The Ramsey Show - App - Most of Your Poor Financial Decisions Start With You (Hour 1)

Episode Date: December 13, 2023

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Dr. John Deloney, number one best-selling author a couple times over and host of the Dr. John Deloney Show, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Merry Christmas, America. We're glad you're here. Open phones at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Madison is with us to start off this hour in Atlanta, Georgia. Hi, Madison.

Welcome to the show. Hi, Dave. Hi, John. Thank you so much for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So I'm in a predicament that I've actually made myself. I got married, second marriage for both of us, not quite six years ago.

And at that time, I had been through a pretty bad divorce and had a pretty traumatic first marriage. So definitely was healing from that and met this wonderful man, so nice to me and kind to me. And I just fell head over heels in love with him. I knew he was broke. I knew he didn't have any money. And that just didn't matter to me. He was just so nice to me. And I loved being treated nice.

So we got married. I did have him sign a prenup because I was expecting to inherit a large amount of money from my parents' estate at some point. I hadn't at that time, but I knew that that would be in the future. And so he did sign a prenuptial agreement and didn't have any problems with that. However, I started our relationship with just paying all the time. I paid for everything. We'd go out for dinner, I started our relationship with just paying all the time. I paid for everything. We'd go out for dinner, I would pay. I already had a place where I lived that I paid for and, you know, et cetera, et cetera.

So I understand how I've kind of set a pattern. And at the time, it didn't bother me. And, you know, I also want to add this man's a Christian man. He knows the Word of God. You know, I really have put this in God's hands and asked for his help. But I just can't figure out why there's no spirit of generosity with him. He just, I've brought up several times, you know, can you please pitch in? Just kick in.

I don't expect half and half. I have plenty of money. I don't, I don't need his money. It's just on principle, just, I just need to know that I'm not just the only one that's supporting us. I feel like I'm, I'm the breadwinner. He doesn't earn an income. He, he did. We are both retired now. He does not have any retirement. How old are you, gosh? I'm 60. He's 64. Okay.

He took Social Security early. He was working at that time, and then when you start taking Social Security, you can only work so many hours. You can only make so much money. So that knocked his availability down to where he really couldn't work very much. But since then, we've both retired and relocated. So what do you feel like the core question is? I think I'm just trying to figure out if I'm being taken advantage of. Is this just something where I'm being, you know, I've brought something up several times and I just, nothing changes.

Nothing, it just stays the same. And I don't know if I, well, I guess what my next step should be. Hold on, this isn't a money issue. This is a respect issue. You don't respect the man that you're married to. Because, like, I bring home a quote-unquote income to the house, but my wife, my God almighty, if she disappeared, the house would go away. So I don't look at her and say, say wow you're not contributing to this thing and i'm paying for dinner all the time because my money is our money

right and and the home that she keeps and runs and her small business like that's ours too but there's a mutual respect there so this doesn't have to do with money and you mentioned earlier you don't want a thing you don't want your marriage to be where you're paying for everything it is that is the world you set up so yeah the only thing you can do from this point forward is to create something new but this is a respect issue this isn't a i just need him to pitch in issue have you been very clear about what you need or has it been a ah you know like man i sure am paying for a lot and he might be thinking well it's our money have you been very clear with him i'm i'm not no i'm i'm very afraid of confrontation i get very nervous about uh talking about something like this and then you

end up in resentment land because you spend a ton of time having imaginary conversations in your head, don't you? Yes. Yes. That's cruel and unfair to him. And doubt. Yes. So if you're going to be mad at him.

It's hard on your brain too. Yeah. If you're going to be mad at him, he at least deserves to know what he could do. Give him a path back to relationship because right now he married somebody with a lot of money and he might think he's fulfilling his duties as your husband by being the fun-loving guy that just whatever whatever partridge in a pear tree he needs to know you don't respect him yeah i do i do love him and i don't want and I don't want anything to end.

What does he need to do to be a person that you would respect? Because he doesn't need to work. You guys are retired. No. It's not a work ethic thing. What is it that he's supposed to do that makes him valid in your mind? I think just pitching in, say don't know a thousand dollars a month something something so it's in from what where's he got money from he has social security money

and he gets other money so you guys don't have your finances combined at all um we do have a joint checking account but he's never put any money in it. So, no. But does he have an avenue to do that? He could, yeah. He could put money in there, yeah, because he's on the account. But if he's looking at your vast amount of money in that account, and he looks at his piddly government check. Yeah. See what I'm saying?

Like, he needs to know. And again, I think he's going to put $1,000 in that account, and that's not what the issue is going to be. Yeah. If he started depositing $1,000 a month in that account, you'd be right back here in six months. I don't know if I would be. I don't.

It's really, to me, it's like you just said. It's not about money. It's more about respect. And I think because this has gone on for so long, and, you know, I've allowed it to go on so long, and this pattern's been set now, I want to rewrite the rules, I guess. Well, since y'all are married, y'all get to rewrite them together.

Right. And so I think it's a matter of sitting down and having a conversation and say hey we've been married for a few years um i need you to do this right to have me have positive respectful feelings towards you and what can i do for you so that you can have positive respectful feelings towards me yeah let's put all of it on the table let Let's give each other a chance for success. Yeah, 100% of what you don't say, he can't hear. Right. Yeah.

I've been married 43 years. I'm still working on that. Dave, I am too, man. I am too. The things that are in Sharon's head that I have never heard are amazing. But you're in trouble for them. I'm always in trouble. You better fix them.

What's wrong? Nothing. This is The Ramsey Show. Thanks for joining us, America. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. We appreciate you guys hanging out. Merry Christmas to you. Hey, if you like what you hear around here, we could use your help. Please help us subscribe. Click the subscribe button,

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Shay is with us. Shay is in Daytona. Hi, Shay. Merry Christmas. Hi. Merry Christmas. Good. How can we help?

Hi. So just to cut right to the chase, I just took out my first student loan ever. Super nerve wracking. It's for my master's in social work and it's about $45,000. That's without the interest. So I'm just trying to figure out what's a great path to start on that, like how to tackle it super fast because I don't want to be with this debt for like 10 years. You just took out your first loan for a semester or you just finished a degree program and you have $45,000 in the hole? No, so it's like $6,000 a semester,

but they just gave it all to me at once. So it's $45,000 is what they gave me at once. Who's they? I've never heard of that ever. It's financial aid, FAFSA. So they just cut you a check and deposit it for $45,000? Well, not into my bank. It goes directly to my school, and then they start paying it that way.

So it's already given to my school, and my school just takes it out. Okay, so you're starting your master's and you just finance the whole thing well i here dave i bet what's happened is i bet they have you've been approved for the entire program i bet they don't have a check for 40 i bet your university doesn't have a check for 45 000 because they wouldn't prepay like that because you could quit you can drop out it could be a whole thing. But my guess is you were approved for the program, and the school gave you a letter that said you've qualified for $45,000 in federal aid, and every semester you're going to have to re-up and re-up and re-up and re-up.

Okay. That's my guess as to what happened. I've never heard the government prepay. So you're just starting your master's. Yes. And you're spending $45,000 to get a master's in social work. To make what kind of money? Not enough.

It's about $90,000, which would be the salary for it. There's no way you'll make $90,000. That is the salary in Florida for it. Where? Right now. I work at a hospital. And a starting social worker with an LMSW makes $90,000? Not starting out, no, but I've been doing social work and case management

and all that stuff for years. So with the experience and once I get it, I're going, I'm already making 15 right now. So they're bumping it up. Wow. That's extraordinary. Good for them because that's a field that needs more people that drastically is usually underpaid. I would, as a guy who's, I've taught graduate school and mental health programs. I've lived this world.

What I would plead to you is to, you make $50,000 a year. I would cut back for the next three years and cashflow this program. Please, please, please don't chain yourself to the federal government and then try to go into a serving profession. It's a recipe for burnout and you're going to, it's just going to melt you from the inside out. Please don't do this. Yeah. That was one of my big fears. I just definitely don't

want it lingering for so long too and when it comes to money, I just have really bad anxiety over it. The way it doesn't linger is you don't take it. Don't take it. Don't take the check. Pay cash for your degree is what John's saying. $6,000 a semester. Go pay it outright for the three semesters plus your 3,000 hours, whatever you have to do. Your hospital not got any financial matching for education?

No, because I'm not a nurse. They only have it for nurses. Okay. And what enticed me to it was because they said at first that they would, and then when I got here, they said, oh, sorry, no, it's just for nurses. Yeah, I'd find another place to work, too, while you're at it. I'm serious, 100% serious. If they're going to lure you in and then they're going to bait and switch you,

that's a company without integrity. I wouldn't work for them. Gotcha. And I know this is a radical shift, but I would go to the school and say, hey, I need my semester by semester cost. And they're probably going to tell you, well, it depends if you take six or nine hours, whatever, and say, what is a full-time and what is a part-time student going to cost? And then you make $50,000 a year until you find another job where you'll make $60,000. I want you to cash flow this program.

So what we're trying to tell you is that uneasy feeling inside of you when you're called is real. It's right. And it's telling you don't do this. And we're telling you it's right. Don't do it. The best way to get this degree is pay cash for it and, you know, look for someone, maybe another employer that pays 90 when you're out, but also will help with the education like this one promised, but it was reneged on. And so let's do a

couple things here that are pretty radical but if you kind of just you sound pretty chill and if you kind of just allow all this to happen to you it's going to step on your face don't allow this to happen you need to stand up square your shoulders and head straight into this with your teeth you know with with a warrior yell girl i, you need to get after it. John's in Jackson, Mississippi. Hey, John, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave, how's it going? Better than I deserve.

What's up? I have a question about getting an SBA loan to purchase a business. What's your thoughts on that? Never. Never? Never, under any circumstances. Okay. It's a disaster. Why would you buy a business, a small business? Never. Never? Never, under any circumstances. Okay.

It's a disaster. Why would you buy a business, a small business? Well, so I travel 10 months out of the year, and my wife stays at home with kids, and it's a taxing life. Yeah. We're trying to find a happy medium for everybody, and we stumbled what we think is a good opportunity, per se. What is the industry that the business you're looking at is in? Making signs. Okay, and how much is the purchase?

Approximately $1.2 million. Yes, sir. For a sign franchise? It's not a franchise it's a person that started the business and he's looking to retire okay all right um let me give you a different way to skin this cat maybe okay but um let me uh 80 percent of small businesses fail in the first five years. The number one cause of small business failure when we survey them, and we work with 10,000 small businesses in Entrez leadership right now, is what's called cash flow problems. Cash flow problems is a phrase that means a lot of things,

but it primarily means two things. I can't pay my debt payments and i didn't pay my taxes on time and i get screwed by the federal government and um so you're going to have a million two floating around around your neck trying to drag you down while you're trying to run a business this guy's already been running for a few years and uh that's like trying to swim with an anchor tied around your ankle uh it's a bad plan so let's go at this a different way what is the net profit on his business um he pays himself a salary but now what's the net profit on the business on average

over the last uh four years is around 250 okay a million two is a little rich yeah okay we know that part of it we're just we're in the beginning process we're trying to figure out here's how i have here's how i've taught some people who hand the business to the next generation and want to be bought out or they haven't the employee or an employee or a buyer like you that want to be bought out i don't want you to get payments on a million two and fauci decide we're having another quarantine me neither okay that'll put you into bankruptcy court sir it did a bunch of people and because nobody making signs they were making plexiglass but they weren't making signs so you were screwed if were screwed if you'd done this two years ago. So learn a lesson from that.

Now, what you can do is agree to pay him 80% or 90% of the profits after you take a basic small salary out until he gets his million. And about a million is about what it's worth. But if you make $250,000 a year on it and you gave him 90% of it, you'd have him paid out in four and a half years versus getting a loan per se exactly and he'd get his money really really fast that way but you're living on a a wage to get till you get him off your back but if profits go down you're only committed to give him a percentage of profits. So you're not bankrupt then. SBA will come take your house, dude.

Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Well, it's Christmas time. Merry Christmas. You can get Meaningful Grifts for Christmas during our $12 sale right now. Our best-selling books, The Total Money Makeover, Baby Steps Millionaires, John's number one bestseller, the first one he did, Own Your Past, Change Your Future, all just $12.

The Questions for Human Cards, Conversations, the Christmas edition is back. They sold out really quick last year. We've got the New Year's Eve edition for your friends and family. It's a lot of fun. Meaningful gift for everyone there. Check it out, RamseySolutions.com slash store. Maggie's in Atlanta. Hi, Maggie.

Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. Thanks so much for taking my call. Sure. What's up? Hey, so I'm just calling today. I've been listening for about two to three months now. I'm 20 years old. I've been doing an every dollar budget for about a month now and I am needing to get my own place in, mean, ASAP, and I don't even know the first place to start preparing for it. Um, my income is fairly low and my monthly bills are pretty high. So I just wanted to call in and,

and what is your advice? My income is, um, 2300 monthly. What do you do? Um, I process medical records right now. Okay. And you're 20 years old? Yes, sir, 20, and I only have a high school diploma. Okay. Are you looking for new work? Because your income sucks.

Yeah. Yeah, it does. I've been looking around to see what I can do, but with no degree. No degree is not a holdback at all. Yeah, I live in rural Tennessee. I saw a sign the other day that said McDonald's said $20 an hour. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Yeah, I do have a side hustle that I am starting after the holidays are over.

I'm starting a side hustle, and that'll be like $15 an hour, but that's only the weekend that I can do a side hustle, because my job now is a nine-to-five. So what? What happens after five? After five, I come home, and I have... From 5 a.m. to 9 a.m. when you you're broke that's when you work yeah um i do have a well i kind of have a one-year-old my boyfriend um has a kind of have a one-year-old that's impossible that that's impossible that's that's physically impossible you do it's not your baby you're saying yes your boyfriend has a one-year-old yeah I'm sorry, baby, you're broke. You're not babysitting your boyfriend's kid when you're broke,

and you've got to get a place to live, and you don't have the money, right? I don't think I have the money to, no. Right now I'm living with my sister. I've been out on my own since I was like 17, 18. I've been living in people's rooms and just renting rooms, and now I kind of want a place for just me and my boyfriend and his son. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You're not in a position to be taking care of people.

No, no, no. If he wants to get married and take care of you, we'll talk about it. What does he make? He's not working right now oh this is real good maggie maggie are you hearing yourself out loud firefighter yes sir yeah yes sir if you were if you if you were talking to your daughter and your daughter was you you'd smack her well i wish my mama would have yeah i know but i mean you you listen to yourself i'm going to move in with a guy who has a one-year-old and doesn't work and i have to take care of the kid and i'm supposed to take care of these people i i think you need to go somewhere where there's grown-ups well he's he why he's not working right now is he's he's becoming

a firefighter so he that doesn't start until the beginning of january though so right now he's not working right now is he's becoming a firefighter so he that doesn't start until the beginning of january though so right now he's just waiting to see so right now he's not in school to be a firefighter he's only waiting for which firehouse he's going to be doing so why is he sitting on his butt during christmas yeah yeah it's a good question he should be really he should be driving for uber from five to eight a.m. to 8 a.m. You want to date my daughter, you work. And then work all day and then delivering pizzas at night because that's what men do when they don't have a job

and they have a one-year-old. Yeah, and he hasn't worked for about eight months now. I can almost guarantee you he's not going to the fire academy. You know how I know? Firemen don't live like that. That's not the character of a fireman. I know those men and those women. They work their fire shifts, and then they have another job,

and they have another job on top of that. You know why? Because they are so invested in working and going out and serving their communities. I can almost guarantee you he won't go to the fire academy. No, he's already gone, hadn't he? Well, he's waiting to hear back. Oh, he hasn't started yet. No, Dave, he hasn't even started the fire academy yet.

He hasn't worked for eight months. Oh, I thought he just finished. He was waiting to get a sign of job. Hold on. He is a one-year-old. How has he not worked for eight months? Have you supported him? Yeah.

Oh, my. His mom does a lot, and then his. Maggie, Maggie, honey. Maggie, please, listen to two old farts, okay? Both of us have daughters. Run, run. As fast as you can. Run.

Oh, no. Yes. Oh, yes. I don't think I hear that. Okay. I'm sorry. I can't help you, darling. You're running blind into the wall, and you're going to blow the car up when you hit it.

Oh, I'm sorry. Honey, you've been a survivor. You've bounced from room to room. You left home at 17 years old. Your mama didn't tell you not to do this stuff. Two guys who love you and love our daughters are telling you if you were our daughter, we would get rid of mr fireman he he would just disappear somewhere we wouldn't be able to find him you're being prayed and so

i'm telling you this is not going to happen all right and so uh you need an ugly angry older brother or father like one of us and we would tell him to go away and if he didn't we'd help you go away because you got the stuff to go get it done in the marketplace girl you can go out there get you three jobs get you an apartment start you a life start taking a degree field i'll send you a copy of ken coleman's book from paycheck to purpose you can start working on your career you're sharp talking to you but your judge of men is sucks and when you have a man with a one-year-old who's responsible he doesn't work for eight months we call that a deadbeat a burnout and if you ever listen to me talk listen my show i'm overly compassionate and i've got zero compassion for a man who's got a

toddler who's letting a 20 year old girl living living in her sister's house take care of them. Zero. None. Zero. Zero. Zero. You have a daughter. You have a child. Yeah. My goodness. Please, Maggie. He should be ashamed of himself, man. But you're not going to do it, and you're going to learn the hard way, and you're going to call me up at 25, and you're going to go, yeah, you were right,

and now I've got all this debt because I went and bought him a car, and we rented an apartment, and he didn't pay the bill, and the landlord threw us out, and I've got a judgment lien from the landlord, and you're going to be that caller if you go through with this. Please do not go move in with this guy. If you don't dump him, that's your business. I think you're on the way to dumping him. You should be, but for sure, for God's sake,

quit giving him money and don't move in with him. And let's say this. So for those of you who have grown up the last five or six years, like Maggie, you're on your own. You're bouncing from room to room to room. And you spend a lot of time on social media. It appears that things just happen. It appears that bills just get paid. And what you're finding out is, oh, I only make $2,300, but I have an inside job in a medical community. And it feels like I'm connected to something bigger. And I'm not working at McDonald's for God's sakes, or I'm not going to throw boxes at Walmart. I would never do that. And you're going to realize that things don't just happen. You have to make enough money. It's a math problem to make enough money to pay for your rent and for your water and for your food and for your electricity and for your car.

All these things are very expensive, which means you got to go get one job. You got to get two jobs. You got to get three jobs. Develop a plan that is a career where you don't have to work 80 hours a week. There you go. But it takes a few years to get into that but most of us um that are older than 30 have worked more than 40 hours like more than 80 hours the first five years of our working life or 10 of our life um or more yeah and so um and and that's not a, you have no life balance.

No, I have a life that you wish you freaking had. I can tell you that. You just wish you had a tenth of my life, but I've worked my tail end off to get here. That was a good self-censor, Dave. I got that. You got it. Just right there. Right there.

Right there. This is The Ramsey Show. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. This show has become inordinately successful with 30 million of you so are so out there in a given month on YouTube's you know podcast on the various platforms that 680 radio stations that carry us because we understand that personal finance is not math. The problem with my money is the guy I shave with. The mathematics of becoming wealthy are somewhere, you learn them somewhere around the sixth grade.

This is not an intellect problem. This is a behavior problem. If I can get the moron in my mirror to behave, he can be skinny and rich. But he's got issues. And he engages in stupid people tricks. To the extent that I have dysfunction in my relationships, I'm going to struggle to build wealth. To the extent that I have dysfunction in my behaviors, like a lack of work ethic, a lack

of integrity, other character issues, I'm going to struggle to build wealth. And so there is a tie-in between your emotional well-being, your relational acumen, that is more predictive of your ability to become wealthy than your income. In other words, it doesn't matter what you make if you're addicted to cocaine, you're going to lose everything. 100% of addicts, as an example of this discussion, end up broke. Eventually. 100%.

Eventually. Some in 10 months months some in 10 years and they lose everything that's a misbehavior that caused that it's not a math problem that caused that it wasn't they didn't understand how mutual funds work it wasn't that they didn't earn an income a lot of cocaine addicts earn a great income, and they hide their addiction. But if you don't know how to interact with the opposite sex and you continually choose poorly in your mate, you are going to make it almost impossible to create a sustainable financial life.

Isn't that weird? Yeah, and I'm just haunted by that last call, make it almost impossible to create a sustainable financial life. And that, isn't that weird? Yeah. And I'm just haunted by like that last call haunts me because when you say it, like you, you won't accept this from your, for your own child. Everyone goes,

no, I would never accept that. But you just become blind to it and you just keep doing it and just keep doing it and you keep doing it. And you wonder, you keep going back to the, the money the money issue why are we broke why we broke are we broke you gotta you gotta let this predator who is preying on you and your time uh you gotta let him go i ain't doing that all right well there's not there's not like a crypto

secret we can tell you to help you make money there's not like a budgeting hack we can give you um you and him have to go where it's just tough man if you're not connected with your spouse it can be it can be a relational thing i mean it's um you know one of the jokes that we had in the early days of the show was you know if you marry a woman that that likes spending you better enjoy working right you know and so uh but it's also the opposite way absolutely if you marry a man that likes spending you better enjoy working uh and so because you can't but you cannot earn it you can't keep up and the correlation among millionaires between spouses that work

together and that both shoulder the load together it's almost a hundred percent of them yeah there are very few people build wealth dragging a deadbeat along are dragging someone who's misbehaving in some area of their life along someone who won't work someone who can't tell the truth someone that won't file their taxes someone that you know lies all the time. Just these dysfunctional people that are in all of our lives, to the extent that we're wrapped up with them, pretty much ensures that we're going to create a situation where we can't build a sustainable financial situation. One of the reasons I've been able to build wealth is my wife is a freaking rock. She's a rock.

I mean, the amount of drama in 43 years I've had at home when I got home at night with little kids at home was precisely zero. Yeah. The only drama in my house, I bring it. Occasionally, there was drama before I got there. Right. But it's not like like wait till your daddy gets home no fear the wrath of sharon instead you know i mean it's like i there is not a you know i was

not having to carry three or four things around while i was at work i was carrying work around and it's why we were able to make such progress yeah it's it's fun they say say that one of the greatest determinants for joy, happiness in your life, is marrying well. It's the most important decision you make because marrying poorly, it's disproportionate how bad your life is. And marrying well, it's disproportionate how wonderful it makes your life. But our friend Dr. Henry Cloud with the book Boundaries, whether it is your marriage partner or not, just the other people in your life. Your business partner, your buddy. That will suck the marrow out of your bones because you won't put up a boundary. Right.

Or for some reason don't know to put up a boundary. You weren't raised in such a way. Well, I was raised, you always take care of daddy. Well, did you notice that your daddy is a problem? Right. Or, well, that's just so-and-so. Like, stop. That's just the way he is.

I would love, a great exercise for folks is to write down the top five to 10 to 15 people in your life. They can be coworkers. They can be family members. They can be friends. If you're lucky, you got 10 in this current world we live in if you got if you're you're exceptionally lucky if you got 15 write them down and just draw a line across the paper and say vampire or contributor is this a person that when i get done being around them i'm just like or i get done being around them and i can't wait to go hang out again they are

somebody that that brings me up and i i challenge you in 2024 to find opportunities to be around vampire people less. Yeah. And be around those who pour into you, who are excited, who challenge you more. And that doesn't mean you get along all the time. Like some of the people who contribute most of my life, man, we are button heads all the time. And I love them. And I believe very similar things with some of the most vampiric people. I just made that word up. most of my life man we are button heads all the time and i love them and i i believe this very similar things with some of the most vampiric people i just made that word up that just you

get done you're just like golly dude i feel like i was just slogging through quicksand well i mean when you come out of a meeting or you come out of a social uh gathering with someone and you feel like you need to take a shower i don't want to repeat this right i'm done right and my wife's like well we need to be nice no i don't need to be nice we need to be nice to us i'm not gonna be nice i can be nice from a further distance i'll wave from over there you know but this this close physical proximity with slime is a problem yeah you know and it's uh you know and it's okay i'm not it's not that i'm a snob i like you but i'm not gonna hang out yeah i'm it's it's uh i can be nice to you i can help you i love you i'm not gonna i can

encourage you but i'm not going you're not going to be part of my crew that's right yeah because you become who you hang around with and if you find out that you're married to somebody who is more of a vampire than a contributor this is the year let this be the year that you put that on the table and say let's build something something new. Let's build something new. I'm taking your sharp teeth. Yeah. Or like the first caller of this hour that I'm going to be clear for the first time because I find myself, I don't like you.

I don't want to be around you. The things you do annoy me, and I kind of hem and haw and hint. I've never just been honest with you. I've just never told you. Let's put all that on the table this year. Turn the lights on. And decide to heal this thing moving forward. Because at some point, there are people on the margins that are struggling.

That's not who I'm talking to. I'm talking to most of us. Most of us at some point choose the relationships we have. And we choose the dance that we choose to do and those things. And at some point, somebody's got to pull the ripcord and say this this one's over this one's over we're going to build and the reason for the sidebar right now is this this is the time of year to look at this and say okay i want you to leave from this little rant that we've done for the last five minutes i want you to leave with this idea who you hang around with

and who you are going to create relationship with is 100x more important towards whether you're able to build wealth than whether you understand how a mutual fund works or what your income is. They're going to screw up your life if you let them. This is The Ramsey Show.