business. You know what I mean? Because there's part of that where it's like, I don't want this responsibility, but that took a hard left turn. Ooh, gracious. Yeah. Mamas, don't let your boys become.

Leave and cleave. Choose carefully, my darling. Choose carefully. choose a man who loves his mother from a distance I know that's right mom I love you over there listen I say that but when the day comes when my son gets old enough where he has to go over there

I'm gonna be sad I think it's one of the hardest child developmental things I've ever witnessed as we raised kids girls separate from their mom but boys when boys stay right there until they separate when they separate it's brutal and it usually comes somewhere around 16 or 17 years old for people that become men.

Oh, man. But boys who are a mama's boy at 50, they never did cut the cord. And so they're still tugging on her apron strings. Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy, I want the business. Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, would you take care of Mommy? Mommy, I want to make sure you love me, mommy. Oh, brother, I think I'm going to puke. Oh, gosh.

No, I want my son. We do have a manhood crisis in this country for sure. Wow. I mean, this is not masculinity. It's not toxic masculinity. No, this is just a child. Yeah, and a controlling child. A very controlling jerk of a child.

Yeah. Goodness gracious. And here's the thing. Nora's husband, if you happen to end up listening to this, if you're not who she says you are, you need to understand how screwed up your marriage is that your wife wrote this letter to a nationally syndicated show that has. hundreds of millions of people downloaded every month. So if you're not this and she sent this in, you got stuff going on, dude.

So you still deserve bus tracks over your butt. So we threw you right in front of the bus still. That's what happened. Maybe he'll write in a letter next. I hope so. I wish he would just come on the air and let us talk to him. How fun would that be? That would be compelling podcast material.

Oh, man. Wow. Ouch. Here's what's interesting. The number one thing that will keep you from building wealth is screwed up relationships. That's so true. When you can't handle screwed up relationships and put reasonable, gentle, kind, strong boundaries in place

and keep the screwed up people at a distance and the right people up close, and you can't function with other humans, you're going to struggle building wealth, period. This is The Ramsey Show. It's one of the best times of the year, but it's also the time of year when people let their money get totally out of control. Everywhere you look, it's just buy, by, bye, by. so you start swiping the credit card and suddenly it's January and you got a mess on your hands.

Don't let that happen. Tell your money where to go instead of wondering where it went with our budgeting app every dollar. Every dollar not only helps you stay on budget and in control of your spending this holiday season. It also helps you find extra margin in your budget, thousands of dollars of it. And every day will coach you to build better money habits and attack your goals faster than ever. So while most people will be starting in January with the taste of regret in their mouth, you'll already be winning. Start every dollar for free by downloading the app today. Buying a house in this weird real estate market is weird. selling a house in this weird real estate market is weird.

If you want to do it right, you really need a pro in your corner. Somebody that does a lot of transactions, not your Aunt Sally, who got her license three weeks ago. Sorry, Aunt Sally. You don't qualify to be a Ramsey endorsed local provider that's Ramsey trusted. We love you. We hope you do good in the real estate business, but we don't want you to sell a half a million dollar house for somebody we love,

and you've never sold a house. You need to be doing 30 to 50 to 100 transactions, 200 transactions a year, and then you can become the possible, possibly become Ramsey trusted. So if you want to know who's Ramsey trusted and is an high-octane, high-protein producer in your area, you can do that for free at ramsysolutions.com slash agent. Teddy is in Traverse City, Michigan. Hi, Teddy. How are you?

I'm doing great, Dave. What a pleasure to speak to you today. You too, man. What's up? Well, I've been in debt most of my whole life between cars and my wife and I bought a house. I am self-employed. My wife is retired after 32 years.

I make about $70,000 a year in salary. I have $1,400 a month in rental income from a home that we had purchased and paid off. My wife makes about $400 a week and a side hustle, and she draws $1,500 a month from her 401K. Last year, we got a HELOC loan for a home edition. So I still owe about $100,000 on that. I owe $20,000 on the mortgage on the house we're living in now that we put the addition on, as well as $20,000 on a car.

We've got about $1.1 million in retirement. And of that, $210,000 is liquid investments. So my question is, we've been working in debt snowball, but do I sell some of my investments and pay off this debt and just get it over with? Yep. Yep. How old are you? I'm 62, and my wife is 65.

Yes. If you take, you said 1.2, and we turn it into 1, and you're 100% debt free. I'll take it. I mean, you said you had 210,000 that was liquid. I do. You can do it with. It's not tied up in retirement. That's liquid.

Oh, it's no retirement at all. So you're not even going to have taxes on it. Yeah, I know. Well, maybe a little gain on it. It may have been sitting there gaining, but it might have a little capital gain. But so it's not even going to be a $200. hit it's uh be a hundred 150 hit whatever but either way um you're a hundred percent debt free now that only works teddy if you stop borrowing money oh yeah i'm sorry america i've been

and you know i'm real frugal i'm real frugal you know you're not you're 66 with a stupid car payment isn't that you're a millionaire with a car payment yeah don't do that no sir all right brother hey seriously if you go pay all this off and then run up another debt you're just going to eat your nest egg up i can't wait to come and stand on the stage you've inspired me i love it brother i love it you're a good man congratulations on being a millionaire very cool very cool isn't it funny how hard it is to get the culture out of our veins It's very, I mean, it's, it's yapping at us around every corner, you know, everywhere you look. Every corner.

That's why when someone's dead freehouse and everything, we say you're weird. Yeah. Because you are. Weird just means unusual. It doesn't mean bad. Well, the weird, what makes you weird is you've decided to become independent in a culture that teaches you to constantly be dependent. That's what the weird is. let it roll around in the brain for a while that's strong that's strong well done all right let's do

it charlotte's in cincinnati hey charlotte how are you hey good afternoon dave and crew uh thank you so much for taking my call sure i thoroughly enjoyed listening to your program um my question is um my just a tiny bit of my backstores my husband passed away in 2012 and um as a result of insurance money coming in we were able to get debt free my daughter and i and we have stayed debt free thank god and uh she just finished her freshman year in college uh we have a cafeteria 529 plan um projected you have a what 529 it's what's called a cafeteria 529 plan oh a cafeteria i didn't hear i didn't hear the word okay cafeteria okay i got you yeah all right good that's a good plan so um so yeah so we've got our college paid for as far as that's concerned um but um unfortunately the way that it's grown there's a

trajectory of being like an $80,000 surplus at the at the end um it's and I found out that I could only put $35,000 in a Roth IRA in her name that's true after she's 30 okay yeah so I'm a little bit concern about like can i take any of that overage i mean so how much is in the uh 529 total there's probably right now 189 000 okay and how much did you put in and how much is growth well that's just it like it i only i think at the time i only put in like i don't know 85 000 okay she got 100 growth you got 100 growth you got 100 growth Yeah. And of that, 80's going to be, if he keeps growing, there's even going to be more.

And so you'll have an 80-over, is that what we're saying? Yes. Is she getting any scholarships? She is. Okay. You know you can pull that much out. Of. The equivalent of the scholarship can be pulled out each year.

No tax. Equivalent to the scholarship, okay. So she gets a $10,000 scholarship, pull $10,000 out. That's actually a $1,000. incentive to get more scholarships yeah okay because i i guess my tax preparer he doesn't know about that is there any place that you could direct me as to where i could find good solid information about this kind of stuff a different tax preparer because that's pretty standard information i'm not even good at taxes and i know it so yeah um you know if that's if that's one of our

ELPs, I'm sorry, but if it's not, check one of our endorsed local providers for taxes in your area and get a second opinion on it. But you're allowed to pull the equivalent of scholarships out, athletic, academic, whatever the basis for the scholarship is every year, and there's zero tax on it. So she gets a scholarship pulled that much out. Do you know how much she got in scholarships? Like last year, I mean, it was, I don't know, it was around 10,000, I think. Yeah, okay. All right. That's not going to alleviate the problem completely. because if it's times four, it's only $40,000, right? And she's 80 over, so you're going to have another 40.

And I really wouldn't screw around with the Roth IRA at age 30. I'd just go ahead and cash it out. You don't get, it's not 100% tax. You're just taxed and penalized on that amount of growth only. That's why I was asking you what you had in it. And so the calculation is not as severe as it sounds. So let's say you end up pulling $40,000 bucks out because we just got rid of $40 with the scholarship idea.

You know, you might have $5,000 in taxes. It's 10% yeah? Is that the rate? Yeah, on the growth. Yeah. Yeah. So I could in essence take that money out and use it, say, like for home improvements and things like that. And use it for anything if you pay the taxes on it.

And there'll be the taxes and the penalty. There's a tax and a penalty both. But it's maybe a $10,000 or $15,000 out of that $40 you're going to lose. but it's not 100% so they don't take the whole thing and rather than try to screw around with something for a 22 year old wait until they're 30 and these idiots in Washington change the law six times between now and then no I just cash it out take my head and go on and go hey we paid for college and we had a little leftover life's good yeah I agree there you go hey good question thanks for calling so you know that's a very unusual problem

Yeah, it's a good. I think it's a good problem to have. Yeah. I mean, the only other thing is if they left it, I mean, it can pass it. Like, her as a beneficiary, she can pass it to her kids when the time, you know, when the time comes. That's way out there. But. Yeah. Now we got 800 grand. That's true. Yeah. At that point, if you take the penalty, it might hurt a little bit more. Yeah. I think I'm going to go ahead and just be done with it and just say, hey, we did a great job. We might have even done too good a job, but just so slightly. Just so slightly. Yeah, when I hit a golf ball a little bit too long, I just say I hit it too well. That's all it is. This is The Ramsey Show. Do you want to keep more money in your pocket and not Uncle Sam's?

Then listen up. There are tax deductions and credits you could maximize before the end of the year by connecting with an experienced tax professional like a Ramsey trusted tax pro. They know the tax code inside and out so you don't have to. And they can help you file when tax season rolls around. Get a trusted tax pro by going to Ramsey Solutions.com slash tax pro. Ramsey Solutions.com slash tax pro Our scripture of the day, Luke 638, give and it will be given to you.

A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be poured into your lap. J. Paul Getty says, money is like manure. have to spread it around or it smells all right i'll go with a little generosity there we go left in one pile it stinks yes i like that that's good dylan is in houston texas hi dylan welcome to the ramsie show hey dave and jade how are you better than we deserve what's up in your world hey i've got a question for you all i've kind of got two options i'm working baby step number two currently with my wife um we're about 71 000 in debt 67 of that is student loans and $4,000 on a credit card.

Right now we're bringing about $6,200, and I think it'll take us roughly five years to get out of that debt. So that's kind of what I'm going to label is option one. Option two is my wife can have the opportunity to travel with her job, and we would be able to kind of sell our house, pay all that debt off instantly, and then travel around for a couple more years while we save up for another down payment and find the place that we want to stay for a while. And that option, I wouldn't work. I would raise my five-year-old and my two-year-old, maybe finding a job on the road if I got time. But I wanted to get you all the opinion. What kind of work is it? Nursing?

Yeah, well, kind of. It's an echocardiac sonography, so ultrasound of the heart, but very similar to, like, a travel nurse. Okay. So give me a better picture of that. So is that you just, you live somewhere for six months, and then you move on? What does that look like? Three-month contracts, roughly about $2,500 a week. but they range depending

but the average would be about 2,500 a week. And how old are the kids? Three and five. Five-year-old and, yeah, five and two, but yeah. Five and two. Okay. Interesting.

What do you do? I work for the state. Doing what? Fisheries biology. What do you make? I make 69,000. What does she make now? She's part-time.

She's part-time. I'm just to stay at home with the kids two times, so it ranges. but I think about 30,000 a year. Okay. Okay, so she could work full-time and make 70. She could. Yeah.

But your all's concern is that one parent is with the kids, it sounds like. Yeah, we like that. And I'm okay, staying in debt a little longer. I know that's not the Ramsey way, but I'm okay with it so she can spend some time with the kids. It's really important to her. if you were leaning towards one what would you lean towards because when I look at it when I look at what you're showing me it really feels more like a values conversation between you guys some couples are they want the adventure and they would say oh this is a great opportunity let's go out go travel the kids will learn on the road you know that kind of thing whereas other families like the feeling of stability and being in one place so do you see what I'm saying where do you fall on that line. Yeah, for me, option two. And I think that's both of us. So what our concern is, you know, just went through the housing market, right? I mean, we're in a really good spot. We bought in

2019, so we have a low interest rate. We're just not a huge fan of our area. We both love our jobs. We just want a different area. So then you've whittled this down to it all being about interest rate. And that shows me. Or house price. Yeah. House prices are going to escalate during the three or four years he does this. That's true, but they will also have paid off debt, so you'll be saving more. So I think you can pace with that. Yes, and putting into retirement, because right now maybe seven number two, we're not into retirement. So this would essentially jump us into three. Yeah. I feel like what you're leaning towards is option two, and I don't have a problem with that as long as you guys don't have a problem with it. Okay. And then I'd set, I'd set clear limits. How long do we

think we want to do this and then play out the whole thing until the end. What is what is the whole thing look like? We do this for three years at the end of it. We've had X amount of dollar saved and then we can go and we think we can buy this amount of house and cash. Play the whole plan out and then ask yourself what happens if this goes well, what happens if this goes bad and really try to fill in all those variables as best as possible on paper not just mentally not talking about it over dinner but write it down so you can see do we like this. Yeah and give yourself permission to pull the plug in the middle of it yeah there's nothing holding you to this okay three years we're going to do five cities okay that's the plan but after three cities you go this isn't fun yeah we'd stop then stop you know

you don't have to play all the way out it's not a long-term play i would not call it a decade no yeah a decade of this feels you know i think i would put a limit on personally i'd put a limit on it from economic standpoint of five years um yeah because there's only so much adventure you can stand too. So, but, you know, I personally wouldn't do that. But, I mean, I wouldn't do anything longer than five years. I think it's going to, you're going to end up in other kinds of issues. At that point, you got a 10-year-old and an 8-year-old, too. So. But the point of playing that out is to say, what is it that you're trying to accomplish? Exactly. With this money and with this lifestyle. What's in game and is it worth it? And is the, the process we're going

through going to be worth, is the juice going to be worth a squeeze? There you go. Ramon is in San Diego. Hi, Ramon. How are you? Hey, hello, Dave. Thank you for having me. Sure. How can we help? I mean, I don't really know where to start, so I'm just going to put it this way. I'm like $73,000 in debt, and I don't really know where to start. Okay.

I mean, I got myself in this position. I'm down beating myself down to it. And I mean, here we are now. What kind of debt is it? I mean, it's a combination of a lot of things. It's credit card, say, personal loan. Give us a break there. How much on credit cards? Okay, credit cards is about 33,000.

Okay, how much on the car? On the car, $16,000. Okay. What else? Personal loan? Okay, personal loan is $6,000, and student debt is about $12,000. Okay. The car, what's it worth if you sold it?

Just curious? Last time I checked, it would take $24,000. What do you make? I'm currently making $3,000 a month. Okay, so I just want to clarify the car. You said you owe $16,000, and I said if you sold it, you said you'd get $24,000. Is that right? Yeah.

Yeah, last time I checked like a couple months ago. Okay, well, that's good for you. Yeah. Okay, so what if step one was we sold this car to get out of the note? or you want to get out of the note and then you bought something in cash to free up some money. What about that?

Yeah, yeah. That's something I discuss with my wife too and we're kind of on board. What's your wife make? My wife's stay at home. And you make $3,000 a month in San Diego. Ooh, that don't work. What's keeping you in San Diego?

What do you do? Okay, so just a little background in the wider situation. like this. So I lost my full-time job like six months ago. I ended up being unemployed for like four or five months. And I finally landed this part-time job in the meantime. And now I have a job, professional job again. Thank God, lined up in Houston, Texas. It's going to start next month. Oh, that's a big part of this. Oh, that kind of matters in the discussion. So how much you're going to make there? Yeah. So the first few months is going to be like $57,000 a year plus a

$500,000 for rent a month. And after that, I think it's going to get, they're going to bount me at to like $62,000 or $63,000. Good. Salary plus commissions as a sales position. Awesome. Excellent. So the biggest thing to worry about now is saving up for this move because this move is coming.

It's going to be expensive. I still think you need to get rid of this car because it's going to free up extra money. Are they giving you a moving stipend? Yeah. Yeah. I believe they're going to send, like, $1,500 before taxes? $1,500? Okay, that's not a whole lot.

So I want, your homework here is to not make this worse by going into debt on a move. So you need to save up for the move, and you need to do detailed research on what this is going to cost you, because a cross-country move is expensive. When do you move? They want me to be there by January 2nd. Ooh, yeah. So, yeah, you need to be delivering pizzas and Ubers and whatever else you can going crazy between now and Christmas, throwing boxes for FedEx or UPS, whatever you've got to do. I want you working 60, 80 hours a week to pay for the move between now and Christmas, okay?

Yeah, no, yeah, I'm actually looking for a second and a third job at the moment. Yeah, I wouldn't look for one. I'd go get one today. They're everywhere. It's Christmas, dude. I mean, Target's paying $20 an hour. Get your butt over there. So load up on that, and then list your debts smallest to largest, and we're going to pay for you to go

through Financial Peace University, our class. to show you how to do all this stuff because we're running out of time and we didn't get to give you a great answer. So you hang on, Christian will pick up and take care of you, brother. You're going to be great. You're going to do good. I can tell. This is the Ramsey show. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus. You know what I'm going to be.